Israel strikes Houthi targets in Yemen following fatal drone attack in Tel Aviv

The Israeli strikes appeared to be the first on Yemeni soil since the Israel-Hamas war began in October, and they threatened to open a new front in the region as Israel battles proxies of Iran.

A number of “military targets” were hit in the western port city of Hodeidah, a Houthi stronghold, on Saturday, the Israeli army said, adding that its attack was in response to “hundreds of attacks” against Israel in recent months.

“The Houthis attacked us over 200 times. The first time that they harmed an Israeli citizen, we struck them. And we will do this in any place where it may be required,” said Israeli defence minister Yoav Gallant.

The Ministry of Health in Sanaa said that 80 people were wounded in a preliminary toll of the strikes in Hodeidah, most of them with severe burns.

Israel’s military said it alone carried out the strikes and “our friends were updated”.

Houthi spokesman Mohammed Abdulsalam wrote on social media platform X that Yemen was subjected to a “blatant Israeli aggression” that targeted fuel storage facilities and the province’s power station.

He said the attacks aim “to increase the suffering of the people and to pressure Yemen to stop supporting Gaza”.

He said the attacks will only make the people of Yemen and its armed forces more determined to support Gaza.

Mohamed Ali al-Houthi, of the Supreme Political Council in Yemen, wrote on X that “there will be impactful strikes”.

A media outlet controlled by Houthi rebels in Yemen, Al-Masirah TV, said the strikes on storage facilities for oil and diesel at the port and on the local electricity company caused deaths and injuries, and several people suffered severe burns. It said there was a large fire at the port and power cuts were widespread.

The drone attack by Houthi rebels on Friday killed one person in the centre of Tel Aviv and wounded at least 10 others near the United States embassy.

Virtually all projectiles fired from the southern Arabian country towards Israel have so far been intercepted. Israel said air defences detected the drone on Friday but an “error” occurred and “there was no interception”.

Since January, the US and British forces have been striking targets in Yemen, in response to the Houthis’ attacks on commercial shipping that the rebels have described as retaliation for Israel’s actions in the war in Gaza. However, many of the ships targeted are not linked to Israel.

The joint force air strikes have so far done little to deter the Iran-backed force.

Analysts and western intelligence services have long accused Iran of arming the Houthis, a claim Tehran denies. In recent years, US naval forces have intercepted a number of ships packed with rifles, rocket-propelled grenades and missile parts en route from Iran to Houthi-controlled areas of Yemen.

Also on Saturday, at least 13 people were killed in three Israeli air strikes that hit refugee camps in central Gaza, according to Palestinians health officials, as ceasefire talks in Cairo appeared to make progress.

Among the dead in Nuseirat Refugee Camp and Bureij Refugee Camp were three children and one woman, according to Palestinian ambulance teams that transported the bodies to the nearby Al-Aqsa Martyrs hospital.

The 13 corpses were counted by AP journalists at the hospital.

The latest casualties follow a rare moment of hope in war ravaged Gaza, after a medical teams recovered a live baby from a heavily pregnant Palestinian mother killed in an air strike that hit her home in Nuseirat late on Thursday evening.

Ola al-Kurd, 25, was killed along with six others in the blast, but was quickly rushed by emergency workers to Al-Awda Hospital in northern Gaza in the hope of saving the unborn child.

Hours later, doctors told The Associated Press that a baby boy had been delivered.

The still-unnamed child is stable but has suffered from a shortage of oxygen and has been placed in an incubator, said Dr Khalil Dajran. The baby boy’s father was injured in the same strike, but survived.

The war in Gaza, which was sparked by Hamas’ October 7 attack on southern Israel, has killed more than 38,900 people, according to the territory’s health ministry, which does not distinguish between combatants and civilians in its count.

The war has created a humanitarian catastrophe in the coastal Palestinian territory, displaced most of its 2.3 million population and triggered widespread hunger.

Hamas’ October attack killed 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and militants took about 250 hostage.

About 120 remain in captivity, with about a third of them believed to be dead, according to Israeli authorities.

The Israel-Hamas war has left thousands of women and children dead, according to health officials in the Gaza Strip. In April, a premature Palestinian baby was rescued from her dead mother’s womb but died days later.

In the occupied West Bank, the Palestinian Health Ministry said a 20-year-old man was shot dead by Israeli forces late Friday. Commenting on the shooting, the Israeli army said its forces opened fire on a group of Palestinians hurling rocks at Israeli troops in the town of Beit Ummar.

A witness said Ibrahim Zaqeq was not directly involved in the clashes and was standing nearby.

On Saturday, Hamas identified Mr Zaqeq as one of its members. The militant group’s green flag was wrapped around his corpse during the funeral.

Violence has surged in the territory since the Gaza war began. At least 577 Palestinians in the West Bank have been killed by Israeli fire since then, according to the Ramallah-based health ministry which tracks Palestinian deaths.

In Cairo, international mediators, including the United States, are continuing to push Israel and Hamas towards a phased deal that would halt the fighting and free about 120 hostages in Gaza.

On Friday, US secretary of state Antony Blinken said a ceasefire deal between Hamas and Israel that will release Israeli hostages captive by the group in Gaza are “inside the 10-yard line”, but added: “We know that anything in the last 10 yards are the hardest.”

Sporadic negotiations between the warring sides have been under way since November’s one-week ceasefire, with both Hamas and Israel repeatedly accusing each other of scuppering efforts as a deal approaches.