Israeli airstrikes targeted Houthi rebels in Yemen a day after the Iran-backed group claimed a deadly attack on the Israeli city of Tel Aviv.
The Israel Defense Forces, IDF, said its fighter jets struck “military targets of the Houthi terrorist regime” in the area of Yemen’s Hodeidah Port on Saturday in what Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said was a direct response to the death of a 50-year-old Israeli in a Houthi drone attack on Tel Aviv Friday.
This is the first time Israel has struck Yemen, according to Israeli officials.
The Houthi-run Al Masirah TV said the Israeli strikes targeted oil facilities in the port on Yemen’s west coast and injured at least 80 people, most of them with “severe burns.”
Houthi spokesperson Mohammed Abdulsalam said the strikes had also hit civilian targets and a power station. He slammed what he said was “brutal Israeli aggression” aimed at increasing the “suffering of the people of Yemen” and pressuring it to stop its support of Gaza.
Houthi army spokesperson Yehya Saree vowed to respond to the strike, saying the Houthis would not hesitate to strike Israel’s “vital targets” and warning that Tel Aviv was still not safe.
Netanyahu said in a statement on Saturday that Hodeidah was “not an innocent port.”
“It was used for military purposes, it was used as an entry point for deadly weapons supplied to the Houthis by Iran,” Netanyahu said, adding that Hodeidah had also been used to attack international shipping in the Red Sea.
Netanyahu also said the operation, which hit targets 1,800 km (1,118 miles) from Israel’s borders, shows the enemy Israel is serious about responding to threats.
“It makes it clear to our enemies that there is no place that the long arm of the state of Israel will not reach,” Netanyahu said.
IDF spokesperson Daniel Hagari said the strikes were also in response to the roughly 200 projectiles the rebel group has fired towards Israel since October, when Israel’s war with Hamas in Gaza began.
Reported by CNN
