Israeli civil defense members investigate damage after a missile launched from Yemen hits residential neighborhood in Tel Aviv, Dec. 21, 2024. (Mostafa Alkharouf/Anadolu via Getty Images)
(JTA) — Israel hit multiple targets in Yemen on Thursday, escalating what has newly become one of the most active fronts in Israel’s war with Iran and its surrogates.
The strikes Thursday, which hit power stations and the airport, come as Israelis in the country’s densely populated center endure almost nightly rocket attacks from the Houthi militia in Yemen even as attacks from Hezbollah in Lebanon have halted and threats from Hamas in the Gaza Strip have diminished.
The World Health Organization executive director, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, was at the airport in the capital, Sana, when it was hit and said the strike injured a WHO staffer.
“As we were about to board our flight from Sana’a, about two hours ago, the airport came under aerial bombardment,” he said on X. “One of our plane’s crew members was injured. At least two people were reported killed at the airport. The air traffic control tower, the departure lounge — just a few meters from where we were — and the runway were damaged.”
Ghebreyesus was in the country to assess the status of detainees held by the Houthis, and he called for their release.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu cast the attack as one symbolic of the Hanukkah holiday now underway.
“We are in the war of redemption, the Maccabees of our time,” he said. “A short while ago, the Air Force attacked targets of the Houthi terrorist organization in Yemen, both along the coast and in Sana’a.We are determined to cut off this terrorist arm of Iran’s axis of evil. We will persist until we get the job done.”
Israel has crushed Hamas in Gaza, where the terrorist organization launched the war on Oct. 7, 2023, although it continues to engage with the militants in sweeps through the enclave. It has decapitated Hezbollah in Lebanon, where the terrorist group this month agreed to a ceasefire. Rebels in Syria this month ousted the Assad regime, which had been an ally to Iran and a key conduit for support Iran delivered to Hezbollah. That leaves the Houthis, whose capacity to strike within Israel was made manifest when one of its missiles demolished a Tel Aviv school last week, as the strongest remaining proxy of Iran, which Israel also hit directly this fall in response to missile attacks.
U.S. President Joe Biden removed the Houthis’ terrorist designation in 2021. But as the group’s attacks on vessels traveling the Red Sea have intensified since the launch of the Israel-Hamas war, it has led multinational strikes on the group. The White House did not return a request for comment on Israel’s latest strikes, which come as the Biden administration is seeking to curb conflict in the Middle East before Biden leaves office next month.
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