President Joe Biden intends to brand the Shiite Islamist Houthis a “specially-designated global terrorist,” but not a foreign terrorist organization, in response to the Iran-backed group’s attacks on international shipping, according to U.S. officials.
“These attacks fit the textbook definition of terrorism,” a senior administration official told reporters. “We’ve taken this action to pressure the Houthis to cease their terrorist activities, including missile and drone attacks against international shipping.”
The designation represents a partial reversal for Biden, who took the Houthis off this blacklist and another more punishing one just weeks after his inauguration in 2021. The concomitant easing of U.S. sanctions was justified on the grounds that the terrorist designations would have unacceptable humanitarian costs for the people of war-torn Yemen, but the rash of Houthi attacks on vessels in the Red Sea has put new pressure on an administration anxious to curb the Iran-backed proxy while avoiding a major military confrontation.
“The ultimate goal of sanctions is to convince the Houthis to deescalate and bring about a positive change in behavior,” the senior administration official said. “If the Houthis cease their attacks, we can consider delisting the designation.”
The Houthis have proven persistent in their targeting of shipping in the Red Sea. They hit a Greek-owned cargo ship early Tuesday, though the vessel reportedly sustained only “minor” damage, in the latest sign that the joint British and American bombardment of Houthi positions last week has not deterred the group. Yet Biden’s team is stopping short of renewing the stiffer foreign terrorist organization, or FTO, designation.
“We believe that the SDGT designation is the appropriate tool, at the moment, to pressure the Houthis,” the senior administration official said. “With all sanctions, we are looking to make sure that our sanctions are effective in putting pressure on actors to cease activity that is problematic, to achieve the foreign policy goals … We’re always trying to make sure that the impact of our sanctions achieves the desired foreign policy effect while minimizing unintended consequences.”
If Biden’s team explained their cautious approach to the terrorism designations by reference to the humanitarian effects of such a move, that’s not the only complicating factor. The Iran-backed Houthis overthrew the internationally recognized Yemen government after seizing the capital in 2014, a crisis followed by a Saudi-led intervention into the civil war. That conflict raged until the establishment of an “informal ceasefire,” while the Houthis and the Saudis consider their options for a more substantial peace deal.
“They know FTO status would put maximalist pressure on the Houthis, which is why they won’t do it,” Foundation for Defense of Democracies senior adviser Richard Goldberg, who worked on Iran issues at the White House National Security Council under Trump, told the Washington Examiner. “They want the Houthis legitimized enough to be a part of the governing structure in Yemen … They can get around that with OFAC licenses for the SDGT. Not so much with the FTO.”
In the meantime, the Houthi attacks have drawn enthusiastic applause from Tehran. “What [the Houthis] have done in support of the people of Gaza is truly worthy of praise,” Iranian leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said Tuesday. “We hope, God willing, these efforts, acts of resistance and activities will continue until victory.”
Khamenei’s regime is a key backer of both the Houthis and Hamas, the Palestinian terrorist organization that massacred about 1,200 civilians in the Oct. 7 rampage across southern Israel that ignited the war. The role of Iran, with its multipronged proxy network throughout the Middle East, has raised the stakes for Western strategists of any plan to manage the crisis — to the point that France, one of the largest European military powers, declined to join the U.S. and the United Kingdom in hitting the Houthis last week.
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“France has decided not to join a coalition that has carried out preemptive strikes against the Houthis on their soil,” French President Emmanuel Macron told reporters on Tuesday. “Why? Precisely because we have a position that seeks to avoid any escalation.”
The renewed terrorism designation will take effect next month. “We are holding out, as we take this action, unprecedented carve-outs and licenses to help prevent adverse impacts on the Yemeni people,” the senior administration official said. “We are sending a clear message: commercial shipments into Yemeni ports — on which the Yemeni people rely for food, medicine, and fuel — should continue and are not covered by our sanctions.”
