Yemen war/insurgency

[Hash]

This conflict has received little to no attention in Western media, and nobody knows anything about it.

Since 2004, a group of Shi'ah rebels, known as 'Houthis' in northern Yemen (Sa'dah, an old sh**thole town in the isolated mountains of Asir near the Saudi border) have been in revolt against the Yemeni government, which is Sunni and secular as opposed to the clerical Shi'ah Houthis.

In early November, the rebels killed one Saudi border guard in a raid, and the Saudis have since launched a huge air attack on Yemen, the details of which have been kept from the Saudi public and known only to people involved with the RSAF or living in Asir. The Saudis have claimed that all Houthi attacks have been repelled, and that the Saudi navy is in 'complete control of the kingdom's territorial waters' - not that it's hard knowing that the Houthis have like two Titanic lifeboats as their naval forces. The RSAF has been bombing every day since November the Sa'dah region, and the Saudi government ordered the RSAF to empty all its bombs over Yemen. Of course, they don't dare enter Yemeni soil since the last time they did, in 1995, all 19 soldiers had their throat slit by rebels. The Saudis have seen this as a perfect opportunity to put it's aging American air fleet and ammunition supply to good use instead of decaying.

The Saudi forces are led by General Prince Khalid bin Sultan, the American-educated son of Prince Sultan, the current crown prince (known in Riyadh as the 'CP'). Since Prince Sultan, who describes himself as corrupt, allegedly has prostate cancer and Abdullah favours a change in the succession law to benefit the second-generation instead of the sons of Abdul-Aziz; Khalid bin Sultan, who would be in line for succession if the law is changed, is using this war to boost his standing in family circles.

What is interesting is the proxy war this thing has been shaping up into. The Saudis have claimed that they intercepted an arms shipment from Iran to the Houthis, and the rebels have rather obvious support from Iran and the Hezbollah. The Saudis and Yemeni authorities, on the other hand, have obvious support from the United States - and, ironically, Al-Qaeda is alleged to support the Saudi-Yemeni war against the Shi'ah Houthis.

[dead0man]

ironically, Al-Qaeda is alleged to support the Saudi-Yemeni war against the Shi'ah Houthis.

I've heard the exact opposite.  I'll look for a cite.

The western media sucks when it comes to covering second tier military conflicts.  I suppose some of our better papers may have been covering this but I'm too lazy/cheap to find out   I've only known about it because of my job and wiki's "current events" page.

[Hash]

I have a hard time seeing the Sunni Al-Qaeda supporting a Shi'ah insurgency of any sort.

[Tetro Kornbluth]

How does the Cold War era division of Yemen fit into this? I remember seeing demonstrators with South Yemeni flags so I was curious...

[Purple State]

I have a hard time seeing the Sunni Al-Qaeda supporting a Shi'ah insurgency of any sort.

Al-Qaeda (not referring to AQI or anything beyond AQ Central here) has historically not paid much attention to any Sunni-Shi'a split, although it is predominantly Sunni. It should be further noted that it is not necessarily relevant that the Houthi rebels are Shi'i. Much of the issue is just as likely the historical discrimination against and disenfranchisement of the Houthi tribe, rather than any religious division between this tribe and the government.

The idea that this is part of a broader "Sunni-Shi'a" divide or a Shi'a "revival" is largely perpetuated by the Yemeni government itself as a way of gaining support from the US, which has recently decided to see most issues as sectarian in nature, to the near complete overshadowing of tribal divisions.