JEDDAH: The recent claim by a Houthi leader that the US is responsible for the spread of disease in Yemen has been met with derision across social media in the country.

From his hideout Saada, Abdul-Malik Al-Houthi, leader of the Houthi militia in Yemen, gave a speech on the anniversary of the death of the group’s figurehead Hussein Badreddin Al-Houthi, in which he alleged that the US had spread AIDS and cancer across the war-torn country.

“The Americans have done all they could to spread AIDS in Yemen, and they have even promoted it to the extent that the disease has been widely featured in newspapers,” Al-Houthi said.

Al-Houthi went on to claim that the US was also fighting to undermine traditional Yemeni attire to stop men carrying daggers, encouraging students, politicians and social elites to shun such items in favor of pants and other forms of Western dress.

A number of Yemeni social media users, though, were less than impressed by Al-Houthi’s claims, with several openly mocking him.
Ali Al-Bukhaiti tweeted: “After the speech Abdul-Malik Al-Houthi made, I imagined that there were US jets over Sanaa, dropping AIDS and cancer on Yemeni civilians. The US leaves the entire world, and heads to Yemen to bombard them with AIDS. (LOL).”
Abdul-Nasser Al-Mamlouh, another Twitter user, posted: “The US has encouraged the students, elite and politicians in Yemen to wear pants instead of wearing daggers! This stupidity should be published in all languages so that the entire world can realize the size of the calamity the Houthis left in Yemen.”

Abdurrahman Jaber said in a tweet: “The Houthis are simultaneously attacking KSA, Marib, launching a war in Taiz, burning African refugees in Sanaa and planting more mines on Yemeni soil. In such a time, the Houthi leader comes out to say that wearing pants is a US conspiracy.”