Daily Times

Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi rebels fired drones towards Israel on Tuesday in retaliation for its war against Hamas, a senior official from the group told AFP.

“These drones belong to the state of Yemen,” Abdelaziz bin Habtour, prime minister of the Houthi government, said when asked about the launch towards Eilat in southern Israel.

The Houthis, who seized Yemen´s capital Sanaa in 2014 and control large swathes of the country, are “part of the axis of resistance” against Israel and are fighting with “words and drones”, he added.

Israel´s military earlier reported a “hostile aircraft intrusion” that set off warning sirens in the area of Eilat, a resort town on the Red Sea.

“There is no threat in this region and no danger,” Israeli military spokesman Daniel Hagari told a separate televised briefing.

Israel blamed the Houthis for a similar drone attack on Friday in which its aircraft intercepted “hostile targets” headed for southern Israel.

Six people were lightly injured in neighbouring Egypt when debris hit a building in the Sinai resort of Taba, just across the border from Eilat, the Egyptian army said at the time. On October 19, the US Navy said it shot down three land-attack cruise missiles and “several” drones that had been fired by the Houthis, possibly at Israel.

The Houthis will release a statement later on Tuesday with more details of their involvement in the “resistance” against Israel, Bin Habtour said.

Israel has been pounding the Gaza Strip since gunmen from the Palestinian freedom group Hamas stormed across the border on October 7 and, according to Israeli officials, killed more than 1,400 people, most of them civilians.