The Daily Star Editor

Recent developments have brought a country on the geographical periphery of the Arab revolts to center stage.
Unfortunately, instead of events moving in the direction of a dramatic instance of change, as in the case of Egypt and Tunisia, the simple fact is that Yemen has begun moving toward the Libya side of the spectrum.
In the last few days, President Ali Abdullah Saleh once again became the topic of “will he? – won’t he?” speculation, amid the latest initiative to end the stand-off between the embattled regime and the widespread popular opposition.

On Tuesday the crisis was punctuated in Sanaa, when regime forces clashed with armed tribesmen in the area inhabited by Sheikh Sadiq al-Ahmar, the head of the important Hashed tribal federation.
The violence highlights Saleh’s deteriorating support in the country, the latest group to become alienated during the decades of his rule. Saleh has been at loggerheads with everyone from the people of the south, to the Houthis, and is now seeing the public at large take to the streets, throughout Yemen, demanding an end to the regime.

The fighting in Sanaa comes as the second in a one-two punch for Saleh and his ruling clique. The first was when the Gulf Cooperation Council tried to broker a deal that would end the impasse. Not surprisingly, Saleh relied on a tired tactic: expressing support, directly or indirectly, for the compromise solution, and then coming up with a last-minute ploy to avoid actually having to sign the document.

Saleh should be aware that the GCC, and by extension Europe and the United States, have given him a wide margin of maneuver to settle the conflict without resorting to bloodshed.
But he has stubbornly clung to power, setting down condition after condition in an attempt to buy time. Supported by a fossilized dictatorship, with a heavy sprinkling of family members in key posts, Saleh is amounting to another Moammar Gadhafi.

The Yemeni leader has failed to read the writing on the wall, which clearly says, “leave.” Those who have gotten involved in the quagmire of searching for an honorable settlement have given up on Saleh, who is left with feeble attempt to buy time, perhaps in the hope that developments elsewhere might change the situation.

Saleh is becoming a pariah and his recent decisions contain the threat of civil war, which the region can surely do without. Such a development might be Saleh’s final legacy, after unification in 1990, and a civil war to maintain it in 1994. After efforts to keep the country together, its disintegration is now a possibility. Even though Tuesday’s bloodshed did not involve huge casualties, it could be the beginning of a vicious circle of violence. Saleh needs to go, now, or take immediate and serious steps to leave. Yemen is in a no-win situation if he remains.