THE spokesman for Yemen’s Armed Forces has warned Israel against any further act of aggression against Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, saying the coastal city of Tel Aviv in the 1948 Israeli-occupied territories is no longer a safe place as it is within range of Yemeni weapons.
‘The Yemeni Army hereby declares that occupied Yafa (the name of the ancient Palestinian port city where Tel Aviv is established) is no longer a safe zone, and will continue to be a primary target within the range of our weapons.
‘We will focus on targeting sites and facilities deep inside the occupied lands,’ Brigadier General Yahya Saree said in a televised speech broadcast live from the Yemeni capital Sana’a on Friday morning.
The remarks come as a drone hit an area near a US consular facility in Tel Aviv early on Friday, killing one person and injuring 10 others as the Israeli air defences failed to intercept the drone.
Saree highlighted that Yemeni air defence units employed for the first time an advanced and radar-evading unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV), dubbed ‘Yafa’, to strike Tel Aviv.
Saree described the operation as successful, noting that it had accomplished the desired objectives.
The high-profile Yemeni military official added that the drone strike was carried out in support of oppressed Palestinians in Gaza and their valiant resistance fighters, and in retaliation for the massacres that the Israeli military is perpetrating against the civilian population in the besieged territory.
Saree underscored that Yemeni Armed Forces have ‘a bank of Israeli targets’, including sensitive military and security buildings, and they will continue to strike such structures in response to the Israeli military’s atrocities and daily crimes in Gaza.
‘The Yemeni Armed Forces’ operations will continue in support of heroic resistance fighters in Gaza, who are defending our Arab and Muslim lands. Our operations will not cease until the ongoing aggression against Gaza stops and the tight blockade on Palestinians is lifted,’ he pointed out.
Yemenis have declared their open support for Palestine’s struggle against the Israeli occupation since the regime launched a devastating war on Gaza on October 7.
The leader of Yemen’s Ansarullah resistance movement has censured certain Arab countries for their inaction in the face of relentless Israeli attacks on the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip.
Yemeni Armed Forces have said that they won’t stop their attacks until Israeli ground and aerial offensives in Gaza, which have killed at least 38,848 people and wounded another 89,459 individuals, come to an end.
The leader of the Ansarullah resistance movement, Abdul-Malik al-Houthi, has said that it is ‘a great honour and blessing to be confronting America directly’.
The attacks have forced some of the world’s biggest shipping and oil companies to suspend transit through one of the world’s most important maritime trade routes.
Tankers are instead adding thousands of miles to international shipping routes by sailing around the continent of Africa rather than going through the Suez Canal.
- Palestinian resistance factions, including Hamas, have praised the drone operation conducted by Yemen armed forces against Tel Aviv in retaliation for the Israeli genocidal war on the Gaza Strip.
In a statement on Friday, Hamas said: ‘We … highly appreciate and commend the qualitative military operation carried out by the Yemeni Armed Forces and the brothers of Ansarullah, targeting the heart of the city of “Tel Aviv, the centre of the entity and the symbol of its pride”.
‘We highly value the positions of Sayyed Abdulmalik al-Houthi and the dear Yemeni people who support our Palestinian people with all available resources and capabilities.’
The movement also hailed anti-Israel operations conducted by Lebanon’s Hezbollah and the Islamic Resistance in Iraq, stressing that they are ‘a legitimate right of our nation’s resistance and its people, to confront the fascist Zionist expansion and its arrogance in the region’.
‘We commend the positions of the brothers in Ansarullah in Yemen, Hezbollah and the Islamic Group in Lebanon, and the Islamic Resistance in Iraq, and we appreciate their sacrifices.’
The Islamic Jihad also hailed the ‘heroic’ Yemeni Armed Forces for conducting the ‘bold’ operation against Tel Aviv.
The group noted that the operation was ‘a natural response’ to the ongoing war crimes committed against Palestinians in Gaza.
‘Our brothers in Yemen, as well as our brothers on the support fronts in Lebanon and Iraq, have proven that the cause of Palestine and the blessed Al-Aqsa Mosque is the central cause of the Arab and Islamic nations, and that resistance is the only way to confront Zionist and Western arrogance against our nation.’
The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine also praised the Yemeni strike, describing it as ‘a qualitative shift in the responses of the support resistance fronts and demonstrates their ability’ to target areas deep inside the occupied territories.
‘The support fronts in Yemen, Lebanon, and Iraq have fulfilled their promises and expanded their responses to the escalating Zionist massacres in the Gaza Strip. They are ready to continue these unique operations if the aggression persists.’
The Popular Front also said the operations ‘sent clear messages to the cowardly leaders of the occupation that the entire Zionist entity is within the reach of resistance and support front strikes, and that there is no safe place for Zionists anywhere’, adding that it also proved the failure of the US and its allies to protect the occupying regime.
The Yemeni army spokesman says Tel Aviv will continue to be a primary target and that it is ‘within the range of our weapons’.
Brigadier General Yahya Saree, the spokesman for Yemeni Armed Forces, announced that the country had launched an operation against Tel Aviv on Friday morning.
He also warned Israel against any further act of aggression against Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, saying the coastal city of Tel Aviv in the 1948 Israeli-occupied territories is no longer a safe place as it is within range of Yemeni weapons.
The remarks come as a drone hit an area near a US consular facility in Tel Aviv early on Friday, killing one person and injuring 10 others as the Israeli air defences failed to intercept the drone.
Ever since the onset of Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza early last October, the Yemeni forces have carried out scores of operations in support of the war-hit Gazans, striking targets throughout the occupied Palestinian territories, in addition to targeting Israeli ships or vessels heading towards ports in the occupied territories.
The regime’s bloody onslaught on Gaza has so far killed 38,848 Palestinians, mostly women and children, leaving 89,459 others injured.
- World football governing body, FIFA, says it has delayed a decision on a Palestinian request to suspend Israel from international football over the regime’s war crimes against Palestinians in the Gaza Strip.
In a statement on Friday, FIFA said an independent legal assessment of the Palestinian Football Association’s proposals against the Israel Football Association was scheduled to be submitted to the FIFA Council by July 20, 2024.
‘Following requests for an extension from both parties to submit their respective positions, duly granted by FIFA, more time is needed to conclude this process with due care and completeness,’ it added.
It noted that the assessment will be shared with the FIFA Council for any subsequent decision no later than August 31.
During FIFA’s 74th annual congress in Bangkok, Thailand, in May, the Palestine Football Association urged FIFA to suspend Israel over the regime’s genocide in the Gaza Strip.
Palestinian Football Association President Jibril Rajoub said Israel had committed multiple ‘systematic’ violations of FIFA statutes and urged the congress to take a vote to suspend the Israel Football Association from all football activity and to respect the Palestinian territory.
On May 16, the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) supported Palestine’s proposal to suspend Israel from FIFA over the regime’s criminal war in the Gaza Strip.
During the 34th AFC Congress, which concluded in Thailand’s capital Bangkok, the regional body’s president Sheikh Salman bin Ebrahim Al Khalifa voiced his support for the motion by the Palestine Football Association (PFA).
Since 2014, the Palestinian football federation has raised the matter of suspending Israel at least five times, but calls have grown louder since October last year when the Israeli regime launched its fresh genocidal war against Palestinians in the besieged Gaza Strip.
At least 38,848 Palestinians have been killed in the past nine months, most of them children and women. Among the victims are more than 250 athletes, including footballers.
Calls to ban Israel from international sports events have been intensifying in recent days, including by human rights lawyers.
The hashtag ‘Red Card Israel’ has been trending on social media and an online campaign to that effect has garnered over 4.2 million signatures.
