by Phil Stewart, Idrees Ali and Mohammed Ghobari
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The United States and Britain carried out strikes against sites used by Yemen’s Houthi rebels for the first time since the group began launching attacks on commercial shipping lanes at sea Red, in solidarity with the Palestinians of Gaza.
Hundreds of thousands of Yemenis gathered Friday in Sanaa and several other cities across the country to protest against the American-British operations, according to images from the al-Masirah television channel, an organ of the Houthis. The demonstrators brandished Palestinian and Yemeni flags while chanting slogans hostile to Israel and the United States.
US President Joe Biden warned in a statement on Thursday that he “would not hesitate” to take further action if necessary.
“These targeted strikes are an unequivocal message that the United States and (their) allies will not tolerate attacks on our personnel, nor will they allow hostile parties to jeopardize freedom of navigation,” Joe Biden said.
The British Ministry of Defense said in a statement that “early indications are that the Houthis’ ability to threaten maritime trade has been significantly affected.”
US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said in a statement that the strikes targeted Houthi military capabilities, including drones, ballistic and cruise missiles, surveillance equipment and coastal radars.
Planes, ships and submarines were used to carry out the strikes, a US official said, preferring to remain anonymous. According to him, more than ten targets were targeted.
A Houthi military spokesperson reported 73 strikes that cost the lives of five fighters. Six others were injured. These attacks will not go “without punishment or retaliation” and the group will continue to attack ships bound for Israel, he said.
Witnesses told Reuters that a military base near Sanaa airport, a military site near Taiz airport, a Houthi naval base in Hodeidah and military sites in Hajjah governorate had been targeted during the raids carried out on Thursday.
The Houthis, who control most of Yemen, are disrupting global trade by attacking ships passing through the Bab el Mandeb Strait at the southern end of the Red Sea, what they say is a response to the war being waged by Israel in Gaza. They have, to date, carried out 27 attacks on commercial shipping lanes in the Red Sea since November 19.
RIYADH CALLS FOR RESTRAIN
Last December, the United States set up an international operation called “Prosperity Guardian” with around twenty countries to ensure the security of maritime transport, but the Anglo-American strikes are not part of this coalition.
France said Friday that the Houthis bear “extremely heavy responsibility for regional escalation” and that states have the right to react to attacks on freedom of navigation under UN Security Council resolution 2722. voted on Wednesday.
Russia, for its part, announced on Friday that it had requested an emergency meeting of the Security Council. The Kremlin condemned Western strikes that it said were “illegitimate” under international law.
Dmitri Peskov, Kremlin spokesperson, recalled that Russia had abstained in the vote on resolution 2722 which, according to him, confers “no right to carry out these strikes”.
China, Algeria and Mozambique also abstained. The other 11 member countries of the Council voted for the resolution.
Saudi Arabia called for restraint and “avoiding escalation” and added that it was monitoring the situation with “concern.”
Riyadh and the Houthi rebels are negotiating a permanent ceasefire in the war in Yemen, where Saudi Arabia has intervened since 2015 at the head of a coalition of Gulf countries.
An adviser to the Iraqi Prime Minister, Fadi al Shammari, estimated that the West was expanding the conflict between Israel and Hamas.
Iran, for its part, strongly condemned the strikes, believing that they represented an attack on the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Yemen and a violation of laws, rules and international law, a spokesperson said on Friday. of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
(With contributions from Andrew Mills, Maher Hatem, Jeff Mason and Eric Beech; French version Camille Raynaud and Jean-Stéphane Brosse, edited by Blandine Hénault)
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