American-led attacks bring Yemen back to the brink of war
The explosions woke Ali Al-Sunaidar and his children in the middle of the night – a familiar feeling after years of war.
He knew that the centuries-old mud buildings in Yemen's capital Sana could collapse under the pressure of bombing, so he opened the windows in his house and let in the winter air.
“We were terrified and worried,” said Mr Al-Sunaidar, a photojournalist in Sana, after dozens of American-led airstrikes hit Yemen local time on Friday, targeting the Houthi militia that has controlled much of the country's north checks. “We have been living in tension, fear and horror for the past nine years.”
A day later, the United States struck again, bombing a radar facility in Yemen, U.S. officials said.
For nearly a decade, Yemen has been at war, ravaged by a Saudi-led military coalition that has been supplied with American bombs in an effort to defeat the Houthis – a once scrappy tribal militia backed by Iran that has evolved into a de facto government in the north of the country. Yemen. The coalition expected a quick victory. Instead, hundreds of thousands of people have died from fighting, hunger and disease, and since the coalition withdrew several years ago, partly under international pressure, the Houthis have only deepened their grip on power.
Yemen's Houthi militia, strategically located on the southwestern tip of the Arabian Peninsula, has thrust itself into the unlikely global spotlight in recent weeks as it has sown chaos in the Red Sea, attacked commercial ships and hampered global trade. The Houthis have portrayed their campaign of rockets and drone strikes as a righteous struggle to force Israel to end its siege of Gaza.
As an American-led coalition bombs Houthi military installations in an attempt to halt the ship attacks, Yemenis say they feel a deep sense of déjà vu.
“The Saudis tried that path in Yemen for nine years, and it clearly didn't work,” said Farea Al-Muslimi, a Yemeni researcher at Chatham House, a London-based think tank. “The strikes will not stop the Houthis from further attacks in the Red Sea – rather the opposite.”
The Houthis invaded Sana in 2014 and ousted the Yemeni government, embracing a religious ideology inspired by a sect of Shiite Islam. They not only survived the ensuing war, but also thrived by honing their sharper military skills and entrenching themselves in northern Yemen, where they have set up an impoverished quasi-state that they control with a lust for power. iron fist.
Despite efforts to deter them, the Houthis have refused to back down, vowing to retaliate and welcoming the prospect of war with the United States with open glee.
“Yemen is not an easy military opponent that can be quickly subdued,” Mohammed al-Bukhaiti, a senior Houthi official, said in a post on social media platform X after the American-led strikes. “It is ready to engage in a long struggle that will change the direction of the region and the world.”
Military analysts say the Houthis have amassed a diverse range of anti-ship weapons, including both cruise missiles and ballistic missiles in their arsenal, as well as an assortment of drones for one-way attacks. Pentagon officials say the Houthi missiles have a range of up to 1,200 miles, within striking distance of Israel.
The US military's Central Command described the barrage of drones and missiles from Houthi-controlled territory last Tuesday as “a complex attack.” While the missiles pose little threat to advanced Western warships with advanced defense mechanisms, they pose a threat to commercial ships even if fired indiscriminately, analysts said.
Anti-ship missiles, along with drones and speedboats, have become “the group's weapons of choice in its ongoing campaign against shipping in the Red Sea,” said Fabian Hinz, an analyst at the International Institute for Strategic Studies. wrote last week.
Three weeks ago the UN announced a potential “road map” to peace for Yemen. Now Yemenis are concerned that instead of subsiding, the war is entering a new, even more complicated phase.
“The military escalation in Yemen and the Red Sea threatens the people of Yemen and the stability of the broader region,” said Jared Rowell, Yemen country director for the International Rescue Committee, an aid organization.
The Saudi-led coalition's bombing campaign and blockade against the Houthis had already contributed to Yemen becoming one of the world's worst humanitarian crises. Analysts and aid groups have warned that any further escalation from the recent strikes will only deepen Yemen's economic problems, driving up fuel and food prices and worsening hunger.
But for the Houthis, the prospect of war with the United States is a fulfillment of their official narrative, built around hostility toward Israel and the West.
The Houthis are a major branch of Iran's so-called “axis of resistance,” which includes armed groups across the Middle East. But Yemeni analysts say they view the militia as a complex Yemeni group, not just an Iranian proxy.
U.S. officials and those from allied Western governments said the Houthis' continued attacks on ships left them little choice but to respond.
Friday's strikes in Yemen sent a “very clear message” that Britain and the United States would act to keep shipping lanes open, David Cameron, Britain's foreign secretary, told NBC. to follow.”
Pentagon officials insisted they had tried to avoid civilian casualties, while a Houthi military spokesman said five of its fighters had been killed.
Still, the Western attack is likely to increase anti-Americanism in Yemen and strengthen the Houthis' popularity as the group benefits from Yemeni opposition to foreign intervention, said Ibrahim Jalal, a Yemeni non-resident scholar at the Middle East Institute, a Washington-based organization. based research organization. Essentially, there is now “another pretext of a 'foreign enemy' to distract the public from their failed rebel administration that is not providing services or paying salaries,” he said.
In the Yemeni city of Taiz – which is under the control of the internationally recognized government – Mansour Ali, a bus driver, said he welcomed the attacks on the Houthi ships because he believed they were carried out “in solidarity with our Palestinian brothers.”
“I think America and Britain targeted them because of their position on Palestine,” Mr Ali said.
Some US allies in the region, including Qatar and Oman, had warned the United States that bombing the Houthis could be a mistake, fearing it would do little to deter them and deepen regional tensions. They have argued that focusing on reaching a ceasefire in Gaza would remove the Houthis' stated impetus for the attacks.
“It is impossible not to denounce that an allied country has resorted to this military action while Israel continues to overstep its borders in its bombing, brutal war and siege of Gaza without any consequence,” the ministry said. Foreign Affairs of Oman said in a statement on Friday.
Some Emirati and Saudi experts have also criticized the US approach to the Houthis. to argue that international pressure on the Saudi-led coalition to withdraw several years ago – which came after the country reached the brink of famine – had hampered the campaign to defeat the Houthis, emboldening them.
“Some of the international community's policies towards Yemen have contributed to the survival and strengthening of the Houthi militias and encouraged them to take even more hostile actions,” Yemen's internationally recognized government said in a statement on Friday .
The government – which has little power on the ground in Yemen – said it held the Houthis responsible for “dragging the country into a military confrontation” and argued that the only way to guarantee the security of the Red Sea would be to restoring Yemen's 'legitimate power'. state institutions.”
One of the few groups in the Arabian Peninsula likely to welcome the attacks is the Southern Transitional Council, an Emirati-backed armed separatist group that controls much of southern Yemen.
In an interview days before the strikes, Amr Al-Bidh, a senior official of the group, criticized the UN peace process – arguing that it risked giving the Houthis even more power – and said his group would like participating in an international military intervention. against the Houthis.
“We know we cannot eradicate the Houthis,” he said. “But let's at least tone them down – put them in the background.”
But in Sana, photojournalist Al-Sunaidar said the years of protracted fighting had taken their toll, especially on young Yemenis. He lives with his 2-year-old twin daughters and his two brothers, who each have three children.
Before the war, children would get excited when they saw an airplane overhead, he said. “The children waved at it,” Mr Al-Sunaidar said. “Now they cover their ears in horror.”
Erik Schmitt contributed reporting from washington, and Stephen's Castle from London.