Coalition releases proof of Houthi attack on hospital
The Arab Coalition fighting in Yemen has provided further proof that deadly attacks on a hospital and fish market in Hodeidah, in which 14 people were killed, were carried out by the Iran-backed Houthi rebels.
Witness accounts and satellite photos have been released by the coalition, which is fighting to return to power the internationally recognised government of President Abdrabu Mansur Hadi.
The satellite images of the area before and after Thursday’s attack show that the damage to Al Thawra Hospital and market was the result of mortar strikes, a coalition source said.
“The available evidence clearly demonstrates that the damage resulted from mortar shells fired from an area close to the impact sites,” the source told state news agency Wam.
The satellite images released by the coalition show impact craters of about 50 centimetres.
The minimum impact area from an air strike is three metres.
Rashed, a resident of Hodeidah who went to the hospital as soon as he heard the reports of coalition air strikes, told The National the blast craters were much smaller than he had expected them to be.
“I was expecting to see the big craters usually left by air strikes but as soon as I arrived at the scene of the attack I was certain it was not carried out by coalition aircraft,” Rashed said.
“I found shrapnel from mortar shells, which indicated that the attack was from the ground and not from the sky.” When he pointed this out to the Houthi fighters guarding the hospital gates, he was ordered to leave the area, he said.
Mohammed Abdullah, another Hodeidah resident, said he saw unexploded mortar shells and fragments at the hospital and the fish market.
“As soon as I arrived outside the hospital I found the Houthi news channel Al Masirah broadcasting live,” Mr Abdullah said.
“I wondered how they had arrived so fast with all their equipment.
“Then I entered the hospital records office, the roof of which was pierced, and saw a mortar shell that had not exploded.” He said there were many more shell fragments outside the hospital.
Other Hodeidah residents said they heard mortars being fired from a rebel base near the hospital just before the news broke of the attack.
It came on the same day as the planned launch of a cholera vaccination drive, and hours before the UN special envoy for Yemen, Martin Griffiths, briefed the Security Council in New York, where he presented plans to resume peace talks next month.
Yemen’s Minister for Human Rights, Mohamed Askar, said it was timed to gain sympathy from the Security Council.
The government had established that the attack was carried out by Houthis firing mortars from nearby, killing 14 people and injuring 30 others, Mr Askar told The National.
“This crime is not the first one committed by the Houthi militias against civilians in
I found shrapnel from mortar shells, which indicated that the attack was from the ground and not from the sky RASHED Hodeidah resident
Hodeidah or elsewhere by indiscriminate bombing of residential neighbourhoods,” he said.
Mr Askar listed several earlier rebel attacks on civilians in the city and elsewhere in Hodeidah province, including the shelling of a residential area near the airport in Wadi Al Aqoum on July 19 that killed seven civilians and injured 10 others.
There was also the bombardment of Al Tuhaita city, with dozens of missiles on the same day, killing 14 civilians.
The rebels had also shelled areas near the airport on June 27, Mr Askar said.
On July 22, the rebels killed two people and injured 31, most of them children, when they shelled a drinking water distribution point in the Bani Bakr neighbourhood of Hays city, south of Hodeidah.
Six people were killed and more than 15 injured, including children.