The United Arab Emirates has agreed to resume funding select anti-Houthi forces in southern Yemen — specifically the Giant Brigades — after withdrawing from the conflict entirely in January. In exchange, Saudi Arabia will provide air cover for these units. The arrangement represents the first concrete repair of a Gulf rift that saw Saudi jets bombing UAE arms shipments just months ago. The fracture was severe. The UAE had backed southern separatist forces under the Southern Transition Council (STC) and its leader Aidarous al-Zubaidi, who attempted to seize control across the south and announce a secession referendum. Saudi Arabia responded with airstrikes on UAE weapons bound for STC troops, prompting Abu Dhabi to quit Yemen entirely. Riyadh's backed government then sought to try Zubaidi for treason. He fled to Abu Dhabi, where he remains. What forced the reconciliation is straightforward: the Houthis are winning. Despite massive losses, they are advancing toward Taiz and Marib, the last major cities outside old Southern Yemen's borders. Saudi Arabia faces daily drone and missile strikes that have immobilised airports and hit energy infrastructure. On Friday, two Houthi missiles struck Aden airport within 500 metres of a passenger aircraft preparing for takeoff. The day before, a Houthi attack on a presidential palace in Aden killed at least five people and injured sixteen. The counteroffensive declared by Yemen's UN-recognised government last week has produced limited results around Majzar near Marib and the Bab al-Mandab strait. The military problem is structural: the anti-Houthi coalition remains disjointed, and the STC has not agreed to deploy its troops outside the borders of the former South Yemen. An explicit Saudi commitment to a southern secession referendum would likely change that calculus, but neither Gulf state has responded to the separatists' demand. Regional entanglement is deepening. Egyptian President Abdel Fatah al-Sisi announced he would convene an emergency parliamentary session to grant military powers for the defence of Saudi Arabia — explicitly framed as defensive, not offensive. The UK has deployed an RAF Voyager air-to-air refuelling aircraft at Saudi request, with regional diplomats pressing London for more. But the legal shadow of the 2019 Court of Appeal ruling — which found UK arms export licences for a previous Saudi Yemen campaign unlawful — constrains further escalation. Saudi Arabia points to a UN Security Council presidential statement from 15 October affirming its right to self-defence under international law, and claims substantial revision of its methods since the 2015-16 campaign. The UK is weighing these assurances against the Campaign Against Arms Trade's successful legal challenge, which forced revised export-licence procedures. More than 200,000 people have been displaced since August, with no accurate death toll available. Humanitarian groups based in Aden face mounting pressure from the UN. The core dynamic is unchanged: two Gulf states with divergent visions for Yemen's future are being forced into tactical cooperation by a shared enemy whose advances they individually cannot stop.
