Israel Hits Houthis With Yemen Attacks | The Arkansas Democrat-Gazette

SANAA, Yemen – The Israeli military said Saturday it struck several Houthis targets in western Yemen following a deadly drone attack by the rebel group in Tel Aviv the day before.

The Israeli strikes appear to be the first on Yemeni soil since the war between Israel and Hamas began in October, and threaten to open a new front in the region as Israel battles Iran’s allies.

In the western port city of Hodeidah, a stronghold of the Houthis, a number of “military targets” were hit, the Israeli military said, saying the attack was in response to “hundreds of attacks” against Israel in recent months.

“The Houthis have attacked us more than 200 times. The first time they injured an Israeli civilian, we hit them. And we will do this wherever necessary,” Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said in a statement.

According to the Ministry of Health in Sanaa, 80 people were injured in the attacks in Hodeidah, most of whom suffered severe burns.

The Israeli military said it alone carried out the strikes and “our friends were informed.” An Israeli Defense Forces official did not say how many locations were targeted, but told reporters the port is a main entry point for Iranian weapons. The official did not say whether it was Israel’s first attack on Yemen.

Houthi spokesman Mohammed Abdulsalam posted on the social media platform X that the “blatant Israeli aggression” targeted fuel storage facilities and the province’s power plant. He said the attacks were aimed at “increasing people’s suffering and pressuring Yemen to stop supporting Gaza.”

Abdulsalam said the strikes will only make the Yemeni people and forces more determined to support Gaza. “There will be impactful strikes,” Mohamed Ali al-Houthi of the Supreme Political Council in Yemen wrote on X.

A media outlet controlled by Houthi rebels in Yemen, Al-Masirah TV, said the attacks on oil and diesel storage facilities at the port and on the local electricity company had killed and injured several people, with several people suffering severe burns. It said there was a large fire at the port and widespread power outages.

Health officials in Yemen said a number of people were killed and others injured in the attacks, but declined to comment further.

The drone attack by Houthi rebels killed one person in central Tel Aviv and wounded at least 10 others near the US embassy in the early hours of Friday morning.

Nearly all of the projectiles fired from the southern Arab country toward Israel have been intercepted. Israel said its air defenses detected the drone on Friday but that there had been an “error.” Experts have cast doubt on the Houthis’ ability to overwhelm Israel’s air defenses from about 1,000 miles away.

“The distance makes it difficult to deliver the kind of barrage needed to do significant damage,” said Fabian Hinz, a missile expert and researcher at the International Institute for Strategic Studies.

Since January, U.S. and British forces have struck targets in Yemen in response to Houthis attacks on commercial vessels that the rebels have described as retaliation for Israel’s actions in the Gaza war. However, many of the vessels targeted were not linked to Israel.

The joint airstrikes have so far had little effect on the Iranian-backed force.

Analysts and Western intelligence agencies have long accused Iran of arming the Houthis, a claim Tehran denies. In recent years, U.S. naval forces have intercepted a number of ships loaded with guns, rocket-propelled grenades and missile components en route from Iran to Houthi-controlled areas in Yemen.

The Houthis have long-range ballistic missiles, smaller cruise missiles and “suicide drones,” all of which are capable of reaching southern Israel, according to weapons experts. The Houthis are open about their arsenal, regularly parading new missiles through the streets of Sanaa.

DEADLY ATTACKS IN GAZA

Also Saturday, at least 13 people were killed in three Israeli airstrikes on refugee camps in central Gaza, Palestinian health officials said. Ceasefire talks in Cairo appear to be making progress.

The dead in the Nuseirat and Bureij refugee camps included three children and one woman, according to Palestinian ambulance crews that transported the bodies to the nearby Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital. Associated Press journalists counted the 13 bodies.

Earlier, a medical team delivered a live baby to a Palestinian woman killed in an airstrike on her home in Nuseirat on Thursday. Ola al-Kurd, 25, was taken by aid workers to Al-Awda hospital in northern Gaza in hopes of saving the unborn child. Hours later, doctors told the AP that a boy had been born.

The newborn, whose name has not yet been released, is in stable condition but is suffering from oxygen deficiency and has been placed in an incubator, Dr. Khalil Dajran said Friday.

The war in Gaza, sparked by Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack on southern Israel, has killed more than 38,900 people, according to the territory’s Health Ministry, which does not distinguish between combatants and civilians in its count. The war has created a humanitarian catastrophe in the Palestinian coastal region, displacing most of its population of 2.3 million and causing widespread hunger.

The October Hamas attack killed 1,200 people in Israel, mostly civilians, and militants took about 250 hostages. About 120 people remain in captivity, about a third of them dead, Israeli authorities said.

UNREST ON THE WEST BANK

In the occupied West Bank, the Palestinian Ministry of Health said a 20-year-old man was shot dead by Israeli forces on Friday night. The Israeli military commented on the shooting, saying its forces opened fire on a group of Palestinians who were throwing stones at Israeli troops in the town of Beit Ummar.

A witness said Ibrahim Zaqeq was not directly involved in the fighting and was standing nearby. Zaqeq “just looked at them, they shot him in the head,” Thare Abu Hashem said.

On Saturday, Hamas identified Zaqeq as one of its members.

Violence has increased in the area since the war in Gaza began. At least 577 Palestinians in the West Bank have been killed by Israeli fire since then, according to the Ramallah-based Health Ministry, which keeps track of Palestinian deaths.

In Cairo, international mediators including the United States continue to press Israel and Hamas for a phased agreement that would end fighting and free some 120 hostages in Gaza.

On Friday, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said a ceasefire between Hamas and Israel that would see the release of Israeli hostages captured by the group in Gaza falls “within the 10-yard line,” adding: “We know that the last 10 yards are the hardest.”

Smoke and flames are seen rising from a location in Hodeidah, Yemen, in this video footage Saturday, July 20, 2024. The Israeli military says it has struck several Houthi targets in western Yemen following a deadly drone strike by the rebel group in Tel Aviv the day before. (AP Photo)