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Fighting for Peace
Fighting broke out in the Yemeni port city of Hodeidah recently, even as both sides agreed to meet in Sweden to discuss a truce to Yemen’s bloody three-year-long war. “We are facing indiscriminate bombing from both sides,” Hodeidah resident Ibrahim Seif told the Guardian.

The pending peace talks, set for December, unfortunately, won’t help Seif much in the short-term.

But Al Jazeera reported that the United Nations envoy for Yemen, Martin Griffiths, believes the Saudi Arabian-led coalition backing Yemen’s government and the Houthi rebels are both growing sufficiently fatigued with the fighting to seriously consider laying down their arms. The rebels recently announced they would halt their rocket attacks on Saudi Arabia and its allies, for example.

“They are committed,” said Griffiths.

That’s potentially big news. As ABC News explained, Yemen is the shame of the Middle East. The Houthis, who are Shiites backed by Iran, captured the Yemini capital of Sana’a in 2015 and forced President Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi into exile. Fearing Iranian influence on its doorstep, Saudi Arabia and other Sunni Arab countries intervened.

Around 10,000 have died in the violence. Today, 14 million Yemenis are also on the brink of famine. Children are especially at risk, the Associated Press wrote, detailing how parents have resorted to feeding their children leaves to survive. Amal Hussein, a 7-year-old girl whose photograph in the New York Times became a symbol of Yemen’s suffering, recently passed away.

Change is possible, however.

First, the world has turned a more critical eye toward Saudi Arabia after the brutal killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi in a Saudi consulate in Turkey. CNN argued that while US President Donald Trump hasn’t criticized Saudi leaders – and the US is not backing a UN Security Council resolution for a ceasefire – he might put pressure on them to take a more conciliatory tack on Yemen.

Second, writing in an opinion piece in the Hill, Atlantic Council senior fellow Nabeel Khoury postulated that the US might similarly seek – remarkably – to make common cause with Iran on Yemen in a bid to patch over disputes related to Trump’s pulling out of the nuclear deal that ex-President Barack Obama signed with Tehran.

Lastly, the Yemenis themselves are not giving up. For them, life continues.

The New York Times magazine profiled women’s rights activists who continue to fight for their freedoms despite living in a war zone. “They could have us burned alive or burn our children right before our eyes,” one activist said. “We are willing to die here. We’re demanding some human rights.”

Fighting for peace sounds like an oxymoron. But desperate times call for hopeful measures.