Worldcrunch
With more than 115 attacks since 2023, Yemen’s Houthis now offer ship operators a website to register vessels and avoid drone or missile strikes, a move that raises alarms among maritime security experts and highlights the rebels’ bid to control global shipping lanes.
A decade ago, Saudi Arabia plunged directly into the Yemeni quagmire, launching a military intervention alongside several coalition countries. Everyone expected the battle to be settled in weeks. But it soon became clear, this flash intervention would turn into an endless war, making Yemen a testing ground for broader regional policies and interests.
With photographs from Belgrade, Khan Younis and Chicago — among other places.
Israel has killed thousands of Hamas fighters. But the Gaza-based terrorist organization has not yet been completely destroyed, nor have its allied militias in the region.
The Arab front in favor of the Palestinian people is more feeble and ambiguous than ever, even as the people of Gaza are being killed by the thousands. Multiple factors explain this weakness, from fears of a repeat of the 2011 uprisings inside their own countries to longstanding competition with Iran.
Many people, especially in the Arab region, hailed the Houthis’ attacks against Israel. But what they may not know is that Yemeni people have been caught in the crossfire.
The death of Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi in a helicopter crash comes in an already tense context, five weeks after Iran’s confrontation with Israel. The consequences are heavy, both in terms of regional and domestic conflicts.
With their country in an intractable civil war, thousands of Yemeni women have been unable to obtain passports and other official documents without the permission of a male guardian or relative — as warring authorities have been systematically violating Yemeni law and women’s right to freedom of movement.
The death of three U.S. soldiers has raised the stakes in a low-simmering, but constant escalation between Washington and Tehran that could explode from the shadows of the war in Gaza — even if by pure accident.
As the situation escalates in the Middle East, the prospect of an all-out war may hinge on whether Iran will cross the Rubicon.
Houthi rebels are now blocking the strategic Red Sea, by striking or seizing merchant ships, while also attempting to launch rockets into Israeli territory. This has sparked a strong response from the U.S and Britain, escalating a situation that could impact global security in major ways, with competing powers ready to cash in.
For eight months, the conflict in Sudan has been overshadowed by larger wars in Ukraine and Israel, even if the death toll and accounts of alleged war crimes are no less disturbing.
Pressure is rising from allies for Israel to change its tactics, which may only harden the position of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu — which may only raise the stakes with regional adversary Iran. Here are three questions that are both crucial and connected.
Houthi rebels in Yemen have escalated their maritime attacks in the strategically vital Red Sea. Both their links to Iran, and the decision to target key shipping routes raises the risks for international escalation.
The Iran-backed Yemeni rebel group Houthis have seized a vessel in the Red Sea’s shipping route and took the ship’s 25 crew members hostage. It’s just the latest sign that the spillover from Gaza may arrive first from the south.
The United States has found itself at the forefront of a conflict that the whole world is following. President Joe Biden faces the pull of public opinion, the threat of Iranian action, and the escalation of the Israeli state.
Despite the official “consensus” by Arab League nations to welcome Syria back to the organization after 12 years of suspension, several key countries were opposed on principal — including key questions still open in North Africa.
In an interconnected world, we are faced again with the negative implications of the so-called “butterfly effect” when a localized conflict can have far-reaching consequences and trigger lasting crises. For our world’s broken food systems, the war in Ukraine should be a wake-up call.
It’s a modern tale with a rich and fragrant whiff of Jonah and the Whale, when a group of Yemeni fishermen made the catch of their lives this week in the Gulf of Aden. After a large, dead whale was spotted floating in the waters of the coast of Yemen, 37 fishermen helped drag it […]
Yemen’s itinerant beekeepers must follow the flowering season. But this nomadism, essential for their bees to produce this liquid gold known around the world, is hampered by the nation’s ongoing civil war.
Shortage of masks and respirators, lack of hospital space, muddled government action: inadequate responses to the COVID-19 outbreak are evident even in the world’s most stable countries. So what happens when the virus arrives in places already under the weight of war? Yemen: Given the ongoing stalemate, many had hoped Saudi Arabia would take the […]
“I try to tell what’s happening, but I try to be considerate, and also make poetic and beautiful images. It’s important to be sensitive, and acknowledge the complexity of what’s going on.” That’s how Italian photographer Lorenzo Tugnoli of the Contrasto agency recently described his work to the British Journal of Photography. A long-term project focused on the humanitarian crisis in Yemen just earned him the 2019 World Press Photo award for General News, Stories. Tugnoli recounted the stories behind five of his most powerful images from Yemen for this OneShot: Cinq video production. [youtube https://www.youtube.com/embed/zru1H440qJU expand=1] Yemen Crisis — […]
AQAP, the local al-Qaeda branch, is determined to learn from its mistakes. They’ve learned that they can’t go too quickly and spill too much local blood.
Beyond the threats and name-calling, foreign policy was high on the agenda of Sunday night’s second U.S. presidential debate between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump. Russia was mentioned 35 times. Syria 14 times. China, usually a Trump favorite, was uttered a mere four times by the candidates during the 90-minute debate. That was still more […]
Aug. 19 is World Humanitarian Day, an annual United Nations tribute that often goes by unnoticed. This year is different: It falls on a week when we’ve been acutely reminded of both the world’s humanitarian crises, and the danger aid workers face every day. Yesterday the world was shocked by the photograph and video of […]
NEW AID TO REACH BESIEGED SYRIAN TOWNS The Syrian government has granted aid convoys access to seven besieged towns, the United Nations announced today after talks in Damascus. The aid is due to arrive “within days,” Al Jazeera reports. The areas concerned are Deir ez-Zor, an eastern city under siege by ISIS, Foah and Kefraya, […]
-Op-Ed- PARIS — In the 1970s, in the aftermath of Richard Nixon’s visit to China, commentators talked about the Washington-Moscow-Beijing triangle. These days, in the Middle East, there is another triangle: between Riyadh, Tehran and Washington. The problem for the region’s stability is that this triangle is absolutely dysfunctional. Indeed, the only way to understand […]
Born in Egypt and educated in journalism at university, Mohannad Ghallab became an extremist and joined al-Qaeda after 9/11. He went on to become an influential voice for the terror group before being killed by a U.S. drone strike.
U.S. WORRIED OVER RUSSIAN BUILD-UP IN SYRIA U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry told his Russian counterpart Sergey Lavrov that Moscow’s continued support for Syrian President Bashar al-Assad “risks exacerbating and extending the conflict” amid growing concerns over reports of Moscow’s military build-up in Syria. Reuters reports that the Tuesday phone call between Kerry and […]
From local politics to the the battle against polio to a banned prostitution film, here’s a quick tour of what has been happening in Morocco in recent days.
ISIS MAKING CHEMICAL WEAPONS U.S. officials believe that ISIS has a specific cell dedicated to making chemical weapons, and they’ve identified at least four occasions when the terrorist group used them, the BBC reports. “They’re using mustard. We know they are,” an unnamed official said. Yesterday, the BBC reported about new evidence showing that all […]
Though deep historical rivalries between Saudi Arabia and Yemen have little to do with Egypt, it has been drawn into the anti-Houthi confict. Having given initial support to the Saudi coalition, how far Cairo will go is the source of intense speculation.
Photo: Hani Ali/Xinhua/ZUMA TURKEY “CHANGING REGIONAL GAME” Recent Turkish strikes against both ISIS in Syria and Kurdistan Workers Party militants in northern Iraq have “changed the regional game,” Hürriyet quotes Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu as saying. But he insisted Turkey wouldn’t use ground troops in the fight against ISIS. According to The New York Times, […]
This one is for the History books: Sarajevo would be almost entirely destroyed during the Bosnian war some 20 years after I took this picture.
Photo: Panayiotis Tzamaros/ZUMA GREECE TALKS RESTART IN BRUSSELS Eurozone leaders and Finance Ministers are meeting today in Brussels to reopen negotiations on the fate of cash-strapped Greece, two days after a resounding “No” to austerity from Greek voters. Angela Merkel declared that “time is running out” and gave Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras hours to […]
ISIS TAKES IRAQ TOWN OF RAMADI ISIS is gaining ground again in Iraq, capturing the town of Ramadi, west of Baghdad. It’s a heavy blow to the Iraqi government and any hopes of rooting out the terrorist group. Shia militias, who already played an important part in retaking the city of Tikrit two months ago, […]
ANOTHER EARTHQUAKE HITS NEPAL A 7.3-magnitude earthquake struck eastern Nepal, near Mount Everest, today, two weeks after the devastating quake killed at least 8,000 in the Himalayan nation. EXTRA! French President François Hollande became the first top Western leader to visit Cuba since the island nation moved to reestablish relations with the United States late […]
U.S. TO REMOVE CUBA FROM TERROR LIST After this weekend’s historic meeting with Cuban President Raul Castro in Panama, Barack Obama announced plans to take off Cuba from the list of countries the U.S. accuses of sponsoring terrorism. The Washington Post reports on what this latest step in the rapprochement between the two neighbors means. […]
Photo: Hani Ali/Xinhua/ZUMA MEDICAL SUPPLIES REACH YEMEN The first medical supplies have arrived in the south Yemen city of Aden, and members of Doctors Without Borders have made their way to some of the city’s hospitals, Al Jazeera reports. Iran dispatched a naval destroyer and another vessel yesterday to waters near Yemen, AP reports. And […]
A view from Turkey on the new conflict that is not only shaking the map of the Middle East, but costing the lives of innocent victims.