An Aramco oil storage facility burns in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia after being struck by a retaliatory missile strike launched from Yemen on 25 March, 2022. (Photo credit: Getty Images)
Two weeks before the latest extension of a UN-brokered ceasefire ends, Yemen’s Ansarallah resistance movement is preparing a package of military and political measures to demand that the UN and Saudi Arabia’s western partners push the kingdom to comply with the terms of the truce.
According to Arabic media reports, Ansarallah and the leadership of Yemen’s National Salvation Government (NSG) are especially displeased with the kingdom’s ongoing seizure of UN-approved oil ships en route to the port of Hodeidah.
The movement has reportedly delivered warnings to the US, the EU, and the UN, saying that Sanaa’s response to Riyadh’s truce violations “will not be limited to the normal military aspects,” but will be commensurate to the suffering being inflicted on the Yemeni people.
In particular, officials seek to implement an “oil for oil” plan that would take aim at strategic facilities belonging to the Saudi-led coalition which benefit their western backers.
“You are preparing for a battle whose theater, if it occurs, will be the Red Sea and the oil facilities of the blockading countries,” Ansarallah allegedly cautioned.
In response to this, the US and EU exerted great pressure on Saudi Arabia to release over a dozen fuel ships it had impounded off the port of Jizan, which had the required licenses from the UN inspection mechanism in Djibouti.
But despite this apparent show of good faith, sources say that the leadership in Sanaa has little reason to trust western powers and considers that experience so far has proven that Yemen’s rights can only be obtained through force.
On the other hand, Saudi Arabia is reportedly not happy about Yemen’s demands to respect the truce, fearing Washington will regain control of the situation and use it to blackmail its Gulf partner at a time when the west is in dire need of oil.
Regardless of these fears, Washington and Riyadh have maintained nearly identical positions on the war in Yemen. In 2016, former US ambassador to Yemen, Matthew Tueller, threatened Sanaa with “starving the Yemeni people” unless Ansarallah conceded to Saudi demands.
Sanaa has also accused the US of bolstering its military presence in Yemen to control oil fields as they do in Syria. Moreover, France has also deployed troops to control oil fields in Emirati-controlled areas.