CETRI
As the war rages on in Palestine, pitting Israeli forces politically and militarily supported by Americans against Hamas, backed by the « Axis of Resistance » [1] led by Iran, the international political landscape and overarching power relations are being reshaped. « Bipolarizing » political dynamics, thought to have vanished with the end of the Cold War, have resurfaced and are influencing a series of peripheral conflicts, commonly referred to as « small wars, » in the surrounding regions of the Red Sea. These differ from “conventional wars” in that they are decentralized from a « central conflict » and sustained by private capital, often fuelled by arms and drug trafficking. Lebanon, Iraq, Syria, and Yemen are now these new areas of conflicts with changing configurations, sharing two common elements. On one hand, the common enemy of these armed groups is Israel, economically and militarily supported by Western states, and on the other hand, they all have a significant ally, Iran. This new geopolitical configuration in the Middle East once again puts Yemen into the spotlight of global news.
In response to the ongoing humanitarian crisis in Gaza and in support of Hamas in its struggle against Israeli aggression, Yemen’s Houthi rebels have decided to counterbalance the favourable international balance of power to Israel, by attacking merchant ships leaving the Red Sea, aiming to disrupt the Israeli and its allies’ economy by hindering maritime trade with Israel. In retaliation, an international coalition led by the United States launched « Operation Prosperity Guardian » to protect commercial ships and counter the geostrategic threat posed by the « Axis of Resistance » in the Gulf regions. However, American and British forces, initially restricted to safeguarding maritime traffic in the Bab-el-Mandeb gulf, subsequently carried out multiple strikes against the Houthis within Yemeni territory, thus escalating violence. The United States justified its actions by unilaterally designating the Houthis at the beginning of 2024 as a « Specially Designated Global Terrorist » group, thus posing a significant risk to the security of American citizens or the national security of the United States, as well as to their foreign policy and economy.
But who are the Houthis ? Where do they come from, and what are their objectives ? Do they truly represent a threat to the United States ? Does the inclusion of the Houthis on the list of terrorist entities and the military support they receive from the Iranian regime legitimize the use of force against the territorial integrity of a state, a fundamental notion of international law ?
The Houthis, from a popular movement to a player in a civil war/The Houthis : Transition from Grassroots Movement to Key Player in a Civil War
Since it sparked the interest of international media in 2014, the Houthi conflict has been too often interpreted solely through the lens of proxy war between Iran and Saudi Arabia but also through the rivalry between Sunni and Shia Muslims. These regional conflict factors carry substantial weight, but their disproportionate focus has largely resulted in oversimplifying the phenomenon into a catchy media narrative.
To understand the Houthi mobilization, one must revisit the circumstances of its emergence in northern Yemen. Until the republican revolution of 1962, a Zaydi kingdom [2] (imamate) governed the rural areas of the northern part of the country in a conflictual coexistence with tribal confederations whose leaders (Shaykhs) were involved in political, judicial, economic, and cultural affairs. The imamate regime differed from the one prevailing in the southern part Yemen as it was characterised by the coexistence of tribal customary law and Sharia, but also by the absence of a state’s judiciary. Thus, the proclamation of the Arab Republic of Yemen (also called North Yemen or North Yemen) in 1962 led to social, political, and economic transformations that deeply impacted the tribal system.
Although the promoters of the republic had promised the Yemeni people the abolition of social inequalities and birth-linked privileges, the new republican order in northern Yemen, rather than promoting state building, development and investment in rural areas, was primarily based on the political and economic clientelism of tribal elites, namely Shaykhs. These practices, we could qualify as political meddling, exacerbated inequality in the distribution of economic resources and political participation, to the detriment of certain segments of the population, especially among the Zaydis. To spread republicanism and introduce state coercion into regions where it was previously absent, the republican state opted for a political homogenization of the elites that disrupted traditional hierarchies, as well as for a confessionalization of the political game by assigning new Sunni republican elites to key positions formerly held by Zaydi notables [3] . This « sunnization » of the elites generated real stigmatization of Zaydi tribal populations, who increasingly felt alienated and marginalized by the new state power.
Gradually, many Zaydis began to openly criticize the republican state for supporting a pro-Western policy that undermined the Zaydi doctrine, historically predominant in the region. This discontent peaked in the 1980s with the progressive emergence of a resistance movement initiated by Husayn Al-Hûthi, a prominent Zaydi religious leader, who gave his name to the rebellion. Thus, at its inception, the Houthi movement highlighted the deep social, political, and economic injustices resulting from decades of neglect and marginalization by the Yemeni government in the northern part of the country. The establishment of political pluralism in the early 1990s, following the unification of North and South Yemen, led to the crystallization of this marginalized politico-religious Zaydi expression, previously dormant, of the former losers of the republican revolution of 1962.
Confronted with the growing power of the Houthi movement and a decline in his own popular support, President Ali Abdallah Saleh initiated numerous propaganda campaigns starting from 2004. These campaigns were designed to undermine the credibility of the Houthis.
They were systematically depicted as a rebel group supported by Iran, seeking to spread Shiism through violence and to break the hard-won republican unity. The repression gradually took on a military dimension, with the intensive bombing of the lightly armed Houthi forces. The capture of Husayn al-Hûthi in September 2004 and his execution only served to galvanize his supporters, given the importance of martyrdom in Zaydi doctrine. The rebels’ resistance led Saleh to intensify his military response and to seek the help of rival tribes of the Houthis. In doing so, the Yemeni government exacerbated latent intertribal tensions, once regulated by traditional tribal mediation systems at the local level. This development complicated the dynamics of the conflict and led to the emergence of several small, intertwined conflicts within a broader confrontation between the Houthis on one side and the government on the other.
The horrors and atrocities committed by the government against Yemeni civilians, consisting of series of intensive bombings on civilian infrastructure such as schools, water reservoirs, and nursing homes, endangered the entire population of the targeted regions. This initiated a vicious circle of violence and recruitment among the tribes of northern Yemen in favor of the Houthis. Thus, gaining the sympathy of those who were suffering, the Houthi movement continued to grow in size and combat capability, strengthening their military positions in the region to the point of seizing Sanaa, the capital, during the year 2014.
At the same time, President Saleh instrumentalized the demands of Houthi leaders and certain unfortunate episodes, such as the expulsion of Jews from the city of al-Salim in 2007, to garner international support. The framing of the rebel movement as a terrorist movement by the Yemeni government served as justification for involving foreign powers militarily, starting with the coalition of Arab countries led by Saudi Arabia as part of the operation to restore the president ousted by the insurgency. The coalition’s bombing campaign between 2015 and 2020 resulted in large-scale destruction and the worst humanitarian crisis in the world.
In summary, the birth of the Houthi movement is first explained by the massive popular opposition to the rise to power of republican elites, strategically promoted by a government seeking control in a region historically and politically dominated by a Zaydi tribal system. Their consolidation, multiplication, and radicalization are then explained by the exacerbated violence of government repression measures aimed at crushing the rebellion, thus generating deep popular resentment that led thousands of civilians to join the ranks of the Houthis.
Are the bombings lawful ?
The United Kingdom and the United States invoke self-defence to justify bombings in Yemeni territory, stating that these actions are in accordance with international law. What is the reality ? Use of force ? Preventive self-defence ? Acts of aggression ? Disproportionate countermeasures ? The American and British bombings raise questions about the legality of these acts under international law. Have these Western powers violated fundamental legal principles by bombing Houthi positions in Yemeni territory to protect their economic interests in the Red Sea, or have they simply exercised their right to self-defence outside their national territory ?
At first glance, an examination of the international legal framework for the use of force does not easily extend the application of the use of force for self-defence to economic considerations. It seems even more difficult to conclude such legality for the simple reason that self-defence must be in response to an armed attack or imminent armed attack that has endangered or would endanger the territorial integrity of the « threatened » State (in our case, the United States and the United Kingdom). However, these bombings take place more than 11,000 km from American territory and 5,200 km from British soil. Why then resort to the justification of self-defence ?
It is common for American military interventions to be legitimized by motives other than international law, such as moral imperatives but also economic interests. In several cases, Americans have argued that an economic aggression would be assimilated to an aggression within the meaning of Article 3 of United Nations General Assembly Resolution 33/14, thus authorizing the victim State to retaliate. Based on the « unwilling or unable » theory, under which intervention could be conducted on foreign territory due to the lack of willingness or capability of that state to end the conflict, Americans acted officially in the name of self-defence in the fight against terrorism. Aerial bombings were thus carried out in Libya in 1986, Sudan and Afghanistan in 1998, and against the Houthis in 2023. In all these precedents, the self-defence argument invoked by the United States in response to economic aggression was not recognized by other states or by the United Nations General Assembly.
Indeed, the legitimacy of a self-defence intervention on the territory of a third State, within the meaning of Article 51 of the United Nations Charter, presupposes that a prior act of armed aggression can be attributed to that State. Attacks perpetrated by private groups, especially in the context of the « war on terror, » do not in themselves justify a response on the territory of another State without demonstrating its involvement. [4]
If self-defence is not applicable, it is up to the Security Council to justify the use of force under a « binding » resolution, taken under the provisions of Chapter 7 of the United Nations Charter. Seized with the question, the Security Council demanded on January 10, 2024, « that the Houthis immediately cease attacks that impede international trade and infringe on navigation rights and freedoms. » However, recalling its previous resolutions on the situation in Yemen, the Security Council called « for caution and restraint to prevent further deterioration of the situation in the Red Sea and the region » and invited « the parties to redouble their diplomatic efforts for this purpose, including by continuing to promote dialogue and the Yemen peace process under the auspices of the United Nations. » This clear rejection of the application of Chapter 7, which would allow the use of force in the event of a threat to international peace and security, unequivocally reflects the position of the United Nations on the issue. It can be inferred that Anglo-American reprisals on Yemeni territory are justified and carried out on the basis of political, and perhaps geopolitical, considerations rather than purely legal considerations.
The problematic role of certain media representations
The Houthis are first and foremost a protest movement, born out of political and religious marginalization, in conflict with an authoritarian government. This description deviates from the caricatured image conveyed by some Western media. Indeed, these media tend to adhere to simplistic anti-Iranian narratives and present the rebel movement as terrorist, whereas no tangible evidence of Iranian intervention could be established before Saudi military involvement in the conflict (2011) [5]. The more active cooperation since 2014, when the rebels became the de facto authority in the northern provinces, does not mean that the Houthis have become « proxies » of Tehran.
However, much of the foreign and international analysis of the Houthi conflict continues to be based on the assumption that Yemen has been involved since 2004 in a proxy conflict between Saudi Arabia and Iran.
Anchored in the discourse of the war on terror, this dual narrative obscure the much deeper roots of the conflict, originating in the patronage policies of the Yemeni state and government repression against its population, particularly in the northern regions of the country. The United States and the United Kingdom have designated the Houthis as terrorists to justify their military actions, both in the Red Sea and in Yemeni territory. This designation was crucial for two reasons : first, to encourage Saudi Arabia to intervene and mobilize funds for counterterrorism efforts in Yemen to suppress the Houthi movement ; second, to legitimize before the Security Council and the Western population the bombings carried out by the United States and the United Kingdom on Yemeni territory.
The journalistic tendency to emphasize the massive support provided by Iran to the « terrorist » Houthis has contributed to lending credence to these justificatory discourses. Media outlets such as CNN or Le Monde seem to subscribe to the anti-Iranian narratives disseminated by the United States, often exaggerating Iran’s role in Houthi actions in Yemen. Although ammunition, missiles, and explosive components seized off the coast of the Gulf of Oman are of Iranian manufacture, can we really conclude active Iranian military involvement in the Red Sea ? This question is even more relevant when considering that, over the period 2017-2021, the United States accounted for 39% of global arms sales according to Amnesty International, raising questions about their potential role in the armed conflicts of these countries.
This tendency to adopt media shortcuts fuels and reinforces the narratives that serve as justification for military interventions, obscuring the complexity rooted in the history of the Yemeni politico-military situation. Several media outlets have contributed to shaping the perception of the Houthi rebel movement in line with Western interventionism entrenched in the context of the « war on terror. » This narrative once again reinforces the idea that the end justifies the means, relegating international legal obligations to the background. This trend, which has gained ground among United Nations member states, should be fought against, not only to do justice to the complexity of local situations but also because it weakens global governance mechanisms and the catalytic role that the United Nations should play in managing conflicts on a global scale.
