New Tensions in the Horn of Africa and the Red Sea – Is a region so rich in potential about to implode? A Series. Part Two: Yemen and the Horn of Africa in two parts.

There were some estimates that some 2-3 million Yemenis attended this January 19, 2024 demonstration

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Grayzone interviews Ansar Allah (Houthi) represenative

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“The Americans and British must understand that our people do not know what it means to surrender.”

                                                             Yemeni Houthi Official Statement

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1.

The United States and Great Britain have now launched nine missile attacks against Yemen in an effort to get Sana’a to stop targeting Israel bond container and other ships heading for Israel. Ansar Allah – the more formal name for the group referred to as “the Houthis”, has repeatedly stated that when the Israeli bombing of Gaza stops and Israeli troops have withdrawn, that they will end their missile campaign.

Houthi missile attacks have resumed within 24 hours of each attack suggesting the degree to which they have been ineffective militarily. The Yemenis are using mobile missiles that are easily moved to safe places to avoid destruction. Not that it seems to matter, as neither Congress nor the main stream media in the United States seem to mind, but bombing Yemen without Congressional approval is illegal by U.S. law. Very few members of Congress have done anything to call the Biden Administration to task as of yet.

The U.S. bombing campaign has done nothing to stop Yemenis from targeting Israel-bond ships. Indeed, in response to U.S./U.K threats and missile attacks, the Yemenis have promised to step up their attacks and target not only the area of the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden surrounding the Bab El Mandeb Strait but that now they will target the same kind of ships transiting the Suez Canal and the Gulf of Hormuz!

At about the same time the Yemen’s Parliament in Sana’a declared the US and UK governments “Global Terrorist Networks.”

With a single move, the Yemeni resistance seized the strategic advantage by de facto controlling a key geoeconomic bottleneck: the Bab el-Mandeb. Hence, they can inflict serious trouble on sectors of global supply chains, trade, and finance

As one commentator noted about the Yemenis a few days ago: “They are afraid of nothing. If they manage (the Houthis) to impose “the triangle” (targets at Suez, Bab El Mandeb and Hormuz make for a sort of triangle) that would be General Soliemani’s Grand Design on cosmic steroids.” This spoke Brazilian author, commentator and extraordinary traveler, Pepe Escobar, our modern day Ibn Batuta.

Reinforcing this view, a Yemeni Houthi Official Statement noted:

“The US-British attack is a new attempt to dissuade Yemen from supporting Gaza and ending its naval operations, which has failed. We will continue our military operations against the Zionist enemy no matter how aggressively they might bombard Yemen. Our strikes will go on as long (Israeli) atrocities and genocide in Gaza persist. US-British aggression strengthens the resolve of the Yemeni people to resist.

The Americans and British must understand that our people do not know what it means to surrender.”

2.

Once again the kind of news one rarely sees in the mainstream media here in the USA.

An article in the Arabic post, from Rai El Youm today January 25, a news service speaks of a delegation of Ansar Allah members in Moscow discussing how to “intensify efforts to pressure” the United States and Israel to stop the Gaza war. A statement was issued condemning the American and British strikes on Yemen.

A delegation from the “Ansar Allah” group discusses in Moscow “intensifying efforts to pressure” the United States and Israel to stop the Gaza war and condemn the American and British strikes on Yemen.

Sanaa – (AFP) – A delegation from the Yemeni “Ansar Allah” group discussed Thursday, during a rarely announced visit to Moscow with Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Bogdanov, “the need to intensify efforts to pressure” the United States and Israel to stop the war in the Gaza Strip. According to what a Yemeni spokesman announced.

The official spokesman for the “Ansar Allah” group, Muhammad Abdel Salam, wrote on the “X” platform that he, at the head of a Yemeni delegation, met Thursday afternoon in Moscow with Bogdanov, who is also the special representative of the Russian President for Middle East and African affairs, and the two sides discussed “the necessity of intensifying international efforts to put pressure on America and Israel.” To stop the war in Gaza that has been ongoing between Hamas and the Hebrew countries since October 7.

Abdel Salam pointed out that the meeting discussed the American and British strikes against the Houthis, and that it was emphasized that “America is first to stop the aggression against the Gaza Strip and bring humanitarian aid into it, not to go towards militarizing the Red Sea.”

This comes in the midst of tensions in the Red Sea region, where, for two months, the Yemenis have been carrying out attacks on commercial ships that they say are linked to Israel in support of the Palestinians in Gaza, while the United States, with the participation of Britain sometimes, is trying to deter them by launching strikes on their military sites. The Yemenis respond by targeting the ships of these two countries.

For its part, the Russian Foreign Ministry confirmed in a statement published by Russian news agencies that during the meeting with the Houthis, “the strikes… launched by the United States and Britain on Yemen, which could lead to destabilizing the situation on a regional scale, were strongly condemned.”

In a separate context, the meeting touched on the negotiations that have been ongoing intermittently for months between the Ansar Allah group and Saudi Arabia to put the war in Yemen on the path to a solution.

The conflict broke out in Yemen in 2014, with the Houthis taking control of vast areas in the north of the country, including the capital, Sanaa. The following year, Saudi Arabia intervened at the head of a military coalition in support of the Yemeni government, exacerbating the conflict that left hundreds of thousands dead. The intensity of fighting has decreased significantly since the announcement of a truce in April 2022, although its effects ended after six months.

Abdul Salam said, “The latest developments in negotiation and discussion with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia were reviewed, mediated by the sister Sultanate of Oman, regarding developments in the Yemeni political process.”

For its part, the Russian Foreign Ministry noted that “the importance of intensifying international efforts to quickly create the necessary conditions to establish a full Yemeni national dialogue under the auspices of the United Nations was emphasized.”

Late last year, the Special Envoy of the UN Secretary-General to Yemen, Hans Grundberg, announced that both parties to the conflict in Yemen had committed to engaging in a UN-led peace process as part of a road map to end the war.

3.

As of today (January 25, 2024) the United States and Great Britain have launched 9 attacks consisting altogether of more than 100 missile on Yemen. To date it has had virtually no impact whatsoever on the Yemeni campaign targeting Israel-bond ships passing through the Red Sea.

As Tony Shaffer a former Department of Defense Intelligence officer (wearing a nostalgic “Reagan for President” t-shirt in an interview with Judge Napolitano noted, that by attacking the Houthis the Biden Administration gives the appearance of progress even if they accomplished nothing militarily. Referring condescendingly to the missile attacks as “military virtue signaling” Shaffer went on to argue that they were more about “narrative management” of what the Administration wants Americans to believe rather than “inconvenient facts”.

With 12% of global shipping passing through the Red Sea cut in half within less than a month both Washington and London were pressured to “do something” to suggest they still are in control of the situation – which they aren’t.

Shaffer is right about the uselessness of the U.S. bombing campaign against Ansar Allah in Yemen. But as he develops his argument, claiming he’s against going to war against Iran, (at least not now?) he is for finding ways to pressure Iran … ie, pressuring Iran will bring Ansar Allah back in line. Two quick points: 1. the other way to end the bombing of Israeli-bond ships through Bab El Mandeb, related as it is to Israel’s murderous campaign in Gaza, is to press Israel (and the Palestinians) to accept a serious ceasefire with teeth. 2. So Iran “controls” Ansar Allah? that makes me laugh and as a former Department of Defense analyst, I’m surprised he doesn’t know that – frankly I expect he does – he doesn’t discuss it publicly.

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