Saudi Intervention in Yemen’s Conflict: An Analysis

Abstract

Saudi Arabia intervened in the Yemen conflict aimed to keep stability in its immediate neighborhood, protect the regime president Abd Rabbo Mansour and defuse the influence of Iran its main rivalry in the region. These goals of Saudi Arabia foreign policy were not possible to achieve especially after the Houthis seized control of Sana. Nevertheless, Yemen now is standing on the brink of civil war, and the intervention by Saudi Arabia cannot do anything to avoid it. In spite of Riyadh has prevented the Iranian-backed Houthi rebels from capturing the whole country but the Houthis still control large parts of the country. The Saudi "Operation Decisive Storm" campaign was an absolute disaster for Yemen and the air strikes against the Houthis changed the situation of civil war in the country from bad to horrific. Yemen is now being viewed as the worst humanitarian crisis in the world as hundreds of thousands of people dying and millions facing the specter of disease and starvation. Saudi Arabia's justification for this attack is based on the claim that it just offering help according to a neighbor in need of assistance based on a specific request from the ruling authority, but in reality, it is seeking for its interests and foreign policy goals in the region.