US report: The Revolutionary Guard runs Houthi operations as one of the Iranian shadow tools
English - Monday 31 January 2022 الساعة 08:36 am
NewsYemen, special translation:
Houthi rebels have escalated their ballistic missile and drone attacks on the UAE as part of their war against the Saudi-led coalition in Yemen.
These ongoing Houthi attacks are part of Iran's broader shadow war by proxy against the United States and its allies in the Persian Gulf, Iraq, Syria and Yemen, which has escalated in recent weeks.
And last Monday, the UAE announced that it had shot down two ballistic missiles that targeted its capital, Abu Dhabi, launched by the Houthi rebels.
The US Air Force also announced that it had intervened to defend against ballistic missile attack.
The Houthis claimed to have targeted Al Dhafra Air Base in Abu Dhabi, which hosts nearly 2,000 US pilots serving in the US Air Force's 380th Air Expeditionary Wing. The US forces were placed on high alert and were transferred to security caches shortly after the early missile warning was launched.
The Houthis claim that their missile attacks are in retaliation for the Emirati military activity in Yemen, including the recent attack led by the Giants Brigades in Shabwa and Marib, in which the Houthis suffered crushing defeats.
In addition to launching long-range terrorist attacks against Emirati and Saudi civilian targets, the Houthis have also resorted to piracy, illegally seizing a UAE-flagged ship in the Red Sea on January 3, and the Security Council has demanded its release and its crew.
Iran's hand is clear
The ongoing Houthi attacks are part of Iran's broader shadow war by proxy against the United States and its allies in the Persian Gulf, Iraq, Syria and Yemen, which has escalated in recent weeks.
The Iranian Revolutionary Guards are smuggling drones, missiles, and other advanced military technologies to their Houthi allies, training them to use increasingly sophisticated weapons, and are largely believed to play a key role in launching missiles at long-range targets.
And the Houthis are not the only Iranian proxies threatening the UAE. On January 21, a spokesman for the Iranian-backed Iraqi militia threatened to attack the UAE, falsely accusing it of supporting ISIS terrorists.
All of these groups pose mortal threats not only to the UAE, Saudi Arabia, and local civilians, but also to the United States.
When tensions between Iran and the United States peaked in January 2020 due to the massive attacks on American forces in Iraq by Iranian-backed militias, the Trump administration responded with a drone strike that killed General Qassem Soleimani. As the commander of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards' Quds Force, which coordinates the activities of proxy militias, Soleimani was the principal architect of Iran's proxy war strategy.
Immediately after the anniversary of his death, Iranian-backed militias in Iraq and Syria escalated their attacks on American interests. Over the course of four days beginning on January 3, a series of missile and drone attacks were launched on US military forces in Iraq and on the residences of State Department employees at Baghdad airport.
The Houthis also seized an Emirati-flagged ship marking the second anniversary of Soleimani's death, the same day Iranian hackers launched cyber attacks on two Israeli newspapers.
It is abundantly clear that the Houthis are working closely with the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, whose support has been indispensable to their missile and drone strikes on the UAE, something the Biden administration is reluctant to acknowledge.
Biden's failed policy on Yemen
The Biden administration has turned a blind eye to Houthi attacks against Saudi, Emirati, and local civilian targets, which amount to terrorism. One of the first steps of the failed Biden administration came in February, when it removed the Houthis from the terrorism list and the sanctions the Trump administration had imposed on the Houthis.
Although the Biden administration offered humanitarian reasons and the need to avoid obstructing foreign aid to reverse President Donald Trump's policy, it is the Houthi group that poses one of the main humanitarian threats to the Yemeni people, as well as to its neighbors.
Despite being removed from the terrorism list, the Houthis escalated their missile attacks on Saudi Arabia and the UAE. Instead of engaging in good faith in negotiations to end the war, they escalated their internal attacks in order to achieve a decisive military victory, thus prolonging the war and the humanitarian catastrophe in Yemen.
The Houthis also returned the favor to President Biden on November 10, 2021, by storming and looting the US Embassy in Sanaa and holding several employees hostage.
This insult exposed the Biden administration's failure to protect American interests, and its failure to induce a realistic rethinking of US policy.
This is partly because Biden's "diplomacy first" approach to Yemen was a disastrous result of the administration's lax policy toward Iran.
The US administration squandered the accumulated influence under the Trump administration's policy of "maximum pressure" against Iran, eased sanctions against Iran, and downplayed China's increasing imports of Iranian oil, as well as the threats posed by Tehran's militias in the region.
This political complacency has encouraged Tehran to make extreme demands at the nuclear talks in Vienna and carries with it greater risks in orchestrating proxy attacks against US military forces and their allies in the Middle East.
In response to the Houthi missile attacks, the UAE and the Arab League urged the Biden administration to reclassify the Houthis as a foreign terrorist organization.
Biden should do so immediately and impose sanctions on the group not only to protect Emirati civilians threatened by such terrorist attacks, but also to protect American interests in the region. Nearly 50,000 Americans live in the UAE, and it is one of the most important financial and transportation hubs in the world.
*The American newspaper "Daily Signal"
