Houthi rebels launch missile assault on yet one more U.S.-owned business ship, Pentagon says

For the third time this week, Yemen-based Houthi rebels Thursday launched missiles at a U.S.-owned service provider vessel, the Pentagon mentioned, the newest in a slew of such assaults from the Iranian-backed militant group on business vessels in and across the Purple Sea.

At about 9 p.m. native time Thursday, Houthi rebels launched two anti-ship ballistic missiles on the M/V Chem Ranger, a U.S.-owned ship that flies beneath a Marshal Islands flag, in accordance with U.S. Central Command.

Each missiles landed within the water close to the ship, CENTCOM mentioned, and there have been no experiences of accidents or injury to the Chem Ranger.

CENTCOM didn’t affirm precisely the place the ship was when the assault occurred.

For the reason that Palestinian militant group Hamas attacked Israel on Oct. 7, killing at the very least 1,200 folks and sparking the Israel-Hamas conflict in Gaza, Houthi rebels, who management giant swaths of Yemen, have launched dozens of drone and missile assaults on service provider ships within the Purple Sea and the Gulf of Aden in what they’ve mentioned is an effort to help Palestinians.

After U.S. officers, together with Secretary of State Antony Blinken, warned for weeks that there can be unspecified “penalties” for the Houthis, the U.S. on Jan. 12, launched the primary of what can be a number of rounds of strikes on Houthi targets in Yemen.

Regardless of these missile strikes, the Houthis have vowed to proceed their Purple Sea assault.

On Monday, the Houthis fired a missile on the M/V Gibraltar Eagle within the southern Purple Sea, CENTCOM reported. There have been no accidents or vital injury, however the missile did trigger an inconsequential fireplace within the ship’s maintain.

And on Wednesday evening, a Houthi-fired drone struck the M/V Genco Picardy within the Gulf of Aden, inflicting some injury however no accidents, CENTCOM mentioned.

Each the Gibraltar Eagle and the Genco Picardy are U.S.-owned and sail beneath Marshal Islands flags.

President Biden indicated to reporters Thursday that the strikes towards the Houthis would proceed.

“While you say ‘working,’ are they stopping the Houthis? No,” Mr. Biden mentioned. “Are they going to proceed? Sure.”  

On Wednesday, the State Division introduced it was reclassifying the Houthis as a “specifically designated international terrorist group.” That transfer reversed a part of an earlier choice by the State Division in February 2021 that had eliminated that designation.

The White Home has repeatedly accused Iran of being concerned within the Houthis’ Purple Sea assaults, allegations Tehran has denied.

Nevertheless, the Pentagon on Tuesday mentioned that, over the weekend, it seized a boatload of “superior typical weapons” despatched from Iran to the Houthis.

— Olivia Gazis, Eleanor Watson and Tucker Reals contributed to this report.