Although short-lived, Yemen’s truce, brokered in April 2022, led to a period of relative calm. Many hoped that the thousands of child soldiers recruited by the different warring parties — reportedly 2,233 in the period from July 1, 2021, to December 31, 2022, alone would leave combat and return to finish their education.
Sadly, this has not been the case. A 2021 UN report, Education Disrupted, noted that former child soldiers were not returning to schools, partly because they lacked the support to do so. It noted “growing concern that if out-of-school children or those who have dropped out recently are not properly supported, they may never return to school.” This underlies the alarming, long-term effect of the recruitment of child soldiers on Yemeni society – robbing an entire generation of a future.
Recent reports suggest that the Houthi group (Ansar Allah) has been using the conflict in Gaza as a new opportunity to recruit children to its armed forces. It is essential to address this harmful practice. Although children in Yemen have been recruited by all warring factions, reports from local and international organizations indicate the recruitment of over ten thousand children by the Houthis as of 2021.
In Houthi-controlled territories, the 2022 truce was used as an opportunity to mobilize recruits, including children, often by force. Houthi officials have reportedly conducted field visits and recruitment campaigns, drumming up support for a new stage of the war. In late September 2023, a leading Houthi figure spoke to students at a school in Amran governorate, 50 kilometers north of Sana’a. In a widely circulated video posted on social media, the Houthi recruiter said he was searching for students who condemned supporters of the 1962 Yemeni Revolution and who were interested in protecting and guarding the country’s values and rectifying the loss of society’s moral compass. Many Yemenis celebrated the revolution’s anniversary as a show of defiance of Houthi rule, leading to a security crackdown.
Different parties to the conflict have employed various methods to recruit children to the battlefield. The Houthis have well-established tactics, honed through almost 10 years of war, and stretching back even further to the group’s emergence from Zaidi revivalism and the “Believing Youth” organization in Sa’ada in the 1990s. These indoctrination methods were strengthened further and became more widespread after the group took control of Sana’a in 2014. According to the Moyyun Organization for Human Rights and Development, Houthi methods for recruiting children include exploiting poor living and economic conditions; indoctrination, often using hate speech; broadcasts on official and community-run social media platforms; control of educational and religious institutions; and summer camps, in addition to disinformation, abduction, and pressure on tribal leaders, sheikhs, and prominent social figures. These figures are often directly responsible for recruiting young fighters, using their purview over aid deliveries as an incentive for enlistment.
There are other, more subversive methods that are very effective. The Houthis often rename child soldiers using the Arab tradition of kunyas, where men are referred to not by their names but as “father of [their first male heir]” (i.e. “Abu Mohammed”). This tradition of teknonyms has been used widely across the Middle East for noms de guerre, but in Yemen it is used by the Houthis to connote maturity, even adulthood, on young boys. This allows children to view themselves as adults, and prepares them to fully leave their childhood behind by creating a false dichotomy between the way they are treated by society and the respect conferred by the movement.
There have been many instances of this tactic being used. In one example, an 11-year-old was recruited by the Houthis and given the name “Abu Laith.” His father had no idea that he had died in battle until he saw his picture on a poster with his name written as “The Martyr Abu Laith.” Many Yemeni parents completely lose track of their children after they are named in this way, and they are often not notified when they die on the battlefield.
In mid-2019, the International Labour Organization gathered local leaders in Sana’a to raise awareness of the dangers of recruiting child soldiers and its destructive impact on not just children but on communities at large. But international interventions have had little impact: Yemen witnessed one of the highest rates of child recruitment in the world in 2019.
The UN Office of the Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Children and Armed Conflict notes that every task given to a child employed in war is dangerous, and potentially fatal. Girls and boys are frequently used in support functions that entail great risk and hardship. Among the tasks commonly assigned to children is assisting ground troops, with children often asked to carry heavy ammunition or even injured soldiers. Children are also used as scouts, messengers, and cooks. Recruited girls are in an especially vulnerable position and risk being sexually abused.
In the case of the 11-year-old “Abu Laith”, recruiters promised his father that he would only be assigned tasks suitable to his age. But as soon as he arrived at the frontlines he was pushed into battle. Without adequate training to even protect himself, his short life was added to the war’s rising death toll.
The outcry from human rights and child protection organizations regarding children’s recruitment to armed groups has fallen on deaf ears, both in Yemen and the world at large. UNICEF’s 2021 report warned of the obliteration of Yemen’s future generation. “If challenges to the education system are not adequately addressed today, as well as in the mid to longer term, there is a very real possibility that the potential of an entire generation of children will be lost.”
In April 2022, the UN, recognizing the danger of the Houthis’ manipulation of education to recruit children, agreed on an action plan with Houthi authorities to end and prevent the recruitment of children, the killing and maiming of children, and attacks against schools and hospitals. However, this appears to have made little difference in Yemen, and Houthi recruitment of underage soldiers has continued apace.
Last May, SAM, a Yemeni human rights organization, called on the internationally recognized government to issue legislation that prescribes harsher punishment for those involved in recruiting children and using them in hostilities, and to open rehabilitation centers for recruited children before they are returned to their families and reintegrated into society. The organization also recommended that the government “ratify the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court to hold accountable those involved in child recruitment crimes.” The lack of movement on these policies demonstrates insufficient political will to bring about change.
Although the belligerent parties have unquestionably forced many children into the ranks, the origins of the problem may predate the war. Tribal conflicts and internal wars were often fueled by young fighters, and many families still push their sons into combat over cyclical blood feuds. A survivor known to the author recounted the ordeal of a tribal conflict that lasted for over ten years in the Al-Udain district in Ibb governorate. He described how combat destroyed his childhood and robbed him of friends who died at his side in battle. His involvement in his tribe’s feud forced him to drop out of school and pick up a gun, pointing it at other children who also grew up on battlefields and had their childhoods lost to war. He is one of a generation that lacked the support to return to school and reintegrate into society, leaving them with few skills but combat experience.
Any solution to the issue of children in Yemen must include the country’s tribes. Local communities must become an important countermeasure to the recruitment of child soldiers. But without support from community members to prioritize education over battle, children are defenseless against being drawn into the violence around them.
This commentary was produced as part of the Yemen Peace Forum, a Sana’a Center initiative that seeks to empower the next generation of Yemeni youth and civil society activists to engage in critical national issues.
