According to the Houthi Interior Ministry, Israel has carried out an attack against the key port of Hodeidah. Israel issued an evacuation order for multiple ports along the coast on Sunday, with a social media post claiming the ports were used for “terrorist activities.”
Details about the attack still aren’t clear, as Israel hasn’t commented on the strike, and the Houthi-run state media denied earlier that there had been any attacks against any ports in Yemen.
Later Tuesday, however, the Houthis retaliated by firing a ballistic missile at central Israel. The alarms sounded and sent over a million Israelis to shelters. Ben Gurion Airport also temporarily halted all flights over the threat, though the missile itself was intercepted.
The Houthis successfully hit Ben Gurion Airport last week with a missile strike, which both Israel and the US tried but failed to intercept. Israel responded with major airstrikes targeting the port of Hodeidah and a concrete factory in a nearby city.
Israel’s evacuation warnings included not only Hodeidah, but also the nearby ports of Ras Isa and Salif. Those two ports are also in Hodeidah Governorate, but are much smaller than Hodeidah itself, which is a major port for northern Yemen.
With the airport in Sanaa has already been effectively destroyed, the Houthis are virtually exclusively reliant on ports for importing food. Hodeidah has been under repeated target by Israel in that regard as well, with food and other aid often destroyed in the process.
Hodeidah port is the source of roughly 80% of Yemen’s food imports. Yemen has limited agriculture, as only about 3% of the land is arable. This has long made them heavily reliant on imports from abroad.
