Published in the Jerusalem Post of 16 February 2022
Ever since the Arab
Spring in 2011 Yemen has been torn apart by civil conflict, an extension of
internecine strife that goes back much further.
The main, but far from the only, protagonists in the current struggle
are the Houthis, a fundamentalist Shia militia group heavily dependent on Iranian
support, and a Saudi Arabia-led coalition of Sunni states determined to prevent
Iran gaining complete control of Yemen, and thus vastly extending its power in
the region.
The battle has flowed
this way and that over the past seven years, but the Houthis have gained more
than they have lost. They ‒ and that
means the Iranian regime ‒ are now the de facto rulers of a broad swath
of Yemen, controlling much of the commerce through which humanitarian aid
flows. The UN has made valiant efforts
over the years to broker a peace deal, and from time to time the Houthis have
given lip service to the idea, but none has stuck.
The militancy of the Houthis, backed as they are by Iranian military hardware, is growing – and to their shame they are making increasing use of children.
A four-member panel of UN
experts maintain in an annual report to the Security Council, circulated on
January 22, that nearly 2,000 children recruited by the Houthis have died
on the battlefield. They say the Houthis use summer camps and a mosque to recruit
children and disseminate their ideology.
“The children are
instructed to shout the Houthi slogan ‘death to America, death to Israel, curse
the Jews, victory to Islam’,” say the experts. “In one camp, children as young
as 7 were taught to clean weapons and evade rockets.”
The panel said it had received
a list of 1,406 children recruited by the Houthis who died on the battlefield
in 2020, and 562 child soldiers killed between January and May 2021.
For about a year the
Houthis have been firing ballistic missiles into Saudi Arabia’s capital,
Riyadh. On January 24 they launched a
missile at the United Arab Emirates (UAE) for the first time. On February 1
another was fired from Yemen as the Gulf state hosted President Isaac Herzog. The UAE’s surface-to-air interceptors struck it
down, but the US military also launched interceptor missiles in response to the attack.
Jen Psaki, the White
House press secretary, said that the US military had used “Patriot interceptors
to … [support] efforts by the armed forces of the UAE”, adding “I would say we
are working quite closely with them.”
The intervention marks a
welcome widening of US involvement in Yemen’s seven-year war between the
Houthis and the Saudi Arabia-led military coalition, which includes the UAE. Initially the Biden administration’s reaction
to the Iranian threat, and in particular to Iran’s increasingly powerful position
in Yemen via its Houthi proxy, was less than comforting to the Sunni Arab world
and to Israel. Intent on re-engaging
with Iran in an attempt to renew the nuclear deal, Biden rejected the hard line
adopted by Donald Trump. The
hardening of the US stance in Yemen may reflect Washington's confidence at
achieving some sort of deal in the Vienna talks.
It is generally accepted
that one key factor, among others, uniting Israel and the Arab signatories to
the Abraham Accords is to frustrate Iran’s aspiration to dominate the Middle
East. The Iranian regime pursues this
ambition unremittingly across the region, both directly by way of its own
Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) in Syria and Iraq, and through a variety
of proxies like Hezbollah in Lebanon, Hamas in Gaza, extremist groups in Iraq
and the Gulf, and in Yemen by way of the Houthis.
Saudi Arabia is
attempting to deny Iran a major role in Yemen’s future. What the world’s
political leaders cannot, or will not, believe is that Iran has its own agenda. It
is pursuing domination of the Middle East and supports a widespread Shi’ite
terrorist network to achieve it. The regime’s enmity toward Western
democracy in general, and the US and Israel in particular, is fundamental to
its purpose. Equally unshakeable is its
intention to acquire nuclear weapons.
British born Martin
Griffiths was serving as UN Special Envoy for Yemen in 2018. He succeeded in bringing the two main
protagonists to the negotiating table on December 6, 2018. Eventually the talks were overtaken by
renewed conflict, but the fact that negotiations are possible should be the
template on which US policy is designed.
UN Resolution 2216, which aims to establish democracy in a federally
united Yemen, should be the basis.
Any new effort would have to be backed by a UN peace-keeping force. Through whatever means would be most effective – new sanctions if necessary – Iran must be deterred from supplying the Houthis with military hardware. Humanitarian aid must be given unfettered access to all parts of Yemen. A lasting political deal would of course involve the end of the Saudi-led military operation, and probably a major financial commitment by Saudi Arabia to fund the rebuilding of the country.
Finally the Houthis must be given the
opportunity to choose. Do they wish to remain an outlawed militia permanently,
or would they prefer to become a legitimate political party, able to contest
parliamentary and presidential elections and participate in government? The
price would be serious engagement in negotiations aimed at a peaceful
transition to a political solution for a united Yemen, perhaps a form of
federal constitution.
The US-Iran
nuclear deal talks in Vienna seem close to an agreement. Is Biden still wedded
to his original Iran-appeasement policy, has he moved sufficiently to sponsor
an initiative of this sort, or is he content to see a rampant Iran actually
conquer Yemen?
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