War on the Rocks: Life and Conflict at the Taiz Frontline
“This is the first drone,” the soldier beside us said as the sound roared overhead. Minutes later, a volley of unguided strikes erupted, though the landing sites remained unclear.
In the hills along the route to Taiz, homes sat abandoned; families had fled into the shadows of the mountains. The air now sang with the bleat of goats and the crack of distant gunfire, punctuated by the taste of acrid smoke.
'Two mortars landed here on my property,' Ali told us, sitting in a ruined shack with a herd of goats a kilometre from the line. He spoke of a shrapnel that pierced his chest and the fear of the next shell.
'I am terrified, but I have no choice,' he said. “We will all go hungry if the animals die.”
The city of Taiz sits at the crossroads of Houthi and government control; north and east lie in Houthi hands, while the centre remains governed. Saudi‑backed forces occupy the heart but are staggered by the advancing fighters who occupy the high ground around the western approaches.
'We shoot over the bodies, but we can’t pull them out,' a fighter near the front line said, eyes damp with the sight of fallen comrades.
Herbal hospital staff in al‑Thawra report patient beds full with both civilians and soldiers. A twelve‑year‑old girl, Ghana Nabeel, lies in an ICU bed, her skull bearing a shrapnel wound from a Houthi mortar that struck nearby while she was herding goats. Doctors warn that her brain has been damaged; her family watches, uncertain about her fate.
The UN has recorded 130,000 people displaced so far this month, on top of 5.2 million displaced during the war. Families arriving at the al‑Monig camp on the outskirts of Taiz bring only what they can carry, barefoot and unshaded, as they flee the retreating shells that have already taken a neighbour’s life.
Fathering a team from the Saudi‑led coalition, the government’s troops try to withstand the Houthi offensive that began with the takeover of Mokha and the closing of the Bab al‑Mandab Strait. Air strikes and missile attacks ripple across the region, bringing global oil markets into a precarious state.
The continuous clash leaves the people of Taiz caught in a tug‑of‑war that threatens not only the city’s infrastructure but also the lives of every resident who must navigate the valley’s dangerous trench of shellfire, drone drones, and a looming sense of an escalating war we cannot quickly locate or end.
'Living in a war is a long‑term nightmare,' an elder witness told us. 'In the hills there was no light. We only heard the thunder of rockets. We prayed for the day when this would stop.'
