Reality is just beginning to sink in for Yemenis astounded by the speed with which their capital city, Sana'a, has fallen to an insurgent group known as the Houthis. A decade ago the movement, which champions the 40% Zaydi Shia minority whose hereditary leaders ruled much of the country until 1962, was a ragtag bunch of tribesmen squeezed by an army siege in the remote northern province of Saada. Talk of the Houthis in Sana'a was dismissed; the idea that their leader might some day give a victory speech in its Tahrir Square unimaginable.
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