Israel says intercepts missile fired from Yemen

JERUSALEM: The Israeli military said Friday it intercepted a missile fired from Yemen, where Huthi rebels recently claimed responsibility for a missile launch that targeted Israel.

“Following the sirens that sounded a short while ago in several areas in Israel, a missile that was launched from Yemen was intercepted” before entering Israeli territory, the Israel Defense Forces said in a statement.

Yemen’s Iran-backed Huthi rebels have not claimed responsibility for the Friday launch, but said Sunday they had launched a “hypersonic missile” at the Nevatim air base in Israel’s Negev desert.

The Huthis are part of Iran’s “axis of resistance” against Israel and the United States, portraying themselves as defenders of Palestinians in the Gaza Strip amid the ongoing Israel-Hamas war.

They have launched repeated missile and drone attacks on both Israel and merchant shipping in the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden, prompting retaliatory air strikes by Israel, Britain and the United States against Huthi targets.

Since President Donald Trump took office in January, the US air campaign has intensified, with almost daily strikes for more than a month.

Huthi-controlled media said this week that US strikes on the movement’s stronghold of Saada killed at least 68 people, all Africans being held at a “centre for illegal migrants”.

Washington said at the end of April that US strikes since March 15 had hit more than 1,000 targets in Yemen, saying earlier that “hundreds of Huthi fighters had been killed as a result” of US strikes.

The Huthi-run Saba news agency said Friday that three people were wounded in a US air strike Thursday evening in the Al Wahda district, citing a preliminary toll from the health ministry.

-AFP