...Saudi Arabia offered a lifeline: The kingdom would pay as much as $10,000 if Hager joined its forces fighting 1,200 miles away in Yemen.
Hager, 14 at the time, could not find Yemen on a map, and his mother was appalled. He had survived one horrific civil war — how could his parents toss him into another? But the family overruled her.
America is involved in a lot of wars and proxy wars, but the conflict in Yemen may be the most shameful of them. And arguably the most counter-productive. Sure, the Houthis may hate America (not entirely without reason), but they hate Al-Qaeda even more.