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U.S.-Made Bomb Used In Deadly Air Strike On Yemeni Civilians
A precision-guided munition made in the USA was used in a Saudi and Emirati-led air strike carried out on June 28 of this year, on a residential home in Ta'iz governorate, Yemen, killing six civilians - including three children, Amnesty International said today.
The laser-guided bomb, manufactured by U.S. company Raytheon and used in the attack, is the latest evidence that the USA is supplying weapons that are being used by the Saudi and Emirati-led coalition in attacks amounting to serious violations of international humanitarian law in Yemen.
WASHINGTON
A precision-guided munition made in the USA was used in a Saudi and Emirati-led air strike carried out on June 28 of this year, on a residential home in Ta'iz governorate, Yemen, killing six civilians - including three children, Amnesty International said today.
The laser-guided bomb, manufactured by U.S. company Raytheon and used in the attack, is the latest evidence that the USA is supplying weapons that are being used by the Saudi and Emirati-led coalition in attacks amounting to serious violations of international humanitarian law in Yemen.
"It is unfathomable and unconscionable that the USA continues to feed the conveyor belt of arms flowing into Yemen's devastating conflict," said Rasha Mohamed, Amnesty International's Yemen Researcher.
"Despite the slew of evidence that the Saudi and Emirati-led coalition has time and again committed serious violations of international law, including possible war crimes, the USA and other arms-supplying countries such as the UK and France remain unmoved by the pain and chaos their arms are wreaking on the civilian population."
Amnesty International spoke to two family members and two local residents, including two witnesses to the attack. The organization also analyzed satellite imagery and photo and video materials of the aftermath of the attack to corroborate the witness reports.
The organization's arms expert analyzed photos of the remnants of the weapon dug out from the site of the strike by family members and was able to use product data stenciled on the guidance fin to positively identify the bomb as a US-made 500 pound GBU-12 Paveway II.
A family ripped apart
Among the six civilians killed in the attack, which took place in Warzan village in the directorate of Khadir, were a 52-year-old woman and three children, aged 12, nine and six.
One family member told Amnesty International: "We buried them the same day because they had turned into severed limbs. There were no corpses left to examine. The flesh of this person was mixed with that person. They were wrapped up [with blankets] and taken away."
One eyewitness told Amnesty International: "I was around three minutes' walk away working at a neighboring farm. I heard the plane hovering and I saw the bomb as it dropped towards the house. I was next to the house when the second bomb fell... and I got down onto the ground."
The closest possible military target at the time of the attack was a Huthi Operations Room on Hayel Saeed Farm - approximately 1km away. However, that stopped operating more than two years ago after being struck by several coalition air strikes in 2016 and 2017. Witnesses told Amnesty International there were no fighters or military objectives in the vicinity of the house at the time of the attack.
A second air strike occurred in the same spot approximately 15 minutes after the first, indicating that the pilot wanted to guarantee the destruction of the al-Kindi family's house. The home was struck again five days later while family members were at the house inspecting the site. No one was injured or killed in the latter attack.
Since March 2015, Amnesty's researchers have investigated dozens of air strikes and repeatedly found and identified remnants of US-manufactured munitions.
"This attack highlights, yet again, the dire need for a comprehensive embargo on all weapons that could be used by any of the warring parties in Yemen," said Rasha Mohamed.
"Serious violations continue to take place under our watch, and it is as crucial as ever that investigative bodies, namely the UN-mandated Group of Eminent Experts, are fully empowered to continue documenting and reporting on these violations.
"Arms-supplying states cannot bury their heads in the sand and pretend they do not know of the risks associated with arms transfers to parties to this conflict who have been systematically violating international humanitarian law. Intentionally directing attacks against civilians or civilian objects, disproportionate attacks and indiscriminate attacks that kill or injure civilians are war crimes.
"By knowingly supplying the means by which the Saudi and Emirati-led Coalition repeatedly violates international human rights and international humanitarian law, the USA - along with the UK and France - share responsibility for these violations."
Background
A recent report by the Group of Eminent Experts on Yemen, established by the UN Human Rights Council, concluded that the repeated patterns of air strikes carried out by the coalition raise "a serious doubt about whether the targeting process adopted by the coalition complied with [the] fundamental principles of international humanitarian law."
The report further documents a range of serious violations and abuses by all sides to the conflict in Yemen - a conflict, which the UN states will have killed over 233,000 Yemenis by year end both as a result of the fighting and the humanitarian crisis. The UN Human Rights Council is slated to vote on the renewal of the Group of Eminent Experts today or tomorrow. Amnesty International, in coalition with other organizations, is urging states to support the Human Rights Council resolution extending and enhancing this group's mandate.
According to the Defense Security Cooperation Agency, in 2015 the US government authorized the sale of 6,120 Paveway guided bombs to Saudi Arabia; in May 2019, President Trump bypassed Congress to authorize further sales of Paveway guided bombs to Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.
This statement is available at: https://www.amnestyusa.org/press-releases/us-made-bomb-used-in-deadly-air-strike-on-yemeni-civilians
Amnesty International is a global movement of millions of people demanding human rights for all people - no matter who they are or where they are. We are the world's largest grassroots human rights organization.
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Mamdani Backers Rally to 'Tax the Rich' as Transition Raises $1 Million in 10 Days From 12,000 Donors
"None of this would have been possible without everyday New Yorkers willing to spare $5, $10, or $20 to help build a government that will deliver for working people," said the mayor-elect.
Nov 16, 2025
Hundreds of people in New York City gathered on Sunday in Union Square with calls to "Tax the Rich" as they showed their support for the progressive agenda of mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani, the democratic socialist elected earlier this month who will take the helm of the nation's largest city on January 1.
The "Tax the Rich — Seize Our Future" event was co-sponsored by the New York City chapter of the Democratic Socialist of America, Housing Justice For All and NYS Tenant Bloc, Jewish Voice for Peace NYC, UAW Region 9A, the Invest in Our New Coalition, and others.
The groups are backing Mamdani's call for universal childcare, free public busses, a rent freeze, and city-operated grocery stores in the city, all which will be made more possible with revenue raised by increased taxes on the city's wealthiest individuals and for-profit companies.
"Zohran Mamdani’s cost-of-living agenda has the support of masses of working class New Yorkers—but winning an ambitious affordability agenda cannot be won with one mayor alone," said the NYC-DSA in a post about the "Tax the Rich" event on their website. "To build the universal public goods we deserve, we need to ensure the wealthiest individuals and corporations in our state are paying their fair share in taxes."
"It will take a movement to push Albany to put working New Yorkers before billionaire donors and tax the rich," said Danny Zaldes, a DSA member and organizer as he called on others to join the effort.
"As we know, power concedes nothing without a demand,” declared Democratic state Sen. Jabari Brisport (D-25) during his speech at the rally, “and today we demand to tax the rich!”
The rally served as the launch of a new campaign by coalition members behind the event, one aimed at making sure that Mamdani maintains grassroots support even as he takes charge of the city's municipal government in the New Year.
In order to fund his transition and maintain that popular support, Mamdani has asked supporters and donors to crowdfund for the transition and has created a nonprofit entity to mobilize on behalf of his progressive vision for the city going forward.
On Sunday, Mamdani's office said it has raised approximately $1 million in just 10 days, coming from over 12,00 individuals with an average gift of $77.
Contrasting the money raised with that of previous administrations, a statement from Mamdani's office said that "during Mayor Eric Adams' transition, he had just 884 individual donors, with an average donation of more than $1,000, and former Mayor Bill de Blasio had 820 individual donors, with an average donation of $2,392."
As it readies to take on the most powerful interests in the city as well as some of the wealthiest people on the planet who call New York City home, Mamdani said in a statement that the support of working people will be crucial to his administration's success.
"None of this would have been possible without everyday New Yorkers willing to spare $5, $10, or $20 to help build a government that will deliver for working people," said the mayor-elect. "I'm grateful for every dollar New Yorkers have contributed to make this vision of an affordable, more livable city a reality."
The campaign said the money will be used primarily for recruiting and retaining during the transition period as the administration takes shape.
"More than 12,000 New Yorkers are contributing to this transition to turn the page on the politics of the past and build a new era for New York City," said Elana Leopold, executive director of Mamdani's transition, in a statement. "Thanks to New Yorkers' supporter, we will be ready on day one with top talent in place and ready to deliver."
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As Dr. Oz Helps Prove 'There Is No Republican Health Care Plan,' Democrats Have Solution Most Refuse to Embrace: Medicare for All
"Healthcare is becoming unsustainable under Trump," says one progressive politician running for US Senate. "Medicare for All would fix it."
Nov 16, 2025
The Trump administration came under fire on Sunday after sending Dr. Mehmet Oz, the Administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, onto CNN's weekend news show to try to explain the Republican Party's elusive "solution" to the nation's healthcare crisis, a topic of much interest in recent weeks amid the longest government shutdown in the nation's history and growing fears over massive premium increases or loss of coverage for tens millions of Americans.
Asked during his appearance to explain what Republicans are considering to address the surging cost of healthcare, Oz talked about direct cash payments—something Trump himself has floated in recent weeks—as well as the idea of health saving accounts (or HSAs) which allow for personalized accounts set up to help pay for out-of-pocket medical needs, though not premium payments.
"If you had a check in the mail, you could buy the insurance you thought was best for you," Oz stated without explaining in what way that is different from people who received tax credits to purchase plans on the insurance exchanges established by the Affordable Care Act signed into law by former President Barack Obama.
Pushing such empty ideas while claiming them as viable solutions to soaring costs is partly what led critics like Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.) this week to issue a public service announcement which stated flatly: "There is no Republican health care plan"—despite repeated claims to the contrary by GOP lawmakers, including Speaker of the House Mike Johnson (R-La.).
Dr Oz: "If you had a check in the mail, you could buy the insurance you thought was best for you" pic.twitter.com/rLoMdxhNPV
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) November 16, 2025
"Dr. Oz a few years ago was pitching Medicare Advantage for All—a scheme to put every person on the corporate health insurance plans he used to sell," said Andrew Perez, a politics editor for Zeteo, in response to the interview. "Now, he’s saying let’s take away insurance from millions and give them a few bucks for their health care instead. Insane."
In a blog post published last week, Nicole Rapfogel, a senior policy analyst with the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities (CBPP), a nonpartisan policy think tank, explained why expanded HSAs, backed by the government or otherwise, would do little to nothing to improve access or lower costs for healthcare.
"Expanding HSAs has been a consistent theme, including in the House-passed version of the Republican megabill, though those provisions didn’t pass the Senate," explained Rapfogel. "But these policies are misguided and would do little to preserve access to affordable, comprehensive coverage."
She further explains that HSAs generally are better for wealthier people who have spare income to direct into such accounts, but of little use to poorer Americans who are already struggling to make ends meet each month. According to Rapfogel:
Most people do not have spare cash to set aside in HSAs; an estimated 4 in 10 people are in debt due to medical and dental bills.
People in lower tax brackets also benefit less from HSA tax savings. For example, a married couple making $800,000 saves 37 cents for each dollar contributed to an HSA, more than three times the 12 cents per dollar a married couple making $30,000 would save.
Further, HSAs do not promote efficient use of health care services. Research has shown that HSAs do not reduce health care spending, but rather shield more of that spending from taxes.
Given that understanding of the well-known limitations of HSAs or other avenues of government backstopping of private insurance, the level of bullshitting or straight up ignorance by Oz on Sunday morning, for many, was hard to take.
It's "pretty amazing," said economist Dean Baker on Sunday, "that Dr. Oz doesn't know that people choose their insurance under Obamacare, but no one ever said Dr. Oz knew anything about healthcare."
In an interview with Newsmax earlier this month, Johnson—who has argued that the GOP has reams of policy proposals on the topic—accused Democrats of having no reform solutions to the nation's healthcare crisis other than permanently fighting to save the status quo, including the "subsidizing the insurance companies" which is at the heart of the Affordable Care Act.
Taxpayer subsidies for private insurance giants "is not the solution," Johnson admitted at the time, though his party has refused to offer anything resembling a departure from the for-profit model which experts have demonstrated is the central flaw in the US healthcare system, one that spends more money per capita than any other developed nation but with the worst outcomes.
Meanwhile, as Republicans show in word and deed that they have nothing to offer people concerned about healthcare premiums in the nation's for-profit system, only a relative handful of Democratic Party members have matched renewed focus on the nation's long-simmering healthcare crisis with the popular solution that experts and economists have long favored: a single-payer system now commonly known as Medicare for All.
Sen. Bernie Sanders, the Independent from Vermont who caucuses with the Senate Democrats, made the demand for Medicare for All a cornerpost of his two presidential campaigns, first in 2016 and then again in 2020. On the heals of those campaigns, which put the demand for a universal healthcare system before voters in a serious way for the first time in several generations, a growing number of lawmakers in Congress embraced the idea even as the party's establishment leadership treated the idea as toxic.
While a 2018 study by the Political Economy Research Institute (PERI) at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst detailed why it is "easy to pay for something that costs less," people in the United States exposed to the arguments of Medicare for All over the last decade a majority have shown their desire for such a system in poll after poll after poll.
A single-payer system like Medicare for All would nullify the need for private, for-profit insurance plans and the billions of dollars in spending they waste each year in the form of profits, outrageous pay packages for executives, marketing budgets, and administrative inefficiences.
Despite its popularity and the opportunity it presents to show the working class that the Democratic Party is willing to turn its back on corporate interests by putting the healthcare needs of individuals and families first, the party leadership continues to hold back its support.
Lawmakers like Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.), who served as national co-chair to Sanders' second presidential run, has been arguing in recent weeks, amid the government shutdown fight, that Democrats should be "screaming" their support for universal healthcare "from the rooftops" in order to seize on a moment in which voters from across the political spectrum are more atuned than usual to the pervasive and fundamental failures of the for-profit system.
Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.), lead sponsor of the Medicare for All Act in the US House, on Thursday reiterated her support for universal coverage by saying, "Instead of raising premiums for millions, how about we just get rid of them? Medicare for All!!"
As former Ohio state senator and progressive organizer Nina Turner said on Saturday, "This is a moment to mobilize for Medicare for All."
I went on Fox News to make the case for national health insurance & Medicare for All.
Democrats need to be screaming this from the rooftops. pic.twitter.com/eq9VO0pAxw
— Ro Khanna (@RoKhanna) November 15, 2025
Dr. Abdul El-Sayed, another former Sanders surrogate now running for the Democratic nomination in Michigan's US Senate race, has been another outspoken champion of Medicare for All in recent weeks.
"While MAGA slowly suffocates our healthcare system, we’re watching corporate health insurance choose profits—and corporate Democrats capitulating," El-Sayed said last week, expressing frustration over how the shutdown fight came to end. "Who suffers? The rest of us. It’s time for a healthcare system that doesn’t leave our insurance in the hands of big corporations—but guarantees health insurance for all of us."
Following Dr. Oz's remarks on Sunday, El-Sayed rebuked the top cabinet official as emblematic of the entire healthcare charade being perpetrated by the Republican Party under President Donald Trump.
"They think we're dumb," said El-Sayed of Oz's convoluted explanation of direct payments. "They know that no check they send will cover even a month of the healthcare Trump bump we can’t afford—but they think we’re not smart enough to know the difference. Healthcare is becoming unsustainable under Trump. Medicare for All would fix it."
In Maine on Sunday, another Democratic candidate running for the US Senate, Graham Platner, also championed the solution of Medicare for All.
After watching Oz's peformance on CNN, Tyler Evans, creative director who works for Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) declared in a social media post: "If we had Medicare for All, you could simply go to the doctor."
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50,000 March in Brazil to Celebrate Death of Fossil Fuel Industry at COP30
"It is time to put these old fuels where they belong—in the ground of history.”
Nov 16, 2025
An estimated 50,000 people took to the streets of Belém do Pará, Brazil, on Saturday to demonstrate outside the halls of the United Nations annual climate summit, holding a "Great People's March" and makeshift "Funeral for Fossil Fuels" as they demanded a just transition toward a more renewable energy system and egalitarian economy.
Organized by civil society organizations and Indigenous Peoples groups from Brazil and beyond, the tens of thousands who marched outside the thirtieth Conference of the Parties (COP30) summit called for an end to the rapacious greed of the oil, gas, and coal companies as they advocated for big polluters to pay for the large-scale damage their businesses have caused worldwide over the last century.
“We are tens of thousands here today, on the streets of Belém, to show negotiators at COP30 that this is what people power looks like," said Carolina Pasquali, executive director of Greenpeace Brazil, said as the march took hold. "Yesterday we found out that one in every 25 COP30 participants is a fossil fuel lobbyist, proportionally a 12% increase from last year’s COP. How can the climate crisis be solved while those creating it are influencing the talks and delaying decisions? The people are getting fed up–enough talking, we need action and we need it now.”
The report by the Kick Big Polluters Out coalition last week showed that at least 1,600 lobbyists from the fossil fuel industry are present at the conference, making it the second-largest delegation overall, second only to Brazil's, the host nation.
"It’s common sense that you cannot solve a problem by giving power to those who caused it," said Jax Bongon from the Philippines-based IBON International, a member of the coalition, in a Friday statement. "Yet three decades and 30 COPs later, more than 1,500 fossil fuel lobbyists are roaming the climate talks as if they belong here. It is infuriating to watch their influence deepen year after year, making a mockery of the process and of the communities suffering its consequences."
While the overwhelming presence of fossil fuel lobbyists has once again diminished hopes that anything worthwhile will emerge from the conference, the tens of thousands in the streets on Saturday represented the ongoing determination of the global climate movement.
João Talocchi, co-founder of Alianza Potência Energética Latin America, one of the key groups behind the "Funeral for Fossil Fuels" portion of the day's action—which included mock caskets for the oil, gas, and coal companies alongside parades of jungle animals, wind turbines, and solar panels representing what's at stake and the better path forward—noted the key leadership of Indigenous groups from across the Global South.
"From the Global South to the world, we are showing what a fair and courageous energy transition must look like," said Talochhi.
Ilan Zugman, director of 350.org in Latin America and the Caribbean, noted the significance of the demonstration, including the symbolism of the funeral procession.
"We march symbolically burying fossil fuels because they are the root of the crisis threatening our lives," explained Zugman. "Humanity already knows the way forward: clean energy, climate justice, and respect for the peoples who protect life. What is missing is political courage to break once and for all with oil, gas, and coal. It is time to put these old fuels where they belong—in the ground of history.”
With the COP30 at its midway point, climate activists warn that not nearly enough progress is being made, with the outsized influence of the fossil fuel industry one of the key reasons that governments, year after year and decade after decade, continue to drag their feet when it comes to taking the kind of aggressive actions to stem the climate crisis that scientists and experts say is necessary.
“We are taking to the streets because, while governments are not acting fast enough to make polluters pay for their climate damages at COP30, extreme weather events continue to wreak havoc across the globe," said Abdoulaye Diallo, co-head of Greenpeace International's "Make Polluters Pay" campaign. "That is why we are here, carrying the climate polluters bill, showing the projected economic damages of more than $5 trillion from the emissions of just five oil and gas companies over the last decade."
"Fossil fuel companies are destroying our planet, and people are paying the price," said Diallo. "Negotiators must wake up to the growing public and political pressure to make polluters pay, and agree to new polluter taxes in the final COP30 outcome."
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