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 Iranian state media have given blanket coverage in Arabic, Farsi
and English to the three-month-old war in Yemen, where Saudi Arabia
and Sunni Arab allies have been bombing the Iranian-allied Houthi
faction for over three months.
The violence has killed more than 2,800 people, displaced one
million and left more than 21 million people or 80 percent of the
population in need of some form of humanitarian aid and or
protection, the United Nations says.
In its latest broadside, the hardline Fars news agency on Wednesday
released a video clip showing the face of Saudi King Salman morphing
into that of Saddam Hussein, the late Iraqi dictator loathed in
Tehran as its enemy in a 1980-88 war, interspersed with scenes of
crying Yemeni children.
Another tactic was a state-sponsored cartoon contest about the Yemen
war -- even as an Iranian court sentenced an activist to more than
12 years in jail on charges including drawing cartoons of Iranian
lawmakers.
One entry showed a Saudi fighter jet delivering bloodied Yemenis
into the hands of jihadists, while the winner depicted the Islamic
profession of faith being erased from the Saudi flag as bombs rained
down.
"Iran's political win comes from the ability to present itself as a
potential peacemaker, rather than the ability actually to secure a
deal on the ground," Julien Barnes-Dacey, of the European Council on
Foreign Relations, said.
QUAGMIRE
"The Iranians don't have much to lose and a lot to gain from the
ongoing conflict and the sense that the Saudis and their allies are
sinking into a deeper quagmire."
Saudi Arabia and its partners aim to restore President Abd-Rabbu
Mansour Hadi from his exile in the Saudi capital Riyadh, saying they
are defending Yemeni sovereignty against the sudden rise to power of
the Houthi militia over the past nine months.
Riyadh has found it hard going: the kingdom has held back from
committing ground troops and has yet to find a powerful enough
Yemeni ally to beat back the determined Houthis on land.
But the coalition does appear to have shut down the possibility of
Iran sending material help to the Houthis: It has taken control of
Yemen's air space and waters and prevented Iranian attempts to ship
and fly in aid.
Now, making a virtue of necessity, Iran is hitting back on the
airwaves.
"The Iranian strategy has changed partly because of a change of
circumstances... (The embargo) prevents them from supporting the
Saleh-Houthi alliance in an overt way," Ayham Kamel, Middle East
director at the Eurasia Group consultancy, said.
The Houthis are allied with army units loyal to former president Ali
Abdullah Saleh, who stepped down as part of a Gulf-backed political
transition following a 2011 uprising.
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"PEACEMAKER"
Iran has long quietly cultivated political ties with the Houthis and
diplomats suspect this expanded into paramilitary training and
supplies in recent years. Iran denies providing material support to
the group.
Tehran has sought to turn the embargo to its advantage, sending a
series of aid shipments that were forcefully turned away by the
coalition -- a move Tehran vigorously publicized.
In April, for example, coalition jets bombed the runway of Yemen's
main airport to prevent an Iranian cargo plane from landing, after
the pilots ignored orders to turn around.
The following month, an Iranian cargo ship set sail for a
Houthi-controled port under military escort, nearly provoking a
showdown with coalition forces planning to inspect the ship.
The vessel ultimately did not test the blockade, offloading its
cargo in Djibouti for delivery by the United Nations before
returning to Iran.
Iranian diplomats have cast Tehran as a peacemaker, putting forward
peace plans and decrying "external meddling" from the United Nations
to the Islamic Organization Conference.
"They are trying to turn on its head the narrative that Iran is
always the one destabilizing the region," Barnes-Dacey said.
For their part, the Saudis have tried to portray their Yemen
campaign as lawful, as being undertaken in Yemen's own interests,
and as a turning point in what Riyadh sees as unchecked Iranian
expansionism in Arab countries.
Saudi Arabia points to the widespread international recognition of
Hadi's presidency and a U.N. Security Council resolution demanding
the Houthis withdraw from occupied areas, surrender weapons and
restore the exiled government.
(Editing by William Maclean/Mark Heinrich)
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