Yemen’s Houthis have carried out military operations against three ships in the Red Sea and Arabian Sea, the group’s military spokesman Yahya Saree said on Wednesday.
“Yemen’s Houthis launched missile and drone strikes against two ships in the Red Sea, the Roza and the Vantage Dream,” Saree said in a televised statement.
A third ship, the US vessel Maersk Seletar, was attacked in the Arabian Sea using drones, Saree added.
The Houthi organisation, which controls the most populous areas of Yemen and is backed by Iran, has been attacking ships off its coast for months, saying it was acting in solidarity with the Hamas terrorist group, also backed by Iran, which is fighting Israel in the Gaza Strip. That war began on October 7 with a Hamas shock attack that killed some 1,200 people and took 250 hostages in Gaza.
Earlier, the group announced it would attack all ships linked in any way to Israel and prevent them from passing through the waters of the Red Sea and the Bab el-Mandeb Strait. According to the US Maritime Administration, the group has carried out more than 50 attacks on ships since November, killing three sailors, hijacking one vessel and sinking another.
In response to the Houthi threat in the Red Sea, the US and UK began strikes against the group from January, with the US regularly launching its own strikes thereafter.
