Maine For Yemen

The war in Yemen has pushed 7 million people to the edge of famine. For three years the United States has supported the side which is most guilty for creating this tragedy: Saudi Arabia and its military allies. At Maine for Yemen we will publish a series of posts on why Mainers of ALL political persuasions should protest this war. Today we start with why we believe this war violates CONSERVATIVE values: 1) No threat to US security We have waded into a brutal civil war that we have no direct stakes in. The Houthi rebels who control most of Yemen’s populated areas pose no serious threat to US military personnel in the region, or any terrorist threat to the US. If they tried to restrict free movement of US shipping in the Red Sea our Navy could easily defeat them. 2) We are not fighting terrorists, and we could be helping them The Houthis are Shia Muslims. This makes them the bitter enemies of Al Qaeda and ISIS, who are Sunni Muslim extremists who want to drive Shias off the

Since 2015 the United States has been supporting the military operation by Saudi Arabia against Houthi rebels in Yemen. We are deeply complicit in terrible destruction in that country, but Congress has never voted on whether the US should even be involved. Saudi Arabia and its allies have dropped American bombs on homes, hospitals, markets, bridges and ports across Yemen, killing thousands of civilians and destroying infrastructure needed to move food around the country. As a result 80% of Yemen's residents are in immediate need of humanitarian aid and more than 7 million are on the verge of starvation. But Congress is pushing back: a bipartisan group of representatives has introduced House Concurrent Resolution 81 to force a congressional debate and vote on America’s military involvement in Yemen’s civil war. The vote will take place in the week of October 9-13. Tell Chellie Pingree and Bruce Poliquin to vot YES on Resolution 81 to get America out of this destructive

I have been living abroad for more than 8 years, recently working in the humanitarian aid sector. So I tend to be lag in my awareness of big things in American politics. In April I returned home to Maine, extremely concerned about our country’s foreign policies, and started asking around where activist energy is concentrating right now. Immediately I was directed to Indivisible. In an old town hall in little Thomaston, Maine I saw more people talking about public policy, and about what they were going to do about it than I ever have before. I got it right away – this is something big. This is something that can change our country. So with that in mind, I’d like to appeal to the Indivisible community. Please, please use some of your passion and anger to oppose America’s appalling role in the destruction of Yemen, the poorest country in the Middle East. I know that Indivisible is focused on opposing Trump’s awful domestic policy agenda. But today our country is dee

Only one member of Maine's delegation has been vocal on the US role in this conflict. Changing that is one of the key goals of Maine for Yemen. But since the US has not directly engaged in the war, there have been only a few instances when our congresspeople have had the chance to be on the record at all. The first instance was the resolution ( SJ Res. 39 ) was put forward by Senators Chris Murphy (D-CT), Rand Paul (R-KY), Al Franken (D-MN) and Mike Lee (R-UT) in September, 2016. It would have blocked sale of Abrams tanks and other military hardware to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. However, the Senate voted to table the resolution and the sales went forward. Senators Susan Collins and Angus King both voted to table the resolution. At this key moment they did not oppose arming a military accused of grave human rights abuses. The "defensive" nature of some of the weapons in question does not change the fact that they are part of Saudi Arabia's ruthlessly violent

This op-ed was published on April 7, 2017 in the Bangor Daily News. It offers a brief summary of the unfolding tragedy in Yemen, America's role in it and the questions we must pose to our leaders. We will get into more detail on each of these topics in later posts.  Jamal Mujalli al-Mashriqi, 4, who suffers from malnutrition, sits on a bed at a hospital in the northwestern city of Saada, Yemen April 4, 2017. Naif Rahma. Reuters Without most Americans noticing, our country has become deeply complicit in a humanitarian catastrophe. In Yemen, a military coalition led by Saudi Arabia is ruthlessly bombing civilian infrastructure, such as schools, hospitals and the bridges that bring food from seaports to the desert interior. Not only have thousands of Yemeni civilians died in these airstrikes, but millions have been pushed to the edge of famine. On the one hand, American diplomats are working admirably to bring the warring parties to the negotiating table, and the United Stat