Houthis Turn Their Sights on U.S. Ships, Vow to Keep Attacking Red Sea Targets
U.S.-owned containership was struck and a Navy destroyer was targeted as attacks become more widespread and indiscriminate
Updated Jan. 15, 2024 7:24 pm ET The Wall Street Journal
Fresh attacks targeted American ships in the Middle East, days after the U.S. led a round of strikes meant to blunt the capability of Iran-backed Houthi rebels to hit ships transiting the Red Sea.
Late Monday, Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps claimed an attack targeting what it called Israeli spy bases in Iraq in retaliation for Israel’s killing of its commanders and allies, adding to tensions in the region about the potential for the war in Gaza to trigger a broader regional conflict.
Earlier, a Houthi missile struck the Gibraltar Eagle, a U.S. bulk carrier, off the coast of Yemen without causing injury or significant damage on Monday, said the U.S. Central Command, which oversees U.S. military operations in the Middle East.
The Houthis later claimed responsibility for the attack.
, the ship’s U.S. owner, didn’t respond to a request for comment.Recent Houthi attacks, initially directed against Israeli-linked vessels, have rattled global markets, upended international shipping routes and become increasingly indiscriminate. The rebels have attacked vessels from boxships to tankers moving sanctioned Russian oil as the global shipping nexus complicates their ability to identify specific targets.
They vowed again Monday to continue their campaign against U.S. and international targets in the region in response to Israel’s actions in Gaza. “Anyone attempting to hinder us from doing so will fail,” a Houthi official said Monday.
Nasruddin Amer, a Houthi spokesman, later said that the Yemeni rebel group would expand its targeting of American vessels. “The ship doesn’t necessarily have to be heading to Israel for us to target it, it is enough for it to be American,” he told the Al Jazeera news network.
The Houthi strikes follow what have been dozens of attacks targeting U.S. interests in the Middle East since the start of the war between Israel and Hamas in the Gaza Strip in October.
Iran’s Revolutionary Guards said late Monday they had launched ballistic missiles at what they claimed were Israeli spy bases in Erbil, Iraq, in retaliation for the killing of some of their officers and allies, according to an IRGC statement carried by Iranian state media. In recent weeks, Israel has allegedly killed a top Guard adviser in Syria and senior members of Lebanon’s Hezbollah and Hamas. Israel hasn’t commented on the strikes.
Iraqi Kurd officials, who have denied any Israeli intelligence presence in Erbil, said the IRGC had struck a private home, killing five civilians. The strike was near the local American consulate, but no U.S. facilities were affected, according to U.S. officials. The Israeli prime minister’s office didn’t immediately return a request for comment.
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The Houthis have launched dozens of missile and drone attacks in the Red Sea, mostly against commercial shipping, since the Oct. 7 attacks by Hamas and other militants from Gaza that prompted Israel to respond with an air and ground campaign in the Palestinian enclave. In retaliation, the U.S. and its allies hit dozens of Houthi-controlled areas in Yemen last week in an effort to degrade the ability of the group to strike in the Red Sea.
But the attacks have continued. U.S. forces earlier Monday also detected an antiship ballistic missile fired toward the southern Red Sea commercial shipping lanes. The missile failed in flight and landed in Yemen, the U.S. Central Command, or Centcom, said.
It followed the U.S. military’s shooting down of a cruise missile fired from Houthi rebel areas toward an American Navy destroyer in the Red Sea on Sunday.
Still, most of the Houthi attacks have struck ships that have no apparent connection to Israel or its allies.
In recent days, they have targeted a vessel laden with oil from the Russian port of Ust Luga, according to shipping trackers. The vessel had previously been owned by a British company but was bought last year by an offshore entity in the Seychelles.