Israel Bombs Yemen as IDF Rolls Through Gaza City, Displacing Hundreds of Thousands

Israeli forces on Thursday resumed airstrikes on Yemen—whose Houthi rebels have been launching strikes targeting Israel in solidarity with Palestine—while pushing deeper into Gaza City, killing dozens of Palestinians, displacing hundreds of thousands of others, and trapping up to 1 million more.

An Israel Defense Forces (IDF) spokesperson said dozens of warplanes and air support units pounded alleged "command headquarters of the Houthi General Staff” and other buildings used by members of the rebel army also known as Ansar Allah.

Thursday's strikes followed last week's IDF bombing of a media complex in the Yemeni capital Sanaa that killed 31 journalists and four other people including a child in what the Committee to Protect Journalists called the world's deadliest single attack on media workers in 16 years.

This, after an IDF airstrike last month assassinated Houthi officials including Prime Minister Ahmed al-Rahawi. US forces—which have been bombing Yemen since 2002 as part of the so-called War on Terror—have also carried out airstrikes in Yemen that have killed and wounded hundreds of civilians.

The Israeli and US strikes came in retaliation for Houthi missile and drone attacks on Israel and Red Sea shipping. The Houthis and Iran have been the only actors in the world that have answered Israel's genocidal war on Gaza with military force.

The latest Israeli bombing of Yemen came as IDF tanks and troops pushed deeper into Gaza City as part of Operation Gideon's Chariots 2, an offensive aimed at conquering, occupying, and ethnically cleansing Palestinians from the embattled coastal exclave.

Gaza officials said dozens of Palestinians have been killed since dawn Thursday, including 25 aid-seekers. The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said that "intensified strikes on Gaza City, including on tents, residential buildings, [and] infrastructure continue to inflict heavy casualties."

Among the victims of Thursday's IDF strikes were at least 10 children and three women killed when the houses and tents in which they were sheltering were bombed, according to The Associated Press.

UN Undersecretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator Tom Fletcher said Thursday that Palestinian children are being “killed while sleeping, playing, queuing for food and water, [and] seeking medical care."

“They’ve been bombed, maimed, starved, burned alive, buried in the rubble of their homes, separated from their parents... scraping through the rubble for food, enduring amputations without anesthetic,” Fletcher added.

More than 300,000 Palestinians have fled for their lives amid Israel's onslaught and engineered famine, while as many as 1 million others remain trapped in Gaza.

At least 65,419 Palestinians have been killed by US-backed Israeli forces since October 2023, according to the Gaza Health Ministry—although experts caution that the actual death toll is likely much higher. More than 167,100 others have been wounded, and thousands more are missing and presumed dead and buried beneath rubble.

Israel is facing a genocide case currently before the International Court of Justice in The Hague, where the International Criminal Court last year issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister and former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant for alleged crimes against humanity and war crimes, including murder and forced starvation.