WASHINGTON (AP) — US and UK hit 36 Houthis target of yemen On saturday second wave of attack This is aimed at further neutralizing the Iranian-backed group, which has relentlessly attacked U.S. and international interests. israel-hamas war. However, Washington did not directly target Iran again as it sought to find a balance between a forceful response and escalating the conflict.
The latest offensive against the Houthis was launched by US warships and US and British fighter jets.The strikes are as follows air raid Targeted in Iraq and Syria on Friday Other Iranian-backed militias and Iran's Revolutionary Guards in retaliation. Three US soldiers killed in drone attack Last weekend in Jordan.
Houthi targets were in 13 different locations, including U.S. F/A-18 fighter jets from the aircraft carrier Dwight D. was attacked by. It came from the Red Sea, according to U.S. officials and the British Ministry of Defense. The U.S. officials were not authorized to publicly discuss military operations and spoke on condition of anonymity.
The United States has warned that its response will not be limited to one night, one target, or one group after the death of a soldier at Jordan's Tower 22 base last Sunday. There is no suggestion that the Houthis are directly responsible, but the Houthis have been the largest US military since Hamas attacked Israel on October 7, killing more than 1,200 people and taking about 250 hostages. has become one of the enemies ofof Ministry of Public Health In the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip, Israeli military operations have killed more than 26,000 people and injured more than 64,400 since the war began.
The Houthis carry out near-daily missile and drone attacks against merchant ships and warships in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden, and have made clear they have no intention of scaling back operations despite pressure from US and UK operations. ing.
“No matter the cost, military operations against Israel will continue until the genocidal crimes in Gaza are stopped and the siege on the population is lifted,” said senior Houthi leader Mohammed al-Bukhaiti. said. “The US/UK invasion of Yemen will not go unchecked and will continue to escalate,” he wrote online.
The Biden administration has indicated this is likely not the last attack. The United States blamed the attack on Jordan on Iraq's Islamic Resistance, a coalition of Iran-backed militias. Iran has sought to distance itself from the drone attacks, saying the militias were acting independently of Iran's instructions.
Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said in a statement that the military action, backed by Australia, Bahrain, Canada, Denmark, the Netherlands and New Zealand, “sent a clear message to the Houthis that they will continue to face further consequences if they act.” I'll send it to you,” he said. Do not stop illegal attacks on international shipping and naval vessels. ”
He added: “We will not hesitate to protect lives and the free flow of commerce on one of the world's most important waterways.”
The Pentagon said the attacks targeted locations associated with the Houthis' deeply buried weapons storage facilities, missile systems and launchers, air defense systems, radars and helicopters. British forces said they had attacked a ground control station west of Yemen's capital Sanaa that has been used to control Houthi drones that have been launched at ships in the Red Sea.
President Joe Biden was briefed on the strike Saturday before leaving Delaware for a West Coast tour, according to administration officials.
The recent strike is third time The United States and Britain were conducting a large-scale joint operation attacking Houthi weapons launch sites, radar sites, and drones. The attacks in Yemen are aimed at underscoring a broader message to Iran that Washington holds Iran responsible for arms, funding and training. militia array Hezbollah in Lebanon, Hamas in Gaza, the Islamic Resistance Movement in Iraq, and the Houthis in Yemen are behind attacks on U.S. and international interests across the Middle East.
Videos shared online by people in Sanaa included the sound of explosions, and at least one explosion was seen lighting up the night sky. Residents said the explosion occurred near a building associated with Yemen's presidential palace. The Houthi-controlled state news agency SABA reported strikes in Al-Bayda, Damar, Hajjah, Hodeidah, Taiz and Sanaa provinces.
Hours before the latest joint operation, the United States launched another self-defense attack on Yemeni facilities, firing six anti-ship cruise missiles, as it has repeatedly done when detecting missiles or drones ready for launch. Destroyed. The day before the attack, U.S. destroyers Laboon and Eisenhower's F/A-18s shot down seven drones launched from Yemen's Houthi-controlled areas into the Red Sea, and destroyer Carney landed in the Gulf of Aden. One drone launched from the United States was shot down. The military removed four more drones that were ready for launch.
The Houthi attacks have caused shipping companies to reroute ships from the Red Sea and send them to various parts of Africa via the Cape of Good Hope, a much longer, more expensive and less efficient route. The threat also prompted the United States and its allies to launch a joint mission in which warships from participating nations would provide an air defense umbrella for ships navigating the critical waterway, which runs from the Suez Canal to the Bab el-Mandeb Strait. is what happened. .
During normal operations, approximately 400 merchant ships sail in the southern Red Sea at any given time.
Following Friday's airstrikes in Iraq and Syria, Hussein al-Mosawi, a spokesman for Harakat al-Nujaba, one of Iraq's main Iranian-backed militias, said the U.S. government was warning that “any action would be met with a response.” We must understand that it causes But in an interview with The Associated Press in Baghdad, he also struck a more conciliatory tone. “We do not want to escalate or escalate tensions in the region,” he said.
While trying to rein in the militias, Iraqi officials have condemned the U.S. retaliatory strikes as a violation of Iraq's sovereignty and called for the withdrawal of the 2,500 U.S. troops stationed in Iraq as part of the international coalition fighting Islamic State. There is. Iraqi and U.S. military officials began formal talks last month to reduce the coalition presence, a process expected to take several years.
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Associated Press writers Ahmed al-Hajj in Sanaa, Yemen, Abdulrahman Zeyad and Ali Jabal in Baghdad, Abiy Sewell and Bassem Mourou in Beirut, John Gambrell and Amer Madani in Jerusalem contributed to this report. contributed to.
