“It Is No Secret that the Current US Administration Is Encouraging the Houthis to Be More Aggressive”

by Khaled Abu Toameh, GATESTONE INSTITUTE  •  January 31, 2022

• The Arabs say that the Biden administration made a mistake when it decided last year to remove the Houthis from the international terrorist list. The Biden administration’s move, they noted, has emboldened one of the most dangerous terrorist groups in the Middle East and endangered international peace and security.
• Ultimately, the terrorism of Iran and its terrorist groups will reach the US, and, as with Afghanistan, it is the Biden administration that will justly be blamed.

• The 22 members of the Arab League urged the Biden administration to re-classify the Iran-backed Houthi militia as a terrorist organization. The attacks “constitute… a real threat to… energy supplies and the stability of the global economy…. harm international peace and security, and pose a threat to international commercial shipping lines.” — Asharq Al-Awsat, January 24, 2022.
• “What is the Biden administration waiting for in order to re-evaluate its position? Does it want to continue being a spectator?” – Atef Saadawy, Egyptian strategic and international affairs expert, Sky News Arabia, January 18, 2022.
• The re-designation of the Houthi militia as a terrorist organization “will… facilitate the process of establishing peace in Yemen and a political solution that preserves its unity and territorial integrity and the security and stability of neighboring countries.” — Atef Saadawy, Sky News Arabia, January 18, 2022.
• The time has come for the US administration… “to end its contradictory positions and flabby handling of the Yemeni crisis, which has exacerbated matters even more.” — Atef Saadawy, Sky News Arabia, January 18, 2022.
• “What is happening now in Yemen is the responsibility of the US…. The first decision of the Biden administration… was to remove the Houthis from the list of terrorism, and this is a big mistake. Iran wants to use the Houthis to pressure the Americans to revive the nuclear deal.” — Emad Adin Adib, prominent Egyptian writer, journalist and businessman, El Watan News, January 25, 2022.
• “[T]he Biden administration needs to show that it knows what is happening in the Middle East….Iran invested every dollar [from the Obama administration] in the service of its expansion project [in the Arab countries] and the empowerment of its militias in the region.” — Khairallah Khairallah, Lebanese writer and political analyst, Alraimedia.com, January 22, 2022.
• “Moreover, it is no secret that the current US administration is encouraging the Houthis to be more aggressive. They [the Houthis] are more hostile towards the US itself. A few weeks ago, the Houthis stormed the US embassy in [the Yemeni capital of] Sana’a…. It seems that the US administration is still convinced that Iran wants an agreement in Vienna and that the Houthis are still searching for a peaceful solution in Yemen.” — Khairallah Khairallah, Alraimedia.com, January 22, 2022.
• Re-designating the Houthi militia as an international terrorist organization is “a step in the right direction.” — Eyad Abu Shakra, Lebanese journalist and political commentator, Reuters, January 20, 2022.
• [M]any Arabs have lost confidence in the US because it has chosen to align itself with Iran, whose forces and militias are occupying Iraq, Syria, Yemen and Lebanon and are now targeting the UAE and Saudi Arabia — not to mention positioning themselves in America’s soft underbelly in Venezuela, Cuba and Nicaragua. In the eyes of these Arabs, the Biden administration is inflicting massive damage on US interests and allies and helping Iran export its terrorism throughout the world.
• It now remains to be seen whether anyone in the Biden administration will wake up to the magnitude of the Iranian threat and actions, redesignate the Houthis as a Foreign Terrorist Organization, and attempt to salvage the credibility of the United States.

Yesterday, January 30, 2022, the Iran-backed militia, the Houthis in Yemen, launched a missile at Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates (UAE), for the third time in as many weeks.

Many Arabs say that they cannot understand why the Biden administration still has not re-designated the Houthis as a terrorist organization, especially in the wake of the recent missile and drone attacks on the UAE and Saudi Arabia.

The Arabs say that the Biden administration made a mistake when it decided last year to remove the Houthis from the international terrorist list. The Biden administration’s move, they noted, has emboldened one of the most dangerous terrorist groups in the Middle East and endangered international peace and security.

Some Arabs believe that the Biden administration’s lenient approach towards the Houthi militia is designed to appease the mullahs in Iran with the hope that they will sign a new nuclear deal with the US and the other world powers.

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