Yemen’s ultra-conservative Sunni Salafists have signed a ceasefire, ending months of fighting with Shi’ite Houthi rebels in which at least 210 were killed, according to various reports.
Fighting between Salafists and their rival al Houthis started in late October when the Shi’ites accused the Salafists of hiding hundreds of “armed foreign fighters” in a Koranic school in the Shiite-dominated province of Saada. The intense sporadic battles focused on the school of Dar al-Hadith, according to one report by Gulf News.
Yet another report by Reuters said the fighting began “when the Houthi rebels, who control much of the northern Saada province, accused Salafis in the town of Damaj of recruiting thousands of foreign fighters to prepare to attack them.”
The Salafists, which follow a strict interpretation of Sunni Islam, claim the foreigners are students.
Government troops began to deploy in the northern province of Saada on Saturday to monitor the ceasefire, which was brokered by a presidential commission and was signed on Friday. It stipulated that the two sides would withdraw from the areas around Dammaj and be replaced by army troops who would monitor the agreement.
The Houthis rose up in 2004 in their stronghold of Saada against the authoritarian government of former President Ali Abdullah Saleh, accusing it of marginalizing them. They accuse radical Salafists in Dammaj, about 50 miles north of the capital Sana’a, of turning the town center into a garrison for thousands of armed foreigners.
The fighting in Yemen mirrors what’s happening to its north, where Sunnis and Shi’ites have been fighting against one another in Syria, while also fighting the Syrian government. Additionally, Iraq is sinking deeper into a sectarian civil war again, with Saudi Arabia, which is predominantly Sunni, providing tacit approval for its citizens to fight in conflicts in both Syria and Iraq.
According to The Oman Observer, sources in the mediation commission said the Salafist leader Yahya al Hujuri had requested President Abdrabuh Mansur Hadi make a decision on providing a solution regarding the Koranic school and its foreign students, while providing protection for the town in the future.
Dammaj has a population of about 15,000. The Red Cross said it evacuated 25 casualties from Dammaj on Friday after the ceasefire. The wounded, some in critical condition, were airlifted to Sanaa, a spokeswoman for the International Committee of the Red Cross said on Friday.
Fighting by other al-Qaida separatists in Yemen’s south threatens to tear the country apart. Yemen is a staunch ally of the U.S., which has come under intense pressure for a secret drone campaign being waged in the Arabian peninsula nation.