The 25-person family is crammed onto the thin mattresses in the simple shed, set up with a few pieces of wood and plastic. The flies get into every nook and cranny and, despite someone persistently trying to sweep, the dust settles like a film on everything.
– When it rains, the water gets everywhere and all our things get completely wet. And in the camp there is both cholera and malaria. I am very worried about the smaller children, says the mother and grandmother Fatima to TV4 who visited the camp.
The family is a victim of the latest developments in the violence affecting Yemen.
After the Iranian-backed Houthi movement began attacking cargo ships in the Red Sea, the United States and Great Britain, among others, responded by aerial bombardment of Houthi targets in Yemen.
“I was terrified”
Fatima and Mohammed’s house, where they lived for over 30 years, is in the port city of Houdeida just south of one of the Houthi bases. A few weeks ago they were woken up by a huge bang and large parts of the house collapsing.
– I was terrified and did not know how many of my children I would find alive. Then we realized that my mother-in-law had died under the fallen roof, says Fatima.
She and her husband Mohammed decided to take their mattresses and flee with the family to a refugee camp some distance outside the port city of Aden.
Still today, they don’t know who bombed their house.
– They say it came from a plane and the American aerial bombings have increased since the Houthis started attacking ships, says Fatima.
– We don’t know if it was the Houthis or the Americans, but we had to leave the city, says Mohammed.
“Sees no lightening”
People from the Houthi movement have also sought out the family and demanded that the sons become soldiers for them.
– I don’t want that, I want my sons to be near me, says Mohammed.
They now belong to the huge group of 4.5 million internally displaced people in Yemen and they worry about the future.
– We see no improvement. We miss having our home, with our things and memories, says Fatima.