Tolerant Muslims Massacred by Yemen´s US-friendly Tyrant Ali Abdallah Saleh, the Al Qaeda Lackey
Dr. Muhammad Shamsaddin Megalommatis
November 25, 2008
The appalling terrorist regime of the sergeant Ali Abdallah Saleh applies incredibly brutal, totalitarian policies throughout the country, which turned out to be an immense jail and a desolate realm run by traitors and anti-patriotic elements ready to behave as serfs to the Yemen-unfriendly, barbaric regime of the Saudi Wahhabis.
Invisible Civilians
The Challenge of Humanitarian Access in Yemen´s Forgotten War
http://www.hrw.org/en/reports/2008/11/18/invisible-civilians
III. Background - One War, Five Rounds
http://www.hrw.org/en/node/76086/section/5
Yemen is a country of 22 million people occupying 528,000 square kilometersabout the size of Francein the southwestern corner of the Arabian Peninsula. [1] Yemens per capita gross domestic product of US$520 ranks it among the poorest countries in the world. [2] Almost all Yemenis are Muslims. The majority are Sunnis, following the Shafii school and mainly living in the center and south of the country and along the Red Sea coast. Most of the remainder are Zaidi Shia, mainly living in the northern highlands. [3]
Since early 2004, a group referred to in Yemen as the Huthis after the family name of the leader of the initial rebellion, have engaged in an armed conflict with the Yemeni military and government-backed tribal fighters in the countrys northern-most governorate, Sada, that has been largely invisible to the outside world.[4] The conflict has comprised five main rounds of armed conflict; the most recent officially ended by government announcement on July 17, 2008. Between these main periods of conflict, low-level fighting continued.[5]
The Huthis
The movement led by the Huthis originated as Believing Youth (al-shabab al-mumin). Husain Badr al-Din al-Huthi founded the movement, which numbered between 1,000 and 3,000 in the mid-1990s, mainly to promote religious education in Sada governorate. [6] The governorate is populated mainly by Zaidi Muslims, that is, people who follow the Zaidi branch of Shia Islam. [7]
Zaidi Muslims believe that leadership of the Muslim community should rest with direct descendants of the Prophet Muhammadsada (singular sayyid). [8] Zaidi doctrine holds that only certain sayyidswith characteristics such as courage, erudition, and pietymay be leaders (imams) of their community. [9]
Zaidi imams led the Yemeni imamate for over 1000 years, until Yemens military-led revolution deposed them in 1962. After the advent of multi-party elections in 1990, the Hizb al-Haqq (Party of Truth) represented the Zaidi, and often sayyid, interests in parliament. The party accepted the existence of the Yemeni republic and, contrary to claims made by the government after the 2004 conflict erupted, explicitly renounced the reintroduction of a Zaidi imamate in Yemen. [10] Following the violent death of Husain al-Huthi in unclear circumstances in 2004, his brother Abd al-Malik al-Huthi assumed the leadership.
By no means do all Zaidis support the Huthis, and many also do not follow traditional Zaidi doctrine. President Saleh himself is of Zaidi origin, and Zaidis from the powerful Hashid tribal coalition have often been well represented in senior political and military positions. In the view of some observers, the conflict is at least as much an expression of center-periphery tensions as it is of doctrinal or sectarian differences. [11]
Tribes Supporting the Government
Tribal conflict is a regular occurrence in Yemens northern governorates, and has complicated the conflict between the government and the Huthis.[12] Since armed conflict erupted in 2004, the government has recruited thousands of northern tribesmen.[13] A government declaration in July 2008 that it intended to recruit a popular army of 27,000 tribesmen led to fears of protracted, small-scale conflict fuelled by revenge killings in the tribal settling of scores.[14] The government all but abandoned the idea of a popular army within weeks of announcing it.
Causes of the Conflict
The Huthis have never issued clear demands of the Yemeni government, although leading Huthi figures have referred to a range of possible explanations for their ongoing decision to take up arms.[15] These include a wish to protect and promote the Zaidi religious identity, opposition to the government because of its cooperation with the United States, economic neglect of Sada governorate, and defending themselves against what they view as unjustified government military operations.[16] The government has publicly characterized the Huthis as terrorists.[17] However, international actors, including the United States, have not used this label.[18]Human Rights Watch, in keeping with its policy of neutrality with respect to armed conflicts, takes no position regarding the Huthi or government decision to resort to arms.
In the 1980s, Yemenis returning from long periods of work in Saudi Arabia established hundreds of Saudi-backed, Sunni religious schools in the Zaidi Shia heartland that spread salafi doctrine, a literalist tendency that aims to restore the original beliefs and practices of the Prophet Muhammad and the generation of Muslims who followed him, and is close to the Wahhabi doctrine prevalent in Saudi Arabia.[19] Many Zaidis viewed the spread of these schools as a Salafi and government attempt to weaken Zaidi social and political influence in Yemen.
In the early 1990s, the Believing Youth movement set up schools teaching Zaidi doctrine.[20] The governmentwhich originally supported these schoolsdecided around 2000 that they represented a Zaidi revival that might threaten its power base in northern tribal areas.[21] The government started shutting down Zaidi schools, a process that is still ongoing.[22] Many observers believe that this prompted the clashes between the military and the Believing Youth.[23]
Another factor behind the governments clampdown on the Believing Youth movement was its adoption of anti-Western political positions. During the Gulf War in 1990-91, after the Yemeni government sided with Iraq in its invasion of Kuwait, Saudi Arabia deported over one million Yemeni workers, on whose remittances millions of Yemenis depended.[24] Gulf countries and the United States cut all aid to Yemen.[25]After 9/11, however, the government openly supported the United States, a position it maintained despite the US-led invasion of Iraq in March 2003 and despite the presence in Yemen of many Yemeni and other Arab veterans of the wars in Afghanistan. Western counter-terrorism analyses regularly refer to Yemen as effectively a rear base of Al-Qaeda in Yemen, making the country vulnerable to US military intervention.[26]
In 2003, the Huthis raised the slogan Allah is Great. Death to America. Death to Israel. Curse on the Jews. Victory to Islam during demonstrations following Friday prayers at the Great Mosque in Sana as well as in mosques in Sada and Damar towns, although the Huthis have never targeted Westerners or Western interests in Yemen.[27]For the government, the demonstrations were almost certainly an embarrassment, given its public commitment to assist US counter-terrorism initiatives.
In May 2004, President Saleh offered to meet Husain al-Huthi but the meeting never took place. On June 18, 2004, the police arrested and temporarily detained 640 Huthi demonstrators in front of the capitals Great Mosque. On June 20, 2004, the governor of Sada traveled to Marran District but tribesmen, possibly affiliated to Husain al-Huthi, denied him access. The same day security forces in some 18 military vehicles attempted to arrest al-Huthi, escalating the fighting into full-blown war.[28]
The War in Northern Yemen: a Non-international Armed Conflict
Under international law, the conflict since 2004 between the Yemen government and the Huthis in northern Yemen has been a non-international (internal) armed conflict in which all parties are bound by international humanitarian law (the laws of war). Yemeni armed forces and pro-government tribal fighters and Huthi forces are obligated to abide by article 3 common to the four Geneva Conventions of 1949,[29] the Second Additional Protocol of 1977 to the Geneva Conventions (Protocol II),[30] and relevant customary international law.[31]
International humanitarian law forbids deliberately harming civilians and other persons no longer taking part in the hostilities, including wounded or captured combatants. It prohibits summary executions, torture and inhumane treatment, rape, looting and other offenses. Humanitarian law also provides rules on the conduct of hostilities to minimize unnecessary suffering. These include provisions relating to humanitarian access to provide relief to the civilian population.In the event that the current armed conflict has genuinely ended, humanitarian law would remain applicable to conflict-related issues.
The United Nations Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement (Guiding Principles) also specify the rights of internally displaced persons (IDPs).[32] The principles are drawn from legally binding provisions set out in international human rights law, including the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights[33] and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights,[34] to which Yemen is party, as well as from international humanitarian law.[35] These principles still apply whether or not the situation in Yemen remains that of an armed conflict.
Note
Picture: Imam Hadi Mosque in Saada endangered because of the brutality of the Wahhabi thugs and death squads of the tyrant Ali Abdallah Saleh, the puppet of the Saudis.
From: http://www.flickr.com/photos/68581665@N00/133401818/
Meaningful comment:
The mimbar of the massive Imam Hadi mud brick mosque in Sa'da, Nth Yemen.
It's Absolutely forbidden to travel to this ancient town, generally, as a westerner or even as a Yemeni(these days 2007) due to the 'houthi 'war around the city, (I heard recently May 2007) nearly 80 000 dead so far!! ( Allahu Alim)
I was extremely lucky as I was arriving from the Saudi Arabian side unexpectedly & over land & had to deal with/protect me.
Zaydi Shi'ite mosque (fivers) different shia sect than in Iran whom are Twelvers. (Twelve Imams succession) which is bizarre considering the Sunni surrounds with exception of the Yami shiite tibes in Najran, Saudi Arabia, north east about 250km.
Astonishing harsh yet ancient & beautiful places with lovely, welcoming populace in my experience. Always delighted to see a 'white' Western Muslim! Alhamdullilah
It is unlikely as a non-Muslim you would ever get to see this live. I should post more of this place it's rarely visited & only by emergency medical western staff occasionally".
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