Gaza peace rather than Trump’s bombs would deal with Houthi shipping threat

Everyone’s been so preoccupied with the Ukraine war that Donald Trump’s deadly assault on the Houthis in Yemen has gone almost unnoticed.

For six weeks now, America has been using “overwhelming lethal force” against the Houthis, to quote the grand order issued by President Trump.

This, from the man who promised he was going to be a president of peace, the one who was “going to stop wars”.

And yet, Mr Trump’s order against the Houthis has propelled the US military into its most intense bombing campaign since the war against the extremist group ISIS a decade ago.

Since March 15, the US has launched nearly twice as many air strikes as the Biden administration carried out in its last year in office. According to Acled, a non-profit that tracks conflict data, there have been at least 351 strikes on the Houthis since mid-March.

It’s causing people, several of whom are innocent, to die. The Houthis have said that 74 people died last week in strikes on Ras Isa fuel port. On April 28, Houthi-controlled television said that a US airstrike killed 68 people after striking a detention centre for African migrants in Yemen. A US defence official subsequently said the US military was aware of claims of civilian casualties and was conducting its assessment.

The point is: What’s the purpose of this wanton killing and bombing?

A sliver of information came from UK defence secretary John Healey who recently confirmed that Britain has now joined Mr Trump’s operation. He has said that Britain went on a mission that targeted buildings where Houthis make the drones they use to attack commercial ships in the Red Sea.

The same sort of grand argument about restoring navigational freedom to the region’s waters is also made by Trump’s America.

But this is revolves around a pointless and dangerous sort of logic, which pays little heed to the sanctity of human life especially, it seems, because it is a Houthi fighter or a Yemeni civilian and or anyone else who happens to be on Yemeni soil at the time a US airstrike occurs.

It’s pointless logic because the Biden administration tried this – and failed – when the Houthis began attacking merchant ships in the Red Sea 18 months ago, disrupting shipping through the Suez Canal.

At the time, the Houthis said their attacks were in solidarity with the Palestinians in Gaza. They paused their attacks on ships after Hamas and Israel agreed a ceasefire in January. When that ceasefire collapsed in March they threatened to resume the attacks. And Mr Trump gave his “lethal force” order.

The right way to deal with the Houthis’ threat to shipping routes is to bring peace to Gaza, not to bomb indiscriminately.