Yemen strikes container ship in Red Sea, says will intensify retaliation in Ramadan
The spokesman for the Yemeni Armed Forces says the army’s naval division has carried out a retaliatory strike against a container ship in the Red Sea, and the missiles hit the vessel in an accurate and direct manner.
Brigadier General Yahya Saree said the operation was launched against a “US-owned ship” in support of the Palestinians, who are suffering in the blockaded Gaza because of Israeli aggression and siege, and were in response to US and British airstrikes on Yemen.
The US Central Command earlier said Yemeni forces fired two anti-ship ballistic missiles at a Liberian-flagged container ship, identified as Pinocchio, in the Red Sea.
Saree vowed in a statement on Tuesday that the Arab nation’s military will ramp up its operations against Israeli-linked ships in the Red Sea and the narrow strait of Bab el-Mandeb during the holy Muslim fasting month of Ramadan in solidarity with Palestinians in the besieged Gaza Strip.
He said the Yemeni Armed Forces will continue to prevent vessels with commercial ties to Israel or heading towards ports in the occupied territories from sailing in the Red Sea and the Arabian Sea, until the brutal Israeli onslaught against Palestinians in the Gaza Strip comes to an end and the all-out siege is lifted.
The United States and Britain have carried out fresh aggression on Yemeni soil by targeting the western province of Hudaydah.
Yemenis have declared their open support for Palestine’s struggle against the Israeli occupation since the regime launched a devastating war on Gaza on October 7 after the territory’s Palestinian resistance movements carried out the surprise Operation Al-Aqsa Storm.
The Yemeni Armed Forces have said they won’t stop retaliatory strikes.
The maritime attacks have forced some of the world’s biggest shipping and oil companies to suspend transit through one of the world’s most important maritime trade routes.
Tankers are instead adding thousands of miles to international shipping routes by sailing around the continent of Africa rather than going through the Suez Canal.
Arabs urged to airdrop arms into Gaza amid Israeli war
Meanwhile, a senior member of the Yemeni Supreme Political Council has called upon Arab governments to airdrop weapons and munitions into Gaza in light of the bloody Israeli military campaign against Palestinians there.
“Arab governments should seize the favorable opportunity, and airdrop armament into Gaza for unarmed Palestinian population in the coastal sliver. This is a moral duty in the face of the genocide that the Zionist enemy is perpetrating in the territory.
“No [international] law or mechanism has managed to stop the massacres in Gaza. The Israeli genocide will stop once Gazans are armed,” Mohammad Ali al-Houthi said.
He further urged Arab states to send paratroopers into Gaza if they want to stop massacres and the hunger crisis in Gaza and earn themselves the reputation of chivalry and assistance.
Since the start of Israel’s genocidal war following Operation al-Aqsa Storm by Gaza-based resistance movements on October 7, 2023, more than 31,000 Palestinians, including many women and children, have lost their lives.
The Israeli military offensive has left a trail of destruction in Gaza, leaving hospitals in ruins and displacing around half of its 2.4 million residents.
Israel has additionally enforced a comprehensive blockade on the coastal sliver, severing the supply of fuel, electricity, sustenance and water to the population residing there.
