Yemen's legitimate authorities have every right to defend national sovereignty wherever they exercise their mandate. More than a right, doing so and preventing a slide into war is their constitutional duty and the natural responsibility of any government.
The Houthi militia, wherever it operates, must not delude itself into believing that Yemenis of any region or tribe could acquiesce to being ruled and humiliated on their own soil by a minority. Yemen belongs to all Yemenis, and no one should be excluded. Through its present conduct, however, the militia turns its back on a basic obligation: to assess its weight among Yemenis, to place the interests of the country above all others, and to accept that it has no right to harm anyone or bring further harm upon Yemen.
The militia treats war as though it were a duty, waging conflict anywhere and drawing any conflict onto Yemeni soil. Did it not proclaim, "War is easier to bear than what I am enduring"? It has grown restless after a long truce that has exposed its impotence before citizens suffering from the abuses and transgressions of its own members. To choose life beneath the shadow of war and destruction is sheer folly.
The worse conditions become and the closer the country moves toward confrontation, the more the Houthi militia seems to revel in the mounting drama. Rather than promoting calm, respecting its own people, and working to ease their suffering.
The fact that stable states endure the turmoil around them and confront the many faces of war and chaos with wisdom should not be mistaken for acceptance of the conduct of groups blinded by the arrogance of the moment. They forget that, in the blink of an eye, circumstances can shift in wholly unexpected ways, and that nihilism amounts to a slow death that leads to its own demise sooner or later.
State authorities continue to fulfill their duties, exercise their constitutional and legal rights, and rally the resolve of their citizens. They know how to divide the tasks of the moment among constitutional institutions, the armed forces, and the security services. Militias destroy states, exhaust their people, inflame competing loyalties, and devastate economies.
Yemen, therefore, must be governed by all Yemenis. It cannot be ruled by a militia. The Houthis must seek common ground with the Yemeni people.
Today, Yemeni women and men are demanding support for every noble and sincere effort to help the country, while resisting the false equivalence between the logic, culture, and conduct of statesmen and the mentality and behavior of militiamen; between a brother who fosters good and a wretch who spreads evil.
To prevent further harm, some Yemeni ministers remain focused on setting a positive example, turning away from the sea of petty quarrels, waves of escalation, shouted threats, and hollow slogans. This approach has its principled advocates.
Because the logic of the state is fundamentally different from that of the militia, the Chairman of the Presidential Leadership Council issues concise statements that lay out firm directives on the management of public affairs. Officials and technical staff working with Prime Minister Shaya al-Zindani then affirmed their commitment to "ensuring a swift response to all possible scenarios and unifying performance so that services to citizens continue without interruption."
Thus, when the representatives of Yemen's legitimate government are seen working in the trenches, the propaganda promoted by those who neither understand nor act loses its force. May we never be among them.
Constructive national work aimed at rebuilding the country and achieving #PeaceForYemen is a battlefield on which the militia loses and the citizens truly prevail.
