Human Rights Watch announced today, Tuesday, that the Iranian-backed Houthi militia is recruiting children as young as 13 years old, as part of a broad campaign in which it recruited thousands to reinforce its forces, taking advantage of the ongoing war in Palestine.

A report issued by the organization indicated that the Houthis have recruited thousands of children into their forces since the outbreak of the Gaza war on October 7, using rhetoric about the liberation of Palestine to attract them, adding that recruiting children under the age of 15 is a war crime.

Nico Jafarnia, Yemen and Bahrain researcher at Human Rights Watch, said: “The Houthis are exploiting the Palestinian issue to recruit more children for their internal fighting in Yemen. The Houthis should invest resources in providing the basic needs of children in areas under their control, rather than employing them in the conflict.” ".

Human Rights Watch confirmed, based on the testimonies of human rights activists, that there has been a significant increase in child recruitment in recent months.

The Human Rights Watch researcher continued: “The Houthis make the children believe that they will fight to liberate Palestine, but they end up sending them to (the front lines) in Marib and Taiz. In fact, the Gaza that the Houthis go to is Marib (a Yemeni city with oil resources). The Houthis attacked it repeatedly.) The Houthis have also illegally besieged the northeastern part of Taiz city since 2015, preventing water and humanitarian aid from reaching civilians.

The report stated that the Houthis are using official institutions, including schools, to recruit children, exploiting urgently needed humanitarian aid to attract them.

The Houthis impose unnecessary restrictions and regulations on the delivery and distribution of humanitarian aid, which amounts to obstructing humanitarian aid. They also prevented aid from entering the city of Taiz, which they have been besieging since 2015, and restricted the movement of women, preventing many humanitarian relief workers from carrying out their work.

The researcher stated, “The future of Yemen depends on its children. The Houthis are proving that the only future they see for the country is for everyone’s goal to fight for the cause of this group.”

The Houthis have recruited thousands of children since the conflict in Yemen began in 2014. The United Nations has verified at least 1,851 individual cases of child recruitment or use by the Houthis since 2010.