The death toll from an Israeli strike on Yemen's rebel-held port of Hodeida climbed to six, Houthi health authorities said on Sunday, July 21, with firefighting teams battling a blaze at the harbor.
Saturday's strike on the port, a key entry point for fuel and humanitarian aid to war-ravaged Yemen, is the first claimed by Israel in the Arabian peninsula's poorest country, about 2,000 kilometers away. It killed six people and injured 83, many of them with severe burns, the rebel-run health ministry said in a statement carried by Houthi media. It said three others remained missing. Earlier, Houthi military spokesman Yahya Saree said the rebels' "response to the Israeli aggression against our country is inevitably coming and will be huge."
Israel said it carried out the strike in response to a drone attack by the Houthis on Tel Aviv, which killed one person on Friday. More operations against the Houthis will follow "if they dare to attack us," Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said. After the strike, the Israeli military said on Sunday it intercepted a missile fired from Yemen toward the Red Sea resort town of Eilat, noting that "the projectile did not cross into Israeli territory."
Saree, the Houthi spokesman, said the rebels had fired ballistic missiles toward Eilat, the latest in a string of Houthi attempts to hit the port city. The rebel announcement came as firefighters struggled to contain the blaze in Hodeida, with thick plumes of smoke above the city, said an Agence France-Presse (AFP) correspondent.
Fuel storage tanks and a power plant at the port were still ablaze amid "slow" firefighting efforts, said a port employee. The employee, who spoke on condition of anonymity for security concerns, said it could take days to contain the fire, a view echoed by Yemen experts.
Hodeida port, a vital entry point for fuel imports and international aid for rebel-held areas of Yemen, had remained largely untouched through the decade-long war between the Houthis and the internationally recognized government propped up by neighboring Saudi Arabia.
The Houthis control swathes of Yemen, including much of its Red Sea coast, and the war has left millions of Yemenis dependent on aid supplied through the port. Despite Houthi assurances of sufficient fuel stocks, Saturday's strike triggered fears of worsening shortages.
Yemen's internationally-recognized government condemned the strike and held Israel responsible for a worsening humanitarian crisis. A statement carried by the official Saba news agency said the Yemeni government holds "the Zionist entity fully responsible for any repercussions resulting from its airstrikes, including the deepening of a humanitarian crisis."
Iran's foreign ministry spokesman Nasser Kanaani "strongly condemned" the attack saying it was "an expression of the aggressive behaviour of the child-killing Israeli regime."