AP explains US-UK strikes on Yemen's Houthi rebels amid ship assaults

(31 May 2024)
RESTRICTION SUMMARY:

ASSOCIATED PRESS – AP Clients Only
Dubai, United Arab Emirates – 31 May 2024
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1. SOUNDBITE (English) Jon Gambrell, The Associated Press:
“Yemen’s Houthi rebels say at least 16 people are dead after U.S. and British airstrikes targeted Yemen. Now these strikes happened overnight and they targeted areas around the capital, Sanaa, as well as the port city of Hodeida on the Red Sea. Now, the U.S. and Britain are describing these attacks as trying to target the areas where they say the Houthi rebels are targeting commercial ships going through the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden. There have been over 50 known attacks on vessels since November. The rebels have been attacking these ships over what they say is a pressure campaign against Israel over its war on Hamas in the Gaza Strip. Now, for their part, the Houthis say that these strikes killed 16 civilians. The Houthis did not offer any evidence to support that, and Houthi fighters are known to wear street clothes in combat. However, they were able to air footage of chaos at a hospital, bloodied people being carried out of what they described as a building housing a radio station in Hodeida. All this comes as these airstrikes by the British and the Americans have been going on since January, and this round of strikes appears to be the deadliest yet. And the Houthi attacks on shipping continue.”
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STORYLINE:
Joint British-U.S. airstrikes targeting Yemen’s Houthi rebels killed at least 16 people and wounded 35 others, the rebels said Friday, the highest publicly acknowledged death toll from the multiple rounds of strikes carried out over the rebels’ attacks on shipping.

Three U.S. officials, speaking on condition of anonymity to describe a then-ongoing attack, described the strikes Thursday as hitting a wide range of underground facilities, missile launchers, command and control sites, a Houthi vessel and other facilities.

They called it a response to a recent surge in attacks by the Iran-backed militia group on ships in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden over the Israel-Hamas war.

The U.S. F/A-18 fighter jets involved in the strikes launched from the USS Dwight D. Eisenhower aircraft carrier in the Red Sea, officials said. Other U.S. warships in the region also participated.

But the Houthis focused Friday morning on just one of the strikes, which 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 downstairs and others in the hospital, receiving aid.

The Houthis described all those killed and hurt in Hodeida as civilians, something The Associated Press could not immediately confirm.

The rebel force that’s held Yemen’s capital, Sanaa, since 2014 includes fighters who often are not 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.

The U.S. and the U.K. have launched strikes against the Houthis since January, with the U.S. 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 did not offer a breakdown between civilian and combatant casualties at the time.

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