US policy causing terrible destruction in Yemen: Activist

Press TV has conducted an interview with Joe Lombardo, a member of the United National Antiwar Coalition, in New York, to discuss the United States’ role in Saudi Arabia’s war of aggression against Yemen. 

The following is a rough transcription of the interview.

Press TV: When we take a look at this war, it is in an area that the United States years ago called the biggest threat to US mainland. I am referring to the AQAP – al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula – and the Saudi war on Yemen more than anything else has now given rise to the ISIL in that area in Yemen... who is competing with al-Qaeda and they could be working in tandem, one never knows, but they are competing to get more people on their side to join their terrorist groups.

Doesn’t the US see that their support indirectly for Saudi Arabia’s war is giving rise to these terrorists? And supposedly there has got to be this war on terrorism.

Lombardo: Well, US policies all around the world have been giving rise to terrorism, from Afghanistan all throughout the Middle East. It is the same thing in Syria right now. And I do not know what is in the minds of the rulers in the United States but I think they are as intelligent as you and I, and I think they can see this.

So, maybe this is a policy that they want. Every state that they have gone into from Iraq to Afghanistan, to Syria, to Libya has become a failed state and maybe that is part of their policy to destroy these powers that they feel might stand in their way for total domination in those areas so they can replace them with something more...

Press TV: We are trying to make sense of this because we just witnessed what has happened in Paris in those attacks. What is it going to take for this support for terrorists to cease?

You even have the former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who has said that Turkey and some of the Persian Gulf Arab countries need to make their minds up whether they want to continue with their support and this particular war, it is for a regime like Saudi Arabia, who is one of the backers of terrorist groups, actually they loudspeaker that in their TV channels, groups that support terrorists from outside of the kingdom and what is very surprising is just days after the Paris attacks, the Pentagon has approved the sale of 1.3 billion dollars in bombs to Saudi Arabia. It just does not add up together in this so-called war on terrorism.

Lombardo: Well, Saudi Arabia is a very rich country. The actual per capita income in Saudi Arabia is about the same as it is of the United States while the most of the people in Saudi Arabia do not share that wealth. So any kind of aid or sales of arms or military support or military aid to Saudi Arabia has some strings attached and I think part of the strings attached might be to follow the US lead and help the US policy in the entire area.

I am sure a lot of those weapons one way or another will get into the hands of these ISIS (Daesh) and al-Qaeda fighters which is very, very dangerous.

The United States also pushed for Saudi Arabia to leave the UN Commission on Human Rights. This is a country that has a terrible human rights record and what it is doing in Yemen should underscore that. So it is hard to discern US policies except that it really wants to control that whole area and Saudi Arabia and its other allies like Qatar, Jordan and Turkey in the area really being used for that reason.

When someone like Hilary Clinton says they have to buckle down and follow our policies, it is very difficult to figure out what US policies are because US seems to be not really attacking and not really bombing ISIS for instance in Syria even though that is their stated goal and that is why they were so upset when Russia started doing this.

So it is hard to figure out exactly what the US policy is there except that it is causing a terrible destruction and a terrible situation for the people in Yemen and the whole area.

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