To protect its security interests in the long term, Riyadh may have little choice but to engage with the Houthis.
Khaled Fattah is no longer with the Carnegie Endowment.
Khaled Fattah was a nonresident scholar at the Carnegie Middle East Center, where his research focused on the political, economic, security, and cultural sectors in Yemen, and state-tribe relations in the Arab Middle East. He is a guest lecturer at the Center for Middle Eastern Studies at Lund University in Sweden.
Fattah has taught at various European educational institutions in the fields of international relations, foreign policy analysis, intercultural communication, and the history of the Middle East. He previously worked as a lead researcher, senior consultant, and regional expert for the German international development cooperation sector as well as for various organizations of the European Union and United Nations in the Middle East.
Fattah is a frequent commentator on Yemen and state-tribe relations in the Middle East.
To protect its security interests in the long term, Riyadh may have little choice but to engage with the Houthis.
The falling out between Riyadh and Doha leaves Yemen divided over which patron to follow.
The biggest source of insecurity in Yemen is not the active presence of al-Qaeda, but rather the power struggles and lethal factionalism within the military and state security entities.
In order to stabilize Yemen, President Hadi must professionalize a divided and demoralized military whose officers are overwhelmingly soldiers by day and tribesmen by night.