Israel claimed that its bombing of a cabinet meeting in Yemen last month struck a “crushing blow” against the Houthi rebels. But the rebels’s real leaders were not affected by the strike, and they have vowed to continue their attacks on Israel, according to an analysis published by jacobin.com.
Helen Lackner, the author of the analysis added “On August 28, Israel launched an air strike on the Yemeni capital Sana’a that assassinated some of the Houthi-appointed officials.The Israeli defense minister Israel Katz boasted that his country’s forces had “dealt an unprecedented crushing blow to the top security-political leadership of the Houthi terror organization.” However, this overstated the significance of what had happened, since those killed were more like civil servants, carrying out tasks on behalf of the real Houthi leadership.
Lackner, o an expert on Yemen’s developments thought that on the international stage, governments and media outlets largely ignored this attack on senior civilians engaged in their administrative and management responsibilities. This was in spite of the fact that it constituted a fundamental breach of international law.
The Houthis remain a significant military force, in contrast with the other elements of the Iranian-backed ‘axis of resistance’ that have suffered profound damage from Israeli military actions.
Israeli spy networks and technology previously failed to penetrate the Houthi movement in the way they clearly managed to do when dealing with their opponents in Lebanon and Iran. However, recent events indicate that they have access to information, as demonstrated by the attack on the rebel’s in Sana’a.
In the past, Yemen and the Houthis were not Israeli intelligence priorities in comparison with Lebanon, Syria, or Iran, but this has now changed.
In July, Israel established a special unit of two hundred operatives devoted to gathering information about the Houthis, one that operates with the participation of CENTCOM, the US military command in the Middle East.
As well as their own sophisticated satellite and electronic cyber-surveillance technology, the Israeli intelligence services can draw on ground-level information that reaches them indirectly from local sources, obtained via intelligence agencies of the allied countries operating in Yemen.
However, the Houthis have vowed to carry on with their campaign against Israel, and it looks as if they will have the technical ability to do so. Should they begin to suffer any shortage of sophisticated ammunition requiring imported advanced parts, they can compensate for it by using technologically simpler means.
For the twenty million or so Yemenis living under Houthi rebels’ rule, this situation will lead to worsening insecurity and tension. The atmosphere of suspicion and distrust in Sana’a will intensify, even among the Hourhis first- and second-rank leadership teams. Already seriously affected by reduced humanitarian and other international support, the rebels’ Allah regime is now lashing out.
y August 31, the movement had already made a series of arrests in Sana’a. Within days, it had detained nineteen UN humanitarian agency staff members, including one international staff member, on suspicion of having direct relations with foreign states. This came after earlier arrests last year of humanitarian workers, who still remain in detention. The latest Israeli attacks terminated recent hopes that many of those detainees might be released on the occasion of the Prophet’s birthday.
The deafening silence from the IRG about the attack on Sana’a reveals the satisfaction of its members at what Israel has done. However, this satisfaction further undermines the credibility of an entity that is already largely discredited.
While Yemenis are increasingly fearful at the prospect of more savage and indiscriminate Israeli attacks, strong support for the Palestinian people remains the dominant feeling throughout the country. Moreover, regardless of one’s politics, those killed were Yemeni citizens, even if they were working with the Houthis, and their loss at the hands of Israel touches all Yemenis.
Israel is acting with complete impunity and without any constraints throughout the region, regardless of international law and with the full support of the Trump administration. It is worth noting, however, that Trump ended the bombing of Houthi-controlled Yemen earlier this year without consulting or even informing Israel, just before his rapacious visit to three Gulf states.
Indeed, Israel opposed this move by Trump and even asked the United States to restart its air strikes in July. US bombing of Yemen has not resumed to date in spite of the renewed Houthi attacks on Red Sea shipping, whose termination was the main official justification Trump gave for ending the US campaign.
In reality, Trump interrupted the campaign for two reasons: first, his forthcoming trip to the Gulf, during when it would have been embarrassing for the United States to be involved in bombing of a neighboring Arab state, and second, US military opposition to a futile and expensive operation that depleted forces from the East Asia sector and showed no prospect of victory.
Regardless of its apparent symbolic importance, the assassination of Houthi rebels’ officials was not as politically significant as it might have seemed to be at first sight. It did not amount to the decapitation of the Houthi movement.
Within the Houthis, power resides in a group of men — definitely no women, given the movement’s misogyny — who are closest to “revolution leader” Abdul Malik al-Houthi, and extends to the small Supreme Political Council that this group dominates. Within this framework, the prime minister and his colleagues are little more than clerks guided by the Houthis instructions as well as the presence of loyalist “supervisors” throughout the administration.
The many difficulties faced by Yemenis continue to worsen. Increased food insecurity is at its worst in the areas under Houthi control, where the diminishing supply of international humanitarian support is mostly absent.
On September 10, the significantly reduced UN humanitarian response plan was only financed at 18 percent of the necessary level, with most of that inadequate sum going to IRG-controlled areas of Yemen.
For ordinary people, the designation of the Houthi movement as a “Foreign Terrorist Organization” and the various sanctions imposed by the United States will worsen levels of poverty and deprivation through their impact on the flow of remittances. In addition, further indiscriminate Israeli bombings will kill and wound people as well as causing anxiety and terror for young and old alike.