TORY prime minister Rishi Sunak escalated military action against the Houthi movement in Yemen yesterday, while also announcing that 20,000 British armed forces will be deployed across Europe next month in the biggest land mobilisation for 40 years.
Speaking in the House of Commons, Sunak made the absurd claim that the UK’s military action against Yemen is unconnected with with Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza.
‘We shouldn’t fall for the malign narrative that this is about Israel and Gaza. UK strikes are a direct response to the Houthis’ attacks on international shipping,’ he claimed.
He also alleged that Houthi fighters had carried out 25 ‘illegal’ and ‘unacceptable’ attacks on shipping in the Red Sea in the past three months and that an attack on 9th January was the ‘biggest attack on the Royal Navy for decades’.
‘They fired on our ships and our sailors. It was the biggest attack on the Royal Navy for decades and so we acted.’
The UK strikes were ‘limited’ and ‘carefully targeted’ to degrade Houthi capacity to make further attacks, Sunak claimed.
‘I don’t take decisions on the use of force lightly. It was limited, not escalatory. It was a necessary and a proportionate response to a direct threat to the UK vessels, therefore to the UK itself.’
Sunak said that the Royal Navy is in the Red Sea as part of Operation Prosperity Guardian.
He claimed he’d attempted to resolve the issue with diplomacy, and the Houthis were given ‘clear and unambiguous warning’. He then repeated that attacks on Houthi targets are ‘completely unrelated’ to the Israel-Gaza conflict.
He stressed that inaction risks sending ‘a dangerous message that British vessels and British interests are fair game.’
Labour leader Keir Starmer backed Sunak and said he ‘strongly condemns the Houthi attacks on shipment, putting civilian and military personnel in serious danger, including British forces.’
Parroting Sunak, Starmer said the UK strikes were ‘limited’ and ‘targeted’ and did everything possible to protect civilian lives. ‘That is a proportionate response.’
Houthi chief negotiator Mohammed Abdulsalam declared that their stance has not changed since the US-UK air strikes on their positions.
He said: ‘Attacks to stop Israeli ships or those heading to the ports of occupied Palestine will continue.’