Buthaina Muhammad Mansour al-Raimi is her family’s sole survivor.

The 5-year-old was at home with her parents and her five siblings when a Saudi-Emirati-led and US-British-backed coalition airstrike destroyed their apartment building in Sana’a, the capital of Yemen, on August 25, 2017.

NZHerald report

“‘The house fell”

“I was in my mother’s room with my father, sisters, brother and uncle,” Buthaina tells AFP from rebel-held Sanaa, where she has returned from Saudi Arabia to live with Ali and her cousins.

“The first missile hit, and my father went to get us sugar to get over the shock, but then the second missile hit, and then the third,” she says.

“And then the house fell,” adds the little girl, who says she is eight.

It was the night of August 25, 2017.

The uncle who died was her “favourite”, she says.

Along with her family, eight other civilians including two children were killed in a house nearby.

A few days later, the picture of Buthaina attempting to force open her right eye went viral.

The Saudi-led alliance admitted responsibility for the air strike describing it as a “technical mistake”.

But it drew strong international condemnation.

NDTV report