Responding to the Houthi movement's threats to international
shipping, the US launched a new wave of airstrikes on Saturday. On Monday,
the Red Sea port city of Hodeidah and Al Jawf governorate north of the capital
Sanaa were targeted, Houthi-run Al Masirah TV said.
"Every
shot fired by the Houthis will be looked upon, from this point forward, as
being a shot fired from the weapons and leadership of IRAN, and IRAN will be
held responsible, and suffer the consequences, and those consequences will be
dire!" Trump said on his Truth Social platform.
The White House said that Trump's message to Iran was to
take the United States seriously.
The Pentagon said it had struck over 30 sites so far and
would use overwhelming lethal force against the Houthis until the group stopped
attacks. The Pentagon's chief spokesperson, Sean Parnell, said the goal was not
regime change.
Lieutenant General Alex Grynkewich, director of operations
at the Joint Staff, said the latest campaign against the Houthis was different
to the one under former President Joe Biden because the range of targets was
broader and included senior Houthi drone experts.
Grynkewich said dozens of Houthi members were killed in the
strike. The Biden administration is not believed to have targeted senior Houthi
leaders.
The Houthi-run health ministry said on Sunday that at least
53 people have been killed in the attacks. Five children and two women were
among the victims and 98 have been hurt, it said. Reuters could not
independently verify those casualty numbers.
One US official told Reuters the strikes might continue
for weeks. Washington has also ramped up sanctions pressure on Iran while
trying to bring it to the negotiating table over its nuclear program.
The Houthis say their attacks, which have forced companies
to re-route ships to longer and more expensive journeys around southern Africa,
are in solidarity with Palestinians as Israel strikes Gaza.
Houthi leader Abdul Malik al-Houthi said on Sunday the
militants would target US ships in the Red Sea as long as the US continues
attacks on Yemen.
Under the direction of al-Houthi, who is in his 40s, the
ragtag group has become an army of tens of thousands of fighters and acquired
an arsenal of armed drones and ballistic missiles.
While Iran champions the Houthis, the Houthis deny being
puppets of Tehran, and experts on Yemen say they are motivated primarily by a
domestic agenda.
The Houthis' military spokesman, without providing evidence,
said in a televised statement early on Monday that the group had launched a second
attack against the US aircraft carrier USS Harry S. Truman in the Red Sea.
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