The US Senate on Wednesday dealt a stinging bipartisan rebuke to Donald Trump’s foreign policy and his alliance with Riyadh, voting to end support for the bloody Saudi-led war effort in Yemen.
Lawmakers in the Republican-controlled chamber approved a historic curtailment of presidential war powers that directs Trump “to remove United States Armed Forces from hostilities in or affecting the Republic of Yemen” within 30 days.
The Senate vote was 54 to 46, with seven Republicans defying the president and aligning with Democrats.
The text now heads to the Democrat-led House of Representatives, which approved a similar measure that stalled earlier this year, and which is likely to pass the latest effort.
The White House has threatened a veto, calling the measure “flawed” and saying it would harm bilateral relationships in the region and hurt Washington’s ability to fight extremism.
But its full passage would set a historic marker. It would be the first measure passed by Congress to invoke the 1973 War Powers Resolution to directly curtail a president’s use of military powers.
“Today, we begin the process of reclaiming our constitutional power by ending US involvement in a war that has not been authorized by Congress and is clearly unconstitutional,” Senator Bernie Sanders, who is running for president in 2020 and is a sponsor of the measure, said on the Senate floor.
Republican Senator Mike Lee concurred, saying Saudi Arabia “is not an ally that deserves our support or our military intervention.”
Saudi Arabia relies heavily on the US in its brutal war on Yemen. Washington has deployed a commando force on the Arab kingdom’s border with Yemen as well as the logistical support and aerial refueling.
The war in Yemen is the world’s worst humanitarian crisis, with an estimated 14 million people at risk of famine.
It is a humanitarian catastrophe, with an average of 123 civilians killed or wounded every week and at least 14 million people at risk of starvation.
The Saudi-led coalition is alleged to be committing war crimes in Yemen, yet the United States continues to supply materials and troops in support of the coalition, prolonging a bloody, inhumane war. Efforts to extricate the United States from this immoral war.
The Unjust siege, the continuous bombardment, the stifling crisis and all that caused by the war waged by Saudi-led coalition against Yemen in general and Hodeidah province in particular, have created a tragic environment for malnourished children, which has affected Yemeni children in the first place and the society as whole in all its categories.
