Page 2 of 2 Yemen: A slogan and six wars
By Khaled Fattah
In the early 1990s, the Zaydi-Salafi ideological clash in Sa'dah reached a
dramatic level when Salafis attempted to take over the mosque of Razih - the
major mosque of al-Shabab al-Mum'en. The Salafi-Zaydi confrontations
intensified and were described by some authors as "the clash of
fundamentalism". In the collective action phase, the Zaydi movement in the
northern part of Yemen took the form of a defensive social movement, which had
the Salafists as the challenging group and Sa'dah province as its constituency.
Despite its massive success, however, the movement did not grow into a powerful
grassroots Islamic organization such as Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in the
Palestinian territories.
The militant phase
In 1999, the Zaydi summer religious centers began to be classified into
moderate and conservative ones. The latter were
headed by Hussein Badraddin al-Houthi, the founder of the radical Houthi group,
the son of an influential Zaydi cleric, and a former member of the Yemeni
parliament in 1993-97.
In some cases, the moderate-conservative typology took place even inside the
same center. One year later, a formal split between the centers took place, and
the board of management was no longer capable of administering the centers. The
split of the centers highlighted the division within the Zaydi Shi'a elite in
Yemen.
Armed with his rebellious and charismatic personality, and inspired by the
revolutionary ideas of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini and the organizational
strategies of Hassan Nasrallah, al-Houthi began to radicalize a growing number
of Zaydi youth.
In 2003, Yemen's central authority was alarmed by Al-Houthi activities when his
followers began to shout "Death to America" inside and outside the capital
city's grand mosque after Friday prayers. In Sa'dah, al-Houthi followers wrote
their anti-US slogan on the walls of buildings, including government offices,
and distributed leaflets, which contained accusations directed at the governor
of Sa'dah of him being a Central Intelligence Agency agent, and at the
government of Sana'a of being an ally to the US in the "war on terror" against
the Muslim world.
President Saleh was placed in a quandary after the September 11, 2001, attacks
by Washington's language of "for or against", and the Pentagon's perception of
Yemen as possibly another Afghanistan that might have to be invaded. To save
his country and regime, Saleh had to offer his cooperation, despite the
widespread anti-US sentiment that has intensified in Yemen since the launching
of the "war on terror". In the capital city and in the Sa'dah governorate, the
authorities began arresting hundreds of al-Houthi's anti-US slogan chanters.
According to Hassan Zaid, secretary-general of the Zaydi opposition party,
al-Haq, Yemen's security agencies thought that if today the followers of al
Houthi chanted "Death to America", tomorrow they could be chanting "Death to
the president of Yemen". After Sa'dah, al-Houthi began to mobilize the northern
population with the objective of de-legitimizing the central authority. In his
speeches, al-Houthi encouraged the population to stop paying all sorts of taxes
to the central authority. Saleh's government attempted a number of times,
through the use of peaceful traditional mediation techniques, to diffuse the
tension. Its attempts, however, were unsuccessful.
The Houthi defiance to Sana'a escalated to the extent that his followers
blocked the vital highway to the capital city, occupied local government
offices, took over strategic positions on several mountain tops, and started
adopting guerilla and militia tactics.
Sana'a had to react. On June 18, 2004, clashes between al-Houthi militia forces
and the Yemeni army ensued. The military operation against al-Houthi, however,
did not go as quickly as expected. The few hundred rebels showed a fierce
resistance, and tens of troops were reported dead. Although government troops
succeeded in killing Hussein al-Houthi, the violent insurgency did not come to
an end.
During the past five years, since the first round of confrontations, there have
been five fierce armed clashes with an increasing number of al-Houthi recruits,
led by Abdel Malik, the younger brother of the deceased Hussien al-Houthi. With
every new round of confrontation, clashes increase in their intensity, scope
and repercussions, and new grievances are provoked, thereby multiplying the
points of conflict.
The six confrontations resulted in thousands of casualties and tens of
thousands of displaced civilians. According to the UN Office for the
Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, the current clashes, which began on the
August 12, have displaced an estimated 50,000 people. This brings the total
number of internally displaced persons in the northern governorates since the
first round of confrontations in 2004 to 150,000.
The destructive power of a slogan
Slogans are headlines crowded with meaning. The more correctly the slogan
expresses the dissatisfaction and suffering of the people, the more effective
it will be in mobilizing latent emotions. Observers of the Houthi rebellion are
puzzled by the centrality of the anti-US slogan in the hearts and minds of the
rebels.
Some reports describe how al-Houthi followers in prison refuse to pledge to the
authority to stop chanting the slogan in return for their release from prison.
History of this stubborn insistence on chanting the slogan dates back to the
January 17, 2002, when the slain Hussein al-Houthi began chanting it in one of
his sermons that took place in al-Imam al-Hadi school in Ma'ran, Sa'dah
province. In the sermon, he appealed to the people to do something in the face
of what he called "the massive American arrogance".
"For how long more should we keep doing nothing in response to the American
arrogance," al-Houthi asked his followers. In answering the question, he made
the following statement which ignited the followers: "I say to you, my
brothers, shout! Don't you have the ability to shout: God is the Greatest ...
Death to America and Israel ...Victory for Islam and Muslims? Don't you think
that it is possible for every one of you to make this shout? This shout is a
great honor for us to have, right here in this school.
"By making this shout now, we will be the first who made the shout, which, is
sure, will be made not only in this hall but also in other places. With God's
will, you shall find those who will make the shout with you in other places.
Make this shout with me: Death to America and Israel."
Since this sermon, the anti-US shout has turned into a holy slogan for
al-Houthi followers, and it has become an integral part of their educational
and religious ceremonies, including at Friday' prayer.
Abdel Malik al-Houthi, who currently assumes operational leadership of the
rebellion, said in a May 9, 2005, interview that the slogan is the direct
reason behind all the successive events that took place. He justified the
continuation of chanting the slogan, arguing that it is the least he and his
followers can do in confronting "the American crusade against the Muslim
world".
What do we learn?
Conflicts generate junctures from which we can learn. The complex and
multi-layered conflict in the northern governorates of Yemen teaches us how
anti-US and anti-Israeli sentiments in the region are serving as an umbrella
for sheltering local demands, and as a catalyst for mobilizing local
communities against their own central governments.
The conflict teaches us, also, that the actions of the United States in the
post-9/11 world have contributed significantly in mobilizing insurgencies, and
not only in Iraq. Although al-Houthis are fierce opponents of radical and
militant Sunni groups such as al-Qaeda, they both share a fierce hostility to
US policies in the Middle East. Visitors to remote areas in Yemen will be
quizzed by average tribespeople on US and Israeli actions in Iraq, Lebanon and
Palestine.
In the 21st century, Arab satellite television brought to tribesmen of Yemen
the images of tortured and sexually abused Iraqi prisoners, brutal destruction
of south Lebanon and besieged Palestinian families sitting in front of their
bombarded or bull-dozed homes. The restructuring of the current international
and regional order in the Middle East has become very essential for diffusing
local conflicts, even if such conflicts are taking place in a remote tribal
area in the mountainous north of Yemen.
Khaled Fattah is a researcher at the School of International Relations,
University of St Andrews, United Kingdom.
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