Honed at home in Yemen, Houthi propaganda goes global
Shortly after Yemen's Houthi militia hijacked a commercial ship in the Red Sea and took it and its 25 crew members hostage, the armed group used the ship to carry out a video clip.
In the slick production, called 'Axis of Jihad', a drone camera floats over the colossal ship. Then a famous Houthi poet appears on the deck – accompanied by what appears to be a cardboard cutout of Qassim Suleimani, the Iranian commander murdered in 2020 – and starts singing.
“Death to America and hostile Zion,” the poet Issa al-Laith exclaims, backed by a relentless beat. “By God, we will not be defeated!”
The Houthis — an Iranian-backed militia that controls northwestern Yemen — have long been skilled producers of propaganda, creating poetry, television shows and catchy music videos to spread their messages. But they have never had such a large audience as they do now, as the war in the Gaza Strip pushes them to the center of a global battle for bills and attracts new admirers around the world.
In recent months, the Houthis have gained global notoriety by firing rockets into Israel and attacking ships in the Red Sea, causing limited damage but disrupting the peace. flow of world trade. The United States and its allies have targeted the group repeated air raids This month the country has put itself even more in the spotlight, but the attacks on shipping continue.
The Houthis are betting that what their attacks yield will outweigh any punishment the West metes out, along with the risk of breaking a fragile truce in Yemen's civil war.
Houthi leaders have portrayed their campaign as a just fight to force Israel to end the war in Gaza, where the Israeli army has killed more than 25,000 Palestinians since Hamas attacks on October 7, according to Gaza health authorities.
Now the Houthis, they benefit widespread anger about Israel's conduct in the war, speak not only to fellow Arabs, but also to South Asians, Europeans and Americans, many of whom know little about the group of former rebels and their bloody, repressive history in Yemen.
“Victory in the battle for consciousness is more important than victory in the military battle,” a senior Houthi politician, Mohammed al-Bukhaiti, wrote on X on Tuesday, promoting a YouTube video of an interview he did with an American writer.
On X, Mr. al-Bukhaiti has posted almost exclusively in English in recent days, criticizing Western imperialism and “ruling Zionist clique” as he implored American followers to read the work of left-wing intellectual Noam Chomsky.
“I will now spread my message among the peoples of the Western countries, and I hope that the free people of the world will once again spread it on the widest scale,” he wrote.
Many people with large social media followings were eager to share pro-Houthi messages in English, praising the group for challenging Israel and its key ally, the United States.
“This is what they have been working towards for years,” said Hannah Porter, an independent Yemeni researcher who has studied Houthi propaganda. “They are very open about the fact that so-called soft war, or psychological warfare, is just as important, if not more so, than warfare.”
The group, which calls itself “Ansar Allah,” or God's Helpers, began as a movement led by members of the Houthi tribe focused on the religious and cultural revival of the Zaidi branch of Shia Islam. Early communications strategies were decidedly low-tech, including paper flyers and summer camps for children, Ms. Porter said.
But in the early 2000s, a charismatic leader, Hussein al-Houthi, led the group's transformation into a rebel force fighting Yemen's autocratic, U.S.-backed government.
It was during the years of war against the government that Houthi propaganda was built up, Ms. Porter said. The Houthis described themselves as an anti-imperialist force, fighting corruption and foreign influence, and adopted a slogan, shouted at rallies, that includes the phrase “Death to America, death to Israel, a curse on the Jews.” . In 2012, they expanded their narrative reach by founding Al-Masirah, an Arabic-language television channel based in Beirut.
In 2014, the Houthis formed an alliance of opportunity with Yemen's recently ousted president — the same president they had been fighting against for years — and invaded the capital Sana, ousting the government. Saudi Arabia, Iran's regional rival, led an Arab military coalition in a yearslong bombing campaign in Yemen in an effort to rout the Houthis. hundreds of thousands of Yemenis died of struggle, hunger and disease.
Yet the Houthis not only survived the war against the Saudis, who were helped by American military aidweaponsbut also prospered and founded an impoverished country quasi-state that they rule with one iron fist. They now present themselves as the legitimate government of Yemen, ignoring the internationally recognized government that operates largely in exile.
“They managed to hijack that image and say, 'Only us in Yemen, we represent the Yemenis,'” said Hisham Al-Omeisy, a Yemeni political analyst who was jailed by the Houthis in 2017. That's partly because the Houthis are skilled. to propaganda, he said, “but that is also because the Yemeni government is very weak.”
Mr Al-Omeisy, who lived in Sana when the Houthis took power, recalled that people left the city but returned soon after as economic and security conditions in government-controlled areas were even worse.
Since the start of the war in Gaza, Houthi leaders have presented themselves as plucky underdogs: the only Arab group willing to take on Israel and the imperial power of the United States. In doing so, they have capitalized on the feeling of powerlessness of many Arabs who desperately want to stop the carnage in Gaza.
Powerful Arab states such as Saudi Arabia have focused on diplomacy in an effort to end the war, eschewing the stronger measures they once used to pressure Israel and its Western allies, such as the 1973 oil embargo.
In that context, the Houthis “have cast themselves as the highly moral, credible, real heroes, if you like – of not just the Arabs, but of humanity in general,” Mr Al-Omeisy said.
And across the Middle East, where grief on behalf of Palestinians and anger toward Israel are deeply rooted, the Houthi's popularity has soared.
“At least they are doing their best at a time when other countries like Egypt and the Emirates did nothing for Palestine,” said Baha'eddine Jomli, a 35-year-old Tunisian.
In Bahrain, a Persian Gulf kingdom that has helped the US-led coalition attack the Houthis, the Yemeni group has won admiration from many citizens frustrated with their government's stance.
Ahmed Elmorshedy, a 30-year-old software engineer in Egypt, said that while he does not support the Houthi ideology and is “very suspicious of their motives,” he finds it difficult to condemn the militia attacks in the Red Sea.
“They appear to be a desperate attempt to put pressure on the international community, especially the United States, and push for intervention to stop the ongoing genocide in Gaza,” he said.
A Houthi spokesman did not respond to a request for comment. But last month Mohammed Ali al-Houthi, a senior member of the group, rejected the idea that the group was seeking popularity.
“We do not participate in elections,” he wrote in a message on X. “Our position is one of duty.”
Nadwa Al-Dawsari, a Yemeni non-resident scholar at the Middle East Institute, said Houthi narratives often target potential sympathizers of the western left, exploiting anger over Gaza and “the fear of America becoming involved a new war'.
At home, the Houthis tolerate little dissent, relying on some of the same authoritarian techniques employed by the US-allied Arab rulers they despise. They have closed radio stations and arrested journalists, activists and members of the organization religious minorities – in one case, four journalists had previously been sentenced to death release them in a prisoner exchange.
And even as they criticize Israel for severely restricting the flow of food and water to more than two million Gazans, the Houthis have blocked water access to civilians in Taiz, one of Yemen's largest cities, Human Rights Watch noted in a report. recent report.
The militia's narrative success was surreal for Yemenis suffering under Houthi rule, Mr. Al-Omeisy said. In 2017, after he publicly criticized the Houthis, they arrested him, held him for months and accused him of being a spy. He remembered a small, pitch-black prison cell that made him feel like he was being “buried alive.”
“I'm actually one of the lucky ones,” he said. “A lot of people didn't get out.”
Now living in the United States, he is dismayed when Egyptian, Palestinian or American strangers attack him online for criticizing the Houthis.
“I'm like, what the hell, do you even understand who the Houthis are?” he said.
Reporting was contributed by Saeed Al-Batati, Nazeeha Saeed, Nada Rashwan And Ahmed Ellali.