Latest news with #OperationRoughRider
The Sun
11-07-2025
- Politics
- The Sun
How Houthis have mounted terrifying return to scourge Red Sea again months after Trump said they ‘don't want to fight'
THE Houthis have mounted a terrifying return to scourge the Red Sea after seven months. Despite Donald Trump's recent Yemen blitz to thwart the group, they appear to have come back fighting stronger - hammering two cargo ships within days of one another. 11 11 11 11 Trump's forces targeted Houthi positions in his brutal "Operation Rough Rider" to stamp out attacks on ships in the Red Sea - a vital artery for global trade. The US also looked to batter Iran's influence over the last major militant group capable of hitting Israel. Trump boasted how the militants agreed to a ceasefire after he forced them to surrender. He said on May 6, following 52 days of bombing: "[The Houthis] just don't want to fight, and we will honour that and we will stop the bombings, and they have capitulated. "They say they will not be blowing up ships any more." But this week, the world witnessed the group conduct some of their most intense operations yet - sinking two giant cargo ships within days of one another. Rebels also sank bulk carrier Magic Seas in another hellish attack on Sunday. The dramatic attacks have led to sea traffic dropping, while insurance costs have rocketed in one of the world's major shipping lanes. International security specialist Will Geddes told The Sun how the recent attacks are a clear sign there are more to follow due to backing from Iran. Trump's chilling threat to Houthis as he shares deadly explosion video He said: "Where this significantly increases the risk, particularly to the region, is that although there has been a volley of attacks by the Houthis, with the increased actions collaborating between the United States and Israel against Iran, we know that the Houthis are supported by Iran. "Iran is providing them with more and more sophisticated weaponry, which only means that there is going to be darker times ahead." Between November 2023 and December 2024 alone, the Houthis targeted over a whopping 100 merchant vessels, hammering them with missiles and drones. Two were sunk and four sailors were tragically killed. But, until this week's double ship blitz, their last strike had been seven months ago. Whilst past attacks have been "much more aggressive," it's thought the group have been preparing during their absent months. Martin Kelly, head of advisory for maritime security experts EOS Risk Group, told Financial Times:"They've had six months to replenish their stocks of anti-ship missiles and [sea drones], which could be a factor." And Yemeni expert on the Arabian Peninsula, Farea Al-Muslimi, added: "The Houthis needed to buy time because they were hit very badly by the American airstrikes. And now they want to resume." Methods used by the group have also evolved as their range of weapons continue to grow at a terrifying rate. The group have now focused their attention on a seemingly effective attack launchers - unmanned vehicles. 11 11 11 Mr Geddes told The Sun how despite the group claiming they utilised cruise missiles in the most recent attacks on the two vessels, "we know that they've been increasingly using drones to deliver explosive packages to these ships". The group pack speedboats with remote-controlled explosives that then drive into the side of a ship - forming a hole at water level which causes the ship to sink quickly. Mr Geddes explained how they're "similar to what we've seen historically with the Somali pirates" - and we're set to see "an evolution" of vessels used to deliver the packages as the group grows stronger. Mr Kelly told The Telegraph how unmanned surface vessels could be "the most dangerous type of weapon that the Houthis can use". Last year, United Nations experts said the Houthis were allegedly amassing an eye-watering $180 million each month - solely from shipping agencies. The group allegedly allow the paying vessels to peacefully sail through the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden without getting attacked. Fears now loom that, due to the staggering amount given to the group, they could be becoming increasingly independent. The Houthis have said they are attacking ships linked to Israel in order to show their stance with Palestinians in Gaza. But many believe an ulterior motive in doing so is to bolster the group's popularity. Staggering vid shows US carpet bombing Houthis in 'Operation Rough Rider' as Trump blitzed 800 targets in 44 days An unnamed Iranian official told The Telegraph: "They do it for domestic reasons. "They're not very popular among Yemenis, but Yemenis like Palestine, so taking action for Gaza boosts [the Houthis'] popularity." Resuming attacks in the Red Sea continues to raise the rebel group's international profile whilst also deflecting criticism from inside their own territory. Mr Geddes told The Sun how there is "very little democracy" in Yemen due to the group's power. And as for now, experts argue there may not be a military solution to stopping attacks on ships passing through. The official added: "They've seen that neither Trump nor Israel could stop them, so they think – why not sink a few more ships? "We believe they're bolder now because they've learnt that when the US or Israel bombs them, it doesn't really stop their plans. "Their strikes do nothing to stop them." And Mr Gedde's told The Sun there's a "diversity of different elements" the EU, UK, US and Saudi Arabia would have to do to prevent attacks. He said: "This will be a combination of both an aviation-based and maritime-based levels of countermeasures and attacks against Houthi capabilities, launch points, both for missiles, projectiles, drones, and even any kind of missiles that they may have their hands on. "It's going to amplify the levels of aggression and hostility down there, but the Houthis will continue regardless." 11 11 11 Alongside this week's intensified attacks on ships, Israel has urged the US to resume military operations against the rebels. The Houthi group has continued to fire ballistic missiles at Israel since the tense ceasefire with Iran was reached. But the firing attempts are - most of the time - blasted singly, meaning Israel's Iron Dome is usually able to down them. Israel has told the States that relentless strikes on shipping "can no longer remain solely an Israeli problem," the country's Kan public broadcaster reported. It added that Jerusalem calls for "more intense combined attacks against Houthi regime targets — not just [Israeli] air force fighter jet strikes, but also a renewal of American attacks and the formation of a coalition including additional countries". An unnamed security official also told the broadcaster that Israel's request for US help came at a time where Houthi aggression appears to be expanding. They added: "A broad coalition is needed to convey to the Houthi regime that it is in danger." A few days ago, Israel bombed the hijacked Brit ship Galaxy Leader seized by Houthis in November 2023. The car carrier was snatched by the terror group when crack troops swooped onto it with a helicopter. The Galaxy Leader is owned by a British company, which is partially owned by Israeli tycoon Abraham Ungar. The militants had celebrated its capture as a war trophy - with Yemeni influencers visiting the vessel to show it off. The brutal attack on Sunday night involved around a whopping 50 missiles and bombs, according to the IDF. The Force added the attack was in response to relentless Houthi attacks on Israel. The IDF said: "The Houthi terrorist regime's forces installed a radar system on the ship, and are using it to track vessels in international maritime space in order to promote the Houthi terrorist regime's activities." Who are the Houthis? THE Houthi rebels have spent months terrorising the Red Sea by launching persistent missile and drone attacks on vessels and warships - but who are they? The Shia militant group, which now controls large swaths of Yemen, spent over a decade being largely ignored by the world. However, since the outbreak of the Israel-Hamas war, they sprung from relative obscurity to holding roughly £1trillion of world trade hostage - turning one of the world's busiest shipping lanes into an active warzone. Their warped battle cry is 'Death to America, Death to Israel, curse the Jews and victory to Islam'. Why are they attacking ships? After the October 7 massacre, Houthis began launching relentless drone and missile attacks on any ships - including warships - they deem to be connected with Israel in solidarity with their ally, Hamas. In reality, they targeted commercial vessels with little or no link to Israel - forcing global sea traffic to largely halt operations in the region and sending shipping prices around the world soaring. The sea assaults added to the carnage in the Middle East tinderbox as intense ripples from Israel's war in Gaza were felt across the region - with Iran accused of stoking the chaos. The Houthi chiefs pledged their Red Sea attacks would continue until Israel stopped its offensive in Gaza. The group's chiefs have previously said their main targets are Israel, and its allies the US and Britain. And despite repeated threats from the West and joint US and UK strikes blitzing their strongholds in Yemen - Iran's terror proxy appears undeterred. The UK and US have hit Houthi bases as recently as this month after the terror group once again targeted boats in the shipping lane. Israel has also hammered the group with airstrikes, reportedly hitting oil storage tanks at the port in Al Hudaydah.
Yemen Online
25-06-2025
- Politics
- Yemen Online
Yemen : Houthis likely to be ‘persistent problem' for US, military official says
The Houthi group in Yemen will likely be a 'persistent problem' for the US in the future, a senior US military official said on Tuesday, even after Washington and the Houthis reached an agreement last month that ended a US air campaign against the Iran-backed group, which controls much of Yemen. 'The Houthis are likely to be a persistent problem… that we'll be dealing with in the future a few times again,' Air Force Lieutenant General Alexus Grynkewich, director for operations of the Joint Staff, told lawmakers. Grynkewich has been nominated to lead the US military's European Command. Last month, US President Donald Trump announced the US would stop bombing the Houthis, who had been firing at US warships and commercial vessels off Yemen's coast since November 2023. The US military said it struck more than 1,000 targets during its operation in Yemen, known as Operation Rough Rider. The strikes, the US military said, killed 'hundreds of Houthi fighters and numerous Houthi leaders.' Rights groups voiced concerns about civilian casualties during the bombing campaign. The Houthis — whose slogan calls for 'Death to America, Death to Israel, [and] a Curse on the Jews' — began attacking Israel and maritime traffic in November 2023, a month after the October 7 Hamas-led massacre and hostage-taking that started the ongoing war in the Gaza Strip. The group, which had said it was acting in solidarity with Palestinians, stopped firing at US ships under the May 2025 agreement, though it has continued to attack Israel directly. Last week, the Houthis said they would again target US ships in the Red Sea if Washington were to become involved in Israeli attacks on Iran. However, they did not resume attacks after the US struck three Iranian nuclear facilities over the weekend. On Monday, Trump announced an Israel-Iran ceasefire deal. The nascent truce was shaken shortly thereafter, when Iran fired at Israel and Israel threatened a heavy response, but as of Tuesday evening, it appeared to be holding.
The Guardian
18-06-2025
- Politics
- The Guardian
Trump's Yemen bombings killed nearly as many civilians as in 23 previous years of US attacks, analysis shows
The US bombing campaign of Yemen under Donald Trump led to the deaths of almost as many civilians in two months as in the previous 23 years of US attacks on Islamists and militants in the country. An analysis of Operation Rough Rider by monitoring group Airwars has concluded that 224 civilians had been killed between March and the end of the campaign in May, compared to 258 between 2002 and 2024. Airwars argues that the higher fatality rate after 33 strikes signals a change in policy on the part of the US and is a potential sign for what could happen in Iran, if Trump decides to join the Israeli bombing campaign against the country. 'This campaign sets the tone for Trump at war, and for what allies can do. With the US poised for escalation, we have to understand the Yemen campaign to understand what the future holds,' said Emily Tripp, the director of Airwars. Deliberately targeting civilians in a manner that is considered not proportional to any military advantage gained is considered a war crime according to the Geneva conventions, though the doctrine has been stretched in recent conflicts, most notably Israel's assault on Gaza, where there have been individual incidents of over 100 civilians killed. In the past, the US president has set a limit on the maximum number of civilian casualties that would be tolerated without special approval being granted, according to The War Lawyers, a book by academic Craig Jones of Newcastle University. Operation Rough Rider, a bombing campaign against the Houthi rebels, began in March in an effort to stop attacks on merchant shipping in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden, in the aftermath of multiple attacks conducted under the previous president. It cost an estimated $1bn (£740m) in its first month of operation. Trump described the Biden campaign as 'pathetically weak', meanwhile the text messages between senior US officials on the Signal app discussing the beginning of the bombing were accidentally shared with a journalist. The two most deadly attacks recorded by Airwars were in April. The monitor concluded that at least 84 civilians were killed on 17 April when the US bombed Ras Isa Port near Al Hodeida in the evening, saying it was targeting oil facilities. Airwars reaches its casualty count by examining reports of each incident by relevant authorities and in the media – as well as death notices put up on Facebook and other social media by relatives of the deceased. Two young boys, Fadel Fawwaz Ali al-Musq and Mohammad Ali Saleh Asaad al-Musq, were killed together after a family member, a driver, had brought them to the port while he was working, according to Facebook postings. A 48-year-old driver, Nabil Yahya, was reported as killed by his family when the fuel tanker he was driving burst into flames after the airstrike. 'That truck was all he had,' said his younger brother, Sultan Yahya in a Guardian report last month. A day after the incident the local branch of the Red Crescent Society posted that the air strikes occurred in two waves. After the first wave of bombing, the plane remained 'still flying overhead' and struck again after first responders arrived. At the time, the US Centcom military command said that US forces had taken action 'to eliminate this source of fuel for the Iran-backed Houthi terrorists' and that the strike 'was not intended to harm the people of Yemen'. The second most deadly attack recorded by Airwars occurred on 28 April 2025. It counted that 68 civilians housed in a remand detention centre at Saada were killed and at least 47 injured by alleged US airstrikes on the morning. The centre primarily held migrants coming from African countries and was believed to be holding 115 people at the time of the strike. Multiple bodies were pictured on television and graphic photographs after the attack. In response to investigations about the incident, Centcom said in early May that it is 'aware of the claims of civilian casualties' and is assessing them, but there has been no apparent update from the US military since. The US has been attacking targets in Yemen since 2002, when a targeted drone strike killed six members of al-Qaeda, and the first time civilians were recorded killed was in 2009, when 49 were reported killed following a cruise missile attack that had been aimed at an al-Qaeda camp. Operation Rough Rider came to an end in May, when the US and the Houthis reached agreement, after what the US said was 1,000 strikes at Houthi targets. The Yemeni rebels, who are anti-Israel and aligned with Iran, said they would stop targeting merchant shipping in return for an end to US bombing. Earlier this week, the Houthis fired a handful of ballistic missiles at Israel in support of Iran. One struck the West Bank, wounding five Palestinians.
Middle East Eye
18-06-2025
- Politics
- Middle East Eye
'Unprecedented' civilian death toll in Yemen from US air strikes in 2025
US air strikes on Yemen have led to an "unprecedented" death toll in the country, according to a new report by a monitoring group. Airwars analysed hundreds of open source civilian harm claims and concluded that US President Donald Trump's bombardment of Yemen has been more deadly than any of his predecessors'. The report suggests Trump's military campaign has killed almost as many civilians in 52 days as in the previous 23 years of US military action against Yemen. Trump, who prior to his election had promised an end to US involvement in Middle Eastern wars, has been backing Israeli attacks against Iran in recent days and ordered attacks against Yemen's Ansar Allah, commonly known as the Houthis. Between the first recorded US strike in Yemen in 2002 until the beginning of Trump's Operation Rough Rider campaign in March 2025, Airwars tracked at least 258 civilians allegedly killed by US actions. New MEE newsletter: Jerusalem Dispatch Sign up to get the latest insights and analysis on Israel-Palestine, alongside Turkey Unpacked and other MEE newsletters In just two months of bombing this year, which ended with a ceasefire in May, Airwars documented at least 224 civilians in Yemen killed by American air strikes. Although the US claimed it was only trying to undermine the Houthis' military capabilities, Airwars said the high civilian casualty rate was increasingly becoming the norm in conflicts in the region. In just one attack on 17 April the US struck Ras Isa Port on the Red Sea, allegedly killing at least 84 civilians, including first responders from the Yemen Red Crescent Society and Civil Defence of Yemen. What did Houthis achieve in 18 months of attacks on the Red Sea? Read More » At least three children were amongst those killed. Airwars executive director Emily Tripp told Middle East Eye it was crucial not to lose sight of the civilian victims of escalating warfare at a time of geopolitical strife. "The news agenda is generally stacked against the stories of civilians in war - but how and where civilians were killed in Yemen is so important to understand, especially as the US is poised to intervene across the region," she said. "The US is one of the most powerful militaries in the world - it sets the tone and the norms of war. If we don't pay attention to this deadly campaign, how can we hold our governments to account in the face of future escalation?" Trump announced in May that in exchange for the US ceasing air strikes on Yemen, the Ansar Allah administration had agreed to stop attacking vessels travelling in the Red Sea, which it said it was doing in solidarity with the Palestinians in Gaza. The Yemeni group had targeted what it said were Israel-linked ships in the Red Sea since November 2023, and said that despite the ceasefire, attacks on Israeli ships and territory would continue. Over the weekend the Houthis launched strikes on Israel in apparently solidarity with Iran, who also struck targets across Israel. Wes Bryant, a US Special Operations veteran, told Airwars it was unlikely the administration had undertaken sufficient civilian harm mitigation measures during the Yemen campaign. '[For] each and every strike, there should be an equally weighted effort in civilian harm mitigation fitting with all of the doctrine and standards that we already have in place in the targeting process - from planning characterisation of the civilian environment before execution, to execution of the actual strike while in process,' said Bryant, who is also the former branch chief of civilian harm assessments at the Pentagon. 'I'd say [it is] a near impossibility to do the level of civilian harm mitigation we've seen in other campaigns with this high intensity of a strike campaign in such densely populated urban areas with, again, no actual partner forces on the ground and very limited source intelligence on the ground.' The US also backed an air campaign launched by Saudi Arabia in 2015 against the Houthis, in support of the internationally recognised government, that killed tens of thousands of civilians. The war has largely ceased since a truce and prisoner exchanges in 2022.
Yahoo
11-06-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
US fighter jets used cheap laser-guided rockets for nearly half the drone kills during Operation Rough Rider
Laser-guided rockets were responsible for 40% of recent Houthi drone kills, a top US commander said. Gen. Michael Kurilla told lawmakers Tuesday that F-16 and F-15 fighter jets fired the APKWS rockets. Military leaders have stressed the importance of making air defense cheaper compared to the threat. US fighter jets used laser-guided rockets to destroy nearly half the drones that were shot down during the most recent big operation against the Iran-backed Houthis, a top commander told lawmakers on Tuesday. Gen. Michael Kurilla, who oversees Middle East operations at US Central Command, said during a House Armed Services Committee hearing that Advanced Precision Kill Weapon System rockets fired by American F-16s or F-15s were responsible for about 40% of Houthi drone kills during Operation Rough Rider, the military's seven-week bombing campaign against the rebels. Kurilla was responding to questions about the implications of using expensive aircraft and munitions to fight non-state actors like the Houthis and whether the proliferation of hostile drones had led to more interest in cheaper defenses. "We absolutely need to be putting more work into directed energy — high-powered microwave," Kurilla said. He described the heavy use of the Advanced Precision Kill Weapon System as one of the "innovations" to emerge from Operation Rough Rider. "That's a $25,000 munition going against a roughly $50,000 or $100,000 drone — that is, an Iranian-provided drone to the Houthis," he added. The AGR-Falco Advanced Precision Kill Weapon System, or APKWS, is an unguided Hydra 70 2.75-inch rocket fitted with laser guidance kits that turn it into a precision weapon. Made by British aerospace company BAE Systems, the slim munition can fly with a 10-pound warhead at speeds of 1,000 meters per second. One APKWS rocket is a fraction of the cost of an air-to-air missile that could otherwise be used to take down a drone. US officials have said an AIM-9, for instance, costs around $500,000; the newer AIM-120 is around $1 million. Military leaders like Kurilla have stressed the importance of bringing the cost of air defense to parity with the price tag of the threat, though this is not always possible. US warships operating in and around the Red Sea have been forced to fire expensive surface-to-air missiles to intercept incoming Houthi missiles and drones. SM-2 interceptors, which are on the lower end of the Navy's missile defense capabilities, can still cost upward of $2 million. Others are much more expensive, and the Red Sea fight has seen a high tempo of operations, raising concerns about future stockpiles. Kurilla said during written testimony that US air and naval forces in the Middle East have destroyed "hundreds" of drones, cruise missiles, and ballistic missiles fired by the Houthis into international shipping lanes and at Israel since October 2023. The Trump administration reached a cease-fire with the Houthis in early May, ending Operation Rough Rider. During the campaign, the US military bombed over 1,000 targets in Yemen. However, the rebels continue to fire missiles at Israel, which has retaliated with several rounds of airstrikes. Read the original article on Business Insider
