Incident in the Gulf of Aden came after the Houthis claimed on Tuesday night to have attacked the “Israeli” MSC Sarah ship in the Arabian Sea
Houthis have increased assaults on ships in international seas off Yemen, the Indian Ocean and the Mediterranean, issuing almost daily announcements claiming fresh strikes
Updated 26 June 2024
Saeed Al-Batati
AL-MUKALLA: A missile apparently launched by Yemen’s Houthi militia landed near a ship south of Yemen’s southern port city of Aden on Wednesday, hours after the Houthis claimed to be deploying a new long-range missile in their anti-ship campaign.
The UK Maritime Trade Operations said it received an alarm from a ship’s master regarding a missile impacting waters near the vessel, 52 miles south of Aden, adding that the ship and its crew were safe.
“The vessel is proceeding to its next port of call,” the UKMTO said in its alert, advising ships navigating the Gulf of Aden to take vigilance and notify the authority of any suspicious activities.
The incident in the Gulf of Aden came after the Houthis claimed on Tuesday night to have attacked the “Israeli” MSC Sarah ship in the Arabian Sea using a newly deployed long-range missile.
The MSC Sarah is a Liberian-flagged container ship heading from Panama to the UAE and was seen in the Gulf of Oman on Wednesday morning, according to ship monitoring website marinetraffic.com.
“The Yemeni Armed Forces maintained that this qualitative operation was carried out with a new ballistic missile that went into service after the successful conclusion of testing operations. The missile is distinguished by its ability to attack targets precisely and across vast distances,” Houthi military spokesman Yahya Sarea said in a televised statement.
The Houthis were referring to an incident reported by the UKMTO on Monday, in which the master of a ship reported a nearby explosion 246 nautical miles southeast of Nishtun, a coastal town in the government-controlled Yemeni province of Mahra.
This month, the Houthis have increased assaults on ships in international seas off Yemen, the Indian Ocean and the Mediterranean, issuing almost daily announcements claiming fresh strikes, as opposed to the weekly claims of the past.
The US Central Command and the UK maritime agencies provide comparable daily statements regarding Houthi attacks on ships using drones, ballistic missiles and explosive-laden drone boats, as well as the shooting down of such weapons before they reach their intended targets.
The Houthis maintain that their actions are purely aimed at Israeli-linked ships and those traveling to Israeli ports to put pressure on Israel to end its war in the Palestinian Gaza Strip.
Separately, the Yemeni government has accused the Houthis of holding four Yemenia Airways planes in Sanaa, preventing hundreds of Yemeni pilgrims from returning home.
In a post on X, Yemeni Minister of Endowments and Guidance Mohammed Shabebah said that the Houthis had prevented four Yemenia aircraft from departing Sanaa airport for Jeddah to bring back Yemeni pilgrims, and that he has requested pilgrims to wait in their Makkah hotels until the planes are released.
“The Houthis are holding four aircraft at Sanaa International Airport, preventing them from returning to Jeddah Airport to take pilgrims to Sanaa,” the minister said. Yemenia said a few days ago that the Houthis are holding one of its planes at Sanaa airport and preventing maintenance, as well as refusing to allow the airline to access the more than $100 million in bank accounts held by the Houthis in Sanaa.
At the same time, Human Rights Watch said on Wednesday that the Houthis have abducted and forcibly disappeared over 60 Yemeni staffers from UN agencies, international missions and organizations since May 31, denying them access to lawyers, contacting their families or receiving life-saving drugs.
Citing relatives and experts, the international rights group asserted that the most recent Houthi crackdown is intended to divert attention from the militia’s failure to provide basic services, exert pressure on the central bank in Aden to revoke sanctions on Sanaa-based banks, and seize complete control over critical financial streams from the health, education and corporate sectors, as well as humanitarian aid agencies.
“The Houthis should immediately release all of these people, many of whom have spent their careers working to improve their country,” Niku Jafarnia, Yemen and Bahrain researcher at Human Rights Watch said in a statement, urging the international community to intervene and exert pressure on the Houthis to secure the release of the abducted Yemenis.
“The international community should be doing everything in their power to ensure that these people are immediately released.”
Health workers in Lebanon describe deadly Israeli attacks on colleagues and fear more
The health ministry on Thursday said 40 paramedics, firefighters and health care workers had been killed in Israeli attacks over three days, making it even more challenging to care for people wounded in the intense fighting
Updated 10 sec ago
AP
BEIRUT: Israel’s military struck outside the gates of a hospital in southern Lebanon without warning on Friday, killing seven paramedics and forcing the facility to close, the hospital director told The Associated Press a day after one of the most deadly attacks on health workers in the weeks since fighting escalated between Israel and Hezbollah.
The account of the Friday airstrikes that flung hospital doors off their hinges and shattered glass was the latest to detail attacks that Lebanon’s health ministry says have killed dozens of health workers.
Marjayoun hospital director Mounes Kalakesh said that even before Friday’s attack, ambulance crews in the area were so reluctant to operate that the facility had not received anyone wounded for days.
“We have not been able to work. There was fear and panic among the staff,” he said.
Kalakesh said the government hospital didn’t receive any warning from Israeli forces before the attack, even though nearby villages have received such warnings to evacuate.
Israel has not commented specifically on the incident. Friday’s attack came hours before Israel’s Arabic-language military spokesman accused the Hezbollah militant group, based in southern Lebanon, of using ambulances to transport weapons and fighters, and warned medical teams to stay clear of the group. The spokesman provided no evidence.
It is a charge that Lebanese officials and hospital directors, including Kalakesh, deny. Lebanon’s health minister has accused Israel of committing “a war crime” by targeting medical teams and paramedics.
The health ministry on Thursday said 40 paramedics, firefighters and health care workers had been killed in Israeli attacks over three days, making it even more challenging to care for people wounded in the intense fighting.
The ministry has said more than 100 health workers have been killed in the year since the war in Gaza began and since Israel and Hezbollah stepped up exchanges of fire along the border.
The paramedics with the Islamic Health Committee are part of the coordinated health ministry response to crises in Lebanon. Other civil defense teams have expressed concern for their safety, with some saying they came under attack while clearly identified and operating in areas where they were transporting the wounded or putting out fires.
Israeli strikes have landed near the Marjayoun hospital before but never had come so close, Kalakesh said. He described the paramedics dying in their burning vehicles.
The 45-bed hospital is now shut down.
“I am responsible for this staff. I must protect them,” Kalakesh said, explaining the decision to evacuate. At the time of the Friday attack, there were 30 staff in the hospital. His team was already exhausted after a year of working close to the front line.
Other groups have expressed concern.
A Lebanese Red Cross convoy, escorted by Lebanese troops and coordinated with the UN peacekeeping force in Lebanon, came under fire on Thursday. A Lebanese soldier was killed and four Red Cross volunteers were wounded.
Separately on Thursday, Israeli forces struck rescue teams with the Islamic Health Committee in Beirut’s southern suburbs and the southern village of Odeissah, killing at least four.
In Odeissah, responding ambulances were hit by Israeli fire and three medics who were wounded in the initial attack were killed as rescuers tried to reach them, the health ministry said. In the Beirut suburbs, the team working to remove rubble from the initial airstrike was hit in a drone attack that killed a driver and wounded seven, said Islamic Health Committee spokesman Mahmoud Karaki.
Targeting the health sector undermines the safety net for the public, Karaki said, He said 145 of his team members have been wounded over the past year.
Lebanon’s health ministry has said nine hospitals and 45 health care centers have been damaged during that time.
Hours after the Friday attack outside Marjayoun hospital, another hospital in the southern town of Bint Jbeil was shelled by Israeli forces after receiving a warning to evacuate. Nine members of the medical and nursing staff at Salah Ghandour Hospital were wounded, most of them seriously.
The hospital later shut down because of the damage.
Netanyahu says ‘shame’ on Macron for urging halt to arms supply to Israel
Netanyahu said Israel was fighting a war on several fronts against groups backed by arch-foe Iran
Updated 7 min 23 sec ago
AFP
JERUSALEM: Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Saturday slammed French President Emmanuel Macron for calling for a halt to arms supplies to Israel, which is fighting wars in Gaza and Lebanon.
“As Israel fights the forces of barbarism led by Iran, all civilized countries should be standing firmly by Israel’s side. Yet, President Macron and other Western leaders are now calling for arms embargoes against Israel. Shame on them,” Netanyahu said in a statement issued by his office.
Netanyahu said Israel was fighting a war on several fronts against groups backed by arch-foe Iran.
“Is Iran imposing an arms embargo on Hezbollah, on the Houthis, on Hamas and on its other proxies? Of course not,” he said. All three groups are backed by Tehran and form part of its “axis of resistance” against Israel.
“This axis of terror stands together. But countries who supposedly oppose this terror axis call for an arms embargo on Israel. What a disgrace!“
Netanyahu said Israel would win even without their support.
“But their shame will continue long after the war is won,” he said.
“Rest assured, Israel will fight until the battle is won — for our sake and for the sake of peace and security in the world.”
Gaza journalist, her family among 12 killed in Israeli strikes
Macron urges halt to arms deliveries to Israel, stresses ‘political solution’ to conflict
Updated 47 min 9 sec ago
AFP
CAIRO/PARIS: Israeli airstrikes pounded areas across the Gaza Strip on Monday killing 12, including a journalist and her family, medics said, although the intensity of the ground offensive has subsided as Israel steps up its fight with Hezbollah in Lebanon.
Palestinian health officials said Wafa Al-Udaini, who wrote articles about the war in English advocating the Palestinian viewpoint, was killed when a missile struck her house in the central city of Deir Al-Balah, also killing her husband and their two children. Udaini’s death raised the number of Palestinian journalists killed in the Israeli offensive since Oct. 7 to 174, the Hamas-run Gaza government media office said.
In another strike, a Palestinian was killed and several were wounded in Rafah, near the border with Egypt, while in the northern town of Beit Hanoun an airstrike killed one man and injured others, medics said.
FASTFACT
Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi renewed his call for ceasefires in both Gaza and Lebanon as he held talks with his country’s Syrian ally.
An Israeli airstrike on a house in Nuseirat, one of Gaza Strip’s eight historic refugee camps, killed six people, health officials said.
Some residents said fighting and Israeli military activities in Gaza have declined slightly in the past week as Israel has escalated its military offensive in Lebanon.
While the intensity of the ground offensive has been lower, Israel has kept up its airstrikes in the enclave, they added.
Most of Gaza’s population of 2.3 million has been displaced by the war, in which more than 41,500 Palestinians have been killed, according to Gaza health authorities.
French President Emmanuel Macron urged a halt to arms deliveries to Israel, which has been criticized over the conduct of its retaliatory operation in Gaza.
“I think that today, the priority is that we return to a political solution, that we stop delivering weapons to fight in Gaza,” Macron told broadcaster France Inter.
“France is not delivering any,” he added during the interview recorded early this week.
The US provides about $3 billion in weapons to Israel each year.
In May, the State Department said it did not have enough evidence to block shipments of weapons but that it was “reasonable to assess” that Israel has used arms in ways inconsistent with standards of humanitarian law.
In September, Britain said it was suspending some arms exports to Israel, citing a “clear risk” that they could be used in a serious breach of international humanitarian law.
Macron reiterated his concern over the conflict in Gaza that is continuing despite repeated calls for a ceasefire.
“I think we are not being heard,” he said. “I think it is a mistake, including for the security of Israel,” he said, adding that the conflict was leading to “hatred.”
Macron also said avoiding an escalation in Lebanon was a “priority.”
“Lebanon cannot become a new Gaza,” he added.
Frankly Speaking: Fareed Zakaria on Israel, Gaza and the region post-Oct. 7
No matter which presidential candidate wins, they will have limited ability to influence Israel, says renowned journalist and author
Says the world may have overestimated Hezbollah’s fighting capacity and Iran’s ability to mount a meaningful response
Updated 38 min 44 sec ago
Arab News
RIYADH: No matter who becomes the next US president, they will have very little ability to rein in Israeli excesses in Gaza, Lebanon, and the wider Middle East, CNN journalist, author and political analyst Fareed Zakaria has said.
Although Democratic Party nominee Kamala Harris may be willing to adjust the Biden administration’s stance on Gaza if she is elected, Zakaria believes the nature of US politics will leave her hands effectively tied.
“I doubt you’re going to see much reining in that the American president is able to do,” Zakaria said on the Arab News current affairs program “Frankly Speaking” during a visit to Saudi Arabia for the Riyadh International Book Fair, where he was promoting his latest book, “Age of Revolutions.”
The Indian-born American journalist is the host of CNN’s Fareed Zakaria GPS and writes a weekly column for The Washington Post. A prolific author, Zakaria has a Ph.D. in government from Harvard University where he studied under such famous scholars as Samuel P. Huntington and Stanley Hoffmann.
Zakaria told “Frankly Speaking” host Katie Jensen that Israel seems to have decided to take this opportunity and try to do something much more dramatic to turn the tables on this “Axis of Resistance.” (AN photo)
The American political model made it difficult for Washington to take a firmer line on Israel, he told “Frankly Speaking” host Katie Jensen.
“There will be a bit on the margins,” Zakaria said. “I suspect a Democratic administration would be able to restrain them a little more.”
He added: “Even if Congress can pass laws, Israel probably has strong enough support that they could even override a presidential veto in some circumstances.”
By contrast, Zakaria believes the one person who could rein in Israel is Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, because Israel is eager to normalize ties with Saudi Arabia.
Zakaria told “Frankly Speaking” host Katie Jensen that Israel seems to have decided to take this opportunity and try to do something much more dramatic to turn the tables on this “Axis of Resistance.” (AN photo)
Saudi Arabia has conditioned normalization on Israel offering tangible progress on the question of Palestinian statehood and the Arab Peace Initiative first proposed by Riyadh in 2002.
“Israel wants a normalization of relations with Saudi Arabia,” said Zakaria. “If you look around the Arab world, even if you look at the US, the person with the most leverage in that sense is Mohammed bin Salman, the crown prince of Saudi Arabia.
“In return for normalization, he has the opportunity to ask for something, but it has to be something you could imagine an Israeli government accepting. So that’s going to be a very complicated dance.”
Forced to take a hardline stance by his right-wing coalition, Zakaria says, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is in no position to pursue normalization in exchange for implementing the peace plan.
“Right now, my sense is, Bibi Netanyahu is less concerned about Saudi normalization, because he realizes that anything he says that puts him on the path toward granting the Palestinians political rights, statehood, whatever, will be too much for his coalition partners that include a few very, very extreme Israeli nationalists who believe in essentially no Palestinian state, ever,” he said.
“He knows that if he goes even half a step toward that, he loses his government. So maybe that’s why he’s decided I’m going to go forward and deal with Hezbollah in a much more aggressive way because I can’t do the Saudi normalization deal anyway.”
A demonstrator holds a placard depicting Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu during a Pro-Palestinian rally in Warsaw on October 5, 2024. (AFP)
With public opinion in Israel swinging against the two-state solution to the decades-old Israeli-Palestinian conflict — especially since the Hamas-led attack of Oct. 7 — the chances of advancing any peace plan seem more remote than ever.
However, as Zakaria put in the form of a rhetorical question, what alternative is there to the “intolerable situation” that Israel finds itself in?
“Let’s be honest, Israel has changed,” he said. “It is much more right wing now. The Knesset had a vote on the two-state solution. I think only eight members of Israel’s parliament voted in favor of a two-state solution. I think it was 68 who voted against. So you’re in a very difficult place in Israel if you want a two-state solution.
“But what I come back to is, what is the solution that people in Israel have for the problem of the Palestinian people? Ehud Olmert, former Likud prime minister, so a right-wing prime minister, said very eloquently on my television program, look, there’s 6 million Palestinians in Israel who don’t have any political rights. How can Israel as a democracy continue like that?
“At some point, there has to be some resolution to that. And the only resolution, he was arguing, that makes any sense, that is compatible with the idea of Israel as a democracy, would be to give the Palestinians a state.
People demonstrate in Dublin, Ireland, on October 5, 2024, in solidarity with Palestinians in Gaza, ahead of the October 7th attack anniversary, amid the Israel-Hamas conflict. (Reuters)
“And when you talk to people who are opponents of the two-state solution, they fudge and obfuscate and meander. They don’t actually ever answer that question centrally because what they are accepting is a completely intolerable situation, which is, you know, two classes of citizens, you know, with the Palestinians not even really being citizens.
“They are citizens of nowhere. They don’t have political rights. And that surely can’t continue unendingly, but it is. We are in the 56th year of that circumstance, that occupation.”
Zakaria said he sympathizes with the Palestinian people, but believes they have been let down by both Hamas in Gaza and the Fatah-led Palestinian Authority in the West Bank.
“I think they’ve been led by a series of leaders who in the case of Hamas really have adopted a kind of terrorist mentality where it’s okay to kill women, children, civilians,” he said.
“On the other side, you have the Palestinian Authority that is so corrupt and ineffective that Abu Mazen, Mahmoud Abbas, cannot hold elections for fear of the fact that of course he will be voted out of office by an enraged Palestinian population.
“In addition to that, they missed many negotiating opportunities along the way. I do think they’ve been badly served.”
Palestinian President Mahmud Abbas (C) meeting with a delegation of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) ahead of unity talks hosted by Egypt in al-Alamein. (AFP/File)
Following the Oct. 7 Hamas-led attack, Israel launched its retaliatory operation in Gaza. However, in solidarity with its Hamas allies, Lebanon’s Iran-backed Hezbollah began rocketing Israel from the north, opening up a second front.
What began as a relatively contained exchange of fire along the Israel-Lebanon border suddenly escalated in September, with Israel attacking Hezbollah’s communication networks, weapons caches, and its leadership, culminating in the killing of its leader Hassan Nasrallah on Sept. 27.
Iran retaliated for the killing of Nasrallah by launching a massive barrage of missiles at military targets in Israel on Oct. 1. The Iranian attack caused minimal damage, however, and appeared to be designed to send a message of deterrence rather than start an inter-state war.
But what stands out from this escalation over the past month is the surprising ease with which Israel was able to defang Hezbollah and the apparent inability of Iran to muster a meaningful defense or retort.
Lebanon's Hezbollah supporters had been busy burying dead leaders and commanders these past months as Israel continued to take them down one by one. (AFP/File)
“It’s really extraordinary, first, just to note how well Israeli intelligence was able to penetrate Hezbollah,” said Zakaria. “The pagers, the locations of the weapons caches, and of course the locations of the leadership, including Nasrallah.
“What that tells me is that Hezbollah, which was often viewed as this fearsome fighting force, had also become fat, corrupt, an organization that lived off of all kinds of corruption and arms deals and patronage from Iran, and so was more easily penetrated than one might have imagined. Israel really has destroyed a very large part of it.”
Sharing his impressions following his recent interview with Iran’s President Masoud Pezeshkian on CNN, Zakaria suggested that many in the West may have also overestimated Tehran’s capabilities.
“The Iranian president not only essentially said this was up to Hezbollah — and by the way, I don’t see how Hezbollah could really mount a defense; Israel is so much more powerful, its weapons are so much more powerful, and it’s supported by the US — he also implied that Iran did not have the capacity,” said Zakaria.
Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian speaks during the 79th Session of the United Nations General Assembly in New York City on September 24, 2024. (AFP)
“He said, essentially, we should call a meeting of Islamic countries to condemn what Israel is doing. That’s not a particularly lethal response that you’d imagine, and very different from his predecessors.
“I had interviewed his predecessor, President Ebrahim Raisi, only a year ago, I think. And he had a very different, much more militant, much more hardline view, and would never have expressed openly the idea that Hezbollah didn’t actually have that lethal an arsenal. So there’s some shift in Iran that’s interesting.
“You never know how much power the president has but I think that what we are seeing both with Hezbollah and with Iran is that perhaps we have painted them to be 10 feet tall when they were really, you know, more like 5 feet tall.”
Throughout the crisis in Gaza, and now in Lebanon and between Israel and Iran, the Biden administration has been at pains to prevent a slide into all-out regional war, while also maintaining staunch support for Israel’s right to exist and to defend itself.
Fareed Zakaria said regardless of who between Donald Trump or Kamala Harris becomes the next US president, US influence on Israel will not have much bearing as regards Israel's conflict with the Palestinians. (AFP/File photos)
With Americans going to the polls in November to decide whether Vice President Harris or former President Trump will form the next administration, can the Middle East expect a meaningful change of course on support for Israel? Zakaria is not so sure.
“It’s going to be very hard for either of them to do it because Bibi Netanyahu knows one country almost as well as he knows Israel, and that is the US,” he said. “And he knows how to play the American political system to his advantage.”
So, who does Zakaria expect to win the election? And does he have a preferred candidate?
“Look, anyone who tells you they know who’s gonna win is, I think, wildly exaggerating their powers of wisdom. It is essentially a statistical tie … so it would be foolhardy for me to make a prediction about who’s gonna win. I try not to approach this with the idea that I’m rooting for a team, but I’ll tell you my central concern as somebody who focuses on international affairs.”
He added: “I’m not that partisan. If Trump came in and did some good things, I'd cheer him on. When he did, I cheered him on. So, I try to approach this from the perspective of somebody who is looking at the issues and not at the horse race and who I should bet on.”
Spanish king on Jordan trip says conflict in Gaza has brought unspeakable destruction, must end
In address at Spanish ambassador’s residence in Amman, monarch condemned humanitarian crisis in the enclave
Updated 05 October 2024
Arab News
LONDON: King Felipe VI of Spain on Saturday urged for an immediate cessation of hostilities in Gaza on the first day of his trip to Jordan.
In an address at the Spanish ambassador’s residence in Amman the monarch condemned the humanitarian crisis that has emerged from the conflict in the enclave, which began a year ago, and lamented the suffering and destruction it has wrought, adding: “The conflict must end as soon as possible.”
He also emphasized the deep historical ties between Spain and Jordan, and highlighted the strong political, economic, and cultural interests shared by both countries.
The meeting with the Spanish community in Jordan was a platform for the king to express solidarity and a collective desire for peace amid ongoing regional tensions in the Middle East, he said.
“In these moments, we are also united by a deep desire for peace and dialogue,” King Felipe said.
He called for a return to diplomatic efforts to resolve the Gaza crisis, advocating for the resumption of intensive negotiations aimed at achieving a two-state solution.
“We want to see an end to the humanitarian drama and the silence of weapons, to return to the path of politics and diplomacy,” he said, underscoring the need for a solid and lasting peace for both the Palestinians and Israelis.
King Felipe also expressed optimism about the increasing presence of Spanish companies in Jordan, which he said would play a vital role in promoting growth, prosperity, and employment within the kingdom.
He voiced hopes for an upcoming business forum that would showcase this economic collaboration.
The king also recognized the significant contributions of Spanish cooperation programs in Jordan, praising the efforts of staff working through NGOs and the Spanish embassy’s cooperation office.
“Their work is particularly important in light of the circumstances and challenges the Jordanian society is facing,” he said, referring to Jordan’s longstanding role as a host for refugees fleeing conflict.
