Iran’s cultivation of the Houthis over the years of war in Yemen has armed them with missiles and drones, endangering Washington’s partners and Tehran’s rivals, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.
Yemen was already the Arab world’s poorest country before its civil war began in 2014. Then a Saudi-led coalition joined the fight against the Iran-backed Houthi militia, spreading the ruin.
Both the Saudi-led coalition and the Houthi rebels said they would stop fighting, but further progress toward an end to the seven-year war in the country was uncertain.