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The Houthi movement has its roots in Zaydi Shiism, which took hold in northern Yemen in the 890s.

Last December, large crowds of them came out in the Zaydi stronghold of Saadeh and other northern Yemeni towns to protest Israel’s intensive bombing of that 25-mile strip of land.

The Zaydi branch of Shiism in Yemen was led by court judges or qadis, typically hailing from a caste of putative descendants of the Prophet Muhammad, the Sayyids or Sadah, who emerged as mediators in tribal feuds.

The Helpers of God party militia, or the Houthis, arose among the Zaydi Shiites of northern Yemen in the 1990s as a backlash against the inroads that neighboring, wealthy Wahhabi Saudi Arabia had made.

Under the influence of the anti-Saudi Houthi family, Zaydi militiamen based in Saadeh in Yemen’s hardscrabble north turned radical, coming into frequent conflict with the Yemeni army.