Israel strikes Yemen in response to deadly Houthi attack on Tel Aviv

Sanaa, Yemen: The Israeli army said it hit several Houthi targets in western Yemen after a fatal drone attack by the rebel group in Tel Aviv the previous day.

The Israeli strikes on Sunday (AEST) appeared to be the first on Yemeni soil since the Israel-Hamas war began in October, and they threatened to open a new front in the region as Israel battles proxies of Iran.

Oil tanks burn at the port in Hodeidah, Yemen on Sunday.Credit: AP

A number of “military targets” were hit in the western port city of Hodeidah, a Houthi stronghold, the Israeli army said, adding that its attack was “in response to the hundreds of attacks carried out against the state of Israel in recent months.”

“The Houthis attacked us over 200 times. The first time that they harmed an Israeli citizen, we struck them. And we will do this in any place where it may be required,” Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant said in a statement.

The Ministry of Health in Sanaa said that 80 people were wounded in a preliminary toll of the strikes in Hodeidah, most of them with severe burns.

An Israeli Defence Forces official didn’t say how many sites were targeted, but told journalists the port is the main entry point for Iranian weapons. The official didn’t say whether other allied forces took part in the operation, and didn’t confirm whether it was Israel’s first attack on Yemen.

Houthi spokesman Mohammed Abdulsalam posted on X that Yemen was subjected to a “blatant Israeli aggression” that targeted fuel storage facilities and the province’s power station. He said the attacks aim “to increase the suffering of the people and to pressure Yemen to stop supporting Gaza.”

Abdulsalam said the attacks will only make Yemen’s people and armed 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 strikes caused deaths and injuries, and several people suffered severe burns. It said there was a large fire at the port and power cuts were widespread.

Health officials in Yemen said the strikes killed a number of people and wounded others, but didn’t elaborate.

The drone attack by Houthi rebels killed one person in the centre of Tel Aviv and wounded at least 10 others near the US Embassy on Friday.

Virtually all projectiles fired from the southern Arabian country toward Israel have been intercepted. Israel said air defences detected the drone but an “error” occurred. Experts have expressed doubt about the Houthis’ ability to overwhelm Israel’s air defence system from about 1600 kilometres away.

“The distance just makes it difficult to launch the kind of barrage that would be necessary to inflict major damage,” said Fabian Hinz, a missile expert and research fellow at the International Institute for Strategic Studies.

Since January, US and UK forces have been striking targets in Yemen, in response to the Houthis’ attacks on commercial shipping that the rebels have described as retaliation for Israel’s actions in the war in Gaza. However, many of the ships targeted weren’t linked to Israel.

The joint force airstrikes so far have done little to deter the Iran-backed force.

Analysts and Western intelligence services have long accused Iran of arming the Houthis, a claim Tehran denies. In recent years, US naval forces have intercepted a number of ships packed with rifles, rocket-propelled grenades and missile parts en route from Iran to Houthi-controlled areas of Yemen.

The Houthis have long-range ballistic missiles, smaller cruise missiles and “suicide drones,” all 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.

At least 13 people were killed in three Israeli airstrikes that hit refugee camps in central Gaza on Saturday, according to Palestinian health officials, as ceasefire talks in Cairo appeared to make progress.

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

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

A Palestinian baby boy, not yet named, who was delivered prematurely after his mother Ola al-Kurd was killed in an Israeli strike, lies in an incubator at a hospital in Deir al-Balah.Credit: AP

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