The Daily Clarity

Jihadis take refuge in Yemen

“If disorder threatens, take refuge in Yemen” – Prophet Muhammad

While the context at the time of the  Prophet’s comment  may have been different, the message is being heard loud and clear today by the forces of Jihad in the region. We have been beating the drum about Yemen and the Al Qaeda surge for quite some time. It appears that some others are beginning to notice in the international media, though there is scant coverage of the situation in the US still.Yemen is fast becoming the Al Qaeda safe haven, and the effects are flowing over the border into Saudi Arabia. Yemen is the badlands to Saudi’s south, with porous borders, an impoverished populace, and a failing civil society. Saudi is a nation created on the sword of Jihad, and the pool of new fresh Jihad recruits from Yemen is challenging Saudi’s capacity to cope. Many of the less educated Saudi youth are confused as to why to take up the holy war against Russia in Afghanistan was admirable, but taking up arms against Israel and the US is not. The Saudi border patrol and Interior Ministry are working overtime to attempt to slow the flow of illegal immigrants from Yemen, and convince sections its own marganilized youth not to join Al Qaeda in its war:

In the wake of the Taliban regime’s overthrow in Afghanistan, bin Laden and his followers have come to regard Yemen, alongside Pakistan, as a haven. Indeed, Yemen is now a bubbling cauldron of jihadis who have flocked there because it, like Afghanistan and Pakistan, has weak, easily manipulated state institutions.

President Obama’s recent order to shut down the Guantánamo Bay detention facility has made the problem of Yemen’s weakness a leading international issue. One-third of the Guantánamo detainees are Yemeni, but Yemen cannot guarantee the US that the detainees will be controlled effectively if they are returned home. This fear is real. Many previously-released Guantánamo inmates have disappeared underground.

Saudi Arabia has supposedly created a “model” system for reintegrating and re-educating Guantánamo returnees but many of them relapse and escape to Yemen. Most notorious among these recidivists is Abu Sufyan al-Shihri, now “deputy leader of al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula”. Seven other Saudi jihadis who escaped to Yemen are also known to be active in al-Qaida there.

Thus the two largest countries on the Arabian peninsula – Saudi Arabia, the biggest in terms of landmass and oil wealth, and Yemen in terms of population – are now locked in life-and-death struggles with internal enemies - Yemen, haven for jihadis | Mai Yamani | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk.