Yemen says won’t backtrack on Gaza, calls US 'biggest threat' to intl. shipping in Red Sea

A Yemeni deputy foreign minister has censured the latest spate of US and British airstrikes against positions across the country, emphasizing that the United States is the first and foremost threat to international shipping in the Red Sea.

Speaking at a press briefing in the Yemeni capital city of Sana’a on Monday, Hussein al-Ezzi stated that maritime navigation in the strategic water body is of paramount significance, noting that the Yemeni Armed Forces have time and again declared that international shipping companies are safe to sail their vessels in the area if they are neither Israeli-owned nor destined to ports in the occupied Palestinian territories.

“The United States is the first and foremost threat to shipping in the Red Sea, and it was the first party that militarized the region,” Ezzi said.

The senior Yemeni official added that his country’s military forces will not hesitate to respond to any act of aggression against their homeland, stressing that US and UK strikes won’t make the Republic of Yemen backtrack on its pro-Palestine stances and solidarity with Palestinians in the Gaza Strip.

He also praised Saudi Arabia for its “courageous” position in light of the airstrikes launched by the United States and Britain against several sites in Yemen, stating that Sana’a and Riyadh are on the path towards reconciliation.

Ezzi finally called for protest rallies in the US and Britain in condemnation of attacks against Yemen, extending his gratitude to all parties that have supported Yemeni retaliatory strikes in the Red Sea.

Hamas, Islamic Jihad slam US-UK aggression against Yemen

The US and Britain carried out dozens of air raids on the provinces of Sana’a, Hudaydah and Sa’ada, among several others.

Lebanon’s Arabic-language al-Mayadeen television news network reported late on Sunday that US and British forces had struck 11 targets in the western Yemeni province of Hudaydah, with most of the aerial raids aimed at the port of Ras Isa and al-Zaydiya city.

Baqim district in the northwestern Sa’ada province was bombed four times, while the eastern flank of Sa’ada city, located 240 kilometers (149 miles) north of the capital Sana’a, was hit once.

The United States and the United Kingdom have been carrying out strikes against Yemen after declaring that Yemeni forces bear the consequences of their attacks against Israeli-owned ships or merchant vessels heading to the occupied territories.

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 a surprise retaliatory attack, dubbed Operation Al-Aqsa Storm, against the occupying entity.

Yemeni Armed Forces have said that they won’t stop their attacks until unrelenting Israeli ground and aerial offensives in Gaza, which have killed at least 27,365 people and wounded another 66,630 individuals, come to an end. 

Leader of the Ansarullah resistance movement, Abdul-Malik al-Houthi, has said that it is “a great honor and blessing to be confronting America directly.”

The 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.

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