| ReimTime said: I don't pretend to know much about Yemen, but I am interested in discussions such as this and will do a bit of research. You said that the Shiites are rebelling because a Sunni took over as President? And the USA is fighting ISIL in Yemen as well? AND there is a a faction of separatists in the South? AND the Sunni Empire of Saudi Arabia is helping Hadi attack the Shiite rebels as well? Sounds like a clusterfuck. But the again, almost all Middle-Eastern countries are clusterfucks; thanks to a century of political botches by Western countries. I will do some research and return to the thread. It sounds like another Syria to me. |
I can't say exactly why Houthis are rebelling, I'm not informed good enough, nor do I have a good grasp of the religious differencies between multiple involved groups. But from the standpoint of pure logic if political balance (and given the divided nature of Yemen this is cruicial) is ruined, a lot of thing could come out of this, including this. A quote from insider:
What we’re seeing in northern Yemen today, in terms of fighting between the Houthis on one side, and various armed groups on the other, definitely does have an element of the sectarianism that can be seen across the wider region. However, it’s a lot more confusing. For one, it’s wrong to simply say that Houthis = Zaydis, and, say, al-Ahmar = Shafi’is. Or even worse, Houthis = Shias, and al-Ahmar = Sunnis. For one, the al-Ahmars are traditionally Zaydi, just like the Houthis. I can’t vouch for the religious identification of each individual Ahmar, but I’d say that many of their tribal fighters will still, at least loosely, identify as Zaydi. Ali Abdullah Saleh, who fought 6 wars against the Houthis, was also Zaydi. So is this Zaydi on Zaydi fighting? A Zaydi civil war?
http://alshamahi.com/2014/02/19/yemen-is-more-nuanced-than-sunni-shia/
As far as I'm aware Saudis did play an important role in settelment of the conflict, forcing Saleh to go. From what I get Yemeni political opposition, al-Islah, is their agent. At the same time al-Ahmars are as much of Zaydis as the Houthis and Saleh, and the position of tribal leaders like al-Ahmar was smth that turned the scales not in favour of Saleh during the events of 2011. All in all, I don't think confilct could be solely described as religious -- a lot of facts contradict that -- situation is very similar to as much divided and tribal Lybia.
As for the US. They do a lot of actions, have a lot of positions that contradict to each other at first glance. Support certain party in one country and fight it in another. Methinks unlike Saudis and Iran who granted might have different approaches, but both seek stability in the region, while the US is trying to establish chaos for the sake of chaos. So support ISIL, support Iraq, support Peshmerga, support Houthis (even such reports have been presented, not sure how legitimate), and now support Saudis and Hadi, fight Houthis -- US is officially involved.
