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| Volume 55 Number 7, March 23, 2025 | ARCHIVE | HOME | JBCENTRE | SUBSCRIBE |
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Sana'a, Yemen demonstration in solidarity with Palestine, November 29, 2024
The Yemeni resistance continues to support the people of Gaza, and is undeterred by the renewed US-UK airstrikes across Yemen, including many residential areas, that started on March 15. Some 50 people were killed on the first day alone. The aggression is a reprisal against the Yemeni Resistance which on March 11 reinstated its ban on Israeli ships passing through the Red Sea, the Arabian Sea, Bab al-Mandab Strait, and the Gulf of Aden, until Israel ended its blockade of humanitarian aid to Gaza that violates the Ceasefire Agreement and international law. Since November 2023, the Yemeni Armed Forces (YAF) have carried out more than 100 attacks in a show of solidarity with Gaza. They temporarily suspended their operations when the latest ceasefire took effect in January.
While the YAF were initially only targeting Israeli ships, they are now taking action to defend the people of Yemen by targeting US warships. On March 16, the YAF confirmed they had targeted the US aircraft carrier USS Harry S Truman and its accompanying warships in the northern Red Sea with 18 ballistic and cruise missiles, along with drones.
Ansar Allah leader Sayyed Al-Houthi underscored that "there is no alternative to bearing responsibility in confronting and resisting the Israeli enemy", warning that "if Israel succeeds in eliminating the Palestinian cause, it will expand its crimes to other countries without any restraint".
Al-Houthi addressed the ongoing negotiations, stating that "Hamas cannot be coerced into making concessions regarding the second phase of the agreement in order to prevent war". He stressed that "Hamas cannot be pressured into relinquishing the prisoner exchange card, only for Israel to later resume its aggression".
He accused Israel of "shamelessly pressuring Hamas to complete the exchange outside the agreed framework and without moving to the second phase", adding that "Israel is evading its obligations to end its aggression on Gaza and complete its withdrawal from the Strip".
Yemen's Foreign Minister Jamal Amer underlined on March 18 that Yemen would not scale back its operations against Israeli shipping in the Red Sea in response to US military pressure or appeals from allies such as Iran. This disproves any claim that the Yemeni people do not have their own aims and agency. Within the broader Axis of Resistance, they are no one's proxy. For its part, the US is threatening to escalate its military aggression against not only Yemen, but beyond it, with President Trump on March 17 saying that Yemen's acts of resistance give a pretext for aggression against Iran.