Search
 
Write
 
Forums
 
Login
"Let there arise out of you a band of people inviting to all that is good enjoining what is right and forbidding what is wrong; they are the ones to attain felicity".
(surah Al-Imran,ayat-104)
Image Not found for user
User Name: abdulruff
Full Name: Dr.Abdul Ruff Colachal
User since: 15/Mar/2008
No Of voices: 1852
 
 Views: 863   
 Replies: 0   
 Share with Friend  
 Post Comment  

Iran to protect oppressed people in West Asia!

-Dr. Abdul Ruff

_______________

 

As Saudi led coalition is waging a bloody war in  a weak Arab nation Yemen, already killing  Arabs, Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said recently that Iran will help oppressed people in the region as much as it can, ratcheting up his rhetoric against regional rival Saudi Arabia.  Khamenei said in an address to Iranian leaders and diplomats from the Islamic world that Yemen, Bahrain and Palestine are oppressed, and we protect oppressed people as much as we can.

True, Saudi Arabia does not want any other Muslim nation to dictate terms to it, though it feels helpless and even vulnerable to Western and Israeli threats and now is annoyed with their terms. Above all, Saudi kingdom cannot tolerate a rising Iran in the region that would amount to challenging its own position in the region and worldwide.  That USA is not “doing enough” to contain Iran and Syria is the  major concern of Riyadh.

 

Saudi Arabia, interestingly, considers Shi’a nations a serious threat to Saudi supremacy - in fact more than that of Israel. Saudi attack on Yemen is essentially to showcase its power and capabilities to Iran, though it is presumed Riyadh is trying to signal to Washington its role in the world as a rich superpower of Mideast. In doing so, Saudi king has demonstrated that it can act on its own against “enemies”  or Shi’ite threats on its own without active support from USA.

Sunni Saudi Arabia and Shiite Iran are longtime regional rivals. They back opposite sides in Syria's civil war and are fiercely divided on a host of regional issues. Tensions between Riyadh and Tehran have been rising steadily, not only over Yemen but also the situation in Syria, Iraq, Lebanon and Shiite-majority but Sunni-ruled Bahrain.

The United Nations says at least 1,200 people have been killed in Yemen since March 19, and has repeatedly warned that the already impoverished Arabian Peninsula state faces a major humanitarian crisis.  A Saudi-led alliance began bombing Iranian-allied The Saudi-led coalition that has been bombing a weak Yemen since 26 March, seeing a threat from Houthi militia advances across the Arabian Peninsula state. Riyadh wants to restore Yemen's president, forced into exile by the Houthis. Earlier this week, Saudi Arabia said coalition jets destroyed the runway of Yemen's Sanaa airport to prevent an Iranian cargo plane from landing there.

Iran, the Shiite rival of Sunni-ruled Saudi Arabia, has strongly condemned the nearly six-week-old coalition air strikes against Shiite Huthi rebels who have seized large parts of Yemen including the capital. Iran has provided the Houthis with political and humanitarian support but denies arming them. The Houthis seized the capital, Sanaa, last year, and Yemen's internationally recognized president has fled the country. Iranian leaders have repeatedly criticized the airstrikes and said the Saudi-led campaign is doomed to fail.

The head of Iran's navy said warships would remain in international waters near Yemen as part of a 90-day assignment through July 10. Adm. Habibollah Sayyari told state TV they will then be replaced by another fleet. Iran dispatched the destroyer Alborz and logistics ship Bushehr to the waters off Yemen last month. It says the ships are patrolling the strategic Bab al-Mandab strait on an anti-piracy mission.

As Saudi led Arab coalition is attacking Yemen, because  that Arab nation is considered to be an Iran ally, and now Iran openly expresses it solidarity with people of Yemen. Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said recently that Iran will help oppressed people in the region as much as it can, ratcheting up his rhetoric against regional rival Saudi Arabia.  "Security in the Persian Gulf is in the interests of everyone... If it is insecure, it will be insecure for all," Khamenei said and his comments are likely to be taken by Gulf Arab leaders, who on May 14 met with US President Barack Obama to address security issues, as evidence that Iran is trying to aggressively expand its influence in the region.

Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei went so far as to call the Saudi airstrikes in Yemen "genocide."  Khamenei said the Americans shamelessly support the killing of the Yemeni population, but they accuse Iran of interfering in that country and of sending weapons when Iran only seeks to provide medical and food aid. "The revolutionary people of Yemen do not need weapons because they control all the country's military bases and centres," he added.

General Mohammad Ali Jafari, commander of Shi'ite Muslim Iran's elite Revolutionary Guards, said Sunni Saudi Arabia - Tehran's arch regional adversary - was "shamelessly and disgracefully bombing and killing a nation" and "Saudi Arabia is following in the Zionist (Israel) regime's footsteps in the Islamic world," Jafari was quoted as saying by IRNA. The head of Iran's Revolutionary Guard accused Saudi Arabia of treachery against the Islamic world and compared the kingdom to Israel.  Today, the treacherous Saudis are following in Israel's footsteps, Saudi Arabia is shamelessly and disgracefully bombing and mass killing a nation that is fighting against the arrogant system, or world powers, he said. "Others will not be allowed to put our shared security at risk with military adventures."

Obviously, USA and Europe use Sunni nations against Shi’ite nations and they are eager to see the divide is intact. Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei accused the United States of supporting "immense crimes" in Yemen by Saudi Arabia, which is leading an air war against Tehran-backed rebels. "The Saudi government is killing innocent people, women and children in Yemen ... and Americans support these immense crimes," Khamenei said in a speech to students quoted on his official website.

The United States and Saudi Arabia have accused Iran of arming the Shi'ite Houthis. The Islamic Republic says it gives only political and humanitarian support to the Houthis. Iran's deputy foreign minister said Tehran will not let regional powers jeopardize its security interests in Yemen in the strongest acknowledgement yet of Iranian involvement in the Arabian Peninsula.

Iran has denied accusations from Western and Arab states that it is arming Shi'ite Muslim Houthi rebels in Yemen. Tehran has regularly condemned a Saudi-led air campaign against the insurgents.

Iran does not recognize Hadi and has portrayed the air strikes as an intervention in Yemen's internal affairs.

US Secretary of State John Kerry said that several countries, including Iran, backed a negotiated political process to resolve the conflict in Yemen. The UN Panel of Experts, which monitors compliance with the Security Council’s Iran sanctions regime, noted in its latest annual report that Tehran shipped arms to a number of recipients in the Middle East- Syria, Yemen, Iraq and Lebanon, including the Houthis, Hamas and Hezbollah. According to the panel’s analysis of the 2013 seizure of a Yemen-bound ship, media reports and information received from the Yemeni government, Iranian arms shipments to the Houthis date back to at least 2009. The panel's report said that apart from the 2013 incident no alleged arms shipments by Iran to the Houthis were officially reported to the panel or to the UN Security Council’s Iran sanctions committee.

Saudi Arabia says Shiite fighters in the country have broken a day-old ceasefire. The Saud-led campaign was launched to reinstate the rule of Hadi after the Huthis, backed by army units loyal to ex-president Ali Abdullah Saleh, overran much of Yemen.

 

The United Nations appealed to all sides in the Yemen conflict to respect a fragile five-day truce in the country in a bid to boost the delivery of sorely-needed aid. The plea made by the UN envoy to Yemen, Ismail Ould Sheikh Ahmed, came as Saudi-led forces accused Shiite rebels of violating the truce, two days after it took effect. But the Saudi-led coalition said it would abide by the ceasefire, and stick to its decision to temporarily halt weeks of air strikes on Iran-backed Huthi rebels.

 

 

Houthi fighters withdrew almost completely from the border area between Saudi Arabia and Yemen on Friday morning, as their fighters engaged in fierce fighting in the south of the country. The Houthi withdrawal, first reported by Sky News Arabia, came after a ceasefire announced by Saudi Arabia that has held since May 12 despite reports of violations by both sides .

 

Saudi Arabia, which sees itself as the guardian of Sunni Islam, has long vied for influence with Iran, the region's main Shi'ite Muslim power.  

 

UN chief Ban Ki-moon urged a humanitarian pause in the conflict as embattled aid agencies say they desperately need supplies, including fuel to run infrastructure such as hospitals. His comments came after the UN Security Council failed Friday to back a Russian appeal for an immediate ceasefire or humanitarian pauses in war-torn Yemen. Russia requested an urgent meeting of the 15-member council as the air strikes entered a sixth week, crippling deliveries of fuel, food and medicine.

 

White House said it was working to find a solution for Yemen's crisis as the UN urged a truce, warning the country was on the verge of collapse. More than six weeks of Saudi-led air strikes targeting Shiite rebels in Yemen and ground fighting has killed hundreds of people and forced hundreds of thousands to flee the impoverished country.

Kerry said the United States was working "very hard" to help negotiate a solution to the crisis in war-torn Yemen through the United Nations. Speaking to reporters in Sri Lanka, Kerry said it was not inevitable that Yemen, the scene of Saudi-led air strikes on Huthi rebels, would become a failed state.

Sunni-Shiite divide is artificial because Islam does not provide for a war or any serious conflict between the branches. An increasingly tense standoff between Iran and Saudi Arabia has added a sectarian dimension to regional conflicts, particularly in Yemen where a Saudi-led coalition of Sunni Arab states is carrying out air strikes against Shi'ite Houthi rebels allied to Iran. The standoff has also raised concerns for shipping in the Gulf, a major oil transport route. In the past month, Iranian forces have twice tried to seize commercial ships to settle legal disputes.

In fact, after an initial confusion plus hesitation, USA has welcomed Saudi war in Yemen and President Obama sent his secretary of state John Kerry to Riyadh in a way as to assure US support for its war – illegal or otherwise. Washington has given intelligence and logistical support to the coalition.

 

 

 

 

5/19/2015

 No replies/comments found for this voice 
Please send your suggestion/submission to webmaster@makePakistanBetter.com
Long Live Islam and Pakistan
Site is best viewed at 1280*800 resolution