Comments on the AQAP statement

This statement has something of a different tone from the previous one; whereas the first adopted the attitude of a proud victim, this one is absolutely gleeful, as its title suggests. It gets a bit dull, though, once the author starts talking about the false deceptive lying falsehoods of the lying Huthis (there are a lot of ways to say "lie" in Arabic). I guess what strikes me is that the author seems to assume that he is addressing a sympathetic audience. His audience is not just the jihadi community, but the Yemeni people as a whole, and he expects them to be happy to hear the wondrous news of this new campaign of violence against the Huthis. I'm holding to my previous assertion, that in the medium and long term this kind of violence won't be well-received in Yemen. But it's important to note that according to this statement, both of the suicide bombers were Yemenis. This is made clear by their names: we aren't given the real names of either man, but both have kunyahs (noms de guerre) containing the adjective "San‘ani." Add to this the assertion, in the final paragraph here, that the Huthis now have the backing of the CIA. The intended take-away is that these were attacks carried out by Yemenis against foreigners, for the sake of the Yemeni people.

Time will tell if this tactic pays off for al-Qa‘idah. But I'm more interested and concerned with the Yemeni government's reactions. So far I haven't heard much, but still think it's likely that President Saleh will try to fan the flames of this conflict for his own twisted reasons.