200 Converting Resources to the Cause the Yemen Forum Foundation, converted these skills during the Arab Spring into organizing protests. Ibrahim Al Qataby, with years of experience under his belt mobilizing for human rights in the nonprofit sector in New York, transferred his skills in framing, internal organization, and communicating with the media to bring attention to protest events. That said, organizers attested that they carried a disproportionate burden when rallying inexperienced compatriots to the movement. Ibrahim, for instance, explained the problem with relying on volunteer labor and amateur activists during the revolution. At that time, he said, We had lots of challenges. Our community was not very much involved in any political or human rights advocacy in the US. They were political in the sense where they understand what’s going on, but they never took it to the streets in a form of organized advocacy. They read news, and specifically Yemeni news, but they never organized themselves into lobbyist groups . . .. Especially when a lot of them work twelve hours a day, seven days a week, when is the appropriate time for them to come out? And a lot of community [members] hardly understand how to use the media and the political system, how to navigate it. That was another challenge. When I first started doing this with my colleagues, almost everyone did not know how to get a police permit. Basics [like] how to phrase slogans, signs, how to frame [their messages]. And the few who know how to do it were completely swamped with a lot of extra burden. A number of us were overwhelmed. You’re starting from scratch trying to guide people how to do advocacy, show them A to Z. Accordingly, diaspora movements in the United States and Britain only possessed some of the social capital needed to organize and sustain communitywide mobilization. This dynamic was later echoed in a 2019 report from the Brookings Doha Center, which argues that although Yemenis abroad serve as a valuable resource for their war-torn homeland, “the poor mobilization and coordination among these Yemeni professionals is a major challenge” (Aboueldahab 2019: 1). Another difference between Yemenis’ group-level experiences and those of the Libyans and Syrians was the fact that little of their social capital seemed to reach the protest encampments in Yemen itself. According to respondents, this was due not only to their sparse network ties but also because the advice from the diaspora was not always needed or welcome. As Atiaf, a Yemeni American who participated in the uprisings in Sanaʻa, lamented, “Yemeni Americans would get into details about where people should march. I would say, leave it up to the people in Yemen to decide where to march!” The relational disconnection between insiders and outsiders plagued efforts among activists abroad to help their allies in concrete ways over the course of the revolution. 6.3 conclusion Diaspora movements that converted network ties and capital to rebellion and relief became transnational players in the Arab Spring in different ways. https://doi.org/10.1017/9781009272148 Published online by Cambridge University Press