Yemen’s Ansar Allah (Houthi) militia dramatically ramped up their guerrilla campaign against the United States and Israel, targeting Israel’s internationally recognized capital of Tel Aviv and the coastal city of Ashkelon, and launching a barrage of missiles at US Navy warships.
Houthi spokesman Yahya Saree announced Friday that the militia had fired its newly unveiled Palestine-2 long-range ballistic missile at a military target in Tel Aviv Thursday night, and attacked a “vital target” in Ashkelon, about 50 km to the south, with a Yafa long-range kamikaze drone.
Vowing to continue attacks against Israel in solidarity with and support for Palestine and Lebanon until Israeli aggression against them is stopped, Saree said that the militia’s latest operations were part of a “fifth phase” of operations against the Zionist enemy – a reference to the Houthis’ strategy of gradually ramping up their ops against Israel over the past 11+ months.
“The Yemeni Armed Forces will carry out more military operations against the Israeli enemy in triumph for the blood of our people in Palestine and Lebanon, and will not stop supportive military operations during the coming days until the Israeli aggression on Gaza and Lebanon stops,” Saree said.
Separately on Friday, Saree announced that Houthi forces had carried out their “largest-ever” attack on US warships in the Red Sea region, targeting three Navy destroyers on route toward Israel. The attack involved 23 ballistic and cruise missiles and drones, and saw the participation of the Yemeni militia’s naval, air defense and missile forces, according to the spokesman. That attack came in response to ongoing US-UK aggression against Yemen, he said.
Saree said the anti-US attack had landed direct hits against American naval assets.
The Israeli military announced late Thursday that a Yemeni-launched long-range missile had been detected and intercepted by an Arrow interceptor. The overnight attack set off air raid sirens across central Israel. The military made no mention of a Houthi drone attack on Ashkelon.
A US official told Reuters on Friday that American warships traveling through the Bab el-Mandab Strait had been targeted by Houthi projectiles, but said enemy fire was intercepted and that the ships weren’t damaged. Separately, the Pentagon reported that “almost all” the Houthi launches were intercepted by the ships’ onboard Aegis Combat System, and that no ships were damaged or sailors injured.
Yemen’s Houthi fighters have spent close to a year waging a guerrilla campaign of missile and drone operations against Israel, as well as attacks targeting Israeli-owned or linked and Western merchant ships traversing the Red Sea. The latter have enabled the militia to partially close the body of water down to Israel-friendly maritime traffic.
Houthi attacks have sunk two commercial ships to date and damaged more than 30 others, but more significantly, have jacked up insurance and fuel costs of goods between Asia and Europe, pressuring Western countries to address Israel’s war in Gaza.
The US and the UK began a campaign of air and missile strikes against the Houthis in January designed to “degrade” the militia’s capabilities, but have lost up to ten Reaper drones in the process, and killed over a dozen civilians, while Houthi capabilities have not been noticeably weakened.
US Fifth Fleet Commander George Wikoff said last month that carrier fleets are in no condition to stop Houthi threats to shipping in the Red Sea, and urged the international community to “pressure” the militia, because “right now, quite frankly, they are not under tremendous pressure to come through” to stop the attacks.
Earlier this month, former Royal Navy commander Tom Sharpe lamented that the Houthis appear to be “achieving their ends, all of them, and we’re achieving none of ours,” instead spending “millions and millions of dollars on not winning.”