Yemen approaches failed state

The summer months are usually quiet in the Arabian Gulf, the searing heat prompting expats and locals to pack their bags and head for greener, cooler pastures. But to those paying attention, a war has been raging since August. For several months now, the Yemeni army and rebel Huthi fighters, belonging to the Zaidi offshoot of Shiite Islam, have been engaged in a pitched battle with government forces, leaving tens of thousands displaced and hundreds more dead. On October 14, Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh pronounced to supporters that the northern rebels would be crushed “in the next few days.” Saleh, perhaps tongue in cheek, was careful to attach the archetypal Arab suffix “God willing” to the end of his statement. This may prove a wise move given that the regime has little control over the mountainous north, where fighters with “conventional weapons” have already taken down a number of