The Houthi rebels, officially known as Ansar Allah (Partisans of God), are a Zaydi revivalist and Shia Islamist political and military organization operating primarily in Yemen. The group’s first organization, "the Believing Youth," was founded in 1992 in Yemen's Saada Governorate. They emerged as an opposition movement against then-President Ali Abdullah Saleh, whom they accused of corruption and being backed by Saudi Arabia and the United States. The movement is named after its founder, Hussein al-Houthi, whose killing by the Yemeni military in 2004 sparked the Houthi insurgency.
The Houthis function as a de facto government, ruling a third of Yemen's territory and two-thirds of its population from the capital, Sanaa, which they seized in 2014. They are a key member of Iran's regional alliance, the "Axis of Resistance," and receive military, financial, and logistical support from Iran. Their mechanism involves using sophisticated missiles and drones to target their main regional rival, Saudi Arabia, and its coalition.
A significant recent change is their campaign of disruptive strikes in the Red Sea starting in late 2023, in response to the Israel-Hamas war. These actions, including attacks on commercial vessels and oil tankers, have threatened to close the Bab al-Mandab Strait, a critical global maritime trade chokepoint. The Houthis are ideologically similar to the Lebanese group Hezbollah and their official slogan is against the United States, Israel, and the Jews.