Free Republic

Video on YouTube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=erk22YkMybA Saudi Arabia uses fighter jets against Yemeni Houthi rebels. Both Yemen & Saudi Arabia accuse Iran of arming the rebels. Why did Arab satellites carriers drop Iranian Al Alam TV? And will the war of proxies lead to a confrontation between Saudi Arabia and Iran ?

A senior official from the Iranian Revolutionary Guard has recently met with Houthi rebels and Hizbullah activists in Yemen to coordinate joint military operations against Saudi positions along the border. Asharq al-Awsat newspaper, quoted on Sunday Arab sources as saying the three-way meeting also aimed at developing a plan to escalate the military situation along the Saudi-Yemeni border.

SNIPPET: "Yemeni Shi'ite Cleric and Houthi Disciple 'Issam Al-'Imad: Our Leader Houthi is Close to Khamenei; We Are Influenced Religiously and Ideologically By Iran" SNIPPET: "On September 28, 2009, the Iranian website ayandenews.com, which is affiliated with former IRGC commander Mohsen Rezai, published an interview with cleric 'Issam Al-'Imad, who is a disciple of Hussein Al-Houthi, leader of the Houthi rebels in Yemen. [1] Al-'Imad, who was born 1968 in Yemen, received his religious education in Saudi Arabia, but after studying Shi'ite Islam left Wahhabism to become a Twelver Shi'ite. Since1989 he has been pursuing advanced Islamic studies in the...

Note: Photos included. Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center Geopolitically strategic Yemen has become a focus of local Iranian-Saudi Arabian strife. The Yemeni government accuses Iran of supporting Zaydi-Shi’ite (Houthi) rebels in the northern part of the country with weapons, money and propaganda. Subverting local Shi’ite populations in the Middle East is a frequent Iranian modus operandi.

Renewed fighting in northern Yemen between government and rebel forces is feeding fears that a Middle Eastern proxy war between Saudi Arabia and Iran is spreading to the ungoverned spaces of the southern Arabian peninsula. But western analysts are staring boggle-eyed at quite a different spectre: the prospect that the biggest beneficiaries of Yemeni weakness will be the fanatical jihadis of al-Qaida. UN agencies raised the alarm last week after 55,000 people, mostly women and children, fled clashes in and around Sa'ada city in northern Yemen between the forces of President Ali Abdullah Saleh's Sunni-led government and the Zaydi Shia...

09 September 2009 JIHADIS REPORT OF SYRIAN MEDDLING IN YEMEN Not that I consider jihadis to be a reliable source on such matters, but you know what they say about broken clocks...

Blog Note: The following blog entry is a quote: Larijani In Yemen On Reassurance Visit The London daily Al-Sharq Al-Awsat reports that Iranian Majlis speaker Ali Larijani is visiting Yemen to reassure it regarding fears of Iranian involvement in rebel activity in southern Yemen, and regarding activity by the Houthis in the Sa'ada district in northern Yemen. Senior Yemeni officials have accused Iran of supporting the Houthis (see Yemeni Official: Iran Clearly Involved In Al-Houthi Rebellion). According to the report, Larijani told Yemen President Ali Abdallah Saleh that his country supported Yemen's stability and security. Source: Al-Sharq Al-Awsat, London, May...