U.S. President Joe Biden on Feb. 4 announced an end to support for Saudi-led military offensive operations in Yemen. A day later, the State Department said it would lift the terrorist designation against the Houthis in Yemen. Both moves will be welcomed in Tehran and the tide may turn in favour of the rebels.
The Houthis of north Yemen have been engaged in a long-standing and intermittent insurgency against the government of the country.
The conflict has its roots in the failure of a political transition supposed to bring stability to Yemen following an uprising that forced its authoritarian president, Ali Abdullah Saleh, after 33 years of rule, to hand over power to his vice-president, Abd Rabbo Mansur Hadi, in 2011.
As president, Hadi had to deal with a variety of problems, including a separatist movement in the south, the continuing loyalty of security personnel to Saleh, as well as corruption, unemployment and food insecurity.
The Houthi movement, known formally as Ansar Allah, which champions Yemen’s Zaidi Shia Muslim minority and had already fought a series of rebellions against Saleh during the previous decade, took advantage of the new president’s weakness.
Disillusioned with the transition, many ordinary Yemenis, including Sunnis, supported the Houthis. The insurgency escalated sharply in 2014, when their movement seized the capital, Sanaa, and the surrounding areas.
This was facilitated by a newly forged alliance of convenience with former President Saleh -- whom they killed in 2017. The Houthis continue to hold Sanaa, and a large part of the country’s territory.
Beginning in March 2015, a coalition of Gulf states led by Saudi Arabia launched a campaign of economic isolation and air strikes against the Houthi insurgents.
Yemen abuts a strategic choke point of global importance, the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, which connects the Gulf of Aden to the Red Sea. It is a vital route for oil and natural gas shipments passing from the Persian Gulf to the Red Sea and on to the Suez Canal. Around nine per cent of total global petroleum products pass through the strait.
The Saudis and their allies failed to reconquer the entirety of Yemen but they did protect the Bab el-Mandeb. Similarly, the intervention prevented the main port of Yemen, al-Hudayda, from falling under the complete control of the Houthis.
The result is that Yemen, like some other Arab countries, is now subject to de facto division and ongoing conflict. The Houthis control the capital and a large part of the populated center of the country. Hadi’s internationally recognized government controls much of the east and the strategically important south and western coastal areas.
To further complicate matters, the separatist Southern Transitional Council, supported by the United Arab Emirates, controls the port of Aden and a section of the southern coast. Finally, Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula and the Islamic State group are active on the ground.
The Houthis follow the Zaidiya branch of Shia Islam, whereas the Iranians are Twelver Shia. Nonetheless, the Houthis have had support from Iran. Also, some 60 per cent of the former Yemeni army having allied with them.
Iran uses the territory in Yemen controlled by the Houthis for the launching of missiles on Saudi Arabia. For example, the Houthis claimed responsibility for the sophisticated attack on Saudi oil facilities at Abqaiq and Khurais in September 2019, but the weapons came from Iran.
Yemen’s economy, already fragile prior to the conflict, has been gravely affected. The war has wrecked the country's roads, hospitals, water and electricity networks, as well as other infrastructure.
Hundreds of thousands of families no longer have a steady source of income, and many public servants have not received a regular salary in years. The country’s civil war has worsened the humanitarian crisis.
All parties to the conflict have committed human rights violations. Almost a quarter of a million people have died in Yemen’s war, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said in December.
As well, 3.6 million people have been internally displaced and some 20 million are experiencing food insecurity. And public health experts warn that the COVID-19 pandemic may have further significant negative effects on Yemen’s vulnerable population.
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