Houthis (Ansar Allah)

The Houthi movement, formally Ansar Allah, emerged in the 1990s among Yemen's Zaidi Shia minority in the northern Saada region, initially as a religious revivalist movement before evolving into an armed insurgency against the Yemeni government from 2004. Taking advantage of the 2011 Arab Spring uprising against President Ali Abdullah Saleh, the Houthis expanded their territorial control and seized the capital Sanaa in September 2014, triggering a Saudi-led military intervention in 2015 on behalf of Yemen's internationally recognised government and plunging the country into a prolonged civil war and humanitarian crisis. Backed with weapons, training, and funding by Iran as part of its 'Axis of Resistance,' the Houthis became the de facto governing authority over most of northern Yemen's population. Beginning in November 2023, in declared solidarity with Gaza, the Houthis launched sustained drone and missile attacks on commercial shipping transiting the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden, disrupting a route carrying roughly 12-15 percent of global trade and prompting United States and United Kingdom airstrikes on Houthi military targets in Yemen from January 2024.

• Existed: 1992 CE – present
• Type: Entity
• Government: Non-state militia and de facto Yemeni authority
• Capital: Sanaa