Skip to content

All Articles


In what one can only imagine was an awkward and stiltedly polite conversation, “Information Minister Hassan al-Lowzi has met with a delegation of Human Rights Watch headed by Joe Stork, […]
News Yemen reports on recent clashes, which led to the deaths of six soldiers, although an al-Huthi spokesman is denying the report. The spokesman is also warning the government against […]
Over at Foreign Policy.com Ian Bremmer tells us why we should care about Yemen’s future – a subject close to Waq al-waq’s heart. I disagree with his take on the […]
Earlier this year Sultan al-Sam’ai, a MP for YSP from Ta’izz, helped to form the “Popular Movement for Justice and Change,” which as this piece from al-Tagheer points out is […]
Despite the warnings of my better angels, I couldn’t resist a quick read through of the Nasir al-Wahayshi interview posted to jihadi sites. What can I say, for me a […]
Friday December 17 marked the one year anniversary of the US air strikes in Majalla, which killed, along with some al-Qaeda operatives, a number of women and children. The incident […]
Available videos of talks on al-Qaeda in YemenJanuary 2010: The Yemen Crisis: Some Ground Truths (Princeton)January 2010: Big Think Interview, Big ThinkDecember 10, 2009: Yemen’s Three Layers of Crises, National […]
All at once, it seems, Yemen’s neighbors have decided the whole “let it become a failed state” plan might not be in their best interests. Kuwait has agreed to float […]
I have thought for some time now that a book that is really needed is some sort of jihadi dictionary, explaining common words phrases and allusions that often pepper jihadi […]
As noted below, the Yemeni Parliament has overwhelming agreed to postpone elections for two years, pushing them to the futuristic 2011. The Yemen Observer, taking an angle I hadn’t thought […]
Big day today. Nothing less than the future of Yemen- and, indeed, the world- is at stake, and it will all be decided in the matter of the next two […]
In his weekly address today, the President directly tied the Christmas bombing with AQAP. It was only a few minutes of a talk, so I don’t want to read too […]
I am attempting to maintain good humor, but as a warning to those who read this blog: please properly cite the material you gain from this blog. Much of what […]
One question that came to mind after reading through the second issue of Inspire is: Does the US now put Samir Khan on the CIA hit list now that he […]
You heard it here first. The new issue of Sada al-Malahim should be out soon. Of great curiosity this time will be whether or not the organization addresses al-Awfi’s confessions, […]
I have been a bit hard on some of the NY Times’ reporting coming out of Yemen lately, but I like to think that it is a loving criticism. Still, […]
As everyone’s attention is rightly focused on the north and the Huthi conflict, the south is still hanging around. In Abyan clashes between an Islamist militia (not al-Qaeda) and security […]
This is the last time I’ll be doing this, but I have a column up on the internet. This one is not about Yemen. I’ll only mention them in a […]
The Drone/UAV issue that we wrote about here now appears to be solved or at least partially so.Trey very helpfully posted a video of UAVs being launched in and around […]