Levi Salem Musa Marhabi, a Yemeni Jewish man, remains in custody under the Houthi movement in Yemen despite a 2019 appeals court order for his release. Arrested in 2016 for facilitating the departure of a Jewish family and an 800-year-old Torah, Marhabi has endured years of documented torture, medical neglect, and shifting prison conditions that have left him partially paralyzed.
Who is Levi Salem Musa Marhabi?
Levi Salem Musa Marhabi is a member of Yemen’s dwindling Jewish community who became a target of the Houthi movement nearly a decade ago. His arrest in March 2016 was directly linked to his efforts to assist a local Jewish family in fleeing the country, an operation that also involved the transport of a historic 800-year-old Torah scroll. As reported by The Jerusalem Post, although a Houthi appeals court officially ordered his release in 2019, the ruling was ignored by his captors, and he has remained in detention in Sanaa ever since.
What are the conditions of his detention?
The United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) has cataloged a series of severe human rights abuses inflicted upon Marhabi. According to their reports, Houthi captors have subjected him to beatings, electrocution, and systematic starvation. The sustained mistreatment has led to catastrophic health consequences; the American Sephardi Federation notes that Marhabi is now partially paralyzed, and his physical condition has deteriorated to the point where he has lost his teeth and suffers from chronic kidney and lung damage.
Following the October 7, 2023, Hamas-led invasion of Israel, the situation grew increasingly precarious. USCIRF reported that the Houthis relocated Marhabi to a prison ward populated by extremists who issued direct threats against his life. It was only after a 10-day prison strike that he was moved into solitary confinement, a move that provided a temporary reprieve from his immediate cellmates but left him in continued isolation.
Why was he not released in previous negotiations?
In 2021, Asharq Al-Awsat reported that the Houthis reached an agreement to release Marhabi, but the deal was contingent upon the exile of the final three Jewish families remaining in Yemen.
Yemen’s Houthis still hold Jewish prisoner Levi Marhabi despite a release order, with USCIRF reporting torture and medical neglect. ✍️: @DanielleGreyman https://t.co/QAM7jKyhBY
— https://x.com/Jerusalem_Post/status/2115861797488005346
“They gave us a choice between staying in the midst of harassment and keeping Salem a prisoner or leaving and having him released,” one displaced individual told Asharq Al-Awsat. “History will remember us as [some of] the last of Yemeni Jews who were still clinging to their homeland until the last moment… We had rejected many temptations time and time again, and refused to leave our homeland, but today we are forced.”
The families ultimately chose to leave, yet the promised release did not materialize, leaving Marhabi behind while his community was forced into permanent exile.
Why does this matter in 2026?
The continued detention of Marhabi stands in stark contrast to broader regional trends. Over the past three years, several high-profile hostage cases across the Middle East have seen successful resolutions, including the release of Israeli-Russian researcher Elizabeth Tsurkov after two years of captivity in Iraq.
The international community remains largely blocked from direct intervention, and the lack of communication with his family continues to be a primary tool of his captors. As of October 2026, Marhabi remains in Sanaa, his health failing, waiting for a release order that was signed by a court seven years ago but never enacted by the authorities in charge.
