Yemen: From Blockade to War?

Saudi Arabia and its allies traditionally see Yemen as within its sphere of influence, in relation to which it has a direct influence on the official Yemeni government (the country is a strategic point, important for sea communications through the Red Sea as well as along the south of the Arabian coastline). 

Yemen’s subordinate position does not amuse the Houthi’s, who comprise up to half of the country’s population. A direct confrontation with the coalition has been taking place from 2014, and Yemen has been fully blockaded since 2017.

It is also very important that the Houthi’s don’t accept the current borders. Earlier, the Saudis took a part of the nation’s territories and forced the former Yemeni leadership to accept the deal.

In the last year the Houthi’s have twice tried to mount a missile attack on Riyad in order to remove the blockade, although the Saudis have managed to down the missiles in the air with the help of anti-missile weaponry.

The Houthi’s have good relations with Iran and ‘Hezbollah’, because of which they are constantly accused by their opponents of receiving funding from third parties. In this context everything the Houthi’s do is automatically considered to be Teheran’s fault. These accusations are supported by disinformation campaigns in neighbouring countries with a Shiite population: Iraq, Lebanon, Syria, and Bahrein.

Alongside open warfare, Yemen is being torn apart by internal contradictions, among which is the confrontation between Hadi on the one hand and Saleh’s clan on the other, as well as the conflict between the northern and southern parts of the country.  

It is important to take other Yemeni actors into account, including the ‘Muslim brothers’ and the ‘Al-Islah’ party, who, until recently, both took the Saudi side. Considering the new alignment of players, the situation might change for the groups.

The Saudis think that they can break the Houthi resistance and place the responsibility for the catastrophic situation in the country on them.

Regardless, the Houthi’s aren’t giving in and the capital city of Sana is under their control as it was before.

One of the forms anti-Houthi propaganda took was blaming the group for the murder of Yemen’s ex-president, Abdalla Saleh, who had lately had extraordinarily difficult relations with the rebels. However, as we have written earlier, it is unlikely that this would have been useful for either the Houthi’s or Iran; if they wanted to deal with Saleh, they would rather have imprisoned him after publicly accusing him of dealings with the Saudis. However, Saudi media has presented this as a Houthi action.

At the current situation the war will lead to irreversible consequences and Yemen is at risk of becoming a failed state. There remains the hope that the condemnation of Riyad’s actions on the international level and unofficial negotiations for a compromise will lead to the gradual ending of military activity and the ending of the blockade.  

As Geopolitica.ru has written before, there have been negotiations between the Yemeni government, ‘Ansaralli’s’ (Houthi’s), and the Saudis about conditions for a truce, such as immunity for Saleh and his entourage, the participation of Saleh’s son, general Ahmed Ali Saleh, in the presidential elections, and the firing of Yemen’s current president, Mansur Hadi.   

The fact alone that Saleh was killed speaks measure about someone being interested in breaking up the procedures. It could hardly have been the Houthi’s, who are in the ring of enemies themselves.

It is certain that there will be changes in the country’s balance of power: especially for the party that manages to get the ‘Muslim brothers’ and ‘Al-Islah’ on side.