In the latest escalation in Yemen, Saudi Arabia says it beat back a Houthi militia offensive that targeted the capital Riyadh, as well as border cities Jazan and Najran, on June 23.
On Tuesday morning, Houthi military spokesman Yahya Sarea claimed the Iran-backed rebels had launched a successful assault on neighboring Saudi Arabia in a televised address.
“A large number of winged ballistic missiles and drones targeted the capital of the Saudi enemy … pounding military headquarters and centres including the defence and intelligence ministry and (King) Salman Air Base,” Sarea claimed during the rebel-run Al Masirah TV broadcast.
Shortly after, Saudi Arabian spokesman Colonel Turki Al-Malki said the Joint Coalition forces had neutralized the attack by intercepting and destroying eight “bomb-laden UAVs targeting civilians” bound for Riyadh on Monday night. They intercepted another three ballistic missiles fired from the Houthi-held Sa’dah governorate in Yemen towards the Saudi border cities of Najran and Jazan.
“The continuation of these terrorist, hostile acts using bomb-laden UAVs confirms the extreme, unethical ideology of the militia toward innocent civilians,” Al-Malki stressed in a statement carried by the state-run Saudi Press Agency (SPA).
Al-Malki said the attack was a “flagrant defiance” of international humanitarian law, adding the Joint Forces Command of the Coalition will “implement all necessary measures to protect innocent civilians.”
Britain’s Foreign Secretary, Dominic Raab, joined Al-Malki in this position by voicing the UK’s condemnation for the Houthi attack on Tuesday afternoon.
“I condemn these latest attacks on Saudi Arabia by the Houthis, and their continued offensives within Yemen which cast further doubt on their claims to want peace,” the foreign secretary said in a press release.
“With over a million Yemenis believed to have contracted coronavirus, it is more vital than ever that the Houthis cease their hostilities and allow the UN-led humanitarian response to get on with saving Yemeni lives,” Raab noted.
Yemen has been mired in a bloody civil war for five years which pits the Houthi rebels, based in northern Yemen, against the internationally recognized government that rules from Aden in the South with the backing of a Saudi-led coalition.
The civil war has turned the already impoverished country into the world’s worst humanitarian crisis, with an estimated 80% of Yemenis requiring humanitarian aid and protection.
Saudi Arabia is planning to introduce a proposal that aims to realize a power-sharing agreement to end the conflict in Yemen. Saudi officials have not made the framework available publicly, but the proposal has been shared with Reuters who released details of the plan on Thursday, May 18.
The framework aims to create conditions for a renewal of the Riyadh Agreement that was signed on November 5, 2019 after months of delay.
The two-month deadline for implementation of the agreement has long since passed, but Saudi Arabian diplomats are hoping to re-engage the Southern Transitional Council (STC) and the Saudi-backed Yemeni government to finally implement the power-sharing deal.
Developments
The Yemeni conflict continues to spiral out of control amid grave concerns over the impact of COVID-19 while its devastated healthcare facilities are unable to cope with an influx in infections.
NGOs like Doctors Without Borders (MSF) have called on combatants to cease hostilities amid an unfolding “catastrophe,” but fighting continues and a funding drive for Yemen failed to raise the $2.4 billion needed to avert disaster in the country.
Significant advances made by the Emirati-backed STC have further weakened chances of a successful implementation of the Riyadh Agreement. Since signing the agreement, the STC has declared self-rule over Aden and swaths of the country’s South in direct violation of the terms.
The STC’s actions have highlighted the fractured nature of Saudi-Emirati cooperation who now support opposing sides vying for control.
Saudi framework
The new Saudi proposal calls for an immediate ceasefire in the Abyan province where ongoing fighting continues to claim casualties on all sides. The STC rescinding their declaration of self-rule over the important port city of Aden would then follow the ceasefire, which could prove to be a hard sell for the Transitional Council who has now ruled the area for months.
If the STC does agree to rescind its emergency rule over the area, Saudi-backed Yemeni President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi would proceed to appoint a governor and security chief in Aden and appoint a new prime minister.
The Hadi-appointed prime minister would then proceed to form a cabinet that would include politicians of the STC.
The formation of government would follow a full withdrawal of STC forces from Aden. The agreement would require STC’s military units to move to Abyan where they have been engaged in direct conflict with government forces.
Incentives
While the agreement demands significant concessions from the Emirati-backed STC, it is unclear what incentives it offers for compliance.
Two STC sources have already told Reuters they would want to see the government formed before they withdraw their forces from Aden, as it remains unclear if Saudi diplomats are offering the STC, or the UAE that backs them, a quid-pro-quo for abandoning hard-fought military gains.
Another sticking point of the agreement is that the implementation of the deal would return the country to a similar status quo that prompted the Shia Houthis, who are backed by Iran, to rebel against Hadi’s government in the first place.
Bilateral agreement
A June 18 Houthi communique made no reference to the Saudi proposal but instead brought attention to a decaying oil tanker off Yemen’s coast. The unaddressed threat could soon create a 1 million-barrel oil spill in the Red Sea.
The Saudi-backed coalition is continuing aerial raids against Houthi weapons depots as they advance towards Marib, a stronghold of the Saudi-led coalition. The Houthis in turn have launched drones against Saudi targets, prompting the Saudi-led coalition to threaten “rigorous measures.”
It appears that Saudi Arabia is hoping the framework will bring Emirati-backed forces back to its ranks in order to concentrate efforts against the Iran-backed Houthi forces.
While observers should see any reduction in violence as a positive development, true peace in Yemen can likely only be realized by addressing all fighting parties’ concerns.
The Yemeni Civil War has created the worst humanitarian crisis in the world, leaving more than one hundred thousand dead, millions homeless, and even more without food and water.
More than 20 million Yemeni civilians continue to suffer from food insecurity, with 18 million lacking access to clean water. The economy of the Arab country has fallen into shambles, with the worst of this impacting Yemen’s densely-populated North, which remains under the control of the militant Houthi movement.
However, despite the continued economic disaster affecting the Yemeni people, the Houthis have now implemented a major tax reform that critics argue is designed to siphon money away from the Yemeni people in order to further sustain the Houthis’ domination over their occupied territories.
They undertook the change, an amendment to Yemen’s Zakat tax code, through an executive order in April; however, the Houthis postponed the announcement of the change until recently. Independent from traditional taxes collected by the state, the Zakat is typically defined as a religious levy specifically earmarked to aid the poor.
The “Khums”—one-fifth—amendment imposed an additional levy of 20% on all of Yemen’s natural resources, including agriculture, oil, and livestock, three of Yemen’s most important industries.
The Zakat is by no means a novel concept in Yemen; in fact, as one of the five pillars of Islam, the Zakat tax is established as law in numerous countries, including Libya, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, and Yemen. However, while the Zakat is traditionally designed to help the poor, the money raised through these means will now be given to the descendents of the Prophet Muhammad, the “Bani Hashem” tribe—of which the Houthi’s leadership claims to be a part.
In following with a long history of what some claim is a Houthi monopolization of power in Yemen, the move seems to represent yet another attempt by the group to consolidate the country’s wealth into its own hands.
The Houthi Yemen
In the mountainous interior of Yemen’s densely populated North, the Houthi occupation has become analogous to the authoritarian rule of Yemen’s former dictator Ali Abdullah Saleh. Rather than overthrow the previous regime in Yemen, the Houthis have instead acted to replace it with an equally authoritarian leadership.
The Houthis and Saleh initially reached a power-sharing agreement when the former took control of Sana’a in 2014, but the alliance eventually broke down three years later and Saleh was killed.
Within months, the Houthis began to purge Saleh-loyalists and monopolize their grip on Yemen. The group appointed “mushrifeen”—supervisors—within every level of the government to ensure loyalty.
On Wednesday afternoons, the Houthis send civil servants, academics, and other officials to “dourat thiqafiya”—cultural sessions—where they swear allegiance to the Houthi’s leader, Abdul-Malik Badreddin al-Houthi. These euphemized indoctrination camps reflect the new culture of Yemen, one where the authority and legitimacy of al-Houthi is beyond question.
“The trajectory [of the Houthis] is towards a Zaydi version of the Taliban,” Abdul-Ghani al-Iryani, a Yemeni analyst, said earlier this year.
Although the Houthis maintained the parliament and military, the group created a parallel government, the Supreme Political Council (SPC), that wields ultimate power. At the reins of this new Yemen is al-Houthi, who has since adopted the title of “Wali al-Alam,” loosely translated as “Supreme Leader.”
Not content with the mere title of “Supreme Leader,” al-Houthi has styled himself as a military strongman, in the likes of Saleh many years before. Al-Houthi has claimed that he is leading a “massira quraniya,” a Koranic march, and his followers proclaim that the Houthis will soon take control over Islam’s holiest cities—Mecca, Medina, and Jerusalem.
However, despite these grandiose proclamations, the Houthis remain firmly entrenched in North Yemen, continuing to rule over their territory in the authoritarian style that has dominated Yemen for decades.
The Fear Economy
The aftermath of the Houthi insurgency left the economy of Yemen in ruins, with the ongoing Yemeni Civil War imposing a hold on any reconstruction efforts. However, beyond being victims of circumstance, the Houthis have persistently operated a systematic campaign to disrupt the flow of aid from the United Nations and foreign actors into Yemen.
Although the World Food Programme (WFP) imports enough food into Yemen to feed more than 12 million people, the Houthis’ “mushrifeen” determines how the food is distributed. Houthi loyalists remain well-fed, with the remaining food being gifted to favored merchants who profit from the monopolized food market. By the end, the rest of the population in Houthi-occupied Yemen are left to fend for themselves.
Aid workers who attempt to circumvent this network of Houthi obstruction are often extorted for money or arrested and held hostage. This has forced many aid organizations to leave the country and abandon their efforts.
Within the ensuing climate of fear in the new Yemen loyalty is a prerequisite to survival. Further, the consolidation of Yemen’s national wealth into the hands of the Houthis has made the group into the sole provider for social welfare in their occupied territories.
The new change to the Zakat tax only exacerbates this power monopoly in Sana’a, as the Houthis will continue to profit from the levies on a barely-recovering economy. However, although the Houthis are unlikely to lose their foothold in North Yemen any time soon, the group’s recent activities and promotion of tribalist policies have awakened dissent from both within their occupied territory and abroad.
Dissent Within and Abroad
The people of North Yemen initially greeted the Houthis as liberators, offering applause and open arms. As the Houthi leadership grew more predatory and oppressive, discontent began to surface among the Houthis’ subjects.
This discontent has been evident following the Houthis’ decision to amend the Zakat, with Yemeni citizens criticizing and mocking the decision on social media.
Following news of the amendment, Yemeni citizens took to social media to voice their grievances over the issue.
In particular, critics have argued that the policies of the Houthi government continue to inch closer to those of South Africa’s apartheid regime, highlighting the Zakat amendment as further evidence.
“If what is rumoured about the Houthi legislation that gives the Hashemites a fifth of the country’s wealth under the claim that it is their legitimate right, then that is a calamity for the Hashemites before being a disaster for the country,” Mohamed Azzan, a Yemeni Islamic scholar, said on Twitter.
“Yemenis will look at it as looting their wealth motivated by racism, and this tyranny only deepens feelings of oppression, giving rise to appalling revenge, albeit after a while.”
Members of Yemen’s government-in-exile feature among the critics, including Minister of Human Rights Mohammed Askar, who argued that the amendment displayed the Houthis’ attempts at dividing Yemen through sectarianism and discrimination.
“The so-called law issued by Houthi militias gives them a new opportunity to rob Yemenis and national resources, and it was not ratified by constitutional entities in the country,” Askar told the newspaper Asharq Al-Awsat.
“When examining the law, it becomes evident that it is exceptionally discriminatory and it sets the stage to divide society into classes and abolish the concept of citizenship among the members of the community.”
Joining with Turkey, the United States, Brazil, and others, the Houthis in Yemen are continuing to follow the path of authoritarianism and domination. As Yemen’s population adjusts to their country’s disappearing wealth, the Houthi leadership remains immune to Yemen’s fragile economic state.
