Scrutinizing the World

Prior to the uprising in 2011 and the Saudi-led intervention in 2015, Yemen had already seen six rounds of fighting between the Houthis and the central government led by Ali Abdullah Saleh (1942-2017). These wars took place in 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, and 2009/10, the last one being the longest and most destructive of all. Also, during the last war the Houthis entered Saudi territory and fought for the first time against Saudi forces on the ground. In September 2014, the rebels took over Sanaʿa and forced the incumbent Yemeni president Abdrabbuh Mansur Hadi (*1945) to flee, first to the Southern city of Aden, then in March 2015 to Saudi Arabia where he has stayed ever since.

The fact that Saudi Arabia entered negotiations with the Houthis in November 2019, before COVID-19 became a serious issue in the kingdom, shows that the economic factor is only one of many considerations for the Saudi leadership. I would argue that the military threat posed by the Houthi rebels played a more pronounced role, especially after the September 2019 attacks on the oil fields in Buqayq and Khurays. Thus, the growing threat emanating from the Houthis as well as the kingdom’s long-term and expensive economic reform program can explain the Saudi willingness to talk. International pressure and the COVID pandemic have also contributed to a greater level of restraint in Saudi Arabia’s policies towards Yemen.

It is obvious that Saudi Arabia’s economic priorities, namely its Vision 2030, the diversification of its economy, the $500 billion futuristic city “Neom” in the province Tabuk, left no room for a continued war in Yemen. The shrinking of the kingdom’s financial reserves and its ambitious plans for economic reform have changed the Saudi approach to the Yemeni conflict for the better. In the end, it has proven to be a useless war which might have even increased the Houthis’ dependence on Iran and strengthened al-Qaʿida in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP). The conflict has led to what the United Nations described in 2017 as the currently “worst humanitarian crisis in the world”.                  

It is quite clear that Saudi Arabia’s primary regional goal has been to contain Iran’s influence. Disappointed by the passive Obama administration, the Saudis started to become more active in the region, be it in Syria, in Bahrain, or in Yemen. The Trump administration (2017-2021) paid new attention to Riyadh and pursued an uncompromising anti-Iran policy which was supported by Saudi Arabia and Israel alike. Mohammed bin Salman’s willingness to recognize Israel, the UAE’s peace agreement with Jerusalem on 13 August 2020, and both the Saudi and Emirati opposition to the Muslim Brotherhood have underlined this new alliance. There is a pro-Western, pro-American axis of Arab countries (primarily Saudi Arabia and the UAE, but also Egypt and Jordan) who fear Iran’s expansion more than anything else in the Middle East, even more than the popular outrage and condemnation for making peace with Israel.