RIYADH, Saudi Arabia
The US military said early on Tuesday it had conducted a strike against “explosive uncrewed surface vehicles” belonging to the Houthis in Yemen in an operation on Monday afternoon.
The statement by CENTCOM said
the vehicles “presented an imminent threat to U.S. Navy ships and merchant
vessels in the region” and the action, carried out at approximately 3:30 p.m.
local time, was in self defense.
The US and its allies have
been conducting strikes against the Houthis who have declared a blockade of
maritime traffic that supports Israel’s war on Gaza. The allies said the
strikes were necessary to safeguard the security of ships in the Red Sea and to
support international trade.
The US and UK have led the
attacks against the Houthis, and Australia, Bahrain, the Netherlands, New
Zealand and Denmark have provided support.
Separately, the United Kingdom
Maritime Trade Operations (UKMTO) organization said on Tuesday it had received
a report of an incident 57 nautical miles west of Yemen’s Hodeidah and said
authorities were investigating.
Israel has been conducting a
military campaign in the Gaza Strip since early October after Hamas attacked
settlements in Israel killing 1,200 people and taking scores of hostages. The
military response by Israel has killed over 27,000, mostly women and children,
and prompted the International Court of Justice to rule that there may be a
plausible case of genocide in the densely packed enclave.
The US said it does not want
to escalate regional tensions but conducted strikes in Iraq and Syria last week
in response to the killing of three US military personnel at Tower 22, a base
in Jordan. The US blamed the drone assault on Islamic Resistance, a coalition
of anti-US groups backed by Iran.
Friday’s strikes in Iraq and
Syria against Iran-back militias and the Iranian Revolutionary Guard hit 85
targets across a dozen sites and killed around 18 people.
Iraq condemned the attacks,
calling them a violation of sovereignty, and said Washington did not consult
with Baghdad before they were carried out. On Monday, the US State Department
walked back a statement made shortly after the strikes that Iraq had been
informed ahead of the military assault.
Tehran said it had no role in
the drone strike on the base in Jordan and that the militias act
independently. Before Friday’s strikes, Iran’s President Ebrahim Raisi
said that his country would not start a war but would act “strongly” if anyone
tried to bully it.
The administration of US
President Joe Biden has stopped short of attacking any targets within Iran.
The UN on Monday urged parties
in the conflict to pull back from the brink and consider the “unbearable human
and economic cost” of a region wide conflagration.
During a meeting of the
Security Council to discuss the latest escalation, the under-secretary-general
for political and peacebuilding affairs, Rosemarie DiCarlo, once again called
for an immediate humanitarian ceasefire in Gaza and for the unconditional
release of all Israeli hostages held by Hamas.
Meanwhile, US Secretary of
State Antony Blinken returned to the region on his fifth tour since the
Israel-Hamas war began. He met Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman in Riyadh
on Monday and is expected to travel to Israel, Qatar and Egypt as the US and
its regional allies try to deal with a growing humanitarian disaster in Gaza.
Israel and Hamas are yet
to agree on plans to release hostages in return for a humanitarian
ceasefire, despite diplomatic efforts over the last few weeks.
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