The conflict in Yemen has been ongoing in one form or another – on and off – in the same geographic location, between almost identical groups of people, for well over a thousand years.

The Houthis come from from Saada in north Yemen, and since its arrival in the 9^th century Saada has been the spiritual heartland of Zaidi Islam. Zaidis have provided rulers of Yemen at various times across the centuries. The former president Ali Abdullah Saleh is, actually, a Zaidi – he was in power for over 30 years.

Although Saleh was fighting the Houthis before he was deposed, he has since allied himself with them to fight the group led by his former deputy of almost twenty years – Abdurabu Mansur Hadi.  Prior to serving together, Saleh and Hadi were on opposite sides in North and South Yemen, before unification in 1990. Ironically, if the original Houthi insurgency had not deposed Saleh, Hadi would not be president today.

Today, Hadi is back in Aden, while Saleh and his Houthi followers are in Sana’a. Swings and roundabouts.

The players and their demographics are near identical; the men who lead these groups have been fighting each other for decades. It is the balance of power between them changed. Compared with the previous major conflict (of the 80s), the Yemen war is now also a civil war, rather than a war between two neighbouring states. In the last conflict, that had meant that the regional organisation, the Arab League, was able to act as a broker to ceasefire agreements and so on; in this conflict, the Arab League is firmly wrapped up in the fighting.

A civil war does not have the benefit of clarity that a legal border provides; and belligerents of the same country are reliant on external assistance.  Hadi has the backing of Arab sunni states and all their institutions, whilst the Houthis are constrained to finding friends amongst the shia community. In recent years, that has led to an inevitable shift towards Iran.

This is probably why the conflict persists, when the Houthis might have routed Hadi by now. Saudi Arabia would rather embed itself in a long-term war on its southern border than freely permit Houthis to rule Yemen while Iran is in the background.

That puts everything in a bind. After 1,150 or so years, the Zaidi communities are in Yemen to stay. And although it is a more recent, politicized movement, Houthis are inseparable from Zaidi Islam. Short of ethnic cleansing, the Houthis movement can never be completely eliminated only suppressed.

This means that in their best case scenario, the Saudis and Abdu Rabbu Hadi have only one realistic objective to aim for: that Houthis are forced out of from Sana’a and back to their northern stronghold. In any solution, Houthis will have to be accommodated in the political process.

In a further irony, the Houthis have previously acknowledged that Hadi is – in fact –  the legitimate ruler of Yemen. It was the pace and depth of his reforms in the country that they took issue with. In the past they have even offered Hadi a power-sharing deal.

Maybe if Hadi aimed for something such as a power-sharing deal, the civil war would have a prospect of closing.  However, the pockets of the Arab League and Gulf Cooperation Council are deep, and they can afford to support a proxy war for as long as the Houthis are willing to fight it. While he carries their backing, Hadi has no incentive to power-share.

The GCC have, however, paid a heavy price for their involvement. If the Saudis which to persevere with continuing with an (militarily) unwinnable mission, perhaps its allies should look for other ways to counter Iranian influence in the region that are less costly – politically and financially – as well as more effective.

In the meantime – and in order to help avert the humanitarian disaster unfolding in the country – the international community would be well advised to reexamine the moribund efforts at peace-brokerage being provided by the UN.