Backgrounder to the War on Yemen

Donald Trump: Today, I have ordered the United States Military to launch decisive and powerful Military action against the Houthi terrorists in Yemen.

It’s quite dubious whether Ansar Allah are terrorists. Their attacks on shipping have been designed to avoid civilian casualties. All of their attacks on Israel have been on military targets, broadly seen. There have been several deaths and a dozen or so injuries, but that’s quite amazing for a group that is shooting so many drones and missiles at populated cities and ships.

Terrorism means you are terrorizing completely innocent civilians by killing and seriously wounding them in order to pursue a political goal. None of this is evident here. Anyway, Israel is one of the biggest terrorist organizations in the whole world, behind only a couple of other groups and armies. You are trying to tell me that committing a literal genocide isn’t the very definition of terrorism?

Second of all, there’s no such thing as “the Houthis.” The Houthis a…