Houthi Movement
Other Names: Ansar Allah, The Houthis, ٱلْحُوثِيُّون
Founded: 1980’s
Type: Armed Islamist terrorist organisation
Organisation Ideology: Islamism/Yemeni Nationalism/Extremist Zaydi Revivalism
Country: Yemen
Key People:
Abdul Malik al-Houthi
Abd al-Khaliq Badr al-Din al-Houthi
Abdullah Yahya al-Hakim
Online Resources
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Overview
The Houthi movement is an armed Islamist terrorist organisation based in Yemen. A large Zaydi Shia clan originating from Yemen’s northern Saada province, the group originally sought to revive Zaydi traditions in Yemen in opposition to Salafi influence from neighbouring Saudi Arabia in the 1980s and 1990s. Following the ouster of Yemen’s former president, Ali Abdullah Saleh in 2011, the Houthi movement — named after its founder, Hussein Al Houthi — saw an opportunity through a series of events to ally with the former president and take control of large parts of Yemen, most importantly the capital Sanaa, the Red Sea port of Hodeidah, and the Southern port of Aden. Although the Houthi movement is primarily a Yemeni nationalist movement focused on the conflict in Yemen, it became a — like many others — a religiously radicalised organisation following the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003. Today, the group states that Yemen is being attacked by a Saudi-American-Israeli conspiracy, evident in its Islamist-inspired slogan “God is Great, Death to America, Death to Israel, Curse on the Jews, Victory to Islam”.
Ties to Extremism
The Houthi movement has been labelled as a terrorist organisation by Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Malaysia and previously the U.S. Washington D.C. decided to revoke the designation of the movement as a Foreign Terrorist Organisation (FTO) in February 2021 due to concerns that its continued designation would exacerbate the dire situation in Yemen. Following the Houthis drone and missile attacks against the UAE in January 2022 that led to civilian deaths and material destruction, the Biden Administration stated it was considering reinstating the organisation as an FTO.
Inside Yemen, the Houthis have been engaged in crimes against humanity and have been accused of war crimes by the United Nations and individual member states. According to the UN, these crimes include indiscriminate shelling of civilian areas, targeting civilians with snipers, siege warfare and child recruitment. Over the course of the war in Yemen, the Houthi movement and its supporters have generally accused other Yemenis who disagree with the Houthi narrative of being supporters of Daesh, whether those opponents were members or supporters of the internationally recognised government, the Southern Transitional Council or other non-state actors in Yemen. The Houthis use this, and other inflammatory speech to signal to western governments’ that they are the sole Yemeni partner in the fight against Sunni Jihadist groups operating in Yemen. Although the Houthis have been engaged in armed hostilities against other Islamist extremist elements such as Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) and the Muslim Brotherhood-aligned Al Islah Party, both of whom are active non-state actors in Yemen, the remainder of the Houthis’ enemies in Yemen are not radical Islamists, as their propaganda suggests.
Notwithstanding Houthi attacks against neighbouring countries that have resulted in the deaths of innocent civilians, nor their attacks inside Yemen as mentioned above; it is pertinent to highlight the movement’s extremist governance in areas under its control. Approximately 80 percent of Yemen’s population live under the control of the Houthi movement, the group has adopted an extremist and draconian Islamist viewpoint on social issues, women’s rights, and the protection of religious minorities. In January 2021, Amnesty International condemned a Houthi decision banning women from working in restaurants, following justification from the Houthis that it “contradicts conservative Yemeni identity”. In addition, the Yemeni Coalition of Independent Women (YCIW) — a Yemeni women’s rights group — organised a panel in June 2021 in Geneva where they discussed Houthi crimes against women in prisons, including beatings, sexual violence and torture. The Houthis record on women’s rights epitomised following the creation of the Zainabiyyat units — an all female armed unit that is in charge of searching women, enforcing strict social codes on women under Houthi control and maintaining order and security in female prisons. Houthi critics likened the Zainabiyyat units to the all female armed units employed by Daesh that undertook similar activities aimed at enforcing extremely dogmatic gender segregation and curtailing women’s freedoms.
The Houthis have also targetted Sunni places of worship in Yemen, and indiscriminately attacked mosques throughout the country over the course of past seven years. According to the U.S. Department of State, a Yemeni human rights organisation revealed that since the Stockholm Agreement was signed in December 2018, the Houthis damaged or destroyed 49 mosques in Hodeidah province, and transformed more than one hundred mosques around the country into military barracks or sniper positions. Other religious persecution was hate speech aimed at Bahais, Jews, and other Muslims that were not aligned with the movement’s political goals.
