Operation Gold Beard: Month 2, Week 1, Day 5.

Last Tuesday (21/4/15) Saudi Arabia announced that it was ending its bombing campaign against its neighbour Yemen that began on March 26th (26/3/15).

Last Wednesday (22/4/15) Saudi Arabia carried out further air-strikes against the Yemeni city of Taiz. On Thursday (23/4/15) the Saudis carried out 20 air-strikes against the Yemeni cities of Aden, Hodaida and Ibb. I think you can see where I'm going with this.

On Sunday (26/4/15) the Saudis resumed bombing of Yemen's capital Sana'a. This seems to have been in response to an article published on Friday (24/4/15) in "The Economist" magazine which claimed that Iran had negotatiated a deal with the Saudis that would allow them to continue bombing positions in the south of the country provided they left the capital alone. The Saudis seem to be making quite clear that no such agreement ever existed.

The bombing of Sana'a continued on Monday (27/4/15) and yesterday (28/4/15) the Saudis bombed the runway at Sana'a airport in order to prevent an International Red Crescent/Cross (ICRC) aid flight from landing. The damage to the runway continues to prevent evactuation flights from taking off and aid flights from landing. The ICRC now describe the humanitarian situation inside Yemen to be a catastrophe beyond words. The US is still refusing to attempt to evacuate its nationals from the country.

Later on Tuesday the MV-Maersk Tigris that had been charted by a Saudi company to sail to the United Arab Emirates (UAE) entered Iranian waters in the Strait of Hormuz. This was done in the full knowledge that the ship and it's cargo were subject to a seizure order due to the non-payment of a debt. So as the ship entered Iranian waters it was duly seized by the Iranian Navy. Initially the ship failed to comply with the entirely lawful Iranian order to stop which forced the Iranian Navy to fire warning shots. At this point the ship sent out a distress call which prompted the US Navy destroyer USS Faragut to rush to the seen to moniter the situation amid inital reports that the Danish owned, Marshall Islands registered MV-Maersk Tirgis was an American ship.

This strikes me as a Saudi engineered situation intended to trigger a military confrontation between the US and Iran. The hope being that the USS Faragut would be tricked into opening fire on the Iranian Navy ships or that it would stray into Iranian territorial waters prompting the Iranians to fire on it. The US actually tried to play a similar trick on the UK back in 2007 when they messed about with GPS data causing UK Naval personnel to stray into Iranian waters and be detained for 13 days before the matter was resolved peacefully.

Just prior to the MV-Maersk Tigris entering Iranian waters Saudi Arabia announced that it had captured 93 members of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) including 65 Saudi nationals over the first 4 months of this year. The group included 2 Syrians and a Saudi who had been planning to attack the US Embassy in Riyadh - Saudi capital. This struck me as a desperate attempt by the Saudis to convince the US that is was siding with them against ISIL rather then the other way around. The intention being to make sure the US/Saudi relationship was as strong as possible during the seizure of the Maersk Tigris.

It also served to distance Saudi Arabia from claims on Sunday that ISIL are now operating freely in Yemen fighting against the Yemeni government that Saudi Arabia is trying to overthow.

16:15 on 29/4/15 (UK date).