Agents, Not Puppets: Debunking the Myth of Proxy Warfare in Yemen
The Yemeni civil war, a devastating conflict that has caused immense suffering for millions of Yemenis and torn the country apart, has been frequently labeled as a proxy war in popular media and policy debates. The involvement of Arab states, such as Saudi Arabia and the United Arab of Emirates (UAE), on one side, and Iran on the other, has led many to accept this framing without critically examining its implications. However, the proxy war narrative in Yemen is not only reductionist which oversimplifies the conflict's complexity, but it also misrepresents the entire conflict and robs Yemenis of their own agency and undermines their own legitimate concerns. This proxy war characterization misses an important point: Yemen civil war is fundamentally a multifaceted struggle between local groups vying to impose their own political projects, independent of the involvement of external actors. Before delving into the reasons why this portrayal is not only factually incorrect but also has...