On August 9, an airplane belonging to the Saudi-led coalition appears to have hit a school bus in Yemen, killing 40 boys between the ages of six and eleven. According to investigators, the bomb was American-made—not a surprise, as the U.S. has been supporting Saudi Arabia and its allies in their efforts to drive the Iran-backed Houthi rebels and al-Qaeda from Yemen. The civilian deaths again brought to the fore concerns about Washington’s role in this bloody civil war, which has dragged on for almost four years and precipitated a humanitarian crisis. Noah Rothman comments:

Elsewhere in Yemen, another American bomb is making headlines of a different sort. On Tuesday, American and Yemeni officials revealed that they have high confidence that a U.S. drone strike killed Ibrahim al-Asiri, who was described by Barack Obama’s former acting CIA director Michael Morell as “probably the most sophisticated bomb maker on the planet.” . . . Asiri is one of many al-Qaeda leaders and mid-level commanders dispatched by U.S. drone patrols in Yemen, and Americans are safer because of those operations. Those American bombs get less attention than the munitions the United States provides to Saudi Arabia and its allies around the world, but they are all part of the same campaign.

The bomb that killed 40 young boys on August 9 was part of a shipment to Saudi Arabia that was approved by the State Department in 2015, under President Barack Obama. That was not a particularly controversial move at the time. . . . The possible disruption of America’s anti-terror operations [against al-Qaeda] in this theater wasn’t the only peril posed by this new conflict.

After taking [the capital city of] Sana’a, the Houthis descended on the strategic port of Aden, which is situated on the vital Bab al-Mandab Strait. That tiny, two-mile-wide northbound shipping lane leads directly into the Suez Canal and provides every port on the Indian Ocean with access to the Mediterranean and Europe. If the Houthis captured it, Iran would be free to shut the strait by deploying mines or harassing shipping vessels. No American administration, Republican or Democratic, would tolerate such a threat to international trade and global security.

[T]he alternative to a Saudi-led war is not American disengagement. . . . If American guided munitions were called onto targets by American observers on the ground in Yemen, it’s entirely possible that the kind of needless death that occurred on August 9 might have been avoided. But who thinks that direct U.S. intervention would mollify anyone condemning U.S. support for Saudi-led operations? Calling for immediate American disengagement, as so many liberal and libertarian lawmakers have done, is not a serious approach. It is a luxury available only to those who are not responsible for the preservation of the U.S.-led global order.

On Tuesday, a Hizballah drone attack injured three people in northern Israel. The next day, another attack, targeting an IDF base, injured eighteen people, six of them seriously, in Arab al-Amshe, also in the north. This second attack involved the simultaneous use of drones carrying explosives and guided antitank missiles. In both cases, the defensive systems that performed so successfully last weekend failed to stop the drones and missiles. Ron Ben-Yishai has a straightforward explanation as to why: the Lebanon-backed terrorist group is getting better at evading Israel defenses. He explains the three basis systems used to pilot these unmanned aircraft, and their practical effects:

These systems allow drones to act similarly to fighter jets, using “dead zones”—areas not visible to radar or other optical detection—to approach targets. They fly low initially, then ascend just before crashing and detonating on the target. The terrain of southern Lebanon is particularly conducive to such attacks.

But this requires skills that the terror group has honed over months of fighting against Israel. The latest attacks involved a large drone capable of carrying over 50 kg (110 lbs.) of explosives. The terrorists have likely analyzed Israel’s alert and interception systems, recognizing that shooting down their drones requires early detection to allow sufficient time for launching interceptors.

The IDF tries to detect any incoming drones on its radar, as it had done prior to the war. Despite Hizballah’s learning curve, the IDF’s technological edge offers an advantage. However, the military must recognize that any measure it takes is quickly observed and analyzed, and even the most effective defenses can be incomplete. The terrain near the Lebanon-Israel border continues to pose a challenge, necessitating technological solutions and significant financial investment.