http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/09/world/middleeast/yemen-saudi-arabia-houthis-rebels.html 2016-10-08 23:03:37 Saudi-Led Airstrikes Blamed for Massacre After Yemen Funeral Bombs struck a reception hall in Sana where mourners had gathered, killing at least 82 and wounding hundreds, officials said. === SANA, Yemen — Fighter jets from a Saudi-led military coalition repeatedly bombed a crowded reception hall in Sana where mourners were gathered after a funeral on Saturday, killing scores of people and wounding hundreds of others, according to Yemeni health officials and witnesses. The strikes destroyed the hall and so overwhelmed the city’s hospitals that the Health Ministry broadcast pleas on radio stations to summon off-duty doctors to help tend to the wounded. Yemeni officials said the scale of the carnage made it hard to quickly compile a complete death toll. Nasser al-Argaly, a Health Ministry official, said that at least 82 people had been confirmed dead and that more than 500 had been wounded, The Associated Press reported. Witnesses said rescue workers were still collecting body parts and looking for survivors under the rubble. “Some of the people who were carried out of the hall were headless,” said Muhammad Alhadrami, who lives near the hall and rushed there soon after the strikes. Others had “smashed legs,” he said. Mr. Alhadrami said that two nearly simultaneous strikes hit the hall, followed by a third roughly a minute later. Some rescue workers gathered outside the hall in the immediate aftermath, scared to enter for fear of being hit in another strike. “It’s a very ugly massacre,” Mr. Alhadrami said. Maj. Gen. Ahmed Assiri, a spokesman for the Saudi-led coalition, said that coalition officials were aware of the reports and that it was possible that there were other causes for the blasts. The Saudi bombing campaign has been going on for more than a year now, but it has been eclipsed by the wars in Syria and Iraq, and largely ignored by world powers. If the death toll is confirmed, the strike on Saturday would be one of the deadliest of A military coalition lead by More than 9,000 people have been killed, and many Yemenis have been pushed toward famine while extremist groups like Al Qaeda and the Islamic State have taken advantage of the chaos to step up their operations. Saturday’s funeral was for the father of Galal al-Rawishan, a Houthi ally who serves as the interior minister. Mr. Rawishan was not injured.