Houthi rebels in Yemen claimed responsibility against Israeli airstrikes at Sana’a airport early Friday after a missile attack on Israel’s Ben Gurion airport and a drone attack on Tel Aviv.
The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said its defenses intercepted the ballistic missile before it reached Israeli airspace, although residents in the central region were ordered to shelter in place for fear of debris. There have been no reports of hostile Israeli drones over Tel Aviv.
It was the latest in a series of tit-for-tat exchanges. On Wednesday, Israeli air strikes and drone strikes against Israel took turns. The Houthis They began targeting Israel and Israeli ships at the beginning of the Gaza war in October 2023, saying they were acting in conjunction with the Palestinians.
A Houthi statement on Friday said Israel’s strike “will only increase the determination and determination of the great Yemeni people to support the Palestinian people.”
The Prime Minister of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu, has vowed to attack Israel in Yemen, saying that Israel’s goal in Yemen is to remove the Houthi threat, which he called “a terrorist entity in Iran’s axis of evil.”
“We will continue until we finish the job,” Netanyahu said.
Netanyahu and Defense Minister Israel Katz were ordered to monitor Israeli attacks on Yemen on Thursday from the air force center. According to Israeli press reports, 25 fighter jets took part in the 1,200-mile (2,000km) sorties that hit a line of targets across Yemen. The primary target was the Sana’a international airport, where the attack left the bombed-out tower in total control and shattered windows in the terminal buildings. Airport authorities said four people were killed and 20 injured.
An Israeli statement said the air force also struck the Hezyaz power station south of Sana’a on Thursday, as well as a port, an oil terminal and a station around Hodeidah, saying it was aimed “at forcing Iranian weapons into the region and at the entry of senior Iranian leaders.” Houthi media said a total of six people were killed in the strikes.
Katz said after the operation: “As we said, whoever hurts Israel, let’s hurt them. We will hunt down all the leaders of the Houthis and strike them as we have done in other areas.
Head of the World Health Organization (WHO), Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, it was Sana’a airport waiting to start when the Israelis struck on Thursday. A member of the crew from Tedros’ plane was injured in the strike.
“When the attack happened in Sana’a airport, [Tedros] and several UN colleagues had their passports signed before heading to the UN plane,” said Margaret Harris, WHO spokesperson. “They were driven by UN security to shelter in UN marked vehicles. They remained in UN-marked vehicles until the bombing stopped, at which time the UN team left the airport and went to a safer location.”
Tedros, who had been in Yemen to negotiate the release of detained UN staff and to assess the humanitarian situation, said on Friday that a crew member had undergone surgery and passed away.
Tedros he said on social media he flew his delegation with the aid of the UN Humanitarian Air Service from Sana’a to Jordan, where he would receive further medical treatment.
The commander of the Israeli air force, Maj Gen Tomer Bar, said that Israel had only used a small part of its forces against the Houthis. “More,” said Bar.
Military analysts in Israel have said that the IDF will find it much more difficult to remove the Houthis than to pursue the leader of Hamas in Gaza or Hezbollah in Lebanon.
Military commentator Yossi Yehoshua wrote in the newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth: “I drove two hours to Gaza (without traffic) from the minister’s office in Kirya. [defence headquarters] in Tel Aviv to find the long-term leaders of Hamas. In the north, intelligence information was systematically collected to carry out the assassination of a senior Hezbollah leader when the order was finally given.
“Slaughtering terrorist leaders who know how to hide in a remote, dark land is not exactly a walk in the park.”
The IDF is still fighting Hamas in the ruins of Gaza nearly 15 months after it invaded the coastal strip in October last year, responding to Hamas’s attack in southern Israel that killed 1,300 Israelis. The death toll in Gaza is estimated at more than 45,000.
on Friday, i. The Israeli soldiers entered Kamal Adwan Hospital, one of the closest medical facilities to operate in Gaza, ordered everyone inside the hospital compound and a nearby school, where they began to search patients and medical staff, according to witness accounts.
Hopes of a shutdown before the Biden administration takes office in the U.S. on January 20 leave yet to be filled and winter is set to drag on. Several deaths from the cold were reported, including those from a European hospital in southern Gaza. He was found dead on Friday morning inside his tent in Mawasi district west of Khan Younis.