By Anthony Harwood

September 20, 2019 "Information Clearing House" -  It's like the start of a bad joke.

What's the difference between 10,000 people being killed in air strikes and a bunch of missiles taking out an oil processing facility for a few days?

The answer is no laughing matter.

The difference is that only the one which threatens the markets will "not be tolerated" by the Trump administration.

For more than four years, the people of Yemen have been relentlessly bombed back to the Dark Ages by a Saudi Arabia-led coalition, reckless, to put it charitably, about where its aircraft drop their payloads.

Forty-seven fishermen here, 137 funeral mourners there, a 20-strong wedding party and, in one year alone, 443 children.

Four hundred and forty three children.

Forty-four of these children were on a bus on a summer school trip into Saada when their vehicle was hit by a stray missile in August 2018.

A video taken by one of the boys showed them laughing and playing on the bus shortly before it was hit.

When, a week later, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo found himself meeting the Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, no mention was made of the day the children died.