Yemeni researcher Baraa Shiban says Iran built influence through recruitment networks over years and now uses the Houthis to pressure Saudi Arabia and its Western allies – WSJ.
Shiban, an associate fellow at London’s Royal United Services Institute (RUSI), participated in Yemen’s 2011 uprising and later negotiated with the Houthis.
Iran International aired his account on its “Eye for Iran” podcast. However, it could not independently verify the full extent of the recruitment he described.
According to Shiban, young Yemeni activists received invitations to conferences in Lebanon after joining the uprising. Organisers presented these gatherings as discussions about democratic reform, but Hezbollah operatives ran them.
Activists receptive to Tehran’s ideology then met an officer from Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), he said. Some subsequently travelled to Iran.
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Shiban identified the officer, known by the alias Abu Hadi, as Hassan Irlou, who later became Iran’s ambassador to Houthi authorities in Sanaa.
He said participants in these networks helped establish the movement’s political bureau in the Yemeni capital. “I think we’re entering phase three,” Shiban said.
He argued that Tehran preserved its relationship with the Houthis to enable a broader confrontation. In his assessment, attacks now serve Iranian interests while advancing the movement’s own ambitions within Yemen.
Shiban also linked Tehran’s strategy to Bab el-Mandeb, the passage connecting the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden. He believes Iran wants leverage over another shipping route alongside the Strait of Hormuz.
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Meanwhile, Saudi officials put the death toll from recent attacks across the kingdom at at least 19 people. Separately, Yemeni authorities said Houthi missiles killed five people at the presidential palace compound in Aden on Thursday.
Yemeni researcher Baraa Shiban says Iran developed recruitment networks over years before using its Houthi relationship to pressure Saudi Arabia and Western allies.
