Yemen: The Zionist-led aggression against Yemen has shifted from the battlefield to a far more dangerous front — the battlefield of awareness. Bombs and missiles are no longer the only weapons; disinformation, fake hashtags, and fabricated videos have become the new tools of warfare targeting the minds and morale of Yemenis.

A New Kind of War

Member of Ansarullah’s Political Bureau Hizam al-Asad explains that the war on Yemen “is no longer merely military — it has evolved into a massive propaganda and psychological assault managed from joint operations rooms that bring together American, Zionist, Saudi, and Emirati intelligence and media apparatuses.”

He noted during an interview with Al-Masirah TV that this transition intensified after the announcement of the Gaza ceasefire, when the confrontation moved from open warfare to psychological and informational domains — what experts now call “fifth-generation warfare.”

This new form of conflict uses psychological, media, and information tools to undermine a nation’s identity, confidence, and social cohesion, rather than its military infrastructure.

The Technical Infrastructure of the Information War

According to the ClearSky Cybersecurity Foundation’s 2024 Annual Report, dozens of fake outlets operate simultaneously under so-called “influence operations” networks targeting Yemen, Lebanon, and Palestine. The report estimates between 20 and 50 websites and digital pages managed from outside the region, financed by intermediaries in Europe and the Gulf, and designed to spread fabricated news and videos aimed at discrediting Yemen’s leadership and demoralizing the public.

A report by the Arab Center for Digital Policy (April 2025) identified about 75 websites and accounts involved in organized disinformation campaigns against Yemen, including pages using fake Yemeni names that recycle content from Israeli military spokesperson Avichay Adraee in Arabic.

Coordinated Media Arms

Al-Asad noted that the rhetoric of Israeli military spokesmen mirrors, almost identically, the narratives of Saudi, Emirati, and pro-aggression Yemeni media outlets.

A report by Al-Mayadeen (October 2025) confirmed that the unified language and themes shared between Zionist and Gulf media indicate the existence of joint “information warfare rooms” where propaganda and psychological messages are coordinated around the clock.

Military analyst Zain al-Abideen Othman added that the enemy operates bot networks and fake platforms to manipulate public perception and reframe events in favor of foreign agendas, with the core objective of breaking trust between leadership and people.

Digital Weapons and Psychological Targets

A report by the Al Jazeera Media Policy Institute (May 2025) stated that these campaigns aim to exaggerate minor disputes into existential crises, distort Yemen’s image among Arab audiences, and erase Yemen’s role in supporting the Palestinian cause.

Having failed militarily and politically, the enemy is now seeking internal division through systematic rumors about corruption, weakness, and fragmentation.

“The front collapses when morale collapses,” Othman warned. “The bomb destroys structures, but the lie destroys trust.”

ClearSky data shows that misleading digital networks have operated continuously since 2016, reflecting nearly nine years of coordinated information warfare. The Arab Center report confirmed that at least 75 websites have been hacked or taken down due to cyberattacks, while over 30 major disinformation campaigns have targeted Yemeni national and grassroots platforms in the past two years alone.

Meanwhile, official Yemeni media channels — including Yemen TV, Saba, Al-Eman, and Yemen Today — have been repeatedly blocked from the Nilesat satellite since 2015, alongside the shutdown of thousands of Yemeni accounts on Facebook, X (formerly Twitter), and YouTube.

Strategic and Regional Implications

This media warfare transcends propaganda — it is now a strategic weapon aimed at undermining the foundations of Yemen’s resilience and eroding the coherence of the Resistance Axis.

According to Othman, the campaign deliberately links psychological warfare with Yemen’s economic hardships, magnifying social and economic tensions to erode public confidence. Another tactic is “agenda distraction,” creating side controversies to divert public attention from the core confrontation with the enemy and from major regional causes such as Palestine.

Analysts believe these efforts are part of a broader regional project coordinated between Washington, the Zionist entity, and Gulf capitals to reshape public consciousness across the Middle East and weaken resistance movements.

A report by Foreign Policy (June 2025) described the success of Israel’s disinformation campaign against Yemen’s media as “a strategic gain equivalent to controlling a maritime front,” underscoring the military value of information control in modern conflicts.

During an August 2025 panel at the Washington Institute, a former Pentagon official acknowledged that US and Saudi involvement in these psychological operations falls under a wider plan of “re-engineering regional awareness,” reflecting a coordinated Western-Gulf effort to neutralize anti-occupation sentiment.

Resilience and Counterstrategy

Despite the intensity of these propaganda assaults, al-Asad affirmed that the growing information war only strengthens the unity of the Resistance Axis, saying, “The fiercer the psychological war becomes, the more we know we are on the right path — this is not just a battle to defend land, but to defend consciousness itself.”

Othman predicts that disinformation campaigns will escalate before any major political or military shift, such as new ceasefire negotiations, to undermine potential national gains. The European Center for Disinformation Monitoring (September 2025) anticipates a 40 percent rise in cyberattacks targeting Yemeni platforms next year, paralleling an increase in counter-efforts from Resistance media networks.

In the end, the battle for awareness is a battle for existence — as vital as the one fought on the battlefield. Information has become a weapon, and awareness is the final trench.

As the martyred leader Hussein Badr al-Din al-Houthi once said:

“The enemy does not look at what capabilities you possess, but at the spirit and morale of your people.”

Translated by Almasirah English website