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Israel has vowed to begin targeting leaders of the Iranian-backed Houthis in Yemen — a major escalation after the terror group claimed responsibility for a spate of missile and drone attacks.
“Just as we took care of [Yayha] Sinwar in Gaza, [Ismail] Haniyeh in Tehran and [Hassan] Nasrallah in Beirut, we will deal with the heads of the Houthis in Sana’a or anywhere in Yemen,” Israel’s defense minister Israel Katz said Tuesday, according to the Times of Israel.
The warring words came as Houthi rebels fired another ballistic missile at the Jewish state early Tuesday morning, triggering sirens across the center of the country.
The Israel Defense Forces said it managed to intercept the missile using its long-range Arrow air defense system before it entered Israeli airspace, the Times of Israel reported.
Nobody was injured in the attacks, but one person was seriously hurt in the rush to seek shelter and a brief panic was sown across the city.
On Friday, however, 16 were injured after a Houthi missile exploded on a Tel Aviv playground.
At least 200 missiles and 170 drones have been launched into Israel by the Houthis in the last year.
Israel has previously attacked Houthi infrastructure in Yemen, but now it seems the Jewish nation has had enough.
“We will act both against their infrastructure and against them to remove the threat,” Katz said.
The defense minister also issued a threat to Iran, promising that “whoever sponsors the Houthi terror in Hodeida or Sana’a will pay the full price.”
Iran is known to back Muslim extremists in the region and has provided much of the funding for the Houthis, Hezbollah in Lebanon, and Hamas in Gaza, during their aggressions against Israel.
On Monday, Katz also vowed to “decapitate” Houthi leadership.
The Houthis have previously promised to continue their harassment of Israel so long as the war in Gaza persists.
With Iran’s backing, the Houthis spent much of the year bringing chaos to the Mediterranean and international commerce by harassing shipping lanes in the Red Sea in the hopes of disrupting the flow of supplies into Israel.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Sunday that Israel would deal with the Houthis in the same way as it has dealt with other of Iran’s “terrorist arms.”
Hezbollah previously vowed to continue launching rockets into Israel from Lebanon so long as the war in Gaza continued — but were cowed in November and agreed to a ceasefire after the Jewish state destroyed its ability to wage war and killed its leader, Nasrallah.
As the tensions continue to mount, some leaders in Israel — including senior politician Benny Gantz, and many within Israel’s security operations — think it is time to target Iran directly, according to the Times of Israel.
Iran has previously launched two barrages directly at Israel — most of which were intercepted — while Israel has responded by destroying Iranian launch sites.
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