Free Republic

In a stunning sweep of the Yemeni capital, the country's Shiite rebels seized homes, offices and military bases of their Sunni foes on Monday, forcing many into hiding and triggering an exodus of civilians from the city after a week of fighting that left 340 people dead. It was the latest development in the Hawthi blitz, which has plunged volatile Yemen into more turmoil, pitting the Shiite rebels against the Sunni-dominated military and their Islamist tribal allies. The heavily armed Hawthi fighters on Monday seized tanks and armored vehicles from military headquarters they had overrun, and raided the home of...

Video on YouTube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=erk22YkMybA Saudi Arabia uses fighter jets against Yemeni Houthi rebels. Both Yemen & Saudi Arabia accuse Iran of arming the rebels. Why did Arab satellites carriers drop Iranian Al Alam TV? And will the war of proxies lead to a confrontation between Saudi Arabia and Iran ?

A senior official from the Iranian Revolutionary Guard has recently met with Houthi rebels and Hizbullah activists in Yemen to coordinate joint military operations against Saudi positions along the border. Asharq al-Awsat newspaper, quoted on Sunday Arab sources as saying the three-way meeting also aimed at developing a plan to escalate the military situation along the Saudi-Yemeni border.

SAN'A, Yemen – Saudi Arabia has launched a large military incursion across the border into northern Yemen, using fighter jets and artillery bombardments to try to end a Shiite rebellion inside its troubled southern neighbor, Arab diplomats and the rebels said Thursday. The northern rebels, known as Hawthis, have been battling Yemeni government forces intensively over the past few months in the latest flare-up of a sporadic conflict that has lasted five years. The Hawthis are based in northern Saada province, which borders Saudi Arabia. "Saudi jets dropped bombs on a crowded areas including local market in the northern province...

SNIPPET: "Yemeni Shi'ite Cleric and Houthi Disciple 'Issam Al-'Imad: Our Leader Houthi is Close to Khamenei; We Are Influenced Religiously and Ideologically By Iran" SNIPPET: "On September 28, 2009, the Iranian website ayandenews.com, which is affiliated with former IRGC commander Mohsen Rezai, published an interview with cleric 'Issam Al-'Imad, who is a disciple of Hussein Al-Houthi, leader of the Houthi rebels in Yemen. [1] Al-'Imad, who was born 1968 in Yemen, received his religious education in Saudi Arabia, but after studying Shi'ite Islam left Wahhabism to become a Twelver Shi'ite. Since1989 he has been pursuing advanced Islamic studies in the...

Note: Photos included. Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center Geopolitically strategic Yemen has become a focus of local Iranian-Saudi Arabian strife. The Yemeni government accuses Iran of supporting Zaydi-Shi’ite (Houthi) rebels in the northern part of the country with weapons, money and propaganda. Subverting local Shi’ite populations in the Middle East is a frequent Iranian modus operandi.

Renewed fighting in northern Yemen between government and rebel forces is feeding fears that a Middle Eastern proxy war between Saudi Arabia and Iran is spreading to the ungoverned spaces of the southern Arabian peninsula. But western analysts are staring boggle-eyed at quite a different spectre: the prospect that the biggest beneficiaries of Yemeni weakness will be the fanatical jihadis of al-Qaida. UN agencies raised the alarm last week after 55,000 people, mostly women and children, fled clashes in and around Sa'ada city in northern Yemen between the forces of President Ali Abdullah Saleh's Sunni-led government and the Zaydi Shia...

09 September 2009 JIHADIS REPORT OF SYRIAN MEDDLING IN YEMEN Not that I consider jihadis to be a reliable source on such matters, but you know what they say about broken clocks...

SNIPPET: "SANAA, May 19 (KUNA) -- A senior Yemeni official warned on Tuesday of acts of sabotage that could be jointly launched by Al-Qaeda Organization in the Arabian Peninsula and the local militant group of Al-Hawthis." SNIPPET: ""The organization could join hands with Al-Hawthis in wreaking havoc on Yemen and use the country as a launch pad for their terrorist acts regionally and internationally," he warned. Al-Alimi made the remarks after Al-Qaeda leader Abu Basir Nasser Al-Wahayshi approved in an audio tape on Wednesday the militant activities in southern part of the Arabian Peninsula in a clear reference to Yemen....