A circulating video of “the Houthis recently seized government forces’ armored vehicles.” This is its truth

A video clip spread on social media claiming to show scenes of Houthi fighters seizing weapons and armored vehicles from the legitimate Yemeni government forces, during the ongoing battles within the Ma’rib Governorate. A 16-second video clip showed armored military vehicles equipped with heavy weapons moving through a barren land with soldiers on board, with a watermark indicating the "war media" associated with the Houthi group.

The video was accompanied by a misleading description that said: “Specific weapons that arrived a few days ago were filmed with the “legitimate” army in Ma’rib this morning and were with the Houthis.” By splitting the video into still shots and using a reverse search, we found a longer video clip, about an hour long, that was posted on September 29, 2019, on the Houthi “war media” website.

The title of the video was: “Complete scenes of the first phase of Operation Victory from God in the Najran axis.” At the time, the military spokesman for the Houthis, Yahya Saree, said that the scenes went back to what he called the “Victory from God” operations, during which Saudi forces were targeted, as he claimed.

The video was circulated with the renewal of battles in the Marib Governorate, which is rich in gas and oil, coinciding with the continuation of fighting between the Iranian-backed Houthis and the Yemeni army forces affiliated with the internationally recognized government in a number of Yemeni governorates.