Yemen gives Israel four-day ultimatum to stop blocking Gaza aid
Sanaa says it is ready to reimpose a blockade on Israeli-linked ships in regional waters if the ceasefire violations continue
The leader of Yemen's Ansarallah resistance movement, Abdul Malik al-Houthi, announced on 7 March a four-day grace period for Israel to resume ceasefire talks and lift its blockade on humanitarian aid for Gaza, threatening to resume Sanaa's naval operations against Israeli-linked ships.
"We meet the siege with a siege," Houthi emphasized, adding that Yemen “cannot stand by and watch the Israeli enemy’s aggressive approach in starving the Palestinian people in Gaza.”
“We do not just issue statements, but we can support the Palestinians in several areas,” the Ansarallah leader said, pointing out that "in the course of implementing the ceasefire in Gaza, it was clear that the Israeli enemy was procrastinating in fulfilling its obligations, especially those related to the humanitarian file.
The Ansarallah-led Yemeni Armed Forces (YAF) ceased military operations in support of Palestine following the start of a US-sponsored ceasefire in Gaza earlier this year. Since November 2023, the YAF repeatedly targeted US, UK, and Israeli-linked commercial ships and western warships in the Red Sea, the Indian Ocean, and the Mediterranean Sea.
Sanaa's efforts to stop the US-Israeli genocide in Gaza prompted an illegal warinitiated by Washington and London, resulting in hundreds of airstrikes in the Arab world's poorest nation.
Despite the western onslaught, the YAF were undeterred in their military campaign and forced several US aircraft carriers and European warships out of the Red Sea. The country has also downed 15 US MQ-9 Reaper drones and recently fired its air defenses on a US F-16 jet.
A year ago, the former US Special Envoy for Yemen, Timothy Lenderking, admittedthat “there is no military solution” for Yemen.
“I don’t think people really understand just kind of how deadly serious it is what we’re doing and how under threat the ships continue to be,” Commander Eric Blomberg with the USS Laboon told US media last year.
Houthi's warning comes almost a week after Israel reimposed a total blockade on humanitarian aid shipments for Gaza after obstructing the ceasefire agreement from moving forward by demanding an extension of the first phase.
Hamas has rejected any extension of phase one and is demanding strict adherence to the agreement and international pressure on Israel.
“The resumption of war on Gaza will be met with the entire [Israeli] enemy entity coming under fire ... If the war returns to Gaza, we will intervene with support through various military means,” Houthi warned on Sunday.