Thread by @Aldanmarki

Recent actions by the Ansarallah, while serving a clear strategic purpose, is also a symbol of the Yemen's refusal to bow to the same powers that have kept it impoverished and downtrodden for a hundred years.

🧵Mega thread of Yemen's history.

(Will be updated continuously.)

We start with North Yemen.

North Yemen had just regained its political autonomy after the defeat of the Ottoman Empire in 1918, with judicial and executive power granted to Imam Yahya Hamideddin al-Mutawwakil, the proclaimed king of Yemen's newly-created monarchy.

Imam Yahya was at the beginning well-liked by the Yemeni people. He was an anti-colonial ruler, and rose to prominence for his role against Ottoman colonialism. Likewise, he refused to recognize the superficial border lines drawn up by the British that separated-

Yemen into two political entities, the independent northern Yemeni state and the British-ruled territory in the south. One of Imam Yahya's first policies was to supply weapons to loyal tribes in the British-controlled south to ignite a last anti-colonial rebellion.

Yemen under Imam Yahya's rule was far from tranquil. In 1934, the newly-founded Saudi kingdom declared war on Yemen over a border dispute. The war lasted 3 months from March to June, and resulted in the provinces Najran, Jizan and Asir being annexed by Saudi Arabia.

The 1934 war resulted in a humiliating defeat for Yemen and the Imam. The Imam became gradually unpopular as he was, in the latter years of his reign, perceived as increasingly autocratic and repressive.

Imam Yahya was shot dead on February 17th 1948 during an event known as the Alwaziri coup. Imam Yahya was succeeded by Imam Ahmad Bin Yahya Hamideddin, who once again straightened Yemen's anti-colonial doctrine.

Imam Ahmad would later forge ties with the USSR, China & Egypt.

Imam Ahmad's new ties to the Communist bloc may seem odd given the conservative nature of his rule, but were predominantly led by his desire to expel the British from Yemeni territory, and unite Yemen into one single state.

But contrary to Imam Yahya, Imam Ahmad was known as an unreliable ruler whose mood swings could make or break policy decisions on an hourly or daily basis. Further, the rise of Arab nationalism throughout the Arab world put Imam Ahmad in a less-than-ideal position.

Discontent was brewing internally in Yemen. Imam Ahmad's deals with Egypt and the Communist bloc began to crumble.

Imam Ahmad passed away on September 19, 1962, and his eldest son, Muhammad Al-Badr was proclaimed king.

Al-Badr took over a weakened kingdom.

On September 26, 1962, a group of Republican officers led by Colonel Abdullah Al-Sallal in the Royal Palace Guard, led an assault on Imam Al-Badr's residence in Sana'a.

The Yemen Arab Republic was proclaimed shortly after. Sallal became its first president.

At first, it was reported that Imam Al-Badr was killed in his palace during the palace bombing. Later it turned out that he had managed to escape, and had fled to Yemen's highlands where he was able to assemble loyal tribes to fight the new Republican government.

A new frontier of the Cold War had thus emerged, with the Republicans on one side backed by Egypt and the Communist Bloc, and the Imam on the other side backed by the Saudis, the US and the UK.

Fighting drags on and turns into an 8-year long civil war from 1962 to 1970.

The Republican government was from the beginning over-reliant on Egyptian support just to keep functioning. This relationship with Egypt was widely perceived by Yemenis in the countryside as yet another colonial attempt by a foreign power to take control of Yemen.

Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser had sent a 20-thousand strong expeditionary force to Yemen by 1963, but Yemeni republican ruler Al-Sallal saw that as insufficient. The number doubled to 40-thousand Egyptian soldiers in 1964.

The Egyptians suffered heavy losses.

By 1967, the Egyptians had lost 15,000 men in the conflict, and with the war suffering stalemate after stalemate, the Egyptian government decided to withdraw its troops.

The Yemeni republican forces were now all alone - poorly armed and unprepared.

The war takes another turn by 1967, when Republican forces would find themselves besieged by royalist forces in Sana'a city. The siege lasted for 70 days, and eventually led to a tactical Republican victory over the royalists.

However, the royalists would remain active.

And here's where it gets interesting:

Saudi Arabia proposes a deal to the republican government. They proclaim their readiness to recognize the Republican government under the condition that the royalists are included in a shared cabinet.

By this time, the Republican side had already split into a left-wing and a right-wing. While the left-wing refused compromise and urged that the revolution should continue, the right-wing opportunistically agreed to Saudi Arabia's demands.

Hostilities ceased in 1970.

The right-wing had agreed to Saudi Arabia's demands, and in turn, Saudi Arabia gave diplomatic recognition to the Yemen Arab Republic.

The left-wing republican officers were purged from decision-making and had fled to South Yemen (which had become independent 3 years prior).

Which leads us to South Yemen.

South Yemen was first colonized in 1839 by forces of the British East India Company with the establishment of the Aden Settlement.

Between 1839 - 1932, the Aden Settlement was ruled directly by the Bombay Presidency.

Administrative control was later handed over to the Viceroy of India, and became its own distinct "Crown Colony" under direct British rule in 1937.

Aden was the only part of South Yemen under direct British control. The rest of South Yemen was known as the "Aden Protectorate", which came into being following a set of informal protection arrangements between nine Yemeni tribes and the British Empire.

In 1962, the Aden Colony was integrated into the newly-established "Federation of South Arabia" - a caricature of a Westphalian nation-state entirely drawn up by the British to resemble a "native state" for the Yemeni people. Aden would become its capital.

The purpose of creating this "federation" was to embolden the feudal principalities that governed the south at the time. These principalities were ruled by warlords susceptible to British bribery, which kept its population suppressed in favour of British strategic objectives.

On October 14 1963, the worst possible scenario for the British started to unfold.

The killing of anti-colonial hero Rajeh Bin Ghaleb Labouza ignites an unprecedented popular revolt in the south and the start of Yemen's anti-colonial struggle.

Two anti-colonial movements take shape in the south. The left-wing National Liberation Front (NLF), and the Arab Nationalist Front for the Liberation of Occupied South Yemen (FLOSY).

The goal was clear. Yemen needed its own Algeria-style decolonization.

Fighting intensifies by the mid-1960s, especially in the Radfan Hills where the NLF had its primary command centre.

The British are ruthless and unforgiving. Everything that breathed was murdered. Entire villages razed to the ground.

The air superiority of the British forces was unable to stop the impending assault that threatened the crown colony of Aden.

As a last-ditch measure to calm discontent, the British handed over policing to the Federation of South Arabia.

It went south quickly.

By 1967, thousands of Federation Army soldiers staged a grand mutiny against their British rulers.

Word had spread that the British had helped Israel in the Yom Kippur War, which led to massive discontent all throughout South Yemen.

The federation army later joined the NLF.

The NLF is now well-entrenched in Aden. Revolutionary command centres are popping up everywhere throughout the South. In Aden, the NLF begins to storm prison after prison, opening the gates and freeing the prisoners.

The British are still present, but their colony is lost.

As the NLF starts to push further into Aden, the British begins their gradual but speedy withdrawal from the country.

British army personnel and settlers were evacuated by helicopters and ships. A process that took months through 1967.

The last colonizer left Yemen on November 30th, 1967.

The Chairman of the NLF, Qahtan Al-Shaabi, returned to his home country on that same day and was given a hero's welcome by the people.

The People's Republic of South Yemen was thus proclaimed.

First order of business for Al-Shaabi's new independent government was land reform.

Land previously held by the feudal lords of the former protectorate and South Arabian Federation was granted free of charge to the peasantry at official handover ceremonies.

One major obstacle faced by the newly-independent South Yemeni state was the existence of royal and feudal pockets, especially in the northern parts of the country bordering North Yemen.

The NLF mobilized its forces against the remaining royalists. Fighting thus continued.

The left-wing of the NLF largely perceived the reforms enacted under Qahtan Al-Shaabi to be insufficient, and saw the shaky peace under his leadership as unacceptable.

They believed only a true revolution could curtail Yemen's socioeconomic ills.

On June 22nd 1969, the left-wing of the NLF overthrows Al-Shaabi and his government, purges the Nasserists from authority and proclaims the People's Democratic Republic of Yemen, the only Marxist-Leninist state to have ever existed in the Arab World.

Let's get back to North Yemen.

Abdul Rahman al-Eryani had been president of the Yemen Arab Republic for two years by 1970. He had arranged a normalization of relations with Saudi Arabia, and presided over a post-war Yemen torn to shreds. Abject poverty ruled supreme.

The conditions that Yemen found itself in was seen as unacceptable to most, and in 1974, a firebrand Lieutenant Colonel by the name of Ibrahim Al-Hamdi swooped in, overthrew Eryani in a bloodless coup, and declared himself President.

Al-Hamdi immediately became popular.

Ibrahim Al-Hamdi, generally proscribed as left-leaning, saw Yemen falling into the abyss. Poverty was everywhere, feudalism still reigned supreme and the central state in Sana'a had practically zero authority just a few miles outside of the city gates.

Something had to change.

Al-Hamdi identified Saudi Arabia's influence in Yemen as the primary reason for his country's socioeconomic decline.

It is important to remember that at this point, Saudi Arabia controlled everything in Yemen. It appointed Yemen's prime minister, controlled Yemen's finances-

controlled Yemen's foreign policy, had the power to dismiss or appoint Yemeni cabinet members as it saw fit and in large part treated Yemen as a Saudi province.

Al-Hamdi had reforms in mind, and it would take the military & popular participation to implement them.

One of the first things Hamdi did was to shut down the "Ministry of Tribal Affairs" which he considered one of Saudi Arabia's main gateways into Yemeni politics. Saudi Arabia controlled Yemen through the tribes, and Hamdi's plan was to limit tribal influence in government.

Next, Al-Hamdi centralized the military command structure & civil governance under one authority. Yemen was very much split between different "centres of power" after 1970, with the central command being just one out of many. Hamdi believed that would never suffice-

if Yemen was to become a modern and prosperous nation-state. It also meant that the newly-established central authority had to limit and destroy influence of warlord figures and tribes, which often turned violent. But in the end, it largely worked.

The people of North Yemen loved Al-Hamdi. Finally, they began to see light at the end of a long and dark tunnel. A rising Yemen was looming over the horizon. No more poverty, no more war, no more despair.

Unfortunately, that never happened. Not by Yemen's own design, but because the imperialist powers feared a rising and prosperous Yemen.

Especially considering Hamdi had forged close ties with his Marxist counterparts in the south.

What Saudi Arabia feared primarily was not just an independent Yemen, but a socialist, anti-imperialist *united* Yemen that would have the capacity and capability to enforce its will and its objectives on the region at large.

What the US & UK feared was the Red Sea and the Bab Al-Mandab coming under the direct authority of a Yemeni government hostile to Imperialist powers, something that could, in their view, only take form if Yemen was allowed to become truly independent...

Remind you of anything?

By the mid-1970s, something begins to take shape, and it is here the politics of both North & South Yemen begin to merge.

Remember the left-wing officers that were purged after 1970? They've returned, and have assembled into the "National Democratic Front".

The National Democratic Front, backed militarily and financially by South Yemen, declares an armed struggle in the North against the Northern government, and fights for the unification of Yemen under one socialist government.

While the NDF had came into being prior to Hamdi's rise to power, it is important to mention that interestingly, the NDF ceased its armed operations during Hamdi's rule precisely because Hamdi appealed to the Yemeni peasantry and was considered acceptably leftist.

So while the NDF, at this point a known and strong player, had paused its struggle, Hamdi now faced newfound obstacles. Something is not right. Saudi Arabia is getting irritated, and Hamdi flies to Riyadh in early 1977 to make amends.

It was a *very* short visit.

As Hamdi's visit to Riyadh didn't work out as intended, he began to focus on reunification efforts with the South. They came extremely close, to the point where the diplomatic corps was unified between the two, and the adoption of a unified school curriculum.

Two days prior to a scheduled visit to Aden that would've likely finalized reunification efforts, Al-Hamdi was invited to a banquet by Ahmad Al-Ghashmi, Hamdi's right-hand man.

It would be the last time Hamdi was ever seen alive.

Details are murky and often contradictory, but it is widely acknowledged that Al-Ghashmi, with fellow conspirators, shot and killed Al-Hamdi and members of his entourage.

A funeral was held for Al-Hamdi the next day, attended by treacherous Al-Ghashmi (identified by his Hitler moustache) and Salim Rubai Ali, head of state of South Yemen.

Al-Ghashmi would replace Hamdi as President of North Yemen. The Saudis now had a puppet figure in power.

Al-Ghashmi didn't rule for long. A year later in 1978, a briefcase handed to him by a South Yemeni diplomat exploded and killed him in an instant.

The assassination of Al-Ghashmi was likely ordered by Salim Rubai Ali in retribution for Al-Hamdi's killing.

The National Democratic Front took up arms once again after Hamdi's assassination. Saudi interference had gone too far.

They rushed into action and occupied largest swathes of territory at the border between North & South Yemen.

It marked the beginning of the "Front Wars".

The Front Wars, an oft-overlooked and understudied period in Yemen's modern history, was a civil war between the Marxist NDF on one side and the Islamic Front, an extremist organisation funded and established by Saudi Arabia, on the other.

For the Saudi puppet regime that came after Al-Hamdi's murder, the Islamic Front was an absolute necessity. The central government was in complete disarray, and so too the army. The Islamic Front helped and assisted North Yemen in suppressing rebellion and dissent.

The person who would take over in Al-Ghashmi's stead was Ali Abdullah Saleh, who would later become known as Yemen's long-time despotic ruler.

He took over a North Yemen in complete disarray. Luckily for Saudi Arabia, he was even more of a puppet than Al-Ghashmi.

Saleh presided over a Yemen embroiled in yet another civil war. With the help of Saudi Arabia, he boosted the Islamic Front, gave them weapons and integrated them into separate Yemeni Army brigades.

By the early to mid-1980s, the Marxist NDF was defeated, with its cadres seeking exile in Lebanon. Saleh and the Islamic Front had won the war. His rule on power seemed untouchable.

Saleh sought the immediate reversal of Ibrahim Al-Hamdi's policies, including Hamdi's local development agenda.

Hamdi had become especially popular by ordering the establishment of independent agricultural cooperatives that would lead the country to self-sufficiency.

Saleh's new scheme, and the reversal of Hamdi's reforms, depended on loans from the IMF and the World Bank, and required the mass liberalization of what was previously publicly owned assets.

These policies will be felt decades later.

What happened to the Islamic Front, now that the Front Wars were over?

Some chronicles assert that they were reorganized primarily by Saudi Arabia and sent to Afghanistan to assist the war effort against the Soviet Red Army.

For the two Yemens, the 1980s was largely characterized by incredible economic uncertainties. China had liberalized, the USSR was "opening up" and a need for new economic investments was desperately needed.

Reunification talks between North & South resume.

By the early 1980s, the head of state of South Yemen, Abdul Fattah Ismail (who had risen to power following a coup that ended in Salim Rubai Ali's death), went into exile in Moscow and was later replaced-

by Ali Nassir Muhammad, who took a less interventionist stance towards North Yemen.

In 1986, Abdul Fattah Ismail returns to South Yemen and civil war in the South breaks out between Ismail-loyalists on one side, and Ali Nassir's government on the other.

The war lasted more than a month. Ali Nassir was ousted and fled to the north, Abdul Fattah Ismail disappeared and was presumed dead, and in their wake, Ali Salem Al-Beidh rises to power as General Secretary of the Yemen Socialist Party and South Yemeni head of state.

South Yemen was, just like North Yemen, was in economic decline. The USSR had pulled crucial investments and funding, and the socioeconomic conditions for reunification was now ripe.

Yemen becomes one country on May 22nd 1990, with Ali Abdullah Saleh as President.

It's important to mention here that Yemen's reunification was, objectively speaking, a progressive move. It was a goal long fought for and sought after by all of Yemen's historically progressive currents. It was cheered for and praised by the entire population.

Most people truly believed that Yemen's reunification would turn a new page in Yemen's long and tumultuous history. A fresh start, free from war and despair. A future ready to be shaped by a united people.

History, however, would have it otherwise.

The first election of the now-unified Yemeni state takes place on April 27 1993. A total of 301 seats are to be contested.

A 50/50 tie is generally expected between Saleh's General People's Congress Party and Al-Beidh's Yemeni Socialist Party.

That never happens, though.

The GPC wins 123 seats with a 28.69 percentage of the vote.
The YSP wins 56 seats with an 18.54 percentage of the vote.

The Islah Party, a new player, wins 62 seats with a 17.14 percentage of the vote.

Something is not right.

The Islah Party, an outgrowth of both the Islamic Front and the Muslim Brotherhood established in 1990, comes in second in the final results with more seats than the YSP, despite getting a smaller pecentage of the vote.

At this point, it becomes increasingly clear for Al-Beidh that something more sinister is in the making. Not only has Saleh guaranteed his grip on power, the YSP has been totally sidelined in the elections and reduced to a fraction of what it once was.

The 1993 elections also saw the introduction of a new political player.

Hussein Badruddin Alhouthi was elected representing the Al-Haqq Party, a political mandate that was supported by the Yemeni Socialist Party.

Saleh began his purge immediately after the 1993 election.

Countless members of the Socialist Party were either disappeared or assassinated. Saleh had also flat-out refused to implement many of the terms that were stipulated in the 1990 unification accord.

Concerned with his own security, Ali Salem Al-Beidh fled Sana'a in August 1993 and reestablished his residence in Aden. At this time, southern cabinet members were sacked one by one, and troops began to build up along the former north-south border.

In early January 1994, Ali Abdullah Saleh claimed that MiG fighter jets loyal to former South Yemen had launched bombing raids on a military base in the North.

Shortly afterwards, officials in Saleh's own government admitted that they were on an approved training mission.

Here it is important to highlight that although Yemen has been a unified state for 4 years, the army still suffered a clear North/South divide and had at this point not been reorganized.

And even though Saleh's charge about the MiGs was a clear lie, the foundation for further aggression was already prepared.

Any imminent war would be a losing war for Al-Beidh and the YSP. The USSR was no more. Saleh had the upper hand in virtually every aspect.

Enter: Saudi Arabia. Once again. Surprise surprise😒

Interestingly, Saudi Arabia had offered to lend Al-Beidh a helping hand. Not because Saudi Arabia had turned left in less than a decade, but for the sole reason to help separate the young unified state.

Saudi Arabia played Al-Beidh like a fiddle. Al-Beidh, feeling overconfident that Saudi Arabia would come to his aid financially and militarily, declared the secession of South Yemen on May 21st 1994.

Saudi Arabia never came.

While it paid South Yemen lip service, it financed and propped up North Yemen's military. The Islamic Front also makes a return once again.

Yemen once again finds itself embroiled in a civil war.

The 1994 Civil War, despite lasting only 2 months, was incredibly brutal and sinister.

Saleh had aroused his constituency by calling his war effort a "holy war against communist disbelievers".

The Islamic Front led the charge and devastated the South and its identity.

The Islamic Front destroyed South Yemen's socialist heritage and legacy.

Statues were toppled as they were considered idolatrous. Socialist emblems were etched out of buildings and walls. Murals were painted over. South Yemen's communication infrastructure was dismantled.

Civilians were gunned down in the streets. Socialist Party officials were tortured to death. Socialist books were burned in massive bonfires. Libraries were ransacked. Cultural institutions were burned down.

South Yemen - and Yemeni Socialism - was no more.

Hussein Alhouthi, at the time representing the Al-Haqq Party in parliament, strongly and vocally objected to Saleh's violent assault on the South. To aid his southern brethren, Alhouthi would organize local gatherings in his home region Saadah to protest the war.

For that reason, Alhouthi had his personal residency ransacked by Saleh's army and multiple members of his family arrested.

Alhouthi remained undeterred and continued to campaign for the equal political rights of South Yemenis.

Saleh had emerged victorious through bloodshed and terror. It would seem, albeit for a brief moment, that his rule on power was absolute and unopposed.

And while some resemblance of stability had returned, it wouldn't last long.

Yemen's next election was held on April 27 1997.

Hussein Alhouthi, who was elected to parliament in 1993, did not seek a reelection.

Instead, he withdrew to Yemen's northern highlands in Saadah to focus on his new project that would later become the "Believing Youth Movement".

Hussein Alhouthi's focus on religious teaching in the North served two important purposes.

1. To reignite the revolutionary flame of Zaydi Islam, and to that extent make Zaydism more appealing to Saadah's youth.

2. To counteract the growing influence of Salafism in Saadah.

Saleh, in a deal with Saudi Arabia, had essentially agreed to resettle former Islamic Front fighters in the northern highlands bordering the Saudi Kingdom. These fighters included both veterans from the 1994 war, but also homecoming veterans from Afghanistan.

At first, Hussein Alhouthi's newfound project was entirely peaceful. The Believing Youth was established as a religious initiative committed to non-violence as a result of the 1994 war. it preached coexistence and dialogue across different Islamic schools of thought.

The September 11 attacks in New York and the subsequent US-led "War on Terror" changed all of that.

This is when Hussein Alhouthi's teachings starts to get increasingly more political, with topics like imperialism and colonialism being taught through a religious lens.

It is through the prism of the US War on Terror and invasion of Afghanistan that the infamous "Houthi slogan" is adopted in 2002.

The slogan spreads fast, and in a couple of months becomes the most recognizable protest slogan in Yemen.

The "Houthi slogan" becomes the only political expression that Saleh actually feels threatened by.

The slogan is spray painted with stencils on every street corner, at every wall, junction and bridge. The slogan is everywhere. In Sana'a, in Taiz and across the country.

Saleh feels threatened precisely because he had been forging closer ties with the US since the late 1990s, ties that only grew closer in the wake of the 9/11 attacks.

Saleh's Yemen, in the eyes of the US, was to become an important partner in their war on terror.

It's early 2004. The slogan is still spreading everywhere. Saleh is deploying his security apparatus to crack down on dissent. His crackdown is predominantly targeting Yemen's youth, who were leading the protest campaign. Tens of thousands were arrested.

On the 18th of June 2004, approximately 640 followers of Hussein Alhouthi, who were protesting infront of the Great Mosque of Sana'a, were arrested by Yemeni police.

Two days later, the Yemeni government offered a bounty of 55 thousand dollars for the capture of Alhouthi.

These events triggered a large-scale Yemeni Army operation in Saadah with the purpose of capturing Alhouthi, and whoever got to him first would be paid the bounty.

25 followers of Alhouthi were shot dead in July 2004, and the bounty raised to 75,5 thousand dollars.

On September 10th 2004, the Yemeni Defence Ministry announced that Hussein Alhouthi, including 20 of his closest aides, had been killed in Marran directorate of Saadah Province.

The news of Alhouthi's death, including the grim details describing how he was burned alive in a cave where he had taken shelter with his aides and his family, enraged the entirety of Saadah province.

These events led to the First Saadah War.

Hussein Alhouthi's father, esteemed Zaydi cleric Badruddin Alhouthi, takes over the movement for a short period of time. Badruddin steps down, and Hussein's younger brother Abdul Malik Alhouthi assumes leadership.

A fully-fledged civil war is now raging in the North.

Fighting continues through a total of 6 phases, colloquially known as the Six Saadah Wars.

The 6th and final war in 2009 was the bloodiest. The Believing Youth, now fighting under the name "Ansarallah" (God's Partisans) faced an emboldened Yemeni Army backed by Saudi Arabia.

With the direct participation of the Saudi Army & Air Force, the Yemeni Army launched "Operation Scorched Earth" in an attempt to defeat the Ansarallah through an iron-fist approach.

The operation leads to hundreds of thousands of people becoming internally displaced.

The international community begins to learn about the conflict, and it is also here that the Ansarallah establishes a digital internet presence in an effort to win hearts & minds globally.

They would release multiple videos like the one shown below.

Fighting is intense, but the Ansarallah has the upper hand. Saleh's Army is disorganized, poorly equipped and losing morale.

The US knows this, and compels Saleh to disarm his anti-air weapons stockpile in fear that they could be captured further down the line.

The Yemeni Army starts to crumble. Important Army positions are overtaken one by one by the Ansarallah.

During the latter half of 2009, the war spills into Saudi Arabia itself, with crucial border outposts overtaken by Ansar fighters.

Fighting drags on.

On the 25th of January 2010 the leader of the Ansarallah, Abdul Malik Alhouthi, offered a truce to prevent further civilian loss of life. They warned, however, that the fighting would turn into open combat if the Saudis refused to disengage.

Later, the Yemeni government proposed a conditional ceasefire.

The five conditions were:

1. Re-establishment of safe passage on roads
2. Surrender of mountain strongholds
3. Full withdrawal from all local authority property
4. Return of all military equipment seized during hostilities
5. Release of all detained civilians and soldiers.

On the 30th of January 2010, Abdul Malik Alhouthi blamed the government for recent upsurge in fighting in a video released online, but agreed to the terms set forth by the government.

January 30th 2010 is generally considered the end of the Six Saadah Wars, although fighting would continue well throughout 2010 at gradual levels of ferocity.

Then comes 2011 - the year of the Arab Spring.

Protests once again take Yemen by storm.

In January 2011, major street protests in Yemen followed shortly after the popular ouster of the Tunisian government, and quickly spread through most of the country.

The Ansarallah had firmly joined the side of the opposition to Ali Abdullah Saleh's rule.

It's crucial to highlight just how dire Yemen's situation was at this time. Saleh, the Gorbachev of the Arab World, had turned a relatively prosperous & self-sufficient economy into one that was overreliant on IMF loans and foreign imports just to remain afloat.

By 2011, Yemen imported upwards to 90% or more of everything it consumed, even basic food stuffs like flour and meat, which used to be widely cultivated in the country.

The country was massively in debt and unemployment was rampant. By all accounts, Saleh had to go.

However, that soon proved easier said than done. If the democratic process was to be respected completely would mean Yemen having a chance to become truly independent, which ran counter to Saudi & US interests. On the other hand, the Saudis & US could not tolerate a Yemen-

in complete disarray either. To regional and global powers, it was very important to keep Yemen just barely afloat, but without tipping the scale on either side.

Yemen's Arab Spring was short-lived.

Saudi Arabia, the US & UK went into emergency mode and began drafting plans that would, one, ensure that Yemen remained within the fold of Saudi dominance, and two, artificially create conditions that resembled a democratic process.

The Saudi-dominated Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) steps in and offers Saleh a deal that would grant him political immunity from prosecution on the condition that he stepped down and handed power to his vice-president Abdrabbuh Mansour Hadi.

Saleh, obviously, takes the deal.

Power was now transferred to Mansour Hadi, but the GCC had "promised" a "democratic process" for the Yemeni people.

In 2012, a sham presidential election is conducted with Mansour Hadi's name being the only one on the ballot.

He wins the vote by 100%.

Yay to democracy...

The Yemeni Socialist Party and the Ansarallah are the only two factions that publicly decided to boycott the election, calling it a clown show, a circus and a disgrace imposed upon the Yemeni people.

The only semi-positive thing Mansour Hadi did during his "interim term" was establishing the National Dialogue Conference, in which all of Yemen's major political parties and actors would take part to discuss the country's future.

This process resembled true newfound hope.

The National Dialogue Conference was a transitional process held at the Movenpick Hotel in Sana'a from March 18, 2013 to January 24, 2014.

The Conference was divided into separate working groups focused on separate but important political issues that had to be resolved.

As stipulated in the GCC agreement, the final outcome of the Dialogue Conference would result in a new draft constitution for the country.

All political actors took part in the process willingly, and it is also here that Ansarallah's Politburo emerges for the first time.

The Dialogue process is really interesting and peculiar, because it involves certain political actors bringing forth to the table various proposals one wouldn't otherwise have expected.

One of Ansarallah's key dialogue representatives is Dr. Ahmad Sharafuddin.

Dr. Sharafuddin had a PhD in law from Ain Shams University, and taught law at a Sana'a University. Well-respected and well-liked universally, he represented a new and modern face for the Ansarallah. One that was keen on Yemen's democratic transition.

Dr. Ahmad Sharafuddin presents Ansarallah's official vision for Yemen's future at the Dialogue Conference:

A secular, federal Yemeni state where religion plays no role in either the executive or judicial branches of state authority.

Dr. Sharafuddin argued that Yemen since 1990 had found itself stuck in the muddied waters of conflicting legislation and constitutional paragraphs. A legalese hell, if you will. A lawyer's worst nightmare. The result of a merger between nationalist North and communist South.

One of his arguments was that the Yemeni constitution included conflicting articles that attributed supreme legal authority to both God and the People, and said it can't possibly be both.

He said either supreme authority is vested in the Lord, or the People. Not both.

His ideal compromise was a renewed constitutional framework where religious rhetoric was completely absent. He argued, further, that this would only strengthen Yemen's social and religious cohesion between the country's different Islamic schools of thought.

On January 21st, 2014, Dr. Ahmad Sharafuddin was violently gunned down and murdered by unidentified gunmen, as he was about to participate in the closing plenary session of the Dialogue Conference.

Dr. Sharafuddin's murder was not the first, nor the last.

Abdul Karim Jadban, another senior Ansarallah representative, was shot dead in a likewise fashion just two months prior to Dr. Sharafuddin's killing.

It was clear that there were malicious forces present in Yemen hellbent on tearing apart not just the Ansarallah, but the very fabric of the Dialogue Conference.

Prime suspect in both killings was the Islah Party, the Muslim Brotherhood-offshoot that had emerged in 1990.

The Islah Party had largely emerged as the strongest political force in the immediate wake of the Arab Spring protests. They amassed great leverage and power over the protests, with its members rising to the top as its key leaders - one of them being Tawakkol Karman.

Saudi cables leaked by Wikileaks at the time proved that Tawakkol Karman had met with Saudi officials in an effort to seek their support for her efforts, at a time when she openly criticized Saudi Arabia.

The Yemen/Saudi double-game was once again unfolding.

2013 saw the rise of the Islah Party as Yemen's de-facto ruling-party.

Although Mansour Hadi belonged to the General People's Congress on paper, it was the Islah Party who pulled the strings behind the scenes.

This becomes increasingly evident when one looks at General Ali Mohsen Al-Ahmar's rise to power. At this time, Al-Ahmar ruled both the Sixth Regional Command and the powerful First Armored Division, and was key to Mansour Hadi's personal security apparatus.

We'll get to Al-Ahmar later. Let's focus on the Dialogue Conference.

The Dialogue Conference concludes officially on January 24, 2014 with a less-than-ideal outcome for most parties. The Ansarallah objects to the provisions stipulated in the draft constitution-

arguing that the federal division of Yemen as proscribed by it would divide the country into rich and poor regions, and further deepen the socioeconomic divide whereby rich regions get even richer with no incentive to share, and poorer regions get poorer.

The Al-Hirak Movement, the bloc representing South Yemen's grievances, likewise saw the outcome as flawed as it failed to sufficiently address South Yemeni demands for greater political autonomy and expanded political rights.

Further, the outcome gave Mansour Hadi an extension on his already limited transitional term, which the Ansarallah perceived to be fundamentally corrupt, and demanded Hadi resigned from his post.

It's July 2014. Protests are (again) taking Yemen by storm in dissatisfaction with Hadi and the outcome of the National Dialogue.

One policy change would soon turn out to be fatal for Hadi's cabinet.

Some background: In 2010, a year before the Arab Spring sweeps through Yemen, the UK-based think-tank "Chatham House" releases a roundtable summary of a Yemen Forum it had helped organized earlier.

The then-deputy Finance Minister of Yemen, Jalal Omar Yaqoub, is attending.

Minister Yaqoub begins to identify a set of ten priorities that Yemen had to focus on, to steer the course of its economy straight.

The language here is a bit unclear, but the priorities Minister Yaqoub mentions are all part of a plan rigorously supported by the US and the IMF.

The third priority that Minister Yaqoub mentions at the 2010 roundtable is a slash in diesel subsidies.

The Yemeni government had been subsidizing diesel and gas to make it cheap for its citizens to buy.

Remember: This is 2010. Saleh had still not be overthrown.

In late July 2014, the government of Mansour Hadi decides to readopt Yaqoub's 10 policy priorities.

Fuel subsidies are slashed and the prices immediately begin to skyrocket.

Guess what happens next.

Hadi is unable to control the discontent, and it gets bloodier and more chaotic. Protests intensify, and starts to spread across the country.

A peaceful protest on September 9, 2014 in front of the Prime Minister's office is crushed through bloodshed.

Ali Mohsen Al-Ahmar's goons are responsible for the carnage, but it doesn't end with the gunning down of civilians.

His soldiers begin to storm hospitals one by one to either arrest or assassinate wounded protesters.

It has thus become incredibly clear and obvious that Hadi is willing to massacre his own people to pave the way for IMF-drafted liberalization schemes and austerity measures.

September 21, 2014 would mark a turning point that would seal President Hadi's fate forever.

It's a quiet Sunday morning in Sana'a, but Hadi is expecting the worst. He had failed to heed numerous warnings by Abdul Malik Alhouthi, demanding a reversal of austerity policies.

Suddenly, armed convoys starts rolling into Sana'a.

They are the "People's Committees".

The Yemeni Army crumbles. The police abandon their posts. Thousands of security personnel switch sides and defect from Hadi's government.

The People's Committees (independent armed cells organized by the Ansarallah) becomes the de-facto authority in a matter of hours.

Mohsen Al-Ahmar leads a gunbattle with his loyalists against the Ansar-led People's Committees, but it's a lost battle.

Sana'a, the capital of Yemen, is overtaken in a relatively bloodless process.

Key Ministries and state institutions were overtaken. The People's Committees installed checkpoints across the city.

Hadi is not overthrown. He is forced to comply with the demands of the Yemeni people, including the demand to roll back all IMF-backed austerity policies.

Most significantly, the Ansarallah was able to force Hadi to sign the UN-sponsored Peace and National Partnership Agreement, which stipulated the establishment of a new and inclusive government that would include members of all factions, including the Ansar and the Hirak.

A mass celebration soon followed later that evening, with a large fireworks display lighting up the Sana'a skyline.

What followed shortly after the signing of the PNPA was a process of political reconciliation between multiple different parties.

This time, however, the Islah Party was suffering. The Ansarallah had deliberately sidelined them from power in favour of more progressive parties.

Forums and workshops were organized throughout the country in order to find a solution to Yemen's political deadlock. Civil society organizations, the trade unions and cooperatives were included in the process.

On the sidelines, the Ansarallah acted as the people's observer on matters concerning state governance. A new body called the Revolutionary Committee would burst into ministry offices and demand the signing of inquiries into corruption or missing funds.

The Ansarallah, contrary to what many people think, had the backing of 13 of the country's most progressive political parties, including the National Democratic Front Party, the parliamentary successor to the Marxist-Leninist National Democratic Front.

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Things are generally going pretty swell, all things considered. New allegiances are being forged in the flames of the revolution. New understandings are made and signed. The political situation is still shaky at this point, but so far so good.

Mansour Hadi, at this point still the de-facto president of Yemen, decides to resign from his post prematurely on January 23, 2015, creating an immediate power vacuum.

The Ansarallah accept, but decides to place Hadi under house arrest for the foreseeable future. Trust between Hadi and the Ansar has collapsed, and the Ansar is not taking any chances.

Fast forward to early February, 2015.

An announcement is broadcasted that on Friday, February 6th, an important declaration will be held in the presidential palace in Sana'a. Political dignitaries are invited. The foreign press is invited.

Something huge is underway.

It's Friday. The foreign press have setup their tripods. The political dignitaries have taken their seats.

Out comes Abdul Karim Al-Khaiwani, award-winning Yemeni journalist and Women's rights activist, and takes the podium.

"Today, the revolution enters a new phase", he says.

Al-Khaiwani starts speaking.

The US, UK and Saudi Arabia begins to worry. Things are developing faster than they would've liked.

Their influence in Yemen is dwindling in front of their eyes.

Leaders from all of Yemen's progressive parties and movements spoke at the podium - including a representative of the original Al-Hirak movement representing South Yemen's interests.

The political dignitaries have finished their introductory speeches.

A document is brought forth to the podium, and a famous TV presenter appears. He starts reading.

This would mark the beginning of the Constitutional Declaration.

The articles of the Declaration are then read aloud in front of the audience and rolling cameras.

The Declaration turned the Revolutionary Committee into the vanguard of the Revolution, and did away with the old structures of authority.

This is the entire declaration in full.

This was a seismic event for Yemeni politics.

The House of Representatives was disbanded. The superstructures of authority, which used to grant Saudi Arabia unopposed access to domestic Yemeni affairs, were dissolved with the blink of an eye.

They were panicking in Riyadh.

They were panicking in London, and they were panicking in Washington.

Yemen has once again risen from its slumber, in total refusal to submit to the dictates of any outside forces.

Embassies started burning their documents. Foreign diplomats began leaving the country.

Loyalists of the deposed Islah party began staging protests in opposition to the Declaration. They were especially big in Taiz, one of Yemen's biggest cities.

For the most part peaceful opposition, of course with the backing of external forces.

But the peace was short-lived.

Abdrabbuh Mansour Hadi, who had been living under house arrest since January, manages to escape his arrest on the 21st of February 2015, and flees south to seek refuge in Aden.

Shortly thereafter, he appears on television from the presidential compound in Aden, proclaiming himself to still be the legitimate president of Yemen, despite his resignation a month prior.

Ali Abdullah Saleh, the former president deposed in 2011, urges Hadi to seek exile.

Then it gets serious.

The Yemeni Army, of which two thirds had sworn loyalty to the Revolutionary Committee and the Ansarallah, started to move south in order to catch Mansour Hadi and to combat the renegade and rogue forces that had remained on his side.

The Army pushes further south, and meets heavy resistance on its way. On March 19, the Army is engaged in heavy battles with Mansour Hadi's forces around Aden Airport. Army forces are led by Abdul-Hafez al-Saqqaf, but Al-Saqqaf's forces are defeated by the Hadi loyalists.

Following the defeat of Al-Saqqaf's forces, the Yemeni Air Force begins bombing the presidential palace in Aden to force Hadi out. The bombing runs continue for at least a couple of days.

But Hadi was not in the palace at all.

He had already fled Yemen.

Yemeni Army forces eventually manages to take control of Aden airport and its vicinity. The battle takes a couple of days, but ends in relative calm. Unrest, however, was far from over.

On March 26, 2015, the then-Saudi ambassador to the US, Adel al-Jubeir, announces in Washington DC that Saudi Arabia had launched a military operation on Yemen.

The War on Yemen, which is still ongoing as of writing this thread, had thus begun.

Saudi Arabia is now once again at war with its poorer neighbor.

The entirety of Yemen is under siege. Sana'a is being bombed every day.

All of it is recorded by the smartphones of ordinary Yemeni people.

It's every day and it's continuous. All major Yemeni cities are targeted deliberately.

Saudi war planes drop the bombs, but the US pinpoints the targets from its own command centers.

It goes on like this for months on end.

Of course, the Yemeni people were not going to take any beating.

The entire country rose and mobilized against the traitors who had sold them out, against the powers that had exploited them for decades and against the murderers killing their children from above.

There were ongoing mediation efforts in 2015 to bring the Saudi-American war on Yemen to an end. Yemeni diplomats try every channel that is available to them, but they hardly get any response back. They try again.

Months pass. April, May, June, July... The bombings continue.

On the 8th of July 2015, the Yemeni Armed Forces starts responding to the aggression for the first time.

On that date, the Yemeni Army launched a DPRK-produced Hwasong-6 ballistic missile at the central power station in Jizan, Saudi Arabia.

A general mobilization is declared in August that year. All able-bodied men were to report to their local recruitment center.

Shortly afterwards, the Yemeni Army begins pounding Saudi installations across the border with anti-tank missiles & artillery.