European Centre for Counterterrorism and Intelligence Studies, Germany & Netherlands – ECCI
Dr. Muhammad Al-Arab
In Yemen, a child is not born to dream or to build a nation, but may be born to carry a rifle heavier than their weight, or to be thrown into the frontlines of death before they learn how to write their name. Numbers don’t lie, but the tragedy is too great to be contained by statistics. More than 17,000 children have been recruited by the Houthis in recent years, according to various UN reports, but those who survive are manipulated mentally, have their souls poisoned, and have their childhood buried without a shroud.
The methods used by the Houthi group to recruit children are not just criminal, but devilish to the core. The story always begins simply, with wrapped sweets, a bag of wheat, or a promise that the child will become a great man feared by enemies. The scene ends with a child covered in dirt on the frontlines of Nehm, Marib, Saada, or Al-Jawf. They recruit them with promises, lies, songs in the queues, and then hand them a long rifle and a series of lies.
They enter schools with eloquent speeches, displaying the fictitious heroics of (martyrs), and organize jihadist trips that begin as picnics and end with intense military training in secret camps, where children’s minds are planted with slogans and death. There is no such thing as childhood in their dictionary…!
Every child is a soldier in the making, and every poor family is exploited. They promise food aid, a monthly salary, and that (the martyr is in paradise), but they don’t tell them that paradise in Yemen is closed until further notice.
The most terrifying thing is that some children are actually kidnapped from the streets, from schools, or from orphanages. There are testimonies recorded by international organizations of mothers who saw their children taken from their hands under the pretext of (cultural courses), and the only thing that returned was a coffin or just a photo with a sign reading (the small martyr fighter). The child is not asked for their opinion, nor are they given the right to cry; instead, they are trained to chant the slogan, disassemble weapons, and believe that the enemy is anyone who does not believe in the Houthi ideology, whether they are their neighbors or even their own family.
The Houthis have hijacked the pulpits, schools, religious programs, and even songs, turning them into tools for satanic mobilization. They call the recruits (Little Ansar Allah) and hold ceremonies to honor them when they return without limbs, or never return at all. The child who used to tend sheep or play football becomes a number in a military report, or a name in the list of the fallen in the (sacred battle).
In Sana’a alone, dozens of schools have been recorded as having transformed from educational institutions to platforms for mobilization, teaching hatred instead of geography, sectarian hatred instead of mathematics, and training on using Kalashnikovs instead of pens. Even the stories told to children in reading lessons are no longer about hope or childhood, but about (the martyr who sacrificed himself and triumphed over the enemies). They don’t teach the child how to live, but how to die.
UN reports, including one by the Yemen experts team from the Security Council, have documented the Houthis’ involvement in recruiting children across all provinces under their control, including using them for combat missions, guarding, planting landmines, and working as informants. There have also been reports of girls being used for logistical and intelligence tasks, which is a double violation of childhood and humanity.
What is even more shocking — and tragic — is that this recruitment is not limited to Yemen. There are testimonies of refugee children being returned from refugee areas to the frontlines, and some children were smuggled to Lebanon to attend training camps affiliated with Hezbollah, before being sent back to Yemen as (little elites) indoctrinated both ideologically and militarily.
And if a child dies, the family doesn’t mourn, but the father is sometimes forced to appear at a celebratory event to bless his son’s martyrdom, thanking God for the honor of martyrdom. Public grief is not allowed, as mourning for a martyr is considered betrayal of the divine project, as they describe it.
As for those who object? Their fate is imprisonment, humiliation, accusations of national treason, or denial of food aid. In entire villages, the elders have been threatened for refusing to send their children to the frontlines, and in some cases, medicine and food have been denied to families that refused to hand over their children to the (cultural course). They recruit with poverty, threaten with hunger, and wrap crime in sanctity.
17,000 children have been officially recruited, according to the numbers, but the real figure may be many times that. Documentation is difficult, and the stories are buried with the bodies of children in the hills of Nehm, the deserts of Al-Jawf, and the mountains of Al-Bayda. The tragedy is not in the number, but in the silent acceptance that the Houthi group has imposed through force, fear, and propaganda. The tragedy is that a society that could not protect its children will not survive a long-term war… one that starts with the small rifle and will only end when hatred ripens in the hearts of the children who survived death, and they become the fuel for the next war.
When milk is replaced with bullets, curricula with recruitment, and Eid with a funeral, Yemeni childhood is in existential danger. The child who sees blood as a symbol of pride will not know how to build a nation, but will only learn how to destroy it. The Houthis didn’t just recruit children; they recruited Yemen’s future against itself, separating the present from tomorrow, and turning childhood into a field for poisonous ideas. While the world sleeps on repeated reports, the devil continues to sign… with the fingers of the Houthis.
European Centre for Counterterrorism and Intelligence Studies, Germany & Netherlands – ECCI
