US Helped Build ISIS – Provide Weapons from U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, Libya

Photo: Hillary Clinton with the “Libyan rebels”.

During an appearance on Fox News, General Thomas McInerney acknowledged that the United States “helped build ISIS” as a result of the group obtaining weapons from the Benghazi consulate in Libya which was attacked by jihadists in September 2012.

Asked what he thought of the idea of arming so-called “moderate” Syrian rebels after FSA militants kidnapped UN peacekeepers in the Golan Heights, McInerney said the policy had been a failure.

“We backed I believe in some cases, some of the wrong people and not in the right part of the Free Syrian Army and that’s a little confusing to people, so I’ve always maintained….that we were backing the wrong types.”

Then made reference to a Bret Baier Fox News special set to air on Friday which will, “show some of those weapons from Benghazi ended up in the hands of ISIS – so we helped build ISIS,” said

In May last year, Senator Rand Paul was one of the first to speculate that the truth behind Benghazi was linked to an illicit arms smuggling program that saw weapons being trafficked to terrorists in Syria as part of the United States’ proxy war against the Assad regime.

“I’ve actually always suspected that, although I have no evidence, that maybe we were facilitating arms leaving Libya going through Turkey into Syria,” Paul told CNN, adding that he “never….quite understood the cover-up — if it was intentional or incompetence”.

At the same time it emerged that the U.S. State Department had hired an Al-Qaeda offshoot organization, the February 17th Martyrs Brigade, to “defend” the Benghazi Mission months before the attack.

Senator Paul was vindicated less than three months later when it emerged that the CIA had been subjecting its operatives to monthly polygraph tests in an effort to keep a lid on details of the arms smuggling operation being leaked.

CNN subsequently reported that dozens of CIA agents were on the ground in Benghazi during the attack and that the polygraph tests were mandated in order to prevent operatives from talking to Congress or the media about a program that revolved around “secretly helping to move surface-to-air missiles out of Libya, through Turkey, and into the hands of Syrian rebels.” Key Syrian rebel leaders later defected to join ISIS.

In addition to ISIS obtaining weapons from Benghazi, many members of the group were also trained by the United States at a secret base in Jordan in 2012.

Aaron Klein was told by Jordanian officials that, “dozens of future ISIS members were trained at the time as part of covert aid to the insurgents targeting the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in Syria.”

As we have previously documented, many of the United States’ biggest allies in the region, including Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Turkey and Qatar, have all bankrolled and armed ISIS militants.

Paul Joseph Watson is the editor at large of Infowars.com and Prison Planet.com.

Source GlobalResearch

Deaths Saudi officers as Houthi rebels in Yemen attack Saudi border

Houthi rebels in Yemen have fired a mortar round at a Saudi Arabian border post, killing three Saudi officers and wounding two others, Saudi Arabia's Defence Ministry says.
A statement from the ministry on Saturday said that the incident took place the previous day in the Saudi border province of Najran.
The Saudi forces responded with gunfire, the statement said.
The ministry statement also said that since its campaign against the Houthis began last month, 500 Houthi fighters had been killed in clashes along the border.
Earlier this month, three Saudi border guards were killed in separate fighting with the Houthis.
Clashes in Aden
Meanwhile, in Aden, more than two dozen fighters and civilians died in fighting between Houthi rebels and gunmen loyal to President Abd Rabbu Mansour Hadi, as the Saudi-led coalition intensified its air strikes in and around Yemen's capital Sanaa.
The coalition said that it was targeting suspected weapons storage sites used by the Houthis.
The air raids, which hit the Defence Ministry and facilities including al-Hafa military camp, lasted for several hours, Sanaa residents told the Reuters news agency.
The Republican Guard was also targeted in the 17th straight day of coalition air strikes on the country.
The strikes came after fierce clashes in Aden killed at least 25 people, Agence France-Presse news agency reported.
Despite the fighting, planes carrying medical aid desperately needed by civilians have finally been able to land for the first time since the air strikes began more than two weeks ago.
SOURCE Al JAZEERA

U.S and its allies failed to target the epicentres of jihad -- Saudi Arabia and Pakistan.

 

The Arabs opposed the Ottomans and sided with the allied powers in the First World War in the hope of getting the right to self determination.

Veteran foreign correspondent Patrick Cockburn (65), who has reported from the Middle East since 1979, has three full-length books on Iraq already to his credit. This monograph on the rise of the ultra-jihadist Islamic State builds on his reportage for The Independent and long-form writing for the London Review of Books.

It attributes the birth of IS to the belligerence shown by the West following the 9/11 attacks. It makes clear that it was not 9/11 but the reaction of U.S and its allies to the attacks that made al-Qaeda’s rise and expansion inevitable, giving birth to other splinter groups, including the most recent and the most violent one. Cockburn says that if the West’s war on terror has been a spectacular failure, it is because of its failure to target the epicentres of jihad -- Saudi Arabia and Pakistan.

Two recent developments that Cockburn says provided fertile breeding ground for the IS are: marginalisation of the Sunnis in Iraq; and the hijacking of the Syrian uprising by jihadists. In both cases, Wahhabi Islam, a puritanical form patronised and exported by the House of Saud, provided the ideological fuel.

It is clear from the pessimism expressed by the book about the future of the region that questions behind the rise of the groups like IS need to go beyond those merely focused on security and stability: they need to take into account colonial ambitions that were instrumental in creation of the nations as such. For, isn’t the rise of non-state actors in the Middle East a product of the way the states were organised there 100 years ago?

The Arabs opposed the Ottomans and sided with the allied powers in the First World War in the hope of getting the right to self determination. However, they were used as strategic bargaining chips by the victors. The application of Sykes-Picot line to divide the region into French and the British spheres of influence was matched in its mendacity only by the Treaty of Versailles signed a few years later. The people of the region were left betrayed.

As written by T.E. Lawrence -- Lawrence of Arabia -- and quoted by Robert Fisk in The Great War For Civilisation, the Arabs did not risk their lives in battle simply to “change masters.” They wanted independence of their own.

Their experiments with puppet administrations started in 1922 when Britain installed King Feisal — neither an Iraqi nor a Shia — in Shia-majority Iraq. Robert Fisk calls this “our first betrayal of the Shias of Iraq.” There were more betrayals in store, resulting in societies, with a glorious record of coexistence, getting split further along sectarian lines. Cockburn foresees balkanisation of the region into Shia, Sunni and Kurdish enclaves where the ‘other’ is targeted. Here, he fears we may see a repeat of the carnage that accompanied India’s partition. However, military interventions in the form of air strikes continue, in the hope of defeating the enemy. Assuming that IS can be defeated by military means, a question that arises is: What could be done to prevent the future emergence of such groups? This book doesn’t provide many answers but the corpus of literature on the region does.

The West needs to attempt a genuine reconciliation with its erstwhile colonies and present-day clients. The next year will mark a century since the Sykes-Picot pact was signed. Serious reflection on what went wrong with the re-organisation of the states in the region needs to take place. This has to involve acceptance of historical blame.

The superpowers need to learn from history that Iraq and Syria are progenies of civilisations which a rich culture of tolerance and state building. The Mesopotamian civilisation, as fabulously documented by Jared Diamond in the rambunctious read, Guns, Germs and Steel, had a centralised state as early as 3500 BC.

The rich Mediterranean climate of Tigris and Euphrates valleys and the emergence of writing and irrigation technologies led to the formation of complex political organisations. What explains the irony that, in a region which has inherited such a sophisticated system of state building, the most popular party is a non-state actor?

The prime reason is the encumbrances thrown in the path of nationalist movements, first by colonial powers like Ottoman Turkey and Britain and later by post-colonial ones like U.S. and Soviet Union, which prevented the rise of modern institutions. Alas, U.S. and its allies show collective amnesia when it comes to history. The IS has numerous enemies but, as Cockburn says, they are disunited and have varying ideologies. IS is neither Islamic nor a state but to “degrade and ultimately destroy” it, as President Barack Obama put it, the West has to allow the organic evolution of genuine states, where Islam and democracy can both be allowed to play a role and where national aspirations, not external interests, provide the binding force.

Saudi-led air strikes failed to stop Houthis capture Ataq city

 

Houthi fighters, backed by supporters of former Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh, have entered the provincial capital of the Shabwa province in eastern Yemen, despite intense Saudi-led air strikes against the group.
Residents said local tribal chiefs and security officials facilitated the entry of the Houthi forces to the city of Ataq on Thursday, where they took control of the offices of the local government and security forces compounds.
It was the first time that the Houthis and their allies had entered the city, bringing them closer to the country's most prized economic asset, the Belhaf natural gas facility and export terminal, on the Arabian Sea about 160 km to the southeast.

A great nation like Yemen will not submit to bombing. Come, let us all think about ending war. Let us think about a ceasefire...Let us prepare to bring Yemenis to the negotiating table. Hassan Rouhani, Iranian president

Saudi Arabia, backed by four Gulf Arab states and other regional Arab allies, has mounted two weeks of air strikes against the Houthis, who have since pushed south towards Aden, the stronghold of Saudi-backed Yemeni President Abd Rabbu Mansour Hadi.
The air campaign failed to stop the Houthis and soldiers loyal to Saleh entering central Aden, but the coalition says it has cut Houthi supply lines, destroyed weapons depots and pushed them back in some southern provinces around Aden.
Meanwhile, the World Health Organisation (WHO) says at least 643 people have died and more than 2,200 have been injured in the conflict so far.
Tens of thousands of families have also been displaced and the WHO has warned that the situation in the Arabian Peninsula nation is critical.
In a speech on Thursday in Tehran, Iran's President Hassan Rouhani called for an end to the air strikes in Yemen, saying countries in the region should work towards a political solution.
"A great nation like Yemen will not submit to bombing. Come, let us all think about ending war. Let us think about a ceasefire...Let us prepare to bring Yemenis to the negotiating table," he said.
Saudi Arabia and its Gulf allies accuse Iran of arming the Houthi fighters but Iran denies the allegations.
Al-Qaeda continues its advance
Earlier in the day, residents of al-Siddah district in central Yemen said they woke to find al-Qaeda flags flying over local government offices, Reuters news agency reported.
They said a group of al-Qaeda gunmen led by a local commander known as Ma'mour al-Hakem, took over the district at night. Residents said the Houthis, who had been in control of the town for more than two months, retreated without a fight.
The United States defence secretary has said that the escalated conflict has provided al-Qaeda with an "opportunity" to gain new territory in Yemen. This is despite confirmation from the US that it is expediting advanced arms shipments to Saudi Arabia.
Against this backdrop of escalating tensions, the first medical supplies have started arriving in Aden: the medical aid group Doctors Without Borders said they have made it to some of the city's hospitals.
It said a boat carrying 2.5 tonnes of medicine had docked in Aden, the first shipment the group has delivered to the city since the fighting there escalated.
For its part, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said that a surgical team also arrived by boat on Wednesday in Aden.
"It's nearly catastrophic," Marie Claire Feghali, ICRC's spokesperson in Yemen, told Reuters news agency.
"Shops are closed, so people cannot get food, they cannot get water. There are still dead bodies in the street. Hospitals are extremely exhausted."
Source Al jazeera

The United States is supplying intelligence to the Saudi-led coalition now steps up arms for Saudi campaign in Yemen

 

The United States is supplying intelligence to the Saudi-led coalition bombing rebel positions in Yemen and will expedite arms supplies to the alliance, Deputy Secretary of State Tony Blinken has said.

Blinken told reporters in the Saudi capital Riyadh on Tuesday that Saudi Arabia was sending a "strong message to the Houthis and their allies that they cannot overrun Yemen by force".

"As part of that effort, we have expedited weapons deliveries, we have increased our intelligence sharing, and we have established a joint coordination planning cell in the Saudi operation centre," Blinken said. 

At the Pentagon in Washington, Colonel Steve Warren, spokesperson, said the US was looking to deliver munitions to its allies, including by accelerating pre-existing orders.
"It's a combination of pre-existing orders made by our partner nations and some new requirements as they expend munitions," Warren said, asked about Blinken's remarks.

The Houthi rebels swept into the Yemeni capital Sanaa in September and have since tried to expand their control across the country. In February, they placed President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi under house arrest before he fled to his power base in the southern city of Aden and then to Saudi Arabia. 

Yemen's humanitarian crisis worsens as aid delayed.

Blinken's comments came hours after the International Committee of the Red Cross flew medical personnel for the first time into Yemen amid delays that have worsened the humanitarian situation in Aden.

Fierce fighting between militias loyal to Hadi and and the Houthis has been raging in the port city for days.
Russia has presented a draft resolution at the UN Security Council seeking "humanitarian pauses" in the air strikes against the rebels.
'Catastrophic' situation 
The Red Cross warned on Tuesday of a "catastrophic" situation in Aden, as the rebels and their allies made a new push on a port in the central Mualla district of the city but were forced back by Hadi loyalists, witnesses said.
Naval forces of the Saudi-led coalition, which launched air strikes on March 26 in support of Hadi's beleaguered government, shelled rebel positions across the city, witnesses added.
Saudi Arabia's ambassador to the UN, Abdullah al-Mouallimi told Al Jazeera that the Houthis were responsible for civilian casualties.
"We have a situation where Houti militia are operating from heavily populated areas...most of the casualties that we know are happening in civilian areas that are being shelled by the Houthis and their allies. As far as we are concerned we are doing everything possible to make sure medical supplies are being delivered," he said
More than a 100,000 people have fled their homes after the Saudi-led coalition launched air strikes in Yemen, according to UNICEF, the UN agency responsible for children welfare.
A spokesman from the agency, Rajat Madhok, told Al Jazeera that most of those who have been displaced are women and children.
"Most displacements have taken place from and within al-Dhale, Abyan, Amran, Saada, Hajja. The displaced persons are mostly being hosted with relatives," Madhok said.

In a statement published on Tuesday, UNICEF said 74 children caught up in fighting had been killed and another 44 maimed since March 26.
"These are conservative figures and UNICEF believes that the total number of children killed is much higher," the statement read.
The agency's Yemen representative, Julien Harneis, said children were paying an "intolerable" price, and said more needed to be done to protect them.
"These children should be immediately afforded special respect and protection by all parties to the conflict, in line with international humanitarian law," Harneis said.
Source Al jazeera

UN: Yemen Air strikes displaced new 100,000 peoples.

 

More than a 100,000 people have fled their homes after Saudi-led coalition air strikes began in Yemen, according to UNICEF.
A spokeman from the UN agency, Rajat Madhok, told Al Jazeera that most of those who have been displaced are women and children.
"Most displacements have taken place from and within al-Dhale, Abyan, Amran, Saada, Hajja. The displaced persons are mostly being hosted with relatives," Madhok said.
In a statement published on Tuesday, UNICEF, the UN agency that provides humanitarian assistance to children and mothers, said 74 children caught up in fighting had been killed and another 44 maimed since March 26.
"These are conservative figures and UNICEF believes that the total number of children killed is much higher," the statement read.
The agency's Yemen representative, Julien Harneis, said children were paying an "intolerable" price, and said more needed to be done to protect them.
"These children should be immediately afforded special respect and protection by all parties to the conflict, in line with international humanitarian law,” Harneis said.
Aden clashes
The comments came as Houthi rebels and forces backing President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi engaged in fierce clashes in the country's south, reportedly leaving more than 140 people dead in 24 hours on Monday.
Citing unnamed officials, the AFP news agency reported that 17 civilians were among those killed.
The clashes happened in Aden, a power base for Hadi, who fled to Saudi Arabia, as the fighters from the Zaydi Shia sect, expanded their control across the country.

Relief workers have warned of a dire situation in the impoverished Arabian Peninsula state, where a Saudi-led coalition is waging an air war on the Iran-backed rebels.  

The International Committee for the Red Cross (ICRC) said that one passenger plane carrying staff was able to land in Sanaa on Monday, but that the organisation has not yet been able to find a cargo plane operator to fly supplies into the country.
Sitara Jabeen, the ICRC's spokesperson, told Al Jazeera that the humanitarian situation was worsening.

"The situation in Yemen remains extremely critical. The conflict ... has intensified, especially in Aden. We are still trying to find a cargo plane that can carry our supplies to Sanaa," said Jabeen, speaking from the Yemeni capital.

The Saudi-led coalition has bombed Houthi positions since March 26 and has dropped weapons to Hadi loyalists, but the rebels continue to put up resistance and have said they will accept peace talks only if the aerial attacks stop.
The Houthis swept into Sanaa in September and put Hadi under house arrest before he fled to Aden and then to Saudi Arabia. Backed by militias loyal to former president Ali Abdullah Saleh, they control large swaths of Yemen, which is also grappling with al-Qaeda.
Al Jazeera

Yemen's Shiite rebels capture presidential palace in Aden

 

SANAA, Yemen (AP) — Yemeni security officials say Shiite rebels and their allies have captured the presidential palace in Aden following heavy clashes in the commercial center of this southern coastal city.
Thursday's capture came despite week-long airstrikes in Yemen by a Saudi-led coalition trying to halt the advance of the rebels known as Houthis.
Aden's Maasheeq palace is a cluster of colonial-era villas perched atop a rocky hill that juts into the Arabian Sea. The palace was President Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi's last seat of power before he fled to Saudi Arabia last month amid the Houthi advance.
The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media.
AP

18,000 Palestinian refugees traped by IS militants at Yarmouk in Syria

Islamic State (IS) militants have entered the Palestinian refugee camp Yarmouk in Damascus, activists and Palestinian officials say.

Clashes erupted between the militants and groups inside the camp, with IS seizing control of large parts of the camp, reports said.
The UN says about 18,000 Palestinian refugees are inside the camp.
IS militants have seized large swathes of territory in eastern Syria and across northern and western Iraq.
Yarmouk residents told BBC Arabic that members of Aknaf Beit al-Maqdis, a group formed by Palestinian militiamen opposed to the Syrian government, were leading the fight against the IS militants, along with some Free Syrian Army fighters.
IS fighters had seized control of large parts of the camp, an official with the Palestine Liberation Organisation based in Damascus, and the UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, said.
There has been no official statement from IS about the move.
Members of the self-proclaimed Islamic State stormed into the southern side of Yarmouk camp in the early hours of the morning and clashed with the Palestinian brigade, Aknaf Beit al-Maqdis.
Reports suggest they came in from the area of Hajar al-Aswad in the south of the capital. There has been no evidence in the past that IS had any foothold in Damascus.
The Palestinian Ambassador to Damascus, Anwar Abdulhadi, told the BBC that the group had seized the area of the camp near the Palestine Hospital.
Most information is coming from Palestinian officials in areas under government control.
The attack comes days before a deal to ease the humanitarian situation for civilians in the camp was set to come into operation.

Extreme hardship'

First built for Palestinians fleeing the 1948 Arab-Israeli war, Yarmouk was once considered by many to be the de facto capital of the Palestinian refugee diaspora.
Prior to the Syrian civil war, it had more than 150,000 refugees living there, and its own mosques, schools and public buildings.
However, the camp has been besieged by fighting between government troops and rebel forces since 2012.
Unrwa, a UN relief agency for Palestinian refugees, says about 18,000 refugees remain trapped in the camp, with inadequate access to food supplies, clean water and electricity.
In March, Unrwa said: "The extreme hardship faced by Palestine refugees in Yarmouk, but also in other locations in Syria as a result of the armed conflict is, from a human point of view, unacceptable."

War on Terror, War on Muslims?

US President Barack Obama is vowing to "degrade, and ultimately destroy" a terrorist group destabilising the Middle East he says could threaten Americans at home.
Sound familiar? George W Bush made a similar vow, yet more than a decade after launching the so-called War on Terror, both the war and the terror are still raging.
Obama says the fight against the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) will be different than the two wars started by Bush. But Muslims looked at with suspicion around the world are wondering, how different will their treatment be?
What is the impact of increasing surveillance of Muslim communities, banning Islamic dress and equating a religion with a threat? Do the counter-terror measures adopted by the US, Britain and France erode the very democratic principles considered the pillars of a "free" society?
Marwan Bishara asks what happens when the War on Terror turns inward, and prolonged military action abroad turns into a culture of fear at home.

Source: Al Jazeera

After refugee camp, now Yemen factory workers killed in Hodaida air strike

 

An air strike on Yemen's Red Sea port of Hodaida has killed 23 workers at a dairy factory, medical sources said, in what appears to be one of the biggest cases of civilian deaths in a Saudi-led campaign against Houthi rebels.
Residents near the Hodaida dairy factory said it was located near an army camp loyal to former president Ali Abdullah Saleh, while medical sources in the city said the casualties had all been workers at the plant. The strike on Tuesday night had also destroyed a fuel store, the residents told Reuters news agency.
The incident is believed to have been part of an aerial campaign by Saudi Arabia and other Sunni Muslim states to stop Houthi fighters and former president winning control of the country and reinstating Saudi-backed President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi.
However, after seven nights of bombings targeting both the Houthis and forces loyal to Saleh, the coalition has not managed to secure Hadi's control over his last remaining enclave of rule in the southern port of Aden, a key aim of the campaign.
The sound of gunfire and several large blasts were heard in Aden throughout the night, the Reuters news agency reported. Videos posted online, which could not be immediately confirmed, appeared to show fighting at an army base loyal to Saleh in the northeast of the city.
A raid at a coastal defence station at Maidi port in Hajja province north of Hodaida killed six soldiers, workers there said, while further strikes hit an army camp in Sanaa and a government facility in Saadeh in the north of Yemen.
In New York, the UN said late on Tuesday that at least 62 children had been killed and 30 wounded in fighting over the past week, and that an attack on a refugee camp in northern Yemen, which medics blamed on an air strike, broke international law.
UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra'ad Al Hussein warned the country was "on the verge of total collapse".
Indians evacuated
Meanwhile, an Indian naval patrol boat picked up nearly 350 Indian nationals from the port of Aden on Tuesday night, and was expected to arrive in Djibouti during the day, a spokesman for the Ministry of External Affairs said.
More than 4,000 Indians are believed to have been in Yemen when Saudi Arabia launched air strikes last week.
Negotiations are under way to allow evacuation flights into Sanaa, where the Indian community is concentrated, and receive permission to evacuate more from Hodaida, the spokesman said.
Reuters

What they won't admit at the Arab Summit

About the Author

Marwan Bishara

Marwan Bishara is the senior political analyst at Al Jazeera.


Rhetoric and reality
The Arab League Summit has convened just as the region reached the summit of instability, division and violence as a result of the actions of many of those and other Middle Eastern leaders. But don't expect Arab leaders to take responsibility for the dreadful situation they helped bring about - absolutely not.
Instead, much of the blame was directed at "external" forces and the extremists and the terrorists who, in the words of Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah el-Sisi, exploited certain "shortcomings" of Arab governance (i.e. repressive authoritarianism) to try and gain control.

Sisi: Arab nations to create joint military force

It's no wonder the leaders went on to speak of the importance of unity, stability and dialogue, while emphasizing mostly military solutions.
Arab military force
The one concrete conclusion of the Arab Summit is the call for the establishment of a joint Arab military force even though the whole region is suffering from an excess of violence that's affecting and even destroying the lives of countless people.
How will this force be assembled; who will finance it and what are its objectives is not clear in the absence of any blueprints. But what is clear is that there's no precedence for such a joint force, and the Arabs don't have the means, experience or expertise to put in motion the kind of sophisticated logistical and operational plans that allow different militaries to work jointly.
And since this force is not expected to confront Israel or Iran on the battlefield, one assumes it's meant to fight the kind of asymmetrical wars as in Syria or more specifically, Yemen where the Saudis intervened, or Libya where Egypt is so keen to intervene. That is sure to plunge the region into an ever more protracted war.
'Happy Yemen'
Although violence continues to spiral out of control in Syria, Iraq and Libya, it's Yemen that has dominated the Arab League discussion following the Saudi military intervention there. Long known in the Arab world as "al-Yemen as-Said" - or Happy Yemen - the country is a terribly unhappy place as it's transformed, once again, into a battlefield for external and internal forces.

Long known in the Arab world as 'al-Yemen as-Said' - or Happy Yemen - the country is a terribly unhappy place as it's transformed, once again, into a battlefield for external and internal forces.

The Arab Summit has lent its support to Saudi Arabia in its declared effort to stem the tide of the Iranian supported Houthis that endanger national Saudi and Arab security, according to the League.
But how will the Arab nations react if or when the situation in Yemen continues to deteriorate and the Houthis, supported by Tehran, put up major resistance?
Well, already, Iran's allies in Iraq and elsewhere have expressed opposition to foreign military intervention in Yemen or other nations, which is rather puzzling, considering the present Iraqi government has welcomed military intervention in its own country.
It remains to be seen whether the League's attempt at establishing a new Arab order passes the test of Yemen.
Saudi gamble
The fact that it's Saudi Arabia that has shaken off the passivity and defensiveness of the Arabs vis-a-vis Iran's rising influence is both telling and surprising.
It's telling because of the way it exposed what has been known for so many years, notably that Saudi Arabia and Iran have been locked in a Middle Eastern cold war that involved supporting clients and allies in proxy conflicts and wars that destabilised the region.
And it's surprising because the Saudis, who generally outsourced their missions to others, including to the Americans, are for the first time leading a major war with unknown consequences to national and regional stability.
This Saudi gamble seems to turn the tables against Iran, at least in its initial phase, and it has put Riyadh in a much more comfortable strategic position than it was in only a few days ago when the Iranians were gaining all but direct control in Yemen and access to the Red Sea.
Iranian overreach
Most of those present at the Arab League Summit believe that Iran has been overzealous in the way it has intervened in various Arab nations including Lebanon, Syria, Iraq and more recently, Yemen. Tehran has been gaining strategic confidence and regional momentum thanks to George W Bush's failures in Iraq since 2003, and Barack Obama's attempt at reaching a nuclear deal and eventually political rapprochement with the Islamic Republic.
But the Ayatollahs' overreach in Iraq and Syria and their boasting of a new Iranian dominated regional order have sent shock waves across the region and united both Arab and non-Arab states against them. Turkish and Pakistani support for Saudi Arabia in Yemen is sure to weaken Iran's position in the region regardless of whether it reaches a deal with the United States. Well, at least for the time being.

Yemeni Foreign Minister Riad Yassin [AP]

Although quite pragmatic, it remains to be seen how the Iranians will react to the Saudi intervention over the longer run.
The missing elephant
Unlike most other summits over the last half a century, when the Arabs obsessed about the United States, Washington was largely missing from the deliberations and plans of the summiteers.
Indeed, much of the discussion about Yemen, Libya and Syria were driven by the lack of US dependability and the need for the Arabs to act on their own first, rather than wait for US initiatives.
For the first time since their independence, the Arabs are acting not as friends or foes of the United States, and are not taking instructions from Washington regarding their next moves. Instead, the US seems to lend a hand to those who act on their own and in coordination with others to establish order or stability that is conducive to US interests. This might encourage the Iranians to act more vigorously against ISIL in Iraq, nudge the Egyptians to act in Libya, and encourage the Turks to act in Syria.
Forgotten Palestine
Despite Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas's terribly pessimistic review of the situation in Palestine and his emphasis on losing Jerusalem for good, the summiteers have repeated the same tired cliches about Palestine and peace as if either are possible to attain in negotiations with the Netanyahu government (with the exception of the Emir of Qatar or proposed abandoning unworkable initiatives in return for serious international pressure to lift the siege on Gaza and force Israel to recognise the Palestinian State).
Palestine that has long spearheaded all Arab summits has taken the backseat because of the Arabs' preoccupation with countless disasters and challenges on their hands. But more importantly, because of their incompetence and lack of seriousness towards Palestine. And of course towards Syria.
Invisible Arabs
As the summiteers focused their attention on the mostly self-generated regional instability and violence, they did pay some lip service to the important issues of everyday Arabs, including development, justice and freedoms.
Indeed, much of the lofty talk about an Arab military force, combatting terrorism and attaining stability is the antithesis to the peoples' yearning for liberty, dignity and human rights.
Alas, by emphasizing the security issues, most of those present at the Arab League Summit were mostly eager to turn the page on the Arab Spring and its calls for democracy.

Houthis of Yemen threaten Saudi Arabia with suicide bombings

Shia fighters threaten to undertake suicide operations in the kingdom if Saudi-led airstrikes in Yemen continue.

 

Yemen's Houthi fighters have threatened to undertake suicide bombings in Saudi Arabia if the kingdom continues to launch airstrikes against the group's positions.
Abdel Mon'em Al-Qurashi, a senior member of the Houthis Executive Committee, said on Saturday that the group would destroy the Saudi regime for its "aggressive" policies, Iran's Fars news agency reported.

"If Saudi Arabia continues its aggressions against the oppressed Yemeni people, [Houthi] fighters will pave the way for the Saudi regime's destruction by conducting martyrdom-seeking operations inside Saudi Arabia in the coming hours," Quraishi told Fars.

The threat came as the spokesman for the Arab coalition bombing Houthi targets in Yemen, Brigadier General Ahmed Asiri, said Houthi fighters were mobilising towards the Saudi border.
"Saudi forces are trying to deter the Houthis from mobilising in areas near Jizan and Najran using artillery and apache helicopters," Asiri said.
"We will not allow the Houthis to bring their forces near the southern border of Saudi Arabia."
Saudi-led airstrikes have bombed Houthi targets for three consecutive nights, in what they call Operation Decisive Storm, after assembling a coalition of more than 10 countries, five of them members of the six-nation Gulf Cooperation Council.
On Saturday, airstrikes hit Sanaa International Airport and the adjoining military airport, causing damage to planes, airport infrastructure and runways.
The airstrikes hit multiple provinces in Yemen, including Houthi strongholds and the bases of army units loyal to the group's main ally, former President Ali Abdullah Saleh.
In the southern coastal city of Aden, several people were killed on Saturday after a series of blasts rocked an arms depot at the foot of Jabal Hadid mountain overlooking Aden.
The cause was not immediately clear but residents had been looting the arsenal of Soviet-era weapons.
Troops guarding the depot had abandoned their posts earlier this week after their commanders fled.
According to the Houthi-run interior ministry, at least 24 civilians were killed in Friday's strikes, bringing the toll from Thursday and Friday to 45 civilians.
The figures of civilian and combatant casualties could not be independently confirmed, though Amnesty International said at least six children were among those killed in Sanaa on Thursday.
Al Jazeera

Another Human Crisis- The regional war in Yemen

Yet another Arab nation faces a humanitarian crisis following military conflict, as the localised war between various forces in Yemen has taken on a regional dimension. After the besieged Yemeni government requested help, the Gulf Cooperation Council, led by Saudi Arabia, launched air attacks against Houthi rebel positions in Yemen on March 26. The Saudis have deployed a large force with help from Arab countries such as Egypt and Jordan and others such as Pakistan and Sudan. This military action — without UN sanction — has also involved logistical help from the United States. The ostensible reason for the Saudi intervention is to temper the rising Iranian influence in its immediate neighbourhood. The U.S. involvement — which seems to have bipartisan support in the U.S. polity — is more of a reflexive reaction to register support for its Saudi allies and for the besieged transitional government in Yemen. Saudi Arabia and its allies who have joined the effort allege that the Houthis are being funded and armed by Iran.

The Houthis are a Zaidi Shia group that had participated in uprisings against former Yemeni President and long-time ruler Abdullah Saleh and who had felt left out from the transitional government that followed Saleh’s rule. It is the failure of the transitional government — which was set up with help from the Gulf Cooperation Council in 2012 — to accommodate the Houthis’ interests that fuelled the insurgency. The Houthis have a large degree of control over many areas of northwestern Yemen, including over the capital, Sana'a. The Houthi-led insurgency is not the only military conflict raging in Yemen. The al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) leads another insurgency in the southeast along with the Ansar al-Sharia; this one is a Sunni Islamist rebellion. The regional intervention against the Houthis is bound to strengthen the AQAP. The inability of the ineffectual transitional government to effectively govern a nation that has steadily been divided on sectarian lines, and the weakening of the economy, have helped the various insurgent forces strengthen themselves. The Houthi forces’ consolidation in the south could have presented an opportunity for a new, more inclusive and legitimate government following a ceasefire, but that option is now ruled out as the conflict has been effectively regionalised with the Saudi intervention. Yemen increasingly appears to be heading towards Syria’s fate — a nation torn asunder into enclaves controlled by sectarian and fundamentalist groups and constantly at war among one another. What started as yet another promising chapter of the Arab Spring has now taken a turn that follows events elsewhere in the region — regression into a harsh Arab Winter. 

The Hindu Editorial 

Conflict between Iran and Saudi Arabia ---A war of all against all

 

 Hisham Melhem is the bureau chief of Al Arabiya News Channel in Washington, DC.

It has come to pass that in that long arc stretching from North Africa, through the Fertile Crescent and all the way to Yemen all is falling down. States, and non-state actors, sects and tribes, as well as armies, marauding killers, fanatic legionnaires, proxies and millenarians waving swords while hallucinating about the end of time, all are locked in a dizzying free fall with no deliverance in sight. In the past an ‘Arab Cold War’ raged between conservatives monarchies allied with the U.S. and Arab nationalist republics allied with the Soviet Union, there were also limited civil wars, and cross border clashes, and a number of Arab-Israeli wars, and fleeting Western sponsored alliances.

The conflict between Iran and Saudi Arabia while it is framed by many as a sectarian one is in fact a political conflict over national security interests and influence.
Hisham Melhem

And while at times the political rhetoric sounded apocalyptic, and some wars like the Iran-Iraq war kept smoldering for years, the regional order did not collapse and those states whose borders were drawn as ‘lines in the sands’ proved resilient. But the current cataclysmic, multiple battlefields within and across borders have led to unprecedented disintegration of the state system and the fragmentation of societies, with the cancer of sectarianism spreading particularly in a very ailing Arab body politics. It shall come to pass also, that since it took decades of political dysfunction, economic and cultural stagnation and repressive governance to bring the Arabs to this nadir and the region to this impasse that it will take decades for these complex struggles to run their courses, and for the sectarian, political, ethnic and regional fault lines to settle into new patterns after the total exhaustion of the warriors.
The sad collapse of Arabia Felix
In the second decade of the twenty first century, the most common form of warfare in the Middle East (and South Asia) has been that of the phenomenon of the non-state actors battling each other’s while fighting and or receiving aid from their state sponsors. Sometimes these non-state actors act independently, (The Islamic State ISIS) but in many cases they act as powerful proxies (Hezbollah in Lebanon) to states unwilling to risk all, in all-out conventional conflicts. The decision by the countries of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) led by Saudi Arabia along with other Arab and Sunni majority states like Pakistan to militarily intervene in Yemen in support of the Yemeni government against the Houthi rebellion supported by Iran, will be seen –regardless of how the military campaign unfolds- as a milestone in the current cataclysmic regional wars, stretching the front of Sunni-Shiite bloodletting from Yemen on the Indian Ocean, through Bahrain, Iraq, Syria and ending in Lebanon on the Mediterranean Sea. This nascent coalition, which was brought about partially by America’s reluctance to check Iran’s regional hegemonic ambitions, represents the first attempt by regional powers, mostly majority Sunni states to check and roll back Iran’s regional gains. While it is true that Iran did not create the so-called ‘Houthi problem’ it is also true that Iran has exploited the Houthis’ political grievances and became their ally.
Yemen’s slow descent towards disintegration has been in the making for years. The long reign of the former dictator Ali Abdullah Saleh has dragged the country to civil strife and near economic collapse. Saleh’s cynical alliance with the Houthis partly explains Yemen’s full descent into civil war. The famed prosperous ancient land the Romans called Arabia Felix (happy Arabia) today is neither whole nor happy, nor prosperous. There are four Arab majority states engulfed in civil wars: Syria, Iraq, Libya and Yemen. Three of them; Syria, Iraq and Yemen have devolved into proxy wars involving the United States, Iran and many traditional friends and allies of the United States such as Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Turkey.
Into the wild
America’s decisions and alliances in the region of late have been tentative, contradictory, and tactical. The U.S. was quick to declare its support of the Saudi-led anti Houthi and anti-Iranian campaign in Yemen and lending logistical and Intelligence assistance. At the same time in Iraq, the U.S. is using its air power to cover the Shiite-led (and Iranian advised) land campaign to regain Tikrit from ISIS. In Iraq the U.S. is implicitly ‘partnering’ with Iran against ISIS. In Yemen the U.S. is publicly ‘partnering’ with the GCC against the Houthis, Iran’s friends. In Syria, the U.S. co-exists with the Assad regime, even while attacking, verbally of course, the regime’s savage use of barrel bombs and Chlorine gas, without denouncing Iran, the very country that saved the regime from imminent collapse. All the while the U.S. is very eager to reach a historic nuclear deal with Iran which will inevitably raise the ire of Arabs, Turks and Israelis.
The wars in Iraq and Yemen have forced the U.S. to make some surreal and painful decisions, ranging from reluctantly accepting the rising influence of Iraqi Shiite militias in the campaign against ISIS, to trying to destroy the American arsenal that fell into the hands of ISIS in Iraq and the Houthis in Yemen. President Obama’s words last year that America’s war against Al Qaeda in Yemen has been successful have come to haunt him. If President Obama’s decision not to hasten the fall of President Assad in Syria and to arm and equip the moderate Syrian opposition can explain in part at least his dismal record there, one can say the reverse in Yamen. Washington’s single fixation on combatting Al Qaeda in Yemen, and Obama’s failure to provide fuller and stronger support to Yemeni President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi blinded the U.S. to the rising threat of the Houthis. In Iraq, Syria and Yemen, the Obama Administration was caught off guard when it failed to see the dangerous rise of ISIS in Syria and Iraq, or the collapse of the Iraqi army last summer, or the extent of the Houthi rebellion.
The raging civil wars, the emergence of ISIS, and the deepening Sunni-Shiite conflict and the resulting proxy wars of all against all, happened on President Obama’s watch, presenting his administration with a multiplicity of crisis and tough choices. Of course, President Obama is not responsible for the collapse of the regional state system. Arabs, Iranians and others are responsible in the main for their predicament. But president Obama’s deeply flawed decisions on Syria (not to deliver on promises to the opposition or threats to Assad’s regime) and his reluctance to challenge the sectarian policies of former Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri Al-Malaki have contributed to the chaos.
A war of all against all
The conflict between Iran and Saudi Arabia while it is framed by many as a sectarian one is in fact a political conflict over national security interests and influence. Sectarianism is a powerful tool for social/political mobilization, and a lethal weapon for demonization. People rarely fight each other over theological disputations, and even when they do that, they should be reminded that at core the conflict is political and can be understood rationally. The sectarian fires have only been stoked in the last few decades, with few milestones contributing to it; the Iranian Revolution, the Iran-Iraq war, the conflict between the Islamists in Syria and the Assad dynasty since 1970, and finally the American invasion of Iraq.
Iran has been especially effective in inspiring and helping the Shiite Arabs, many of whom may have felt a sense of political empowerment following the Revolution of 1979. Iran played a crucial role in the creation, funding and training of Hezbollah in Lebanon. In the conflicts of Syria and Iraq, Iran coordinated with Hezbollah in Lebanon and used it as an auxiliary force. Similar relations were developed between Iran and Iraqi Shiite groups. To put it bluntly, Iran can and is fighting its Arab foes by deploying Arab Shiites as auxiliaries as we have seen in Syria and Iraq in the last few years. No Sunni Arab or non-Arab power can make such a claim.
In Leviathan, Thomas Hobbes paints a grim reality of life in the absence of order, a condition he called the state of nature, where the dominant rule is that there are no rules, a situation that leads to a ‘war of all against all’. The fraying or the collapse of the nation-state in the Arab world resulting in civil wars, proxy wars, the emergence of the marauding religious extremists have combined to push the region into a state of ‘war of all against all’. No Deus ex machina (a device employed in Greek tragedy allowing for divine intervention) will intervene to end this Arab tragedy. Civil wars are usually ended by one side winning the fight decisively, or when exhaustion forces a compromise or by foreign intervention. None of the regional sponsors of proxies is powerful enough to establish regional hegemony without serious challenges. There will come a moment in history where Arabs, Iranians, Turks, Israelis, Kurds and others, Sunnis and Shiites, Christian and Jews and atheists will be utterly exhausted before they realize that in a ‘war of all against all’ everyone loses. I shudder when I think that, I will not see that moment of bliss in my lifetime.

"Air strikes against Yemen have no justification except Hadi’s failure to manage the state. I hope the brothers will not bet on a losing horse."--Ali Abdullah Saleh

Former Yemeni president Ali Abdullah Saleh called on Saturday for an end to the Saudi-led Operation “Decisive Storm” being waged against Houthi militias in Yemen.
In comments addressed to Arab heads of state meeting in Cairo, Saleh called on the coalition to stop “the aggression and return to the negotiating table,” saying the current president, Abdrabbu Mansour Hadi, had failed to run the country, Reuters news agency reported.
"Let’s go to dialogue and elections, and I promise you that neither I nor any of my relatives will run for the presidency," he said.
"Air strikes against Yemen have no justification except Hadi’s failure to manage the state. I hope the brothers will not bet on a losing horse."
  Reuters

Barack Obama offered U.S. support for air strikes led by Saudi Arabia and Gulf allies on Houthi militia camps in Yemen, while Saudi and Egyptian warships move to the Bab al-Mandab strait off Yemen

 

Saudi and Egyptian warships deployed Friday to the Bab al-Mandab strait off Yemen to secure the strategic sea passage, Egyptian military officials said, as a Saudi-led coalition widened their airstrikes on the second day of an air campaign against Shiite rebels and their allies, aiming to pave the way for possible ground operations.
A top priority for the campaign after the air campaign was weakened the rebels is for coalition troops -likely Egyptians - to move into the southern port city of Aden, a main stronghold of supporters of President Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi, who was forced to leave the country as the rebels and their allies moved on Aden, Yemeni and Egyptian military officials said.
That could prove a tough prospect. On Friday, rebel fighters and their allies - military units loyal to former President Ali Abdullah Saleh - were moving through southern Abyan province toward Aden, aiming to reinforce their fighters already in the city, Yemeni security officials said. At the same time, pro-Hadi military units and militiamen were fighting rebel forces in street battles in several southern cities on Friday.

Saudi and Egyptian plans

The events Friday and the comments by the military officials, who spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity, gave an initial picture of Saudi and Egyptian plans in the conflict that abruptly burst into a regional fight on Thursday after months of chaos within Yemen.
Saudi Arabia and its allies are aiming push back the Shiite rebels, known as Houthis, and Saleh's forces, which have taken over the capital, Sanaa, and much of the mountainous, impoverished nation. The ultimate goal is to restore Hadi, who was expected to arrive in Egypt on Friday for an Arab summit the following day. Saudi Arabia fears the Houthis will give Shiite powerhouse Iran a new foothold on its southern border.
Yemeni Foreign Minister Riad Yassin said there was an “arrangement” for ground troops of the Saudi-led coalition to deploy in Yemen. “It's a comprehensive military operation,” he told the Saudi-owned Al-Arabiya news channel. He said Egyptian naval forces are heading to Bab al-Mandab.
Several Egyptian military officials told the AP that Egyptian and Saudi warships were already at or near the strait. One official said two destroyers and two other vessels were at the strait. Egypt has said securing the passage is a priority for it in the conflict, since Bab al-Mandab is the entrance to the Red Sea, leading from the Arabian Sea to its Suez Canal, a vital route for shipping between Europe and Asia.

Constant bombardment

After more than 36 hours of airstrikes by Friday afternoon, more than 40 percent of Yemen's air defenses were destroyed, according to Yemeni Brig. Gen. Saleh al-Subaihi, a pro-Hadi officer.
Yemeni security officials said around 80 fighters had been killed in the strikes - some from the Houthis, but most from among Saleh's forces. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to the press. The first salvo of airstrikes before dawn Thursday also killed 18 civilians - including six children - when they flattened a block of homes in an impoverished neighborhood near Sanaa's airport.
Diminishing Saleh's forces is a key step before any ground action. Saleh, who ruled Yemen with an autocratic hand for decades, was removed in 2012 following an Arab Spring popular uprising against him, and Hadi was installed in his place.
But Saleh remained in Yemen and maintained widespread influence, particular in the fragmented military and security forces. One Yemeni security official on Friday estimated that 70 percent of the military remained loyal to him, including many of the best trained and equipped units, and they are in bases around the country. Their support for the Houthis has been crucial to the rebels' takeover.
Airstrikes on Friday struck in at least six provinces. In the capital Sanaa, heavy airstrikes came in waves overnight, shaking the city as anti-aircrafy guns fired. New strikes hit Saada, the northern stronghold of the Houthis, aiming at locations where rebel leader Abdul-Malek al-Houthi might be, the Yemeni military officials said. The grave of his brother Hussein al-Houthi, founder of the rebel group, was demolished in the strikes. The attacks prompted Houthis to shut down schools and cancel classes indefinitely, according to a statement sent to reporters by the group.
Saudi warplanes also bombed camps and bases of pro-Saleh army forces northeast of Sanaa and in the southern provinces of al-Dhale and Lahj. In the oil- and gas-rich north-central provinces of Marib, strikes targeted radar facilities.

Vast control

Retired Yemeni army officer Nasser al-Marqashi said he expects the airstrikes to continue for a week to weaken the air defenses before a ground offensive, which would likely be launched from Aden or from the country's sparsely populated far eastern Hadramout province, where Hadi also has supporters.
Houthis and the Saleh loyalists control at least 10 of Yemen's 21 provinces. But in many of those places, their hold is not complete, particularly in the south. In Dhamar and Taiz - two areas overrun by the rebels - thousands of demonstrators staged protests Friday in support of the Saudi airstrikes.
In the southern city of al-Dhale - capital of the province of the same name - pro-Hadi militias were fighting Saleh's forces.
Battles were also going on in the southern city of al-Houta, just north of Aden. There, part of the city is controlled by pro-Hadi militias, another part is controlled by al-Qaida militants, and both were separately fighting Houthi and pro-Saleh forces trying to take the area, Yemeni security officials said.
Saudi Arabia and fellow Sunni-led allies in the Gulf and the Middle East view the Houthi takeover as an attempt by Iran to establish a proxy on the kingdom's southern border. Iran and the Houthis deny that Tehran arms the rebel movement, though it says it provides diplomatic and humanitarian support.

No direct military action

According to defense officials in Washington, the U.S. is providing refueling tankers and surveillance flights for the Saudi operations, and there are several U.S. troops working in the operations center. The White House said the U.S. was not taking direct military action.
Iran has denounced the Saudi-led air campaign, calling it “dangerous step.”
Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammed Javad Zarif said in a statement Friday that Tehran was “ready to cooperate with its brothers in the region, to make it easier for different groups in Yemen to have dialogue to protect the (country's) integrity and facilitate restoration of stability.”
The comment came after Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said in an interview that his country could provide logistical support for the Saudi-led military operation. Zarif said Iran respects its strategic relations with Turkey.
On Friday, Egypt's President Abdel Fattah el-Sissi reiterated Cairo's commitment to Gulf security in a phone call with Saudi King Salman, saying “the security of the Gulf is a red line and part and parcel of Egyptian national security,” according to presidential spokesman Alaa Youssef.
A high-level delegation from Pakistan was traveling to Saudi Arabia on Friday to hold talks on Yemen, following a meeting in Pakistan chaired by Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif to assess the situation.
“If the sovereignty or territorial integrity of Saudi Arabia is threatened, Pakistan will defend it,” Pakistani Defense Minister Khawaja Muhammad Asif told parliament in remarks carried live on state-run television. He said there had been no decision to take part in the Yemeni conflict.

President Barack Obama offered U.S. support for air strikes led by Saudi Arabia and Gulf allies on Houthi militia camps in Yemen during a phone call with King Salman, the White House said Friday.

"The President and King Salman agreed that our collective goal is to achieve lasting stability in Yemen through a negotiated political solution facilitated by the United Nations and involving all parties as envisioned in the GCC Initiative," National Security Council spokeswoman Bernadette Meehan said in a statement.

The remarks follow U.S. lawmakers of both parties reiterating their support for the Saudi-led intervention in Yemen against Houthi rebels, named “Operation Decisive Storm.”
“I applaud the Saudis for taking this action to protect their homeland and to protect their own neighborhood,” House Speaker John Boehner, a Republican, said at a news conference. “If America leads, our allies in the region would be tickled to death and would be happy to join a coalition. But America has to lead.”
The Obama administration has said it is providing “logistical and intelligence support” for the operations. Meehan had earlier justified the offensive against the Houthis as having been requested by Hadi and Yemen’s “legitimate government.”
“While U.S. forces are not taking direct military action in Yemen in support of this effort,” she said in a statement, “we are establishing a joint planning cell with Saudi Arabia to coordinate U.S. military and intelligence support.”
The White House on Thursday expressed concern about Iran's alleged role in stoking violence in Yemen. “We have concerns about Iranian activities in Yemen and reports of Iranian flow of arms into Yemen,” Alistair Baskey told Agence France-Presse.

Saudi fighter plane gets American help

Meanwhile, a Saudi fighter plane was hit by a technical problem and its two pilots ejected over the Red Sea on Friday, state media said, adding that the pair had been returned to the country with American help.
"A plane of the F-15S type was stricken by a technical fault yesterday evening over the Red Sea and the two pilots were forced to use their rescue seats," state news agency SPA quoted a defense ministry official saying.
"Praise be to God, the pilots were rescued in coordination with the American side, and the two pilots are in good health and high spirits," the official said.

‘Decisive Storm’ continues

Fighter jets of Saudi-led coalition forces pounded a Republican Guard camp in the Yemeni capital of Sanaa as Operation “Decisive Storm” continued for the second day targeting Houthi strongholds and their camps on Friday.
Saudi and Egyptian warships deployed Friday to the Bab al-Mandab strait off Yemen to secure the strategic sea passage, Egyptian military officials said, aiming to pave the way for possible ground operations, the Associated Press reported.
Earlier on Friday, Yemen’s former president Ali Abdullah Saleh - who is allied with Houthi leaders and large parts of the army - called for a ceasefire and the resumption of U.N.-brokered dialogue between warring parties.
Witnesses said an air raid by the coalition forces targeted both Houthi members and supporters of Saleh in al-Istiqbal military camp west of the capital.
“Decisive Storm” also launched its air strikes south of Yemen where Houthis and their allies are trying to expand. They targeted al-Anad military camp, which the Houthis had seized last Wednesday.

Yemen crisis escalates after Saudi Arabia bombs rebels

 

The turmoil in Yemen grew into a regional conflict on Thursday, with Saudi Arabia and its allies bombing Shia rebels allied with Iran, while Egyptian officials said a ground assault will follow the airstrikes.

Iran denounced the Saudi-led air campaign, saying it “considers this action a dangerous step,” and oil prices jumped in New York and London after the offensive.

The military action turned impoverished and chaotic Yemen into a new front in the rivalry between Saudi Arabia and Iran.

Yemen’s U.S.-backed President Abed-Rabbo Mansour Hadi, who fled the country on Wednesday as the rebels known as Houthis advanced on his stronghold in the southern port of Aden, reappeared on Thursday. He arrived by plane in Saudi Arabia’s capital of Riyadh, Saudi state TV reported.

Starting before dawn, Saudi warplanes pounded an air base, military bases and anti-aircraft positions in the capital of Sanaa and flattened a number of homes near the airport, killing at least 18 civilians, including six children. Another round followed in the evening, again rocking the city.

Rebel leader Abdul-Malik al-Houthi angrily accused the United States, Saudi Arabia and Israel of launching a “criminal, unjust, brutal and sinful” campaign aimed at invading and occupying Yemen.

“Yemenis won’t accept such humiliation,” he said in a televised speech on Thursday night, calling the Saudis “stupid” and “evil.”

The Houthis, who have taken over much of the country, mobilized thousands of supporters to protest the airstrikes, with one speaker lashing out at the Saudi-led coalition and warning that Yemen “will be the tomb” of the aggressors.

Saudi Arabia’s ambassador to the U.S. Adel al-Jubeir said at a news conference in Washington on Thursday that Iran has been a major backer of the Houthis, with Revolutionary Guard officers and operatives from the Iran-backed Lebanese militia Hezbollah on the ground advising the rebels.

White House spokesman Eric Schultz told reporters on Air Force One en route to Alabama that President Barack Obama had authorized logistical and intelligence support for the strikes, but that the U.S. is not joining with direct military action.

In the air assault codenamed “Operation Decisive Storm,” Saudi Arabia deployed some 100 fighter jets, 150,000 soldiers and other navy units, Saudi-owned Al-Arabiya TV reported. Also involved were aircraft from the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Qatar, Kuwait, Jordan, Morocco, Sudan and Egypt, though it was not clear which carried out actual strikes.

Once the airstrikes have weakened the rebels and their allies in the military forces loyal to former President Ali Abdullah Saleh, a ground invasion of Yemen is planned by Egyptian Saudi and other forces.

The assault will come from Saudi Arabia and by landings on Yemen’s coasts along the Red and Arabian seas, according to three Egyptian military and security officials.

Three to five Egyptian troop carriers are stationed offshore, they said, although the number of troops was not specified, and the timing of the operation was not given.

The aim is not to occupy Yemen but to weaken the Houthis and their allies until they enter negotiations for power-sharing, the officials said, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk about the plans with the press.

Egypt is “prepared for participation with naval, air and ground forces if necessary,” Foreign Minister Sameh Shukri said at a gathering of Arab foreign ministers preparing for a weekend summit in the Egyptian resort of Sharm el-Sheikh.

Saudi Arabia and fellow Sunni-led allies in the Gulf and the Middle East view the Houthi takeover as an attempt by Iran to establish a proxy on the kingdom’s southern border. Iran and the Houthis deny that Tehran arms the rebel movement, though it says it provides diplomatic and humanitarian support.

The Saudis and their Gulf allies on Thursday asked members of the United Nations Security Council for a resolution that would impose an arms embargo on the rebels and impose financial sanctions on individual members.

The dramatic escalation of the conflict underscores the political complexities for Washington in the Middle East-

A traditional ally of Saudi Arabia, the U.S. is trying to negotiate a nuclear deal with Iran by the end of the month.

In Iraq, the U.S. and Iran are implicitly on the same side helping the Shia-led Baghdad government battle the Sunni extremists of the Islamic State group, although Tehran and Washington are avoiding any actual contact.

In Yemen, the U.S. is backing Gulf Arab states against the Shia rebels allied to Iran. At the same time, the al-Qaeda branch in the country the target of a U.S. drone campaign is also fighting the Shia rebels.

Iran condemned the airstrikes that left “innocent Yemenis wounded and dead, and considers this action a dangerous step,” said Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Marzieh Afkham. “This invasion will bear no result but expansion of terrorism and extremism throughout the whole region.”

Yemen plays a crucial geographic role in the world’s oil supply, with tankers that go through the Suez Canal having to navigate around the country. The turmoil caused the price of benchmark U.S. crude to jump $2.22, closing at $51.43 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Brent crude, a benchmark for international oils, rose $2.71 to $59.19 a barrel in London.

Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Emirates, Qatar and Bahrain said their action aimed to “protect” Yemenis from Houthis who are “a tool in the hands of foreign powers.”

In recent months, the Houthis have swept out of their northern strongholds to take over Sanaa and much of the north.

The Houthis have succeeded in their advance with help from Saleh, the autocrat who ruled Yemen for more than 30 years until he was ousted after a 2011 Arab Spring popular uprising. He remained in the country, enjoying the loyalty of some of the strongest military units, which undermined Hadi. Those units are now fighting alongside the Houthis.

The airstrikes appeared to give new spirit to military units and militiamen loyal to Hadi. In Aden, pro-Hadi militiamen battled in two districts with Houthi fighters backed by Saleh’s forces. Bodies of slain fighters were seen in the streets, as shops closed and residents sheltered in their houses, witnesses said.

A Yemeni security official said Hadi had gone by boat Wednesday to the Yemeni port of al-Mukalla in the western province of Hadramawt, where he spent the night. He drove over the border into Oman the next day and was flown to Riyadh. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to release the information. 

AP and The Hindu

Yemen crisis - Saudi Arabia’s military operation “Decisive Storm” strongly criticized by Iran and Syria

 

Both Iran and Syria condemned Saudi Arabia’s military operation “Decisive Storm” against the Houthis on Thursday.
The Iranian Foreign Ministry demanded on Thursday an immediate halt to the Saudi-led military operation describing it as “military aggression,” semi-Official Fars news agency reported.
“The Saudi-led air strikes should stop immediately and it is against Yemen’s sovereignty,” the Students News Agency quoted Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif as saying, according to AFP.
“We will make all efforts to control crisis in Yemen,” Zarif said, according to the agency’s report from the Swiss city of Lausanne where he is negotiating with world powers on curbing Iran’s nuclear programme.
“Iran wants an immediate halt to all military aggressions and air strikes against Yemen and its people ... Military actions in Yemen, which faces a domestic crisis, ... will further complicate the situation ... and will hinder efforts to resolve the crisis through peaceful ways,” Fars quoted Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Marzieh Afkham as saying, Reuters news agency reported.
Meanwhile, the Syrian state news agency said: “Gulf war planes led by the regime of the Saudi family launch a blatant aggression on Yemen,” read a headline carried on the website of the state news agency SANA.

The Syrian government led by President Bashar al-Assad is an ally of Iran, which is in turn allied with the Yemeni Houthi rebels who are fighting to oust the country’s U.S.-backed president.
Iran denies providing money and training to the Shiite Houthi militia in Yemen.
Saudi Arabia launched Operation Decisive Storm late Wednesday to counter Houthi rebels who have besieged the southern city of Aden, where President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi has been holding court.
Violence has spread across Yemen since last year, with Houthi militia seizing Sanaa and sidelining U.S. ally President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi. It has made Yemen a front in Saudi Arabia’s region-wide rivalry with Shi’ite-dominated Iran.
Iran denies providing money and training to the Shi’ite Houthi militia in Yemen, as alleged by some Western and Yemeni officials.
Yemeni Foreign Minister Riyadh Yaseen called on Monday for Gulf Arab help to prevent the Houthis from gaining control of its Yemeni airspace.
Afkham warned that the Saudi-led “aggression is a dangerous move which is in violation of international responsibilities for respecting the sovereignty of countries.
“It will lead to spread of terrorism and extremism in the Middle East region,” Fars quoted her as saying.
AFP, Alarabiya and Reuters

UN starts talks at Doha to resolve Yemen crisis

 

UN-brokered talks aimed at resolving the escalating political crisis in Yemen will be held in Doha, the UN envoy to Yemen has said, after the internationally recognised Yemeni government appealed to the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) for military assistance.
A day after warning the UN Security Council that Yemen was on the brink of civil war, Jamal Benomar announced on Monday that talks between the Yemeni parties would take place in the Qatari capital, and that any agreement reached would be signed in Riyadh.
Earlier in the day, Prince Saud Al Faisal, Saudi Arabia's foreign minister, said that his country would "take necessary measures if needed" to protect Yemen's sovereignty after the country's government, holed up in the southern port city of Aden, appealed to the GCC members for help.
Iran has been repeatedly accused of supporting the Houthis, the armed group that controls the country's north, including the capital Sanaa, an allegation both Iran and the Yemeni group deny.
"We are against Iran's intervention in Yemen ... it is actually an act of aggression," Faisal said.
"We are keen on protecting Yemen’s sovereignty, the legitimacy of Yemen represented by President Hadi.
"We hope that the crisis can be resolved peacefully and we are ready to respond to any demand that the president requests, whatever it is to support him," he said.
Riyadh Yaseen, Yemen's newly appointed foreign minister, has asked for military intervention from the GCC and the imposition of a no-fly zone by the UN.

The GCC is an alliance of Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar, the UAE and Oman; and its Peninsula Shield Force boasts about 40,000 troops and has a permanent base in Saudi Arabia's Eastern Province.
"We've had enough, we can't watch them occupying airports and cities, destroying Yemen's infrastructure, and we sit there and watch", Yaseen told Al Jazeera on Monday. "We can't allow Iran to take over our country."
The request came a day after Prince Mohammed Bin Nayef, the Saudi interior minister, said the GCC was ready to take "all efforts" to defend the country's security".
Houthis took over the democratically elected government headed by Hadi in February and appointed Mohammed Ali al-Houthi, a cousin of the group's leader, as the new president.
The GCC countries have since lined up to support Hadi and have moved their embassies to Aden to back Hadi against the group.
Hadi, who is also backed by Western states, has been struggling to reassert his authority since escaping house arrest and fleeing to Aden last month.
The Houthis have continued to seize more parts of the country and on Saturday took control of parts of the strategic city of Taiz, as they pushed further south towards Aden.
The group, which hails from the northern region of Saada, insists its territorial advance is an outgrowth of its growing popular support.
Al Jazeera

Is Yemen to the edge of civil war

The U.N. special envoy for Yemen warned an emergency meeting of the U.N. Security Council on Sunday that events appear to be leading the country “to the edge of civil war” and urged all parties to step back from the brink and resolve the conflict peacefully.

Jamal Benomar stressed repeatedly in a video briefing from Qatar that “peaceful dialogue is the only option we have.”

That view was echoed by the Security Council in a presidential statement which reaffirmed the readiness of the U.N.’s most powerful body to take “further measures” against any party impeding the road to peace in Yemen. That could mean new sanctions, or possibly other actions.
 Lithuania’s U.N. Ambassador Raimonda Murmokaite said after the closed consultations that all the council members supported a return to negotiations, but she doesn't foresee new sanctions – “not at this stage.”

Benomar said “it would be an illusion” to think that Houthi Shiite rebels - who control the capital Sanaa, much of the north, and are moving further south backed by some members of Yemen's armed forces - could succeed in taking control of the entire country. On Sunday, the Houthis seized Taiz, Yemen’s third-largest city.

“It would be equally false,” Benomar said, to think that embattled President Abed-Rabbo Mansour Hadi, who fled earlier this month to the southern city of Aden - the country’s economic hub - could assemble sufficient forces “to liberate the country from the Houthis.”

He warned that any party that pushes the country in either direction “would be inviting a protracted conflict in the vein of an Iraq, Syria, Libya combined scenario.”
Meanwhile the U.N. Security Council also voiced unanimous support for Yemen’s President Abedrabbo Mansour Hadi and the unity of the country.

“The Security Council reaffirms its strong commitment to the unity, sovereignty, independence and territorial integrity of Yemen, and its commitment to stand by the people of Yemen,” the 15 members said in a statement during an emergency meeting in New York.

The council “supports the legitimacy” of Hadi, it added in its statement, and also made a vague threat of more sanctions against the Shiite militia, known as Huthis, who seized a key central Yemeni city’s airport.
Yemen’s turmoil and political crisis has deepened since the Houthis seized Sanaa in September and put Hadi under house arrest and eventually dissolved the country’s parliament. The country’s al-Qaeda branch, considered by the United States the terror network's most dangerous offshoot, has stepped up attacks against the Shiite rebels.

The Houthis newly announced move to take over the entire country follows the suicide bombings of a pair of mosques in Sanaa that killed 137 people which were claimed by the Islamic State group. It also followed clashes around Aden's airport and planes from Sanaa dropping bombs on the city's presidential palace which Benomar said fortunately did not injure Hadi, who is strongly supported by the Security Council.

“Following the suicide bombings and fighting,” Benomar warned, “emotions are running extremely high, and unless a solution can be found in the coming days the country will slide into further violent conflict and fragmentation.”

He said Yemenis believe the situation is “on a rapid downward spiral,” and are concerned that the conflict “has taken on worrying sectarian tones and deepening north-south divisions.”

“Fears exist that Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula will exploit the current instability to cause further chaos,” he said.

The deteriorating situation led U.S. troops to evacuate a southern air base crucial to the drone program targeting al-Qaeda militants.

Benomar said “extremists on many sides” are actively trying to undermine U.N.-brokered negotiations that he is leading aimed at putting Yemen back on track to complete its transition to democracy so it can finish work on a constitution, hold a referendum on it, and conduct elections.

He stressed that the political impasse can only be unblocked by negotiations that include both the Houthis and Hadi.

“I urge all sides at this time of rising tensions and rhetoric to de-escalate and exercise maximum restraint, and refrain from provocation,” Benomar said.

In the presidential statement approved by all 15 members, the Security Council echoed Benomar’s call for all parties to stop fighting, engage in the U.N.-brokered negotiations and complete the peaceful transition.

AP, AFP and Alarabiya