War In Yemen: Bloody War Between Supporters Of The Government (Essay Sample)

War in Yemen
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War in Yemen
For more than three years now, Yemen has been entangled by a bloody war between supporters of the government (which is internationally recognized) and the Houthi rebels. The government of Yemen and the Houthi rebels have battled since 2014, however much of this fighting was confined to the Houthi stronghold, Saada province northern Yemen CITATION Enn18 \l 1033 (Ennasari, 2018). The war escalated in September 2014 when the Houthi rebels managed to take control of the capital city of Yemen, Saada and proceed to push further downwards towards the country’s second biggest city of Aden. In response to these advances by the rebels a contingent of Arab countries being led by the Saudi government launched a military campaign against the rebels and managed to restore the Saudi government.
The big question however is how did the war start? This conflict traces its roots to the failure of a political power transition that was perceived as bring economic and political stability to Yemen. This was as a result of an Arab uprising which forced the then president of Yemen Ali Abdulla Saleh, to give political power to the then deputy president, Abdrabbuh Mansour Hadi. The new president struggled to with various issues that concerned the political stability of this improvised nation. Some of the things that he struggled with included confrontation by the al-Qaeda to the south, the continued support of the former president by some military officials and the huge rate of food insecurity CITATION Sau17 \l 1033 (Saul & Parisa, 2017).
The Houthi rebellion, that had championed Zaidi Shia and fought various wars of rebellion against the former president, capitalized on the weakness of the current president and proceeded to take control of the northern province of Saada and some of its neighboring areas. Disillusioned and discontented with the then transition of power, most Yemenis including Sunni Muslims pledged their support for the Houthi movement. With this nature of support, the Houthi movement gained a lot of strength which led then to take over Sanna, the capital city of Yemen. The rebellion movement together with the security forces allied to President Saleh then attempted to seize the entire country by targeting other cities. This forced the current president to escape the country in March 2015.
International countries had a huge influence on how the war in Yemen developed. For instant, the Iran government was accused of backing the rebellion. Concerned by the rise and growth of a rebellion group that was believed to get support from the military of the Shia power Iran, Eight Arabian countries being led by Saudi Arabia begun an airstrike campaign against the rebel with the objective of restoring the President Hadi’s government CITATION Enn18 \l 1033 (Ennasari, 2018). Over the years there had been back and forth military campaign between Houthi rebellion and Mr. Hadi forces that is being backed by the Sunni Arabian countries.
The Saudi government, has been particularly on the fore front in leading the air strike campaign against the rebels. To the Saudi Arabians, they actions is believed to stop the advances of the rebel group which they believe is being supported by some terrorist organisation and Iran. The Saudi government aim is to restore President Hadi’s authority who they believe is capable of bring back political stability to the region. Primarily, the Saudi’s are mostly concerned with the rise of Shia power in the region which threatens to topple the rule of the Sunni’s. Basically the war in Yemen Has now escalated to a battle between the Sunni Muslims and the Shia Muslims CITATION Kar18 \l 1033 (Karam, 2018).
Saudi Arabia has for a long time shared a long and porous border with the Yemen and the main fear that the Saudi government has is that the Iranian expansionism through its support for the Syrian government may slip into the country and destabilize the political stability that currently exist in the region. Information from the Arab Gulf course has often state that Iran has now gained control of four Arabic capitals including: Damascus, Baghdad, Sanaa and Beirut. With complete control of Yemen through their support for the rebel movement, the Iran government will have significant influence in the region which will shift the balance of power in the Arab word. This will increase the dominance of the Shias in the region which the Saudi-led countries is viewing as a threat to the economic and political stability of the region CITATION Sau17 \l 1033 (Saul & Parisa, 2017). This is the main reason why Saudi Arabia have taken a strong stance towards the support of the Yemen government to protect both the civilians and the economic prosperity of the region. The Saudi led coalition is comprised of countries such as UAE, Kuwait, Egypt, Jordan, Morocco and Senegal.
The Houthi rebels, on the other hand, have also received there fair support from the Iran government. Iran government is providing military support to the rebellion by sending more advance and complicated military weapons and advisers to the rebels. Through these actions, the Iran government believes that it is stepping up support for their Shia ally in the civil war which threatens to shift the balance of power in the Middle East region. Information from credible source states that over the last few years, the Iran government has taken a critical role in the war in Yemen by increasing their supplies of arms and other military support to the rebel group. This is the same strategy the Iran government has used to support its ally in the Syrian war CITATION The18 \l 1033 (The Atlantic daily, 2018). The Iranian military officials, through a meeting in Tehran resolved to takes several steps to empower the Houthi’s rebellion. In this meeting, the generals came to an agreement to step up the amount of help through provision of arms, training and financial support for the Houthi rebels.
Although the Iranian government is presently denying arming the Houthi rebels, the US military is claiming to have intercepted the shipment of arms from Iran to Yemen in March and they claim that this is the third time that they are intercepting such Shipment.
Information from a senior US general has stated that the involvement of the Iran government in the Hough’s military campaign has reached a level where they are helping the rebels to target ships that belong to the Saudi-led coalition fighting in Yemen. This active support for the rebellion group has caused a lot of damage to the region. The Houthi rebellion is known to be very vicious especially to the civilians. The rebellion is well known to destabilize the humanitarian condition in the region and harassing innocent civilians especially those who do not conform to their ideology. With the support of the Iran government, the military position of the rebellion has greatly improved which means that they can now advance their agenda more viciously. This has further deteriorated the humanitarian conditions in the region and increased the amount of terrorist activity in the region.
Iran is a Shia dominated country while Saudi is a Sunni dominated country. As mentioned earlier, this war has escalated to the war between various religious factions. Looking at these situation critically, we can see that the Shia are fighting the Sunni and Vice-versa with the main objective of gaining control of the Middle East and the entire Arab world. For instant, the Houthi rebellion which is majorly comprised of the Shia tribe are fighting Sunni led government. The Iran government on the other side, which is led by the Shia are providing arms and financial help to the rebellion as a means of empowering the Shia influence in the region. This move has been largely criticized by the Saudi-led coalition who in turn have announced and provided support to the Yemen government as an initiative that is largely believed to restore political stability in the region as well as advance Sunni influence.
The coalition troops being led by Saudi Arabia landed its military campaign in the month of august 2015 and drove the Houthis rebellion and their ally from most of the Southern part country which they had taken control of CITATION Joh18 \l 1033 (Johnston, 2018). This has significantly reduced the advances of the rebellion group and thwarted their operations even after they had taken control of the country’s capital. After Houthi seized the capital city Sanna, the Yemen government have established its base in Aden.
The massive campaign by the Houthi rebellion has led to a diminishing standards of life in the region. The have been a lot of civilian casualties as a result of the war as well as massive displacement. For instant the provision of aid to the civilian is very difficult especially with the advances of the Houthi rebellion group. The aid Organisations, including some international organisation are finding it very difficult to provide aid in the region such as food, medical services and other essentials CITATION Mic18 \l 1033 (Michael, 2018). The Houthi seize of part of the Taiz city has prevented medical and food supply from entering this part of the city. With the prevention of medical and food supply by the rebels, most of the Yemen civilians have been subjected to hanger and poor medical conditions for a very long time CITATION Kar18 \l 1033 (Karam, 2018). Aids agency have now warned that most parts of Yemen, especially those that are under the control of the Houthi rebel, will start to experience widespread starvation and death from famine. As the war continues more and more people are beginning to rely on aid which is not reaching them.
Presently, Yemen is considered to be the world’s largest humanitarian emergency. About 18 million people have been subjected...