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All right you guys, introducing Nasser Araby.
He runs the news organization Yemen Now.
That's Yemen Alon on the internet.
Welcome back to the show.
How are you doing, Nasser?
Thank you very much, Scott.
I'm happy.
Good deal.
Very happy to have you on here and I guess I meant to say reporting here for us from Sanaa, Yemen.
You can find Nasser's articles in the New York Times and other places going back quite a few years covering the various conflicts in Yemen.
So Nasser, I guess first of all, can we just talk about the state of the war?
I guess as most people know, they should know, in March of 2015 Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and the United States and others I guess too in their coalition launched this war against, well, the country of Yemen in an attempt to reinstall the government of Mansour Hadi who had been put in power by Hillary Clinton in 2012 but who had been run out of power by the former president, Saleh, and his new alliance with the Houthi movement, the Shia out of the north.
And so the war has been going on for about two and a quarter years now and I guess as we all know there are lots of casualties but I wonder if anything is really changing on the ground in terms of who controls what territory and is any side making any progress toward achieving their goals?
Well, in terms of achieving progress, there is no progress at all for Saudi Arabia in the ground.
But in terms of their justification, it is now clear, Saudi Arabia at the beginning said that they wanted to restore the legitimacy of Hadi, the Saudi babbit.
For this justification now, it is not valid anymore.
It is clear to the world now that they are killing and destroying Yemen not for this legitimacy of Hadi and the evidence for this is what is happening now in the south.
Emirates is one of the main allies of Saudi Arabia that is fighting in the south, now is refusing.
Emirates, United Arab Emirates, is refusing this legitimacy and not only this, they installed their own president for the south which means that they were killing and destroying Yemen for about 28 months now because of what they want, because of their agenda, not because of what they say about this legitimacy.
So, the progress that Saudi Arabia has made so far is the division of Yemen and the destruction of Yemen and killing thousands and thousands of civilians by excavation and by cluster bombs and diseases.
Now, we have cholera all over the country because of this blockade and because of Saudi crazy steps because they want to end this war by any way.
So, they use the weapon of disease and the weapon of starvation to end this war and it is even, it is despite of this, it is even getting worse and worse for them.
It is getting wider and it is getting hard and hard.
Last week, I was in the border with Saudi Arabia for days with the fighters and I saw their miracles.
I saw miracles that I can't even describe because the summary of this is that these Yemeni fighters are fighting in a very, very, very poor circumstances, but they defeat the Saudi invaders almost every day, almost every day despite the big difference between the weaponaries of the two sides.
So, Saudi Arabia has been only lying and lying and lying about Yemen and it has achieved nothing except, of course, the destruction and the killings of the country only, not more.
All right, Nasser.
So, quite a few things to cover there.
First of all, what's the name of the UAE's new sock puppet president that they're putting forward now to replace Hadi?
Yes.
I'll give you the name.
The name is Aydarous Zubeidi.
This is the name.
And if you want me to tell you why this happened, it happens because Hadi tried to fight, actually, Hadi fired Zubeidi from being a governor for Aden.
And after he was fired, United Arab Emirates imposed him by force, not only as governor of Aden, but as president of the south.
And of course, the south, it is not all the south is under their control because many parts of the south are still under the control of Houthi Salih authorities because they are sticking to the unity.
But this is what is happening.
They say they liberated Aden and they couldn't even rule one day until now.
Neither the Saudis nor the Emirates, even the Emirates, the Emirates people are only imposing this president but doing nothing for the people.
They couldn't even give the salaries for the people.
Yes, they give them money from their own, but they couldn't do anything that makes the country or that makes the south as a province or provinces under government or under any kind of authority.
Qaeda, ISIS is doing everything, Qaeda, ISIS is doing, is just getting stronger and stronger and doing their own programs and their own activities everywhere.
And United Arab, United States is using the drones in the south for nothing, unfortunately, because there is no state there at all.
It's just chaos, lawlessness and uncertainty there in the south.
Well, and we know from Iona Craig's great reporting too that every time that they do, well, I don't know every single time, but it seems pretty often whenever they do a drone strike or a special operations forces raid there in Yemen, they end up just killing a bunch of innocent people when they're attempting to attack Al-Qaeda.
But so let me ask you this.
I wonder, does Al-Qaeda have a preference between Hadi or this new guy, Zubaydi?
Because it's basically, or I guess just, I'm curious how separate all these groups and interests are from each other, nevermind the Houthis and Saleh in the north and in the capital city.
But just there in the south, for those who are against the Houthis and against the Saleh-Houthi coalition there, does Al-Qaeda have a preference or these guys are all fighting amongst each other for power in the south as well?
This is a good question that will be good for your audience, yes.
The preference of Al-Qaeda is to have the parties, the Saudis and Emirates, conflict, to have this conflict continue and continue, because instability will be in favour of Al-Qaeda-ISIS.
So Al-Qaeda is very happy, Al-Qaeda-ISIS is very happy now with these differences between Saudi Arabia and Emirates over Hadi and Zubaydi.
And it is not only a matter of preferences of Al-Qaeda.
Al-Qaeda looks to all as enemies, including Houthis and Saleh.
It looks to everyone as enemies.
But Al-Qaeda, I mean, the good thing for Al-Qaeda is chaos.
If there is chaos, there is Al-Qaeda.
This is what Al-Qaeda wants.
Trump, unfortunately, by supporting Emirates to do that in the south and Saudi Arabia, he is only helping Al-Qaeda-ISIS in a way or another, whether he likes or not.
Trump is supporting Al-Qaeda-ISIS by doing this kind of chaos, because it's now three years, about three years, and they couldn't even make one city in the south as a safe.
They couldn't at all.
So what they are doing with all these billions of money and these tons of weapons and these things, they are doing nothing.
And the problem is, Saudi Arabia has its own agenda that nobody knows, or that the people in the United States or that Trump does not know.
The only people who are fighting with Saudi Arabia in the ground, whether in the south or in the north, are Al-Qaeda-ISIS only.
This is the absolute fact that the people in the United States and everywhere should understand or should at least make sure, should at least check about whether it is right or not.
It is right, and if they want, they can check and they can understand or they can check it in their own way, because no fighters with Saudi Arabia in the ground except Al-Qaeda-ISIS or mercenaries from Sudan.
I saw this with my eyes when I went to the south of Saudi Arabia last week.
Sudanese mercenaries you saw with your own eyes, you're saying?
Sorry?
You're saying you saw the Sudanese mercenaries with your own eyes?
Yes, I saw the dead bodies of them.
I saw the dead bodies and I saw them with my eyes, and I said dead bodies, maybe in the south of Saudi Arabia.
All right, now I just want to make sure and mention here that we already know from the Wall Street Journal and the LA Times and the New York Times and the Washington Post and whatever official confirmation you could need that the United States has been supplying not just weapons to Saudi Arabia and continuing to resupply them with weapons throughout this time, but that American intelligence and logistics people have been helping pick the targets and all of this kind of thing.
Of course, it's American contractors who do all the care and feeding of the Saudis' military equipment.
All their jet fighters and everything are all maintained by American contractors.
And of course, our jets do the mid-air refueling of the Saudi jets as they go to their targets to kill civilians and come back again.
And so, it's every bit as much an American war as it is a Saudi war.
Barack Obama or Donald Trump could turn it off with the flick of a switch.
They wouldn't even have to pick up a pen and write it on a piece of paper.
They could just say the war against Yemen is over now and it would be over at their whim, at their word.
And there's no denying that even though that doesn't get much coverage here in America in terms of the narrative that this is America's war.
They just call it Saudi's war.
This is absolutely America's war.
And of course, our ships are off the coast helping enforce the blockade and all of the rest of this.
So, as you guys hear Nasser telling the story of what's happening to his country here, don't let the plausible deniability of the word Saudi fool you.
This is an American policy from beginning to end here for years now.
And as he's explaining, it's going nowhere.
People are dying, but the battle lines aren't changing.
The stated goals are not being achieved, nor can they be achieved.
And in fact, so talk more about the actual strength of the Houthis and the Saleh government.
These groups used to fight the Saleh government and the Houthis.
It seemed like every time Saleh attacked the Houthis, they got stronger and stronger and stronger every time they beat him.
But then when he got ran out of power, he took I don't know what percent of the army with him and went and made an alliance with these guys.
So, it doesn't sound like there's any power in Yemen or on the Arabian Peninsula that can change that.
Well, let me first emphasize on what you said.
The war in Yemen is not Saudi.
It is American war.
This is the fact that I have been talking about since the very beginning and many, many observers like me.
And you said this now in your introduction.
It is American war because it's easy for Trump now to say, stop this war.
This war should be over and it would be over in minutes.
But unfortunately, because Trump has many other things or many other benefits from this war, he thinks that the money may be okay, or the weapons or Iran or something like this.
But he forgets that he is supporting his enemy.
Trump is supporting the enemy of Yemen and the enemy of Americans and the enemy of the humanity.
He is supporting by this war.
He is supporting Qaeda-ISIS.
He is helping Qaeda-ISIS by this war.
This is what the American audience should understand and be careful about.
Because what is happening now in reality is in favor of Qaeda-ISIS.
And the longer this war is, the better it is for Qaeda-ISIS.
Because Qaeda-ISIS does not want this war to stop at all.
Because it is making use of it and it is getting benefits from it daily in terms of money, in terms of weapons, in terms of recruits, and in terms of expansion and in terms of everything.
And this is what we see with our eyes in reality.
But because of the misinformation and misleading of Saudi Arabia and the media and Saudi Arabia lobbies in the United States, people understand it in a different way.
And this is very dangerous to the security and stability of the United States and the region and Yemen, of course, and Saudi Arabia, of course.
All right.
Now, I interviewed a lady from Doctors Without Borders just a few weeks ago, maybe a month ago.
And she said that they had counted 30,000 cases of cholera.
And she was saying, she was explaining that the disease itself is really not deadly.
It's the diarrhea and the dehydration that kills people.
And so if they could only be able to distribute enough, you know, saline and needles for everybody to keep people hydrated while they're fighting the infection, they could save so many lives.
And I think she said at the time it was 30,000 people were infected.
Or maybe it was 30,000 that they had treated so far.
Now, I'm trying to remember, but I saw it was the Voice of America, the official overseas propaganda network of the United States government said yesterday, of course, they don't concede any American responsibility for this.
But they said yesterday that there are 300,000 Yemenis infected with cholera now.
So I don't know what percentage of those are expected to die, but this is unbelievable.
Yes, it's more than 300,000 now, as the Ministry of Health and the World Health Organization, they confirmed today that it's more than 300,000 cases infected with cholera.
And those who died until now are 2,000 now, about 2,000 cases.
Over two months, we have 2,000 Yemenis died because of cholera.
And it is, as I told you, getting killed by diseases or by starvation.
It is one cause.
It is one reason.
It is Saudi starvation and Saudi blockade.
Because Saudi Arabia is doing everything.
And they use every, every dirty means and every dirty tools and method that could help them to end this war.
But unfortunately, they did not achieve anything.
And they would not achieve because they know that the people, the world knows that Saudi Arabia always wants the impossible to be possible, like what they want from Qatar now.
So they demand impossible things from Qatar.
And they want, also they demand from Yemen, impossible things from Yemen to end this war.
So this war would not end at all if the United States keeps silent and saying nothing to Saudi Arabia.
Because this war is unjust and unfair from the very beginning and has no justifications at all, except that Saudi Arabia wants only to bully or to frighten Iran by killing Yemen.
This is something that is not fair to let Saudi Arabia killing and destroying Yemen to bully or to to frighten Iran.
This is something not logical and not acceptable.
And Saudi Arabia should stop these things because it's very dangerous to everyone.
Well, and they're only proving how inept they are at achieving their goals with this policy.
And of course, it's the new crown prince, he's just been promoted, the former defense minister, this was his war.
I think you covered this as well.
But I know for a fact, Patrick Coburn wrote about back two and a half years ago, not quite two and a half years ago when the war was starting, that this was a big, you know, that half the reason for the war really was internal politics inside Saudi Arabia.
You had a 29 year old new deputy crown prince slash defense minister, and he had to prove what a tough guy he was by starting a war.
He had to solidify his position in the imperial court, in the king's court in Saudi Arabia, by launching this war at the expense of the people of Yemen.
Strategy and tactics and policy had nothing to do with it.
It was his own political fortunes.
Now he's been promoted, seems to have worked for achieving his ends at least.
And this is the guy who is, you know, the Israeli American plan is for him to be the new king.
But now, okay, so let's talk more about the humanitarian crisis here.
You mentioned about the people starving.
The port of Hodeidah is still open at this point, is that correct?
I've been to Hodeidah last week, and I saw the port, and we went from Hodeidah to Haram and Midi, south of Saudi Arabia, Jizan, south of Saudi Arabia.
So, but it is still working, and it is not stopped yet, but it is very, very, very poorly working.
I mean, most of the trains are destroyed.
So you can't use, it is not, it's only for if there is a humanitarian ship or something like this, or a commercial after being checked by Saudis and all these things.
It's like, it's under blockade, not open in the meaning of open, like the airport of Sana'a, for example.
There are UN planes that come sometimes twice a week, but it is closed.
All real trade is shut down, you're saying.
Only relief missions from the likes of the Red Cross or something like that are getting through.
Exactly, yes, yes.
The relief organizations only, yes.
And for Hodeidah, it's also some commercial ships, not only relief, there are some commercial ships also.
All right, hang on just one second, I got to take this break.
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All right, and then, so can you elaborate more about the problem of hunger and starvation in Yemen in this crisis?
Yes, for the starvation, you can call it a famine now, not only by my term, but by the UN term.
It's a famine because the number of those who are under this starvation or in famine are about 17 million Yemenis under the threat of famine.
This means that more than half of the population, according to the UN estimation, not anyone.
So Saudi Arabia depends on starvation because they want to end the war.
And the people who are behind them, like Trump, are crazy to let them do this because by starving people to death, it is not ending the war.
It is a new war and it is a new catastrophe.
It is a new disaster.
And the history tells us this and tells everybody how Saudi Arabia, how this king, who is 31 years old, thinks.
He thinks that by starving Yemenis to death, he would end the war and he would end the problem.
He would not end the problem with this.
But it seems that he is thinking this way.
So starvation is used as a weapon.
Disease like cholera is used as a weapon.
And the central bank is dismantled now, unfortunately, with the will of the United States, with the will of Trump, because they misled Trump and his administration that if we dismantle the central bank, then everything will be in our hands.
Now we have been one year with one million government staffers or government employees without salaries, one million employees, which means about 10 million Yemenis, 10 million Yemenis without salaries for one year now.
This is a big, big humanitarian situation.
This is a war crime according to the international law and the humanitarian law and all laws in the world.
But they are doing it.
They are waiting until Yemenis surrender.
The Yemenis would not surrender.
The Yemenis are depending on themselves and they are now making some new things to live on.
They are managing themselves.
There are many people who are dying because of these things, whether malnutrition or hunger or whatever.
But we saw the people in the battlefield fighting and with everything okay.
And they don't ask for much.
They just ask for food and drink.
And they fight to defend themselves and defend their country with all faith and with all will.
All right.
Now, so it's clear that this isn't going to work.
I mean, as you say, they're not surrendering.
They have, I guess, at least the fighters have enough food to keep going indefinitely here.
It's been more than two years.
And, you know, I guess the Trump administration is still new.
So maybe that's kind of a reset on the war if they think they have a new and better strategy for actually succeeding or something like that.
But I wonder, you know, America aside, in the region, is there any indication that maybe the message is getting through to the Saudis and the UAE here?
I mean, I guess the UAE threw in the towel on Hadi and they've got a new guy to try to rule the South.
So that's some kind of change.
But is there any kind of indication that people are sick of the fighting and that they're ready to sit down and have some kind of negotiation here?
There is an indication, but it is difficult.
The indication is that Saudis now, Saudis and Emirates are convinced that Hadi is the problem.
They want to get rid of him.
They want to get rid of him.
But it is not easy for Saudis to get rid of him now, because Hadi is everything behind this war for Saudis.
Hadi is everything.
Or then the Saudis would be blamed for everything in the eyes of the international community.
So they know that Hadi is the problem.
Hadi is nothing.
Hadi has no popularity in the South and no popularity in the North.
And he's only hurting them and not helping them.
But it is not easy to have the alternative.
Of course, it is not easy for them to get rid of him.
And it is not easy to have the alternative.
It is not easy at all, because those who are fighting in the ground in the South and in some parts of the South are different from those who are with the Saudis in the ground or in Riyadh.
And the Qatari crisis also shows this more and more.
Now, Qatar was a part of this coalition, Saudi coalition in Yemen.
But now Qatar is accused of being terrorists or funding terrorism.
So those who are fighting with Hadi from Qaeda and ISIS, they are saying that the Emirate is occupying South Yemen and some parts of the North of Yemen.
This is what they say in their media.
Officials and activists, they say that the United Arab Emirates now is occupying South Yemen and some parts of the North of Yemen.
This is what they say.
So they now, they start to say what we have been saying from the very beginning, that Yemen is under occupation, not anything else.
But they are still, and there are still attempts from some parties in the South and in the North to help those who want to reach a compromise.
But unfortunately, talking about negotiations and solutions is very, very, very long, because the UN envoy is, unfortunately, is not wanted here in the North of Yemen, because he's seen as very biased.
And he's seen as just an employee with Saudi Arabia.
And he couldn't say, he didn't say even one time to Saudi Arabia, you are doing this, or you should not do that, or please help us not to do that.
No, he is just blaming Houthis and Salih for everything, and saying nothing about the war crimes of Saudi Arabia that are being committed almost every day in markets, hospitals, schools, and weddings, and funerals, and everywhere.
All right, y'all, that is Nasser Arabi.
He runs Yemen Alon.
That's yemen-now.com, reporting from Sana'a, Yemen.
Thank you very much again for your time, Nasser.
You're most welcome.
Thank you very much.
All right, you guys, that's Scott Horton Show.
Thanks very much for listening.
Check out the archives at scotthorton.org, and follow me on Twitter at Scott Horton Show.
Thanks.
