US piles pressure on Yemen's Houthis with new airstrikes
· RTE.ieThe United States carried out new airstrikes on Yemen, the Houthis' Al Masirah TV said, expanding the biggest US military operation in the Middle East since President Donald Trump took office in January.
Responding to the Iran-aligned Houthi movement's threats to international shipping, the US launched a new wave of airstrikes on Saturday.
The Red Sea port city of Hodeidah and Al Jawf governorate north of the capital Sanaa were targeted today, Al Masirah said.
At least 53 people have been killed in the attacks, a spokesperson for the Houthi-run health ministry, said yesterday.
Five children and two women were among the dead and 98 were injured, the spokesperson said.
The Houthis, an armed movement that has taken control of most of Yemen over the past decade, have launched scores of attacks on ships off its coast since November 2023, disrupting global commerce.
The US campaign to intercept missiles and drones has burned through stocks of US air defences.
The strikes, which one US official said might continue for weeks, come as the US ramps up sanctions pressure on Iran while trying to bring it to the negotiating table over its nuclear programme.
Houthi leader Abdul Malik al-Houthi said yesterday that the militants would target US ships in the Red Sea as long as the US continues attacks on Yemen.
"If they continue their aggression, we will continue the escalation," he said in a televised speech.
The Houthi movement's political bureau described the US attacks as a "war crime." Russia urged the US to stop them.
The Houthis' military spokesman, without providing evidence, said in a televised statement early today that the group had launched a second attack against the US aircraft carrier USS Harry S Truman in the Red Sea.
Israel has weakened a large part of Iran's "Axis of Resistance" against US influence in the Middle East -including Lebanon's Hezbollah and the Palestinian militant group Hamas since being attacked by Hamas gunmen in October 2023.
Top Hamas and Hezbollah leaders have been assassinated and the fall of another Iranian ally, Syria's Bashar al-Assad, in December also dealt a blow to the Islamic Republic.
But the Houthis - resilient mountain fighters who defied a Saudi-led bombing campaign in a civil war for years - are still standing, along with pro-Iranian militias in Iraq.
The Houthis said last week they would resume attacks on Israeli ships passing through the Red Sea if Israel did not lift a block on aid entering Gaza.
They had launched scores of attacks on shipping after Israel's war with Hamas began in late 2023, saying they were acting in solidarity with Gaza's Palestinians.
Mr Trump warned Iran, the Houthis' main backer, that it needed to immediately halt support for the group.
If Iran threatened the US, he said: "America will hold you fully accountable and, we won't be nice about it!"
In response, Hossein Salami, the top commander of Iran's Revolutionary Guards, said the Houthis made their own decisions.
"We warn our enemies that Iran will respond decisively and destructively if they carry out their threats," he told state media.
US warplanes shot down 11 Houthi drones yesterday, none of which came close to the Truman, a US official said.
US forces also tracked a missile that splashed down off the coast of Yemen, the official said.
US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth told Fox News' 'Sunday Morning Futures': "The minute the Houthis say we'll stop shooting at your ships, we'll stop shooting at your drones. This campaign will end, but until then it will be unrelenting."
He said reopening freedom of navigation was a core national interest for the US and that Iran had been "enabling the Houthis for far too long."
"They better back off," he said.
The Houthis suspended their campaign when Israel and Hamas agreed on a Gaza ceasefire in January.
But on 12 March they said their threat to attack Israeli ships would stay in effect until Israel reapproved the delivery of aid and food into Gaza.