Feature: Yemen peace seems far, Yemenis optimistic despite tragedies

"Warring parties do not care about us." This is a popular chat usually heard in the capital Sanaa when ordinary people meet up in the street, social meetings or the coffee shops.

Nearly two years since the civil war rocked this poorest Arab country in the southern tip of the Arabian Peninsula. Since then, tragedies have struck nearly every family in Yemen, with many lost their beloved ones and some lost their whole family members in a single airstrike.

Peace efforts have repeatedly failed to end the devastating war that already caused large-scale famine, as ordinary people became in less trust and more anxiety over politicians' frequently polished peace-related statements.

Yet again, the United Nations special envoy Ismail Ould Cheikh Ahmed paid an official visit on Sunday to the capital Sanaa, which is under control of dominant Houthi group and its allied forces loyal to former President Ali Abdullah Saleh, in a fresh effort to push for a negotiated settlement.

But as every UN attempt kicked off to break the stalemate, the war suddenly escalated and the civilian casualties from both sides have continued to mount, with each warring side claiming advances against the other.

Residents yearn to see the outcomes of the UN envoy's new round of efforts to end the war.

"We are optimistic to see the new UN efforts to end the war and lift the all-out blockade," said Murshid al-Raymi, 55, who runs a small grocery.

The Yemen civil war began on March 26, 2015, five months after Houthi group backed by Saleh forces advanced southward from their far northern stronghold province of Saada to eventually oust the Saudi-backed government of President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi and seized control of the capital Sanaa.

Houthis said they fought the government corruption and rejected the government's drafted constitution that splits Yemen into six regional self-governing federations and distribute the country's resources.

Yemen has become a Syria-alike theater of regional war, as what the United Nations Security Council was quoted as that "a Saudi-led Arab coalition of nine countries intervened militarily in Yemen to put internationally-recognized President Hadi's government back to power."

But what's actually happening is that a lot of poor Yemenis are being killed by airstrikes, internationally-prohibited cluster bombs and other munitions that targeted schools, hospitals, popular markets and residential quarters.

Moreover, thousands of Yemeni children starved to death because of the air, sea and land blockade imposed by the coalition forces.

The UN humanitarian agencies reported in their latest statistics that more than 10,000 Yemenis, mostly civilians, were killed since the onset of the civil war, over 30,000 were wounded and around three million have been displaced.

"We are suffering from daily killing, daily airstrikes and daily starvation," said Ali Motahar, 32, a factory worker lying at the hospital suffering from injuries sustained from an airstrike three months ago that hit near his home in the capital Sanaa.

"I count day by day to get recovered and exit the hospital, but my injuries were still serious,"Motahar said in a sad voice. "I'm optimistic of a new Yemen full with peace in the near future."

He shares the hospital room with two others, who also caught critical injuries from airstrikes in the Red Sea port city of Hodayda, and due to medicine shortage there, they were transported to this state-run hospital, which is crowded of war injured.

Khaled Hasan al-Buraiee, 35, lay in the hospital bed near Ali Motahar. He said he was critically injured when an airstrike hit the residential area near his taxi car in Hodayda last month. He carries pictures about the incident in his phone mobile.

"Simply, pictures tell my tragedy, and all I want is peace," al-Buraiee said. Endit