2 AMERICANS RELEASED BY IRAN-BACKED REBELS IN YEMEN

In exchange, 283 Houthi militants returned to Yemen

S A N A A , Ye m e n

Two Americans held hostage by Iran-backed rebels in Yemen were freed Wednesday in a surprise deal brokered by the United States.

The agreement releasing Sandra Loli, an aid worker held hostage for three years, and Mikael Gidada, a businessman held for nearly a year, was only grudgingly accepted by U.S. ally Saudi Arabia, which has waged a years-long war against the Houthi rebel group in neighboring Yemen.

In exchange for the Americans, nearly 300 of the rebel group’s members were returned to Yemen, where some may reenter the battlefield and prolong a conf lict that has become increasingly unpopular in Washington.

That the deal went forward despite ongoing Trump administration help to a Saudi-led coalition in pursuing the war that has killed thousands of civilians suggests the importance

President Donald Trump is placing on the release of American hostages.

The negotiation with the Houthis also took place despite a debate within the Trump administration over whether to label the rebels as terrorists, alongside alQaeda and other groups.

The Americans were f lown out on an Oman air force plane Wednesday from the Yemeni capital, Sanaa. Also on the f light were the remains of a third American, Bilal Fateen. The United States has released no information on how long he was held by the Houthis or the circumstances of his death.

Hours earlier, the same plane, along with another jet, returned 283 Houthi militants who had been stranded in Oman for years after receiving medical care there, according to Houthi officials. The deal, which also called for the delivery of medical aid to northern Yemen, was first reported by The Wall Street Journal.

Trump has cast his emphasis on hostages and prisoners, many of them held by U.S. adversaries or authoritarian regimes, as part of an approach to foreign policy that includes outreach to enemies and a willingness to skirt the longstanding U.S. policy of refusing to barter with hostage-takers or offer concessions.

In the cases of Iran and North Korea, Trump has also suggested that the return of Americans can be a starting point for larger negotiations and agreements.

In a statement Wednesday, national security adviser Robert O’Brien welcomed the release of the Americans and expressed condolences to Fateen’s family. O’Brien also thanked Oman’s leader, Sultan Haitham bin Tariq, and King Salman of Saudi Arabia for their help.

The Houthi leadership also viewed the deal as a victory. The returning militants were greeted by Muhammad Ali al-Houthi, one of the rebel group’s most senior political leaders, according to Al Masirah Net, the rebels’ official website.

“We congratulate the wounded on their return to the homeland after a long wait that was supposed to not happen because of the criminality of the Saudi American aggression,” Houthi said, referring to a U.S.-backed, Saudi-led coalition fighting the rebels.

The Houthis have been trying for years to get the fighters back from Oman. Most of them had been flown there to seek medical treatment for injuries, a result of U.N.-brokered efforts to get the coalition and the rebels to engage in peace talks. But the coalition blocked the fighters from returning to Yemen.

It’s unclear why the three Americans were detained and kept captive. American officials have not, at least publicly, provided details. On Wednesday, in a statement to The Washington Post, Muhammad Ali alHouthi suggested that the Americans were engaged in activity the rebels deemed suspicious.

“There are a lot of Americans who visit the Republic of Yemen and work in Yemen safely,” said Houthi. “If those [three] were only citizens without any suspicious roles or legal violations, they would not had faced anything.”

He also suggested that the Trump administration had purposefully delayed the hostage-release date to time it with the upcoming election. Negotiations, he said, have been ongoing for several months.

The Trump administration denied a political motive in the timing of the release.

“These discussions have been deliberate, careful, and ongoing between Oman and the Houthis,” National Security Council spokesman John Ullyot said in a statement. “Suggestions that the end result was orchestrated to benefit a particular timeline is patently and categorically false.”