by Hugh Fitzgerald
Amid all over the furor over the possible murder of Saudi dissident Jamal Khashoggi by Saudi regime thugs, it is useful to remember that in Yemen, the Saudi-UAE forces that have been fighting against the Shi’a Houthis, backed by Iran, are naturally supported by the Americans. Iran is our declared mortal enemy, Saudi Arabia — we keep telling ourselves — is our staunch ally. We supply both weaponry and logistical support to the Saudi and Emirati forces in Yemen. But there is another actor in Yemen — Al-Qaeda — and here the tale gets murkier.
The Saudis and Emiratis have allowed us to believe that they have been fighting not just the Houthis, but the forces of Al-Qaeda. They have announced that they have “taken” from Al Qaeda this or that town in Yemen. But it turns out that the UAE and Saudi forces have not been fighting Al-Qaeda in Yemen at all, but rather, bribing it to leave key cities and towns. They have paid Al-Qaeda commanders directly, in some cases even letting its fighters take with them their weapons, equipment, the cash which they have locally looted, as well as large sums, too, supplied by the Saudis or Emiratis to get them to leave without a fight.
Furthermore, hundreds of Al-Qaeda fighters have been recruited to join the Saudi-Emirati coalition. This leaves the Americans in the position of supporting Arab allies who are not fighting, but actually helping, Al Qaeda.
Here’s a recent account:
A military coalition battling Houthi rebels secured secret deals with al-Qaeda in Yemen and recruited hundreds of the group’s fighters, a news report said on Monday [August 6]
For more than two years, a Saudi-led alliance – backed by US logistical and weapons support – claimed it crushed al-Qaeda’s ability to carry out attacks from Yemen.
However, an investigation by The Associated Press found the coalition has been paying some al-Qaeda commanders to leave key cities and towns while letting others retreat with weapons, equipment, and wads of looted cash.
Hundreds of al-Qaeda members were recruited to join the coalition as soldiers, the report said.
Key figures in the deal-making said the United States was aware of the arrangements and held off on drone attacks against the armed group, which was created by Osama bin Laden in 1988.
The deals uncovered by the AP investigation reflect the contradictory interests of the two wars being waged simultaneously in the southwestern corner of the Arabian Peninsula.
In one conflict, the US is working with its Arab allies – particularly the UAE – with the aim of eliminating al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP). But the larger mission is to win the civil war against the Iran-aligned Houthi rebels.
And in that fight, al-Qaeda fighters are effectively on the same side as the Saudi-led coalition and, by extension, the US….
The Pentagon recently vigorously denied any complicity with al-Qaeda fighters.
“Since the beginning of 2017, we have conducted more than 140 strikes to remove key AQAP leaders and disrupt its ability to use ungoverned spaces to recruit, train and plan operations against the US and our partners across the region,” Navy Commander Sean Robertson, a Pentagon spokesman, wrote in an email….
In February, Emirati troops and their Yemeni government fighter allies declared the recapture of al-Said, a district of villages running through the mountainous province of Shabwa – an area al-Qaeda had largely dominated for nearly three years.
It was painted as a crowning victory in a months-long offensive known as Operation Swift Sword.
But weeks before those forces’ entry, a string of pick-up trucks mounted with machine guns and loaded with masked al-Qaeda fighters drove out of al-Said unmolested, according to a tribal mediator involved in the deal for their withdrawal.
Under the terms of the agreement, the coalition promised al-Qaeda members it would pay [each of] them up to 100,000 Saudi riyals ($26,000) to leave, according to Awad al-Dahboul, the province’s security chief.
His account was confirmed by the mediator and two Yemeni government officials.
Under the accord, thousands of local tribal fighters were to be enlisted in the UAE-funded Shabwa Elite Force militia. For every 1,000 fighters, 50 to 70 would be al-Qaeda members, the mediator and two officials said.
Not only did the Emirates allow the Al-Qaeda troops to leave the district of al-Said with all their weapons, but promised each fighter up to $26,000 to leave. That, in Yemeni terms, is a gigantic sum.
For many Yemenis, al-Qaeda is simply another faction on the ground – a very effective one, well-armed and battle-hardened.
Its members are not shadowy strangers. Over the years, AQAP has woven itself into society by building ties with tribes, buying loyalties, and marrying into major families.
Power players often see it as a useful tool.
Hadi’s predecessor as Yemen’s president, long-ruling strongman Ali Abdullah Saleh, set the model. He took billions in US aid to combat al-Qaeda after the 9/11 attacks, even as he recruited its fighters to battle his rivals.
The branch is following guidance from global al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri to focus on fighting Houthi rebels, another top AQAP member said.
The impact of the intertwining of al-Qaeda fighters with the coalition campaign is clearest in Taiz, Yemen’s largest city and centre of one of the war’s longest-running battles.
In 2015, Houthis laid siege to the city, occupying surrounding mountain ranges, sealing the entrances, and shelling it mercilessly.
Taiz residents rose up to fight back, and coalition cash and weapons poured in – as did al-Qaeda and Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL, also known as ISIS) fighters, all aimed at the same enemy.
One liberal activist took up arms alongside other men from his neighborhood to defend the city, and they found themselves fighting side-by-side with al-Qaeda members.
“There is no filtering in the war. We are all together,” said the activist, who spoke on condition of anonymity….
What a tangled web they weave, those involved in the violence in Yemen. There have been so many shifting alliances, and so many outsiders, taking part in Yemen’s civil wars. From 1962 to 1970, there was the North Yemen Civil War, fought between the supporters of the Yemen Arab Republic, known as the “republicans,” and those who supported the Mutawakkilite Kingdom in North Yemen, known as the “royalists.” Nasser supported the republicans with 70,000 Egyptian troops, and the Saudis, with help from Jordan, took the side of the royalists. At the time, Saudi Arabia supported the Zaidis, or Houthis, even though they were Shi’a, because the republican idea was recognized as more of a threat to the Saudi monarchy. Some believe that Nasser’s military involvement in Yemen contributed to the poor performance of his army and air force during the Six-Day War, by depriving them of his best officers.
Fast forward to today. After 30 years of misrule, Ali Abdullah Saleh, the ruler of Yemen for 30 years who, in that time, managed to amass a fortune of between 32 and 64 billion dollars, was eventually deposed as president by Abdrabbuh Mansour Hadi. Having made an alliance with the Houthis, the forces loyal to Saleh fought on. The Houthi forces managed to seize San’a, the Yemeni capital, and it looked as if they might take over Yemen. But the Saudis entered with money and weaponry, and with sustained — and indiscriminate — bombing campaigns from the air. Eventually, Ali Saleh decided it would be prudent to join those he thought would win, the side backed by the powerful Saudis, and he switched sides, ending his alliance with the Houthis. For that, a Houthi sniper killed him.
First published in Jihad Watch.
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One Response
Yemen now looks exactly like it did during the Cold War, when one had North and South Yemen. Only difference: instead of pro-Saudi North vs Communist South, you now have Houthi North vs Sunni South.
The greatest feat the Houthis achieved was managing to land shells near Riyadh airport. Nothing would be more fantastic than this civil war spilling into Saudi Arabia