Elijah J Mangier is another major PR-tool of the Assadist regime in Syria - of similar 'quality' like 'al-Masdar News'.
His blog is at least 2, perhaps more years 'old', and sometimes posting Iranian PRBS about Yemen.
In the case of the 'article' you linked above, David, he's babbling about 'Saudi-led Op Decisive Storm helping al-Qaida'.
To make few things clear here: yes, this is one of results of the Op Decisive Storm, but was never intended. What happened is that the advance during that operation was so quick, that the total of about 40,000 involved Saudi, Emirati, Bahraini etc. troops de-facto created a 'power vacuum' behind them: because of total collapse of Yemeni Army and police, there was nobody left behind them to control the 'liberated' areas.
This is what the AQAP exploited in order to establish itself in control of a number of places, foremost in Mukalla area. As mentioned above, Saudis are already neck-deep in fighting them.
Anyway, crucial result of the Op Decisive Storm was to stop such 'blitz' operations. Instead, Saudis and their intergalactic allies decided to spend the next 6-8 months with building a new Yemeni National Army (YNA), and new police. That's why no other major operation was undertaken ever since, i.e. why this war appears to be 'stagnating/going nowhere' ever since September last year. That's also why there were so many reports about graduation of new YNA units etc., the last two months or so.
This period is meanwhile nearly over, the YNA has a strenght of about 20,000; there is a new police too.
Obviously, the AQAP wasn't sitting iddle either, and thus it's not as easy to kick them out of Mukalla now. On the contrary, they are active in Aden too, and there is hardly a day without report about another assassination of some of Hadi's officials.
Mangier's babbling about 'nervousnes reaching its peak' in regards of that video showing a Hezbollah/Lebanon advisor talking to a group of Houthis is nonsense.
Actually it is so that Saudi special forces run a minor op in Sa'ada Governorate, back in early February, and smashed one of Houthi HQs there, capturing loads of documentation in the process - including that video. The video in question - see here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2NmLhAzRj8o - is very important, because it's the first-ever 'firm' evidence for Hezbollah presence on Houthi side in Yemen (i.e. it began convincing 'even' such cynical and sarcastic thugs like me that Saudis might be right after all, especially if combined with a review of how many of Yemenis that originally sided with Houthis have meanwhile turned against them).
Means: that video is surely no reason for Saudis to get 'nervous'. Rather something that made them very happy. And that's a good indication for 'quality' of the rest of Mangier's 'literature'...
Reply With Quote
Bookmarks