Follow us on social

2022-08-08t120808z_350965365_rc27sv9i29ms_rtrmadp_3_religion-ashura-yemen-scaled

Yemen needs more than military parades and anniversary parties

Recent Houthi celebrations are a bit tone deaf — the people here need food and salaries — and the ceasefire is expiring in just over a week.

Analysis | Middle East

SANA'A, YEMEN — Houthi helicopters hovering over the capital on Wednesday morning woke Omar Hanash at 9 a.m. The rebels had declared the day a public holiday so people could celebrate the 8th anniversary of the Houthi take-over of the capital, but Hanash decided to go to the streets in the Sawan area of Sana'a instead to collect bottles and cartons to be used as firewood.

"I live on a food basket from the United Nations and I use the cartons as firewood because I can't afford cooking gas," Hanash told Responsible Statecraft on the afternoon of Sept. 21. "Without the food basket, I would have been starved, and to go celebrating this situation is madness."

Hanash is one of over 23 million people the United Nations says need humanitarian assistance in Yemen today. According to the World Food Programme, the civil war there has made Yemen “the world's worst humanitarian crisis.” 

Hanash, who works as a public servant at the Cleaning and Improvement Fund, complained that Houthi authorities gave him a one-time payment of 20,000 Yemeni riyals ($36) in lieu of his actual salary. He and other public servants in Sana'a criticized Wednesday's military parade because they said their salaries have not been paid, and their economic situations have been moving from bad to worse.

"The Saudi war has weakened the Houthis using warplanes like F16, but the Houthis are parading with old-fashioned helicopters," said Hanash, 55.

There had been no Houthi-sponsored military parades since the Saudi intervention in March 2015, but once the UN-brokered truce went into effect on April 2, the rebel group has hosted several such events — in Dhamar, Amran, Hodeidah, and Sana'a. The UN  expressed concern about the parade in Hodeidah and considered it a violation of the Hodeidah Agreement.

The September parade in Sana'a was the first time the Houthis displayed helicopters captured from the internationally recognized government when they took over the capital city eight years ago. Although the Saudi-led coalition targeted warplanes at Sana'a Airport in that time, it is not clear yet where the Houthis kept these helicopters safe.

Video footage for one helicopter showed it dropping sweets to celebrate what Houthis call the "21 September Revolution" when they led the uprising that forced the government in Sana's, led by President Abdrabbuh Mansur Hadi, to resign.

"If they are honest, they will distribute wheat for starving people begging at Sana'a streets," Ali, who agreed to give his first name, told Responsible Statecraft in Sana'a. "My father is a retired officer without a salary since 2017 and he insults Houthis day and night."

Following the Houthis' takeover of Sana'a, they signed a Peace and National Partnership Agreement with their rivals under the auspices of the United Nations. But their negotiations with Yemeni parties over executing its terms ended with Houthis clashing with Presidential Guards in January 2015 when they surrounded the presidential palace and put Hadi under house arrest.

On Jan. 23, 2015, Hadi played his final card and announced his resignation. On Feb. 10, 2015, the United States closed its embassy in Sana'a and Reuters reported "U.S. officials in Washington who confirmed the embassy would close because of the unpredictable security situation in a country where a rebel group has seized control of the capital, Sana'a."

However, former president Hadi escaped Houthis' house arrest in Sana'a and fled to Aden on Feb. 21. He rescinded his resignation and insists that he is still the president.

This week, former U.S. Ambassador to Yemen Gerald M. Feierstein published an article at Foreign Policy, saying the "Houthis have a poor track record in negotiations. But giving up on negotiating with them isn’t an option."

Meanwhile,the U.S. envoy to Yemen Tim Lenderking has been working on efforts to extend and expand the current UN-brokered truce in Yemen between the Houthis and Saudi Arabia for another six months. 

The State Department said Lenderking returned to Washington on Sept. 14 from travel to the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, and Oman.

“All counterparts expressed their support for an expanded truce agreement that includes paying civil servants, improving freedom of movement through road openings, moving fuel quickly through the ports, and expanding commercial flights from Sana’a airport," the State Department said in a statement. "The United States remains committed to advancing efforts to secure a durable and inclusive peace agreement for all Yemenis that includes their calls for justice and accountability."

The Houthis' conditions for expanding the truce is that public servants in areas under their control be paid salaries from revenues of the oil and gas that the internationally recognized government sells. However, the Saudi-backed government says Houthis should pay the salaries from revenues of Hodeidah port under Houthis' control.

This is just one potential roadblock as Yemen remains at a crossroads ahead of the expiring truce on October 2. At that point the parties will have to choose the fate of this embattled nation — war or peace. They also have to choose the people — feeding them, paying their salaries, allowing them to rebuild. This will be a long journey.


Houthi supporters rally to mark the Ashura day in Sanaa, Yemen August 8, 2022. REUTERS/Khaled Abdullah
Analysis | Middle East
POGO The Bunker
Top image credit: Project on Government Oversight

Army prematurely pushes Black Hawk replacement into production

Military Industrial Complex

The Bunker appears originally at the Project on Government Oversight and is republished here with permission.

keep readingShow less
Abrams M1A2 Main Battle Tank
Top photo credit: An Abrams M1A2 Main Battle Tank is loaded onto a trailer headed to Vaziani TrainingArea May 5, 2016, in preparation for Noble Partner 16. (Photo by Spc. Ryan Tatum, 1st Armor Brigade Combat Team, 3rd Infantry Division)

Gutting military testing office may be the deadliest move yet

Military Industrial Complex

With the stroke of a pen, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth has gutted the Pentagon’s weapon testing office.

His order is intended to “eliminate any non-statutory or redundant functions” by reducing the office to 30 civilian employees and 15 assigned military personnel. The order also terminates contractor support for the testing office.

keep readingShow less
President of Egypt Abdel Fattah el-Sisi
Top image credit: President of Egypt Abdel Fattah el-Sisi attends the 34th Arab League summit, in Baghdad, Iraq, May 17, 2025. Hadi Mizban/Pool via REUTERS

Egypt's energy gamble has left it beholden to Israel

Middle East

As the scorching summer season approaches, Egypt finds itself once again in the throes of an uncomfortable ritual: the annual scramble for natural gas.

Recent reports paint a concerning picture of what's to come, industrial gas supplies to vital sectors like petrochemicals and fertilizers have been drastically cut, some by as much as 50 percent. The proximate cause? Routine maintenance at Israel’s Leviathan mega-field, leading to a significant drop in imports.

But this is merely the latest symptom of a deeper, more chronic ailment. Egypt, once lauded as a rising energy hub, has fallen into a perilous trap of dependence, its national security and foreign policy options increasingly constrained by an awkward reliance on Israeli gas.

For years, the Egyptian government assured its populace and the world of an impending energy bonanza. The discovery of the gargantuan Zohr gas field in 2015, hailed as the largest in the Mediterranean, was presented as the dawn of a new era. By 2018, when Zohr began production, President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi declared that Egypt had "scored a goal," promising self-sufficiency and even the transformation into a regional gas exporter. The vision was that Egypt, once an importer, would leverage its strategic location and liquefaction plants to become a vital conduit for Eastern Mediterranean gas flowing to Europe.

Billions were poured into new power stations, further solidifying the nation's reliance on gas for electricity generation, which today accounts for a staggering 60 percent of its total consumption.

keep readingShow less

LATEST

QIOSK

Newsletter

Subscribe now to our weekly round-up and don't miss a beat with your favorite RS contributors and reporters, as well as staff analysis, opinion, and news promoting a positive, non-partisan vision of U.S. foreign policy.