FROM EIR DAILY ALERT
U.A.E. Announces ‘Pause’ in Assault on Hodeidah in Genocidal War on Yemen
July 2, 2018 (EIRNS)—The U.A.E. government announced yesterday that it was suspending its assault on Yemen’s port city of Hodeidah “to support UN efforts to reach a political solution,” reported Reuters, which reports that the frontlines have been quiet in the past week.
“We welcome continuing efforts by UN Special Envoy Martin Griffiths to achieve an unconditional Houthi withdrawal from Hodeidah city and port. We have paused our campaign to allow enough time for this option to be fully explored. We hope he will succeed,”
U.A.E. Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Anwar Gargash said on Twitter. Reuters states, however, that the demand for an unconditional withdrawal by the Houthis has led previous talks to collapse, and, in his comments on July 1, Gargash made clear that if this were to happen again, the U.A.E. would continue its military campaign.
In any case, the real reason why the U.A.E. stopped the offensive may be different from what they say, as, according to the Iranian news agency Tasnim, reports coming out of Hodeidah suggest that Saudi-backed militants and the U.A.E. forces have suffered major losses in the past days in the western front. The Houthis, for their part, are treating the U.A.E. announcement with a great deal of skepticism. Mohammed Abdul-Salam, the movement’s spokesman, said yesterday that the U.A.E. military operation has not stopped, and the claim of a halt in the offensive was only made to “deceive public opinion.” Elsewhere in his remarks, reports PressTV, Abdul-Salam said that the U.A.E.’s declared ceasefire was an attempt to whitewash its failure to occupy Hodeidah. He said that, although the Houthi movement accepted the UN’s technical and managerial roles in Hodeidah, it would not accept the world body’s observatory role in the city.
The military situation in Hodeidah, particularly the south side of the city, where the airport is located, is not all that clear—except that the U.A.E.-backed forces still have not launched the amphibious assault on the seaport that they had been promising. Yesterday’s announcement might suggest that the Saudi-U.A.E. genocidal attempt to carve up Yemen has run into serious difficulty.
