Trump Milking Saudi King Mural Shows Yemenis’ Disgust at War

By Staff, CNN

A huge mural in downtown Hodeida shows a cow with the horned head of King Salman of Saudi Arabia. At the other end of the beast, US President Donald Trump tugs on its udders -- filling golden pails.

They've got dollar signs on them.

It's a graphic display of how people in the north of Yemen see America's role in a war that's been tearing into the fabric of their country for exactly four years.

The US is Saudi Arabia's biggest arms supplier. The jets and the bombs they drop as well as the tanks, artillery pieces and vehicles used by Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, who lead a coalition against Yemen's popular Houthi Ansarullah movement, are mostly US-made.

Without them, the coalition forces on the outskirts of Hodeida would not have been able to threaten the port city.

So, at a demonstration marking the fourth anniversary of the war on Tuesday, protesters yell "Death to America", and "Death to ‘Israel’".

Hundreds of demonstrators formed up in neat lines during the rally.

There was no faking the passion of some who attended on a blisteringly hot day.

"How much blood, how many parts of our body do you want to stop the war?" Ali Khammash, a teacher yelled.

News that the US Senate voted to cut assistance to Saudi Arabia's involvement in the war, in opposition to Trump's policy, did nothing to impress him.

"Our people and our children tell us the USA kills us. Every day it kills us. Kill us in my school. Kill us in the wedding. Kill us in the park. Kill us in the garden. Kill us in the street. Everybody thinks the USA kills us."

English literature professor Abdel al Montasser echoed the message of the Saudi cash-cow mural, saying that US leaders are "thinking of their own benefits. Saudi Arabia and Gulf countries, they are rich. So the US wants to milk them -- like Trump".