Houthis launch second wave of attacks on Red Sea vessels after deadly British-US airstrikes

Houthi military spokesperson Yahya Sarea chants slogans in Sanaa, Yemen, after delivering a statement on the group's latest attacks against US and British naval vessels as well as commercial ships on the Red Sea. (REUTERS)
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Updated 02 June 2024
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Houthis launch second wave of attacks on Red Sea vessels after deadly British-US airstrikes

  • Saturday's operations were the second in response to the latest US-British airstrikes in Yemen, says militia spokesman
  • US military said no injuries or damage were reported by US, coalition or commercial ships from the attacks

RIYADH: Houthi forces launched anti-ballistic missiles and armed drones targeting a US aircraft carrier, a US destroyer and three vessels in the Red Sea, the Iran-backed Yemeni militia’s military spokesman Yahya Saree said on Saturday.

The US military confirmed the attacks but said no injuries or damage were reported by US, coalition or commercial ships.

In a statement on X, the US Central Command said its forces destroyed one Iran-backed Houthi uncrewed aerial system in the southern Red Sea and saw two others crash into Red Sea.

US forces also destroyed two Houthi anti-ship ballistic missiles fired in direction of the US Navy ship Gravely, it said.

The attacks came a day after a Houthi official vowed to hit back after a joint British US airstrikes hit militia installations in Yemen on Thursday.

“We will meet escalation with escalation,” Mohammed Al-Bukhaiti, a Houthi official, wrote on X.

The Houthi militia, which controls the most populous parts of Yemen and is aligned with Iran, has attacked ships off its coast for months, saying it is acting in solidarity with Palestinians fighting Israel in Gaza.

Saree on Saturday said the group “targeted the American aircraft carrier, the Eisenhower, north of the Red Sea, with a number of missiles and drones,” adding that it was “the second targeting operation against the carrier during the past 24 hours.”

The spokesperson also added that the other operations have targeted a US destroyer and the ABLIANI ship in the Red Sea, along with “the MAINA ship that has been targeted twice in the Red Sea and in the Arabian Sea as well.”

Additionally, “the ship ALORAIQ has been targeted in the Indian Ocean,” he added.

On Friday, F/A-18 fighter jets from the USS Dwight D. Eisenhower aircraft hit a wide range of Houthi underground facilities, missile launchers, command and control sites, a vessel and other facilities, according to the US military.

The militia acknowledged that the joint British-US airstrikes killed at least 16 people and wounded 42 of its fighters. It was the highest publicly acknowledged death toll from the multiple rounds of strikes carried out over the Houthi attacks on shipping.

But the Houthis focused Friday morning on a strike they said struck a building housing Hodeida Radio and civilian homes in the port city on the Red Sea. Their Al Masirah satellite news channel aired images of one bloodied man being carried down stairs and others in the hospital, receiving aid. It said all the dead and nearly all the wounded from the strikes came from there.

The Houthis described all those killed and hurt in Hodeida as civilians. The rebel force that’s held Yemen’s capital, Sanaa, since 2014 includes fighters who often aren’t in uniform.

Other strikes hit outside of Sanaa near its airport, and communication equipment in Taiz, the broadcaster said. Little other information was released on those sites — likely signaling that Houthi military sites had been struck. One person was wounded in Sanaa.

“We confirm this brutal aggression against Yemen as punishment for its position in support of Gaza, in support of Israel to continue its crimes of genocide against the wounded, besieged and steadfast Gaza Strip,” Houthi spokesman Mohammed Abdulsalam posted on X.

The US and the UK have launched strikes against the Houthis since January, with the US regularly carrying out its own in the time since as well.

Abdul Malik Al-Houthi, the Houthis’ secretive supreme leader, offered an overall death toll for the strikes up to that point as 40 people killed and 35 others wounded. He didn’t offer a breakdown between civilian and combatant casualties at the time.

The Houthis have stepped up attacks on shipping in the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden, demanding that Israel end the war in Gaza, which has killed more than 36,000 Palestinians there. The war began after Hamas-led militants attacked Israel on Oct. 7, killing about 1,200 people and taking around 250 hostage.

The Houthis have launched more than 50 attacks on shipping, killed three sailors, seized one vessel and sunk another since November, according to the US Maritime Administration. This week, they attacked a ship carrying grain to Iran, the rebels’ main benefactor.

On Wednesday, another US MQ-9 Reaper drone apparently crashed in Yemen, with the Houthis claiming they fired a surface-to-air missile at it. The US Air Force didn’t report any aircraft missing, leading to suspicion that the drone may have been piloted by the CIA. As many as three may have been lost in May alone.

(With Reuters & AP)


Syrian president to make first official visit to Kuwait 

Updated 11 sec ago
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Syrian president to make first official visit to Kuwait 

CAIRO: Syrian President Ahmad al-Sharaa  will make his first official visit to Kuwait on Sunday accompanied by an official delegation. 

“Syrian President Ahmad Al-Sharaa, accompanied by an official delegation, is due to arrive in Kuwait on Sunday,” read a statement on KUNA News Agency. 

Earlier this month, sources close to Al-Sharaa have reported that the Syrian president was planning a strip to the gulf state in the end of May. 

On his gulf tour, Al-Sharaa had visited Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates.

On his trip to Kuwait, the Syrian president will meet the Kuwaiti leadership to discuss ways to boost bilateral relations.     

 


Iran considers nuclear weapons ‘unacceptable’, FM says

Updated 12 min 42 sec ago
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Iran considers nuclear weapons ‘unacceptable’, FM says

  • Iran has held five rounds of talks with the United States in search of a new nuclear agreement
  • Western governments have long suspected Iran of seeking to develop a nuclear weapons capability

TEHRAN: Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said Saturday that Iran considers nuclear weapons “unacceptable,” reiterating the country’s longstanding position amid delicate negotiations with the United States.
Western governments have long suspected Iran of seeking to develop a nuclear weapons capability to counter widely suspected but undeclared arsenal of its arch-foe Israel.
“If the issue is nuclear weapons, yes, we too consider this type of weapon unacceptable,” Araghchi, Iran’s lead negotiator in the talks, said in a televised speech. “We agree with them on this issue.”
Iran has held five rounds of talks with the United States in search of a new nuclear agreement to replace the deal with major powers President Donald Trump abandoned during his first term in 2018.
The two governments are at odds over Iran’s uranium enrichment program, which Washington has said must cease but which Tehran insists is its right under the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.
Nonetheless, Trump said Wednesday that “we’re having some very good talks with Iran,” adding that he had warned Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu against striking its nuclear facilities as it would not be “appropriate right now.”
Israel has repeatedly threatened military action, after pummelling Iranian air defenses during two exchanges of fire last year.
Trump has not ruled out military action but said he wants space to make a deal first, and has also said that Israel, and not the United States, would take the lead in any such strikes.


Israel strike on south Lebanon kills one

Updated 31 May 2025
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Israel strike on south Lebanon kills one

  • The Israeli army said the strike killed a regional commander “of Hezbollah’s rocket array"

BEIRUT: Lebanese official media said an Israeli strike killed one person in the south on Saturday despite a six-month-old ceasefire, as Israel said it targeted a Hezbollah militant.
The state-run National News Agency (NNA) said a man was killed when an Israeli drone targeted his car as he was heading to pray at a mosque in Deir Al-Zahrani, about 20 kilometers (12 miles) from the Israeli border.
Israel has continued to bomb Lebanon despite the November 27 truce that sought to halt more than a year of hostilities with Hezbollah including two months of open war.
The Israeli army said the strike killed a regional commander “of Hezbollah’s rocket array.”
It charged that during the conflict, the operative “advanced numerous projectile attacks... and was involved recently in efforts to reestablish Hezbollah’s terrorist infrastructure” in south Lebanon.
Under the terms of the ceasefire, Hezbollah fighters were to pull back north of the Litani River, some 30 kilometers (20 miles) from the border, and dismantle military infrastructure to its south.
Israel was to withdraw all forces from Lebanon but it has kept troops in five areas it deems “strategic.”
The Lebanese army has deployed in the south and has been dismantling Hezbollah infrastructure.


Syrian Kurdish commander in touch with Turkiye, open to meeting Erdogan

Updated 31 May 2025
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Syrian Kurdish commander in touch with Turkiye, open to meeting Erdogan

BEIRUT: The commander of Kurdish forces that control northeast Syria said on Friday that his group is in direct contact with Turkiye and that he would be open to improving ties, including by meeting Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan.
The public comments represented a significant diplomatic overture by Mazloum Abdi, whose Syrian Democratic Forces fought Turkish troops and Ankara-backed Syrian rebels during Syria’s 14-year civil war.
Turkiye has said the main Kurdish group at the core of the SDF is indistinguishable from the militant Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), which decided earlier this month to disband after 40 years of conflict with Turkiye.
Abdi told regional broadcaster Shams TV in an interview aired on Friday that his group was in touch with Turkiye, without saying how long the communication channels had been open.
“We have direct ties, direct channels of communication with Turkiye, as well as through mediators, and we hope that these ties are developed,” Abdi said. There was no immediate comment from Turkiye on Abdi’s remarks.
He noted his forces and Turkish fighters “fought long wars against each other” but that a temporary truce had brought a halt to those clashes for the last two months. Abdi said he hoped the truce could become permanent.
When asked whether he was planning to meet Erdogan, Abdi said he had no current plans to do so but “I am not opposed... We are not in a state of war with Turkiye and in the future, ties could be developed between us. We’re open to this.”
The Al-Monitor news website reported on Friday that Turkiye had proposed a meeting between Abdi and a top Turkish official, possibly Turkiye’s foreign minister or its intelligence chief.
A Turkish diplomatic source denied the report, saying “the claims about Turkiye and our country’s authorities” in the story were “not true,” without elaborating.
In December, Turkiye and the SDF agreed on a US-mediated ceasefire after fighting broke out as rebel groups advanced on Damascus and overthrew Bashar Assad.
Abdi in March signed a deal with Syria’s interim President Ahmed Al-Sharaa to incorporate the semi-autonomous administration of northeast Syria into the main state institutions based in Damascus.
On Thursday, Erdogan accused the SDF of “stalling” implementation of that deal.
In the interview, Abdi denied accusations that the SDF was in contact with Israel.
“People have accused us of this. In this interview, I am saying publicly that we have no ties with Israel,” he said.
But he said his group supported good ties with Syria’s neighbors. When asked if that included Israel, Abdi responded, “with everyone.”


Israel blocks Ramallah meeting with Arab ministers, Israeli official says

Updated 31 May 2025
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Israel blocks Ramallah meeting with Arab ministers, Israeli official says

  • Palestinian Authority official says that the issue of whether the meeting in Ramallah would be able to go ahead is under discussion
  • The move comes ahead of an international conference due to be held in New York on June 17-20 to discuss the issue of Palestinian statehood

JERUSALEM: Israel will not allow a planned meeting in the Palestinian administrative capital of Ramallah, in the occupied West Bank, to go ahead, an Israeli official said on Saturday, after media reported that Arab ministers planning to attend had been stopped from coming.

The delegation included ministers from Jordan, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates, Palestinian Authority officials said. The ministers would require Israeli consent to travel to the West Bank from Jordan.

An Israeli official said the ministers intended to take part in “a provocative meeting” to discuss promoting the establishment of a Palestinian state.

“Such a state would undoubtedly become a terrorist state in the heart of the land of Israel,” the official said. “Israel will not cooperate with such moves aimed at harming it and its security.”

A Palestinian Authority official said that the issue of whether the meeting in Ramallah would be able to go ahead was under discussion.

The move comes ahead of an international conference, co-chaired by France and Saudi Arabia, due to be held in New York on June 17-20 to discuss the issue of Palestinian statehood.

Israel has come under increasing pressure from the United Nations and European countries which favor a two-state solution to the Israeli Palestinian conflict, under which an independent Palestinian state would exist alongside Israel.

French President Emmanuel Macron said on Friday that recognizing a Palestinian state was not only a “moral duty but a political necessity.”