The impact of the Iran and Saudi Arabia rivalry on the conflicts in middle east: Yemen case

Today, Iran and Saudi Arabia are two of the most important actors in the Middle East. After the 1979 Revolution, Iran's foreign policy changed radically as a result, relations with Saudi Arabia have reached breaking point. In the following this period, developments such as the exporting the revolution, the Hajj events, the Iran-Iraq War, Execution of Nimr al-Nimr, the Shiite Crescent and the Arab Spring have caused crises between the two countries. Recently, after the Yemeni Civil War, Iran and Saudi Arabia relations have become almost a proxy war over this country and the hegemonic power struggle of two countries over the Middle East has become apparent. The Republic of Yemen, formed by the unification of South and North Yemen, has three main security problems; Houthi, Al Qaeda of Arabian Peninsula and Southern Movement. The Arab Spring has exacerbated conflicts and disagreement caused by these three main security problems. The Salih regime, which was not adopted by these three groups, resigned as a result of the riots in 2011. Then the regime of Hadi took the control. However, Hadi regime did not have a strong authority. Benefiting from this authority gap and allied with Salih, Houthies took control of the country. What happened in 2015 and called Houthi Coup, led to the involvement of Iran and Saudi Arabia, the prolongation of the civil war and the intensification of the conflicts. Iran mostly resorted to soft power elements in this power struggle. The hard power is used by the Houthis behind the scenes. Saudi Arabia, on the other hand, made an unprecedented move in it traditional foreign policy approach in this power struggle and took its place directly on the stage with the "Stability Storm Operation" held in 2015, using the elements of hard power.