Yemen’s government forces have carried out air attacks against the Iran-backed Houthis to repel their advances, as the rebel group has been gaining ground in government-held positions in the past week. The focus of the fighting is now shifting to the region of Marib – the government’s last remaining stronghold in the north and a major oil and gas hub. Should the Houthis gain control of it, it could decisively turn the tide of the war in their favour, say analysts.
Heated battles are also taking place in western Taiz, on the western coast, where reports suggest government forces, supported by Saudi Arabia, are now on the counteroffensive after losing some ground there last week. A video released on Monday by the Yemeni army purports to show Houthi positions and vehicles being bombed there. Trapped in the middle are the civilians.
The International Organization for Migration (IOM) has reported that more than 85,000 have been forced to flee their homes since the beginning of September. More than 2,000 have fled into Djibouti’s northern shores. It is the last remaining stronghold of anti-Houthi forces in northern Yemen.
A Houthi expansion there would threaten government presence and weaken its leverage in the north. Marib also hosts the country’s largest gas and oil fields, meaning that whoever controls it holds some of Yemen’s most important energy infrastructure and a potentially crucial source of revenue. Without facing a crushing defeat in Marib, they would keep fighting to achieve that goal,” Saddam al-Huraibi, a Yemeni political commentator, told Al Jazeera.
Should they gain control of it, the group could earn great leverage to negotiate favourable terms in any future mediation effort. A Houthi capture of Marib would be a “watershed moment” in terms of the country’s internal dynamics, said Adam Baron, a fellow at the Future Security Program of the New America think tank. Still, he said, it will be a tough fight as government forces will see this battle as an existential war.
Marib is also geographically significant because it lies on the easiest road that runs from northern Yemen to Shabwa Governorate in the south – a seafront on the Gulf of Aden and the Arabian Sea – and al-Mahra Governorate. The optics of a win in Marib would also be a powerful propaganda tool for the Houthis, helping them convince many Yemenis that the group is on a roll militarily and is poised for even greater victories, said Nabil Hetari, a Yemeni writer and human rights activist. There is also a humanitarian dimension.
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