Houthis fight against Islamists in Yemen

Shiia Online website, which is the official website of the religious institution in Iran close to the Iranian government, has commented on recent events in Yemen: “The Houthis’ true war has just begun with battles in Sanaa against Islamic currents that are opposed to the Houthis’ revolution in Yemen.”

The Iranian website added that the official results of the negotiations between the Yemeni government and the Houthis were not positive and that Abd Al-Malik Al-Houthi has not given way under pressures he was subjected to during negotiations in Sanaa. It added that the Yemeni Islamic revolution is continuing under the leadership of Al-Houthi against the Yemeni government.

The website accused the Islah Party, the political wing of the Muslim Brotherhood in Yemen, of forming armed militias to aid the Yemeni army in killing the Houthis and the revolutionaries who were demonstrating to bring down the government in Sanaa.

The Iranian website justified the entry of Houthi armed men in Sanaa saying: “The Yemeni Islah Party was the one who started the armed onslaught on the positions of the Houthis in Sanaa in a bid to remove them from the positions they seized and controlled inside the city. On this basis, the armed Houthis had the right to respond to whoever is attempting to undermine the popular revolution that erupted in Yemen under the leadership of Abd Al-Malik Al-Houthi.”

The website explained that the Yemeni army and the Islah Party separated a number of sensitive areas within the capital Sanaa from the regions that are under the control of the Houthis there. The aim was to prevent the supporters of the Islamic revolution in those areas from joining the rest of the revolutionaries and the Ansarullah (The Supporters of God) movement inside the capital.

He added that had these areas been coterminous with the areas under the control of the Houthis, the capital Sanaa would have fallen into the hands of the Houthis and the Shiia revolution under the leadership of the Al-Houthi would have succeeded.

The Iranian website stressed that following the field developments witnessed by the Yemeni capital Sanaa, “the Houthis fight against Islamists in Yemen has officially begun. This phase will be critical and decisive in determining the fate of the Islamic revolution in Yemen. All political and military options remain open before the Houthis in defending their just revolution.”

It is worth mentioning that the Iranian official newspaper Keyhan, which is owned by the Iranian Guide Khamenei himself and represents the official position of the Iranian authority and that of Khamenei, noted in its Saturday’s editorial on the Yemeni crisis that after Yemen and the success of the Islamic revolution in Sanaa, the next step would be to bring down the Al Saud government and to dismantle this “state that has been imposed on Hijaz”.