By Press TV Website Staff
Yemeni armed forces retain the strategic upper hand and remain fully capable of asserting their sovereignty and enforcing the naval blockade despite repeated acts of aggression by the US and Israel, says an analyst.
In an interview with the Press TV website, Rune Agerhus, a political commentator and member of the International Commission for Solidarity with Yemen (ICSY), hailed the recent operations by the Yemeni military against vessels in the Red Sea headed to the occupied territories.
He said these developments are "highly significant for several reasons."
"Despite repeated acts of aggression by both the United States and Israel—the latter even boasting about neutralizing the seized car carrier Galaxy Leader, which they claimed had been converted into a stationary radar platform—the Yemeni Armed Forces retain the strategic upper hand and remain fully capable of asserting their sovereignty and enforcing the naval blockade," Agerhus said.
The widely respected analyst on Yemeni affairs noted that the video released on the operation to neutralize the vessel “Eternity C” included the first-ever audiovisual documentation of the use of an Anti-Ship Ballistic Missile (ASBM) by Yemeni forces.
"The message conveyed by these operations is unmistakable: Yemen’s steadfast commitment to the Palestinian cause and its determination to continue military operations until a ceasefire is reached in Gaza. The 'Yemen question' remains a persistent and unresolved challenge for both the United States and Israel," he remarked.
The operations were carried out by the Yemeni armed forces in solidarity with the Palestinian resistance and in response to the ongoing Israeli genocidal war on the Gaza Strip.
Agerhus described US President Donald Trump as an "impulsive and opaque oligarch" driven by a "desire for immediate results that serve his personal interests and bolster his appeal among core supporters."
He said the ceasefire between the US and Yemen, on Trump's initiative, was precipitated by "a series of strategic and operational failures by CENTCOM and the US 6th Fleet, including the loss of three F-18 fighter jets and over two dozen MQ-9 Reaper drones."
"These setbacks significantly undermined the United States' ability to project power in the region, a blow to Trump, who had anticipated a swift campaign lasting no more than a month," noted the analyst.
"Recent indications suggest Israel is once again pressuring the United States into direct military engagement, leaving the outcome largely contingent on Trump’s willingness—or unwillingness—to resist Israeli demands."
Yemen’s advanced military capabilities, which have been on full display in the past two years amid the Israeli-American genocidal war on Gaza, stem from its "sophisticated human capital," he asserted.
"Yemeni engineers trained in Iraq and the former Soviet Union and returned home to contribute to the development of the country’s strategic defense infrastructure well before the 2015 war. This creative and technical ingenuity has become a key asset, even under conditions of siege and blockade," he stated.
"With Iranian technical support, Yemen has established a domestic defense industry operating with assembly-line efficiency. The low cost of production does not reflect a lack of sophistication; rather, Yemen has mastered the craft of developing an advanced arsenal at a fraction of the cost other nations invest in their militaries."
He particularly referred to the conversion of Soviet air-to-air missiles into surface-to-air defense systems, the enhancement of range and fuel capacity for Korean-origin missiles, and the in-house design and manufacture of new missile systems as examples.
"This is a remarkable feat given the United States’ decades-long effort to systematically degrade Yemen’s defensive capacity and eliminate it as a strategic threat to the Red Sea trade corridor and, by extension, the global economy," Agerhus stressed.
On Yemen's unflinching and iron-clad support for the Palestinian cause at a time when other Arab states have become mute spectators to the raging genocidal war against Palestinians in Gaza, the analyst said, "to be Yemeni is to be loyal to Palestine."
"Yemeni identity is deeply rooted in a modern history of anti-colonial and anti-imperialist struggle. The Yemeni people are actively engaged today because they remember their own historical experiences—passed down across generations—of national transformation throughout the 20th and 21st centuries," Agerhus said.
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