Saudi air strike kills Yemen rebels as US drawn into fight

As the world’s largest oil exporter and a major US ally, Saudi concerns weigh heavily in Washington.

The strikes comes just three days after The New York Times reported that the United States has provided weapons and logistical support to Yemeni government strikes against “suspected hide-outs of Al Qaeda within its borders.”

That involvement has raised questions over whether the US has been active in Yemen – and Saudi Arabia’s – fight against the Houthis as well. Hours after Sunday’s air strike, US Admiral Mike Mullen praised the attack and repeated worries that Yemen could become “another safe haven” for terrorism in remarks to the Associated Press. However, AP says he “refused to discuss whether the United States played an active role in the recent operation.”

While both the Houthis and the government of Yemen insist their conflict is not sectarian, it has strong religious overtones, reports Al Jazeera.

The Houthis are members of the Zaidi sect – which, though an offshoot of Shiite Islam is in many ways closer to Sunni Islam. The sect's leaders ruled Yemen until its 1962 revolution. Since then they have felt socially and economically marginalized as the influence of Sunni Wahhabism, and its patron state Saudi Arabia, has grown.

According to Al Jazeera, the current conflict was restarted in 2004 when Yemeni officials tried to arrest a Zaidi religious leader and former member of parliament, Hussein Al Houthi, on whose head it had placed a $55,000 bounty.

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