Houthi rebels in Yemen said Israeli airstrikes on Thursday targeted the rebel-held capital of Sanaa and the port city of Hodeida, following several days of Houthi launches setting off sirens in Israel.
The Israeli military said it attacked infrastructure used by the Houthis at the international airport in Sanaa and ports at Hodeida, Al-Salif and Ras Qantib along with power stations. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a speech on Wednesday that “the Houthis, too, will learn what Hamas and Hezbollah and Assad’s regime and others learned.”
The Iran-backed Houthis’ media outlet reported the strikes in a Telegram post but gave no immediate details. The U.S. military also has targeted the Houthis in Yemen in recent days. The United Nations has noted that the ports are important entryways for humanitarian aid.
Over the weekend, 16 people were wounded when a Houthi missile hit a playground in Tel Aviv. Last week, Israeli jets struck Sanaa and Hodeida, killing nine people, calling it a response to previous Houthi attacks. The Houthis also have been targeting shipping on the Red Sea corridor, calling it solidarity with Palestinians in Gaza.
Meanwhile, an Israeli strike killed five Palestinian journalists outside a hospital in the Gaza Strip overnight, the territory’s Health Ministry said. The Israeli military said that all were militants posing as reporters.
The strike hit a car outside Al-Awda Hospital in the built-up Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza. The journalists were working for the local news outlet Al-Quds Today, a television channel affiliated with the Islamic Jihad militant group.
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Islamic Jihad is a smaller and more extreme ally of Hamas and took part in the Oct. 7, 2023 attack in southern Israel, which ignited the conflict. The Israeli military identified four of the men as combat propagandists and said that intelligence, including a list of Islamic Jihad operatives found by soldiers in Gaza, had confirmed that all five were affiliated with the group.
Hamas, Islamic Jihad and other Palestinian militant groups operate political, media and charitable operations in addition to their armed wings.
Associated Press footage showed the incinerated shell of a van, with press markings visible on the back doors. Sobbing young men attended the funeral outside the hospital. The bodies were wrapped in shrouds, with blue press vests draped over them.
The Committee to Protect Journalists says that more than 130 Palestinian reporters have been killed since the start of the conflict. Israel hasn’t allowed foreign reporters to enter Gaza except on military embeds.
Israel has banned the pan-Arab Al Jazeera network and accused six of its Gaza reporters of being militants. The Qatar-based broadcaster denies the allegations and accuses Israel of trying to silence its coverage of the conflict, which has focused heavily on civilian casualties from Israeli military operations.
Separately, Israel’s military said that a 35-year-old reserve soldier was killed during fighting in central Gaza early Thursday. A total of 389 soldiers have been killed in Gaza since the start of the ground operation more than a year ago.
The conflict began when Hamas-led militants stormed across the border in an attack on nearby army bases and farming communities. They killed around 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and abducted around 250. About 100 hostages are still inside Gaza, at least a third believed to be dead.
Israel’s air and ground offensive has killed more than 45,000 Palestinians, according to the Health Ministry. It says more than half the fatalities have been women and children, but doesn’t say how many of the dead were fighters. Israel says it has killed more than 17,000 militants, without providing evidence.
The offensive has caused widespread destruction and driven around 90% of the population of 2.3 million from their homes. Hundreds of thousands are packed into squalid tent camps along the coast, with little protection from the cold, wet winter.
Also Thursday, people mourned eight Palestinians killed by Israeli military operations in and around the city of Tulkarem in the occupied West Bank on Tuesday, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry. The Israeli military said that it opened fire after militants attacked soldiers, and it was aware of uninvolved civilians who were harmed in the raid.