Yemen is a country in southwestern Arabia. The Houthis, an anti-American militia, control northern Yemen, where three quarters of Yemen’s people live.
The Houthis are now firing missiles at Israel:
Houthi militants launched ballistic missiles at Israel on Saturday morning, marking their entry into the month-long Iran war that has already caused chaos in energy markets and killed thousands of people.
Some 3,500 sailors and Marines arrived in the region on an amphibious assault ship, according to the US military. Israel continued bombing Iran overnight and on Saturday, while Tehran stepped up strikes across the region and wounded many American personnel in an attack on a Saudi base, according to multiple media reports.
The Yemen-based Houthis, who are supported by Iran, said they would continue operations until US-Israeli attacks on the Islamic Republic and its proxy militant groups, including Hezbollah in Lebanon, cease.
Israel’s military said it identified the launch of a missile from Yemen toward its territory, but did not immediately say if the projectile was intercepted.
The move by the Houthis — announced via a statement on Telegram — opens a new front in the war and raises fresh risks for the oil market. The group hasn’t launched strikes on Israel since a ceasefire in the country’s war against Hamas in Gaza began in October.
While the Houthis didn’t say they would target tankers or other vessels transiting the southern Red Sea and the Bab El-Mandeb Strait, they have the capability to do so. The group effectively shut the waterway to most Western shippers after the war in Gaza began in 2023, forcing vessels to reroute and disrupting a key shipping corridor.
The Saudi Arabian port of Yanbu, which the kingdom is using to bypass the closed Strait of Hormuz for its oil exports, is well within the range of Houthi missiles.
For now, the Houthis are likely to avoid targeting Saudi oil sites, New York-based political consultancy Eurasia Group said in a note to clients. The Islamist militants agreed a truce with Saudi Arabia in 2022, which has largely held and involved the Saudi government making some payments to areas under Houthi control.
In 2024, the Houthis shot down a $30 million U.S. drone. The downing of the drone was announced in a video that chanted the Houthi slogan, “death to America; death to Israel; curse the Jews; victory to Islam.”
The Houthis have restored slavery in Yemen. “The Houthis have expanded slavery in the areas of Yemen they control. More than 1,800 Yemenis are kept as slaves” by Houthi leaders.
Despite their violence, extremism, and reinstitution of slavery, the Houthis have been praised by left-wing groups in America, such as the National Lawyers Guild. The National Lawyers Guild shares the Houthis’ reflexive anti-Americanism. People affiliated with the radical National Lawyers Guild have gone on to become federal appeals court clerks to progressive judges. Such left-wing law clerks draft opinions and orders for powerful Democratic-appointed judges in cases affecting the lives of millions of people, pushing the law in a leftward direction.
