Under Fire: Telegraph Says Iran Pulls Plug on Houthis

By Kamaran Aziz

ERBIL (Kurdistan24) – Under mounting pressure from a bolstered U.S. military campaign in Yemen and amid growing concern over potential direct confrontation, Iran is reportedly withdrawing its military presence from the country and cutting ties with its long-time Houthi allies.

The move, if confirmed, marks a significant shift in Tehran’s regional strategy and its decades-long reliance on proxy groups to project influence across the Middle East.

According to a detailed report by The Telegraph, Iran has ordered its military personnel to leave Yemen following a surge in U.S. airstrikes targeting the Houthi rebels.

The strikes, which began increasing in frequency after leaked conversations among Trump administration officials were made public, have inflicted considerable damage on the group’s military infrastructure and led to the deaths of key commanders.

A senior Iranian official, cited in The Telegraph report, stated that Tehran’s main goal in withdrawing from Yemen is to avoid a direct clash with the United States. The official warned that if an Iranian soldier died under a U.S. strike, everything would change.

The source also added that Iran's leadership is now focused on responding to what they perceive as a more assertive and unpredictable U.S. stance under President Donald Trump.

“Every meeting is dominated by discussions about Trump, and none of the regional groups we previously supported are being discussed,” the official was quoted as saying.

According to The Telegraph, this signals not only a tactical withdrawal from Yemen but also a broader recalibration of Iran's regional proxy strategy, which has historically included Hezbollah in Lebanon and various militias in Syria and Iraq.

The U.S. campaign in Yemen, spearheaded by aircraft carriers such as the USS Harry S. Truman and soon to be reinforced by the USS Carl Vinson, has included near-daily bombardments. Trump has described the strikes as “unbelievably successful,” and the Pentagon has committed to deploying additional A-10 Thunderbolt II ground-attack aircraft and personnel to the region.

According to The Telegraph, these efforts reflect a sharp reversal of the policies under the Biden administration, which had previously delisted the Houthis as a terrorist organization in 2021—a decision Trump reversed shortly after returning to power.

In an added layer of complexity, The Telegraph also reported that a Russian military expert has been stationed in Sanaa, offering tactical advice to the Houthis and advising them on how to target U.S. assets while avoiding escalation with Saudi Arabia.

The kingdom, which has been involved in Yemen since 2015, remains a key actor in regional security dynamics and has hosted ongoing discussions with both U.S. and Russian officials about broader geopolitical conflicts, including the war in Ukraine.

Despite the Houthis' claims of attacking American naval forces in the Red Sea, including targeting the USS Harry S. Truman, the U.S. Navy confirmed that no ships have been hit. However, U.S. naval officials described the volume and intensity of Houthi attacks as the most sustained threat faced by American sailors since World War II.

In remarks shared with The Telegraph, an Iranian regime source suggested that Tehran now sees the Houthis as a spent force. “The view here is that the Houthis will not be able to survive and are living their final months or even days,” the source said. “They were part of a chain that relied on Nasrallah and Assad, and keeping only one part of that chain for the future makes no sense.”

According to The Telegraph, Trump is using this moment to apply additional pressure amid his “Maximum Pressure” campaign on Tehran in an effort to force direct negotiations over Iran's nuclear program.

The recent relocation of B-2 stealth bombers to the Diego Garcia military base in the Chagos Islands is one such signal of escalating deterrence.

Sanam Vakil, director of the Middle East and North Africa programme at Chatham House, told The Telegraph that the Biden-era approach of caution and restraint has been replaced by a bolder campaign aimed at reasserting U.S. influence.

“Trump is trying to prove that he is more effective at ending and solving conflicts than the Biden administration was,” Vakil told the Telegraph. “The strikes are part of a broader maximum pressure campaign aimed at destabilising Iran’s regional ambitions.”

Former Yemeni diplomat Mahmoud Shehrah, now an associate fellow at Chatham House, told The Telegraph that Trump’s strategy represents a direct course correction from Biden-era policy. “The previous miscalculation about the Houthis in the U.S. made Trump carry heavier strikes against them now,” Shehrah noted. “They’ve started to target individuals and key actors of the group.”

Shehrah also pointed to the Houthis’ increasing military sophistication, which has made them a formidable non-state actor within Iran's proxy framework. "They receive advanced missiles and drones from Iran and rebrand them with Houthi names to conceal the connection, primarily for domestic propaganda purposes," he explained.

Following setbacks for Iran's other regional partners—including Hezbollah's battlefield losses and the collapse of Bashar al-Assad’s regime to rebel forces in Syria—the Houthis have tried to take center stage in Tehran's so-called “Axis of Resistance.”

Since the October 7, 2023 Hamas-led attack on Israel, the Houthis have ramped up their military operations and public messaging. According to The Telegraph, the group controls large swaths of territory including the capital Sanaa, and functions as a de facto state by printing currency, collecting taxes, and engaging in criminal enterprises such as drug smuggling and weapons trafficking.

Yemen's rugged, mountainous terrain has further enabled the group to store weaponry in remote locations, making them harder to target. However, Shehrah emphasized that despite these advantages, the Houthis face deep internal vulnerabilities. “They are not paying salaries and impose extreme taxation with zero representation,” he said. “That’s why they rely so heavily on the Gaza war to galvanize public support.”

Shehrah added that Abdul Malik al-Houthi, the group’s leader, harbors ambitions of leading the anti-Israel resistance across the region, but warned that the group’s recklessness may ultimately undermine its longevity.

As The Telegraph concludes, the Houthis now stand isolated, their future uncertain, and their main sponsor in retreat. Whether Iran's withdrawal marks the collapse of its proxy experiment in Yemen, or simply a tactical pause, remains to be seen. What is clear, however, is that the regional chessboard is shifting rapidly under the shadow of renewed U.S. intervention and evolving geopolitical ambitions.