The rebels were reported Friday to have captured Perim, an island vital to controlling the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, one of the worldâs most important shipping routes.
www.nbcnews.com
www.independent.co.uk
Of course this got ignored.
Another shit-stain group on the toilet bowl that is the Middle East. The worst thing about this is that the Houthis are starting to exercise more and more strategic autonomy from Iran. Most of their weapons are still supplied by Iran, but their decision-making is growing more independent and they're even starting to manufacture their own weapons. And they are absolutely in the position to control and choke the Strait. They don't even have to close it. The uncertainty alone is enough to make commodity prices skyrocket.
Saudi Arabia is fucked. Iran and their proxies have snipped off their two primary trade arteries, including their supposed 'backup'. America refused to send military help because they're already caught up in the war on the Persian Gulf front. Trump is truly the biggest loser here. Him and his trailer park hicks really thought a couple of bombs and a flashy leadership decapitation would squeeze Iran, shrink the war, and they'd walk away as the 'saviors'.
The West needs to stay out of the Middle East - not because they don't understand Middle Eastern people, but because they don't understand Middle Eastern political calculus. They assume that 'deep down' ME governments will eventually prioritize their societies over themselves, when many of their regimes have repeatedly demonstrated that they will impoverish, terrorize, murder, imprison, and sacrifice large parts of their own population before allowing the ruling order to collapse, ESPECIALLY at the hands of the West. Khameini's death was a VERY welcome silver lining, but ultimately Western intervention has strengthened ME regimes more than anything else - ESPECIALLY the theocratic ones. Capitulating to or entertaining the West is nothing short of heresy and, to the Irani regime, every life sacrificed for it is worth it.
The Middle East has never needed outsiders to make it an unlivable human rights craphole. Netanyahu, the Ayatollah, the proxies - all in a long line of thugs that preceded America and will easily outlast it. And the West's naive political misjudgments only ever make it worse, if not HELP them.