Saturday, July 20, 2024

Houthis’ deadly Tel Aviv drone strike: ‘Lucky shot’ or strategic threat?

Yemen’s Houthi rebels, who claimed a deadly strike far from their borders inside Israel early Friday, have built up a significant drone arsenal.

Since November, the Iran-backed Houthis have carried out dozens of drone and missile attacks against shipping in the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden, in what they say is an act of solidarity with the Palestinians in Gaza amid the Israel-Hamas war there.

The war was sparked by Hamas’s shock October 7 assault, in which thousands of terrorists stormed southern Israel to kill nearly 1,200 people and take 251 hostages.

After repeatedly threatening to expand their operations, the Yemeni rebels claimed a drone attack Friday on Tel Aviv that killed one person and wounded several others.

It marked a “new phase” in their operations against Israel, said the Houthis, who have been steadily developing their drone capabilities since 2014, when they seized the Yemeni capital Sanaa in an Iran-backed rebellion.

Here is background on the Houthis’ technology: READ MORE