Ibrahim Mothana, an activist, is a co-founder of the Watan Party and Yemen Enlightenment Debate. He is on Twitter.

Drone-striking militants to eradicate terrorism is like machine-gunning mosquitoes to cure malaria. Rather than tackling the real drivers of extremism, drone strikes create an ideal environment for Al Qaeda to grow and propagate.

Winning the hearts and minds of people is key in such unconventional warfare, yet the U.S. alienates Yemeni civilians, many of whom have lost relatives or friends in drone strikes.

Strikes in areas where government barely exists and no services are provided to citizens simply spells disaster. There is also devastating damage to an already fragile economy. Forty percent of Yemen's 23 million people live on less than $2 a day and 10 million people don't have enough food to eat. Unemployed youth living in desperate economic conditions in conflict areas often join militants. They have reached a point where seeking death becomes easier than struggling for life.

To fight Al Qaeda in Yemen, the U.S. should focus on building relations with local communities instead of decimating them with drones.

There could be short-term military gains from killing militant leaders in these strikes, but they are minuscule compared with the long-term damage caused by drones. The notion of targeting Al Qaeda’s leaders to demolish its organizational structure has been proven ineffective; new leaders spontaneously emerge in furious retaliation to the attacks.

This is why Al Qaeda in Yemen today is much stronger than it was a few years ago. Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula had just a few hundred members in 2009, and controlled no territory. Today it has, along with Ansar al-Sharia, at least a thousand members and substantial operational spaces in Abyan and Shabwa, in addition to a presence in Mareb, Rada, Hadramout and other regions of Yemen.

Overlooking the real drivers of extremism and focusing solely on tackling security symptoms with brutal force is as ineffective as curing blood cancer with invasive surgery: not only ineffective but also counterproductive. The repercussions of drone attacks in Yemen could spill across borders, inspiring homegrown terrorism in other countries.

Only a long-term approach based on building relations with local communities, dealing with the economic and social drivers of extremism, and cooperating with tribes and Yemen’s army will eradicate the threat of Al Qaeda.

The drone program is by nature a Sisyphean struggle, no matter how many terrorists are eliminated. In Yemen, every time a drone kills civilians, young Yemenis like me who have always admired America start to see it as part of the problem, not the solution.