The Israeli military on Saturday staged its first-ever direct large-scale air raid on the Yemeni port city of Hodeidah, sparking a massive fire at the port’s oil terminal and other facilities.
The strikes are a response to attacks on Israeli-linked civilian vessels, as well as long-range missile and drone strikes on the country by the Yemen-based Houthi militant group, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said in a statement.
“A short while ago, IDF fighter jets struck military targets of the Houthi terrorist regime in the area of the Hodeidah port in Yemen in response to the hundreds of attacks carried out against the State of Israel in recent months,” the military said.
Footage circulating online suggests the strikes were concentrated at the port’s sprawling oil terminal, with multiple storage tanks seen ablaze.
The flames spread later on, with the burning fuel apparently leaking out of the ruptured tanks and producing single wall of fire. The attack is believed to have inflicted casualties on the ground, according to local media reports.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu commented on the strike later in the day, alleging that the port had been used by the Houthis to receive weaponry from Iran.
He also mentioned a recent drone strike on Tel Aviv, which killed one person and injured at least ten near the US Embassy branch office in the city. The drone attack was touted by the Houthis as a “significant military operation” with a new drone capable of “bypassing the enemy’s interception systems.”
The Houthis, a Shia Islamist group that controls a large and the most populous part of Yemen, have been attacking Israeli-linked merchant vessels since October, describing their campaign as an act of solidarity with Palestinians in Gaza. The attacks prompted a response by a US and the UK-led coalition, which has been conducting airstrikes against the group.
The bombing effort appears to have yielded little result, with the Houthis continuing attacks on merchant vessels and repeatedly targeting coalition warships. Israel’s strikes on Hodeidah will not be left unanswered, the group has already warned.