Yemen is one the likeliest conflict zones to witness an increase in Islamic State (ISIS) activities, especially since ISIS suffered setbacks in Syria, Iraq, and Libya during 2016. The likelihood is based on the nature of the current Yemeni situation, which includes the fragility of the state, the absence of a political system capable of providing security, the ongoing conflict between the legitimate government and the Houthis and instability experienced by the country at all levels, rendering its borders porous. However, ISIS faces challenges, such as the tribal nature of social relations and the presence of al-Qaeda in Yemen.

Precursors

Talk of the emergence of ISIS in Yemen began when some leaders of al-Qaeda came out in support of Islamic State. This became evident on 18 September 2014 when a spokesman for al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, Mamoun Hatem, announced his support for ISIS, which had announced the establishment of a so-called “Islamic Caliphate” only two months earlier. However, the sympathy of this al-Qaeda leader for ISIS did not last long as he soon returned to the embrace of al-Qaeda, under the leadership of Ayman al-Zawahiri. The spokesman was later killed by a US drone strike in the city of al-Mukalla on 11 May 2015. 

Some attribute the emergence of ISIS in Yemen to the Houthi coup and their seizure of key areas of the Yemeni state. Following that, in an audio recording released on 10 November 2014, a group calling itself the Mujahideen of Yemen pledged allegiance to ISIS and its leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, in an internet publication titled “Yemen’s allegiance to the Islamic State.”

Subsequently, rumors emerged that Jalal Belaidi (alias Abu Hamza al-Zanzibari), leader of Ansar al-Sharia - as al-Qaeda in Yemen called itself - announced he was joining ISIS. His announcement came after he committed al-Qaeda’s most heinous crime, where on 8 August 2014 Zanzibari led a massacre of fourteen Yemeni soldiers in the Hadhramaut Governorate, in the country’s east. Zanzibari gave orders to his men to slaughter isolated soldiers and throw their bodies on the roadside. He was later targeted and killed by a US drone on 4 February 2016.

Observers believe that Zanzibari surpassed all previous leaders in al-Qaeda regarding brutality and aggression, providing a model for the Yemeni branch of ISIS, which is known for killing its opponents using brutal methods, including beheadings. But it soon transpired that the al-Qaeda commander was in fact still with the group and had led a number of bank robberies in al-Mukalla and other cities in the provinces of Hadhramaut and Shabwah and Abyan, before his death.

On 24 April 2015, ISIS’s branch in Yemen published a nine-minute and twenty-second-long video in which it announced the establishment of Sanaa province, the newest province belonging to Islamic State. The video showed about twenty fighters conducting military exercises and a demonstration of the use of automatic weapons. It was filmed in a desert area that observers believe was likely outside of Yemen since Sanaa Governorate occupies a mountainous area.

Operations attributed to ISIS

ISIS’s operations in Yemen began on 20 March 2015 with the bombing of two mosques belonging to the Shiite Houthi group in the capital Sanaa, killing leaders and religious figures, notably Al-Murtadha Al-Muhammara and Mohammed Abdulmalik al-Shami. On 30 April 2015 ISIS in Yemen published a video showing the beheading of four Yemeni soldiers and the shooting of eleven others in the province of Shabwah, southeast of the country. The film embodied the strategy of “savagery” pursued by ISIS in its Iraqi stronghold. Members of the organization in Yemen had learned and applied its methods and media strategy.

On 17 June 2015, ISIS in Yemen claimed responsibility for four operations in Sanaa that hit religious sites and buildings belonging to the group Ansar Allah (the Houthis). Together, the attacks killed 31 people and wounded several. Three days later, a car laden with explosives was parked and detonated next to the Dome of Al-Mahdi Mosque, which was under the control of the Houthis in Sanaa’s old city. A number of people were killed and injured in the blast.

On July 18, 2015, the Islamic State in Aden province executed a number of Houthi snipers in the Al-Aidarous neighborhood in the district of Crater in Aden. Three days later, the Islamic State’s branch in Sanaa province detonated a car bomb in a security perimeter belonging to the Houthis in the Geraf district of the capital Sanaa, resulting in deaths and injuries.

In a related incident, ISIS in Yemen announced that it targeted Aden’s governor, Jaafar Mohammed Saad, in a statement on December 6, 2015. The Yemeni authorities announced his death after his motorcade was targeted with a car bomb in the Fatah area, next to the central communications center in Gold Mohur, Attawahi district, while on his way to work.

In 2016, ISIS’s operations in Yemen became even bloodier, with some suicide attacks against soldiers gathered in camps, especially in Aden. In analyzing ISIS operations, it can be said that the areas it focuses on most are cities, rather than the countryside or tribal areas. This is confirmed by ISIS’s noticeable activity in Aden, with some operations conducted in Sanaa.

The dispute between ISIS and al-Qaeda

Islamic State is active in areas of where identities clash; where it finds fertile ground among confessional, sectarian, regional and political divisions which it seeks to cultivate. Its most noteworthy characteristics are territorial control and the declaration of a caliphate, while al-Qaeda is a pragmatic organization based on the principle of “spite” in fighting the distant enemy and is not interested in territorial control. While al-Qaeda divides its opponents into the distant enemy (non-Muslims) and the enemy nearby (Islamic regimes) it excludes the Muslim public and those who do not oppose it, from its crosshairs. On the other hand, ISIS targets everyone, saying that anyone who is not with it is its enemy.

It is known that ISIS’s philosophy of combat depends on control over a particular geographic area, as it does in Iraq and Syria. From there, it strengthens its influence over other areas outside of its control, a goal it has relatively failed to achieve so far in Yemen. In response, ISIS claimed in a November 2015 statement that it had established combat training camps in mountainous areas in the country’s south. It also said that those who carried out the operation targeting a camp of government forces in Shibam, a town in the Hadhramaut Governorate, had been trained in a camp in Yafa, a region in the southern city of Lahj. At the same time, al-Qaeda claimed that its members were the ones who coordinated the attack.

Al-Qaeda in Yemen sees ISIS as an alien organization, whereas it sees itself as having roots and links within Yemeni tribal communities. ISIS’s claim of responsibility for the suicide bombing which targeted a Yemeni military camp in Aden, leaving dozens dead and wounded, was used by al-Qaeda to flirt with Yemeni tribes disgruntled with ISIS. Against the backdrop of the attack, in a statement issued on 22 December 2016, al-Qaeda in Yemen described ISIS as a “deviant group.” It added: “Revealing the truth, and in apology to our Muslim brothers, we make clear that we had nothing to do with this operation, neither from near or far.”

Obstacles to expansion

There are several impediments to the expansion of ISIS in Yemen, notably the following:

1. ISIS has not chosen a recognized leadership in Yemen, which means the organization is not clearly defined. Therefore, some see the fact that unknown leaders issue directives as a sign of the group’s inability to organize itself. It is also a sign of its subservience to leaders abroad and that it receives guidance from the central organization in Iraq. This indicates that ISIS in Yemen is not a strong organization and cannot be considered a full-fledged branch.
2. Some note that ISIS members in Yemen are an extreme wing of al-Qaeda in Yemen and see their advanced operations as more effective than those of al-Qaeda. This contributed to the latter undertaking attacks of a similar style to Islamic State, which observers believe are more efficient and more effective in achieving their goals.
3. Researchers point out that the policy of “spreading terror” by ISIS in Iraq and Syria has to be understood relative to the nature of urbanized societies there. But ISIS may not succeed in an armed tribal society like Yemen. In this regard, some believe that al-Qaeda better understands the importance of having a tribal incubator, which facilitated movement for some elements of the group as a result of dissatisfaction with the state’s policies in the past. This means most tribes do not share the government’s zeal to enter into a war with al-Qaeda.
4. Operations carried out by ISIS violate tribal customs that prohibit the killing of prisoners of war, as well as the kidnap and slaughter of soldiers outside of conflict zones. Such acts are considered shameful by Yemen’s tribes. This means that the formal establishment of ISIS in Yemen and its leadership selection may lead it to a confrontation with tribes since the latter’s values conflict with acts carried out by ISIS.
5. Unlike al-Qaeda, ISIS lacks any kind of incubator among Yemen’s tribes, though it aspires to attract al-Qaeda followers. However, it has not succeeded to date following its consecutive losses in the Hadhramaut and Abyan governorates and the announcement that a number of its fighters would lay down their arms and surrender to Yemeni authorities. ISIS has previous experience of inheriting al-Qaeda militants since its core in Iraq and Syria are mainly composed of fighters who had fought under the flag of al-Qaeda leaders Osama bin Laden, Ayman al-Zawahri and Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.

The tribal obstacle

It is possible to say that ISIS in Yemen has not found a successful incubator that would encourage it to announce its formal establishment and form a branch under the leadership of a structured hierarchy and ranks. Instead, it still relies on external commands and funding to carry out operations. Moreover, its members were the most radical and extreme in al-Qaeda in Yemen who saw in ISIS’s bloody operations in Iraq a successful model to follow. Therefore, the names of ISIS’s members in Yemen who carried out suicide bombings were not announced until after their deaths, out of fear of widespread rejection and resistance to the extremist group and ISIS’s misguided ideology.

It can also be said that ISIS in Yemen, with its policy of controlling territory as the basis for the establishment of an Islamic state, did not find in Yemen a base from which to extend its influence, power, and rule, as the self-proclaimed Islamic State did in Iraq and Syria. It is clear that the organization can spread and grow in more urbanized societies, while it shrinks and weakens in tribal communities like Yemen, Pakistan, and Afghanistan. ISIS does not have influence in these countries, unlike in urbanized countries.