Yemen’s 2014 Revolution Thwarted US Plots, Houthi Says

He made the remarks in a speech broadcast live from the Yemeni capital of Sana’a on Tuesday to commemorate the eighth anniversary of the September 21 revolution against a Saudi-backed regime in the country and its removal from power.

In 2014, the people of Yemen staged a popular uprising against the Saudi-backed unpopular regime of Abd Rabbuh Mansour Hadi. The Ansarullah movement took control of the Sana’a-based government on September 21 after widespread protests across the country, followed by Hadi’s escape to Riyadh.

“The September 21 revolution, from the religious, moral and national point of view, was and still is a requisite (for the country) and benefits our nation,” Houthi said. “The revolutionary movement was broad in its title, goals, and popular momentum, and it did not belong to a specific group but rather to all Yemeni people.”

Stressing that the Yemeni revolution took place at the time when American policies held sway in the country, the Ansarullah leader said such policies plunged Yemen into total destruction and the US tried to use the conflicts at the beginning of the revolution to its own advantage.

“Before the revolution, the American ambassador was  the president of Yemen,” Houthi said, adding, “The Americans tried to exploit the independence of our nation and dominate our country indirectly and without war. The American plot was based on increasing the political divide in line with the internal disintegration of our country.”

He said the United States adopted a destructive policy for Yemen and did not care about the interests of the Yemeni people, adding, “Washington was working to escalate chaos in Yemen, and it was the movement of the Yemeni people that thwarted the plots of the United States and its allies.”                                                      

The Ansarullah leader said the US was working to strip the Yemeni army of its military capabilities, and that Washington had turned its embassy in Sana’a into a headquarters for managing all sabotage activities in Yemen.

“All Yemeni parties were sure that what the American ambassador in Sana’a was doing represented a clear violation of the country’s sovereignty and independence,” Houthi said. “There were Yemeni political parties that were responding to American demands, but the movement of the Yemeni people left the Americans confused.”

Houthi said the aggression against Yemen revealed the reality of those who want to continue their domination over it and that of their hostile policy.

“The aggression targeted government facilities and service facilities, which shows the American intentions to destroy everything in our country,” he said. “The coalition of aggression destroyed all infrastructure, and targeted even courts, prisons, cemeteries, schools and others.”

Houthi stressed that, “The coalition of aggression and traitors among our people are plundering the Yemeni oil wealth, and controlling Yemen's resources.”

Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates — the closest allies of the US in the region after the Israeli regime — have been waging the war on Yemen since March 2015.

The invasion has been seeking to change Yemen’s ruling structure in favor of the impoverished country’s former Riyadh- and Washington-friendly rulers and crush the popular Ansarullah resistance movement. The Saudi-led coalition has failed to meet any of its objectives.

The war, which has been enjoying unstinting arms, logistical, and political support on the part of the United States, has killed tens of thousands of Yemenis and turned the entire country into the scene of the world’s worst humanitarian crisis.

Yemen’s defense forces, which feature the country’s army and its allied Popular Committees, have, however, vowed not to lay down their arms until the country’s complete liberation from the scourge of the aggression.

Elsewhere in his speech, the leader of Yemen's Ansarullah resistance movement lashed out at a move by a few Arab countries to normalize their relations with the Israeli regime, saying Yemen stood against such a US-inspired move.

“Washington and its allies are seeking to bring about change in the region, under the title of normalization and the loyalty of Arab regimes to Israel," Houthi said. “Yemen stood against the path of normalization and stood by the Palestinian cause and the free people of the nation against its enemies.”

Back in 2020, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain signed United States-brokered agreements with Israel to normalize their ties with the regime. Some other regional states, namely Sudan and Morocco, followed suit soon afterward.

The normalization trend has sparked widespread condemnations from the Palestinians as well as nations and human rights advocates across the globe, especially within the Muslim world.