// BBC WORLD NEWS — MONDO
Children brave snipers and mortars to go to school near Yemen front line
Rafeef says the journey to school terrifies her, but she is determined to keep going
Every morning at 6am, 10-year-old Rafeef and her younger brother get ready for school, putting on their cream and brown uniforms.
She always looks forward to seeing her friends and learning about everything from maths to Arabic and Islamic studies. She can't wait to start studying English next year.
But for Rafeef, the journey to school involves far greater risks than crossing roads or missing the bus.
Her school in Taiz, south-western Yemen, stands on a mountain at the edge of a valley known as no-man's land - a heavily contested front line in the civil war between forces supporting Yemen's internationally recognised government, which is backed by Saudi Arabia, and the Iran-backed Houthis.
On one side of the school is government-held territory, on the other are Houthi sniper positions.
Every time she goes to school, she has to walk uphill with her back towards the snipers. "I'm afraid," she says.
Rafeef's school is overlooked by Houthi positions on the mountains beyond the valley
According to Unicef, roughly 3.2 million children in Yemen were out of school even before the war escalated last month.
It says thousands of children have been killed or maimed since the war began in 2014, while thousands more have been recruited by armed groups on both sides.