Yemen's southern separatists are now fighting in the regional war, and they want something for it. As Saudi Arabia battles the Houthis for the Bab al-Mandeb Strait and counts the dead from a missile strike on Riyadh's international airport, the Southern Transitional Council (STC) is making a political claim. Southern fighters, its leader says, are not dying merely to restore a united Yemeni state. Their victories should bring independence closer.
By the Editorial Team of TLF
What al-Zubaidi Said
The most telling news from Yemen in the past two days is not a missile launch or a captured hill. It is the STC leader tying the fight against the Houthis to the demand for a southern state.
South24 reported on 10 October that Aidarous al-Zubaidi has linked the sacrifices of southern fighters at Bab al-Mandeb to the independence struggle. After the deaths of southern personnel, including Colonel Muadh Ali Saleh of the 16th Giants Brigade, he said the reward for those deaths must be an independent South Yemen. He also warned against presenting southern battlefield gains under political slogans that do not speak for the southern cause.
The STC's standing needs context. ACLED reported in January that al-Zubaidi was removed from the Presidential Leadership Council on 7 January and that a delegation in Riyadh announced the STC's dissolution on 9 January. Other STC leaders rejected that announcement, and ACLED described the group as weakened but not defeated. His latest statements show it is still speaking and still claiming a role.
This is no ceremonial eulogy. It is a political warning issued mid-campaign, to the partner backing the campaign.
The internationally recognised Yemeni government calls its offensive a drive to restore state authority. The STC says southern forces are fighting the Houthis, but that their goal is still southern self-determination. That dispute could become the offensive's most consequential political fallout.
Are the Separatists Now Part of the Regional War?
Militarily, southern forces are already in it. Politically, the answer is less simple.
The Southern Giants Brigades are among the main formations fighting the Houthis along the Red Sea coast. Their commander, Abdulrahman al-Muharrami, sits on Yemen's Presidential Leadership Council. ACLED's January analysis also listed him as a deputy head of the STC, so the overlap at the top is real even though the formations are distinct. Reuters documented on 6 October that the Giants have led the counteroffensive around Bab al-Mandeb. The brigade itself, though, is split between Saudi-backed and UAE-aligned factions.
So the Giants are not the STC under another name, and not every southern fighter is a separatist. Still, al-Zubaidi's statement makes the political link hard to ignore. The STC leadership is openly claiming the southern military contribution as part of its independence struggle.
What we are seeing is a temporary convergence of interests, not a settled alliance. Saudi Arabia wants the Houthis weakened and a strategic shipping corridor secured. The separatists want the Houthis beaten without giving up their own political goal. Whether those aims stay compatible once the fighting ends is open.
Bab al-Mandeb: Victory Claims, but Fighting Continues
The immediate focus is the Bab al-Mandeb Strait, the narrow passage between the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden. Saudi-backed forces have announced major advances, including control of Mayyun (also known as Perim Island) and of positions overlooking the shipping lanes.
The picture on the ground is less settled. Southern military sources cited by South24 say Houthi fighters still hold positions around Dhubab and Mayyun despite the southern advances. Landmines, drones and guided weapons are reportedly slowing the clearing of the remaining pockets.
On 10 October the Southern Giants reported repelling a Houthi assault north of Dhubab military airport, with Saudi air support hitting Houthi reinforcements. The Guardian's latest coverage also describes competing territorial claims alongside significant gains by Saudi-backed forces.
Treat claims that the whole strait and its islands are secured with caution. Holding coastal positions does not mean holding the shipping corridor in front of them. Al Jazeera notes that both sides currently claim control of the shipping lanes.
Riyadh Airport: A New Escalation
A missile attack on King Khalid International Airport on Saturday killed 12 people and injured more than 300, according to the Associated Press's 11 October report. The Saudi-led coalition blamed the Houthis. The airport stayed closed into Sunday, disrupting flights across the kingdom.
The Houthis have given no sign of backing off. In a new statement reported by Reuters on Sunday, they renewed their warning to airlines, airport workers and passengers against using Saudi airports, and blamed the kingdom for failed interceptions. Military bases and oil facilities are no longer the only targets. Civilian aviation is now part of the fight.
President Donald Trump has said Washington is considering joining Saudi strikes on the Houthis. That statement alone does not establish a new American combat role, but it points toward deeper direct US involvement.
Taiz and the Interior: The War Is Spreading
The western coastal offensive is only one front. Reports on 11 October point to continued Saudi air operations in Taiz governorate. The Yemen conflict monitoring map Liveuamap, citing Saba News Agency, carried a report of four airstrikes on a government complex in Sam'a district. It also carried a report of two dead and one wounded in a Saudi airstrike on a shop in the Sharjab area of Al-Shamaitain district. Casualty figures and the nature of the targets still need independent confirmation.
In Al-Jawf, Houthi-linked sources report continuing Saudi-backed attempts to advance on their positions. That suggests pressure well beyond Bab al-Mandeb, though what has actually changed hands is unclear.
On 10 October, Yemen Monitor reported that the UN envoy told the Security Council that escalating fighting is worsening the crisis in Taiz and threatening regional stability.
The envoy, Hans Grundberg, told the Council that Yemen has slid back into full-scale war. More than 200,000 people have been displaced since the escalation began in September, according to IOM figures reported by Al Jazeera on 10 October. Taiz accounts for 57 percent of them, according to Yemen Monitor's report on the IOM figures.
The Saudi-UAE Rivalry Has Not Disappeared
Riyadh and Abu Dhabi have backed different political and military actors in Yemen for years, even while both opposed the Houthis. The split showed in the southern crisis at the end of 2025 and the start of 2026, when the STC's ambitions put it in confrontation with Saudi-backed forces. ACLED's analysis of the southern crisis explains how that competition has shaped territorial control, military loyalties and the separatists' political calculations.
The current war has not erased those divisions. The urgency of fighting the Houthis has produced a battlefield in which forces with different political aims fight the same enemy.
For Saudi Arabia that is useful militarily and awkward politically. The kingdom's preferred outcome is not necessarily the independent southern state al-Zubaidi demands. For the STC, fighting is a way to prove its military weight and claim a seat in any eventual settlement.
The latest reporting contains no verified evidence of a new Saudi-STC agreement on independence, or of a full reconciliation between the competing southern and government-aligned factions.
Why This Matters for the War With Iran
With Iranian attacks having all but halted shipping through the Strait of Hormuz, according to Al Jazeera, Bab al-Mandeb matters even more to trade and energy exports. For Tehran and its Houthi allies, pressure on the Red Sea route is extra leverage over Saudi Arabia and its Western partners. For Riyadh, clearing the Houthis from the strait is now a national security priority, not just another objective in a civil war.
That is where the separatists fit in. Their formations can help weaken the Houthis at a vital chokepoint. Their political leadership expects that help to strengthen the case for independence. A war fought partly to protect trade routes could end up deciding Yemen's territorial future in ways neither Riyadh nor Washington can easily control.
TLF Analysis: The Separatists Are Fighting Two Battles
The southern question is no longer a side issue waiting for the guns to fall silent. It is part of the war.
Southern forces are fighting the Houthis around Bab al-Mandeb. The STC is working to make sure the recognised government cannot claim their victories as victories for Yemeni unity.
If the Saudi-backed offensive succeeds, someone has to govern the territory recovered from the Houthis. Will southern formations accept central authority? Will Riyadh entertain demands for autonomy, or will the STC insist that battlefield sacrifice justifies independence? None of this is answered yet.
The Houthis are attacking Saudi Arabia. Saudi-backed forces are advancing against the Houthis. The separatists are claiming their share of the victories. The United States is openly weighing deeper involvement.
Even a military victory at Bab al-Mandeb may not bring political stability. It could open the next chapter of Yemen's unfinished fight over whether the country stays united.
Editorial note: This report incorporates developments reported through the morning of 11 October 2026, Cyprus time. Battlefield claims, particularly concerning Mayyun Island and complete control of Bab al-Mandeb, remain contested. The participation of southern military formations should not be read as confirmation of a unified STC command arrangement or a formal political agreement with Saudi Arabia.