Brigadier General Yahya Saree, military spokesman for the Houthis (Al Jazeera)

The military spokesman for the Ansar Allah group (Houthis), Yahya Saree, announced that an Israeli ship and an American destroyer were targeted in the Red Sea with naval missiles and drones.

Sarie said in a speech to demonstrators in Sanaa yesterday, Friday, that the scope of naval operations had been expanded to include the Indian Ocean, where 3 Israeli and American ships were targeted, warning ships linked to Israel not to pass through the Cape of Good Hope corridor.

Sarie said in his statement, "The naval forces of the armed forces (affiliated with the Houthis) carried out a targeting operation against the Israeli ship (Pacific 01) in the Red Sea with a number of appropriate naval missiles."

He added, "While the Air Force carried out a targeting operation against an American destroyer in the Red Sea with a number of drones, the operation achieved its objectives successfully."

The military spokesman confirmed that their forces “carried out 3 operations against 3 Israeli and American ships in the Indian Ocean, using a number of suitable naval missiles and drones, and the three operations successfully achieved their goals.”

Saree also stressed that their forces "will not stop preventing Israeli navigation or those heading to the occupied ports of Palestine in the Red and Arabian Seas, as well as the Indian Ocean, except when the aggression is stopped and the siege on the mujahideen in the Gaza Strip is lifted."

New targeting

Meanwhile, the British Navy announced, on Friday evening, that an incident had occurred off the coast of the Yemeni Hodeidah Governorate, overlooking the Red Sea.

This came in a brief statement issued by the British Maritime Trade Operations Authority, which was published on the X platform.

The authority said we received a report about an incident (naval attack) that occurred 65 nautical miles west of Hodeidah in Yemen, noting that “the authorities are investigating.”

The Embrey Maritime Security Company reported that a ship was attacked 80 nautical miles northwest of the Yemeni city of Hodeidah.

The company stated that the incident near Hodeidah was related to two explosions near a ship flying the Marshall Islands flag and owned by an American party.

Earlier Friday, the British Maritime Trade Operations Authority and Embrey Maritime Security said that a commercial cargo ship was subjected to a missile attack 76 nautical miles west of the Yemeni city of Hodeidah.

The authority indicated that the bombing caused damage to the ship, but its crew was not harmed, and stated that the ship sailed to another port.

The authority - run by the British Royal Forces - also reported that another ship, which was sailing 50 nautical miles southwest of Hodeidah, reported two missiles flying above it before they exploded at a distance.

The US Central Command (Centcom) announced at dawn on Friday the destruction of 9 anti-ship ballistic missiles and two drones that the Ansar Allah group (Houthis) were about to launch from areas under its control in Yemen, according to the statement.

Centcom said - in a statement - that it destroyed these weapons after the Houthis fired 4 anti-ship ballistic missiles, two of which landed in the Gulf of Aden and the others in the Red Sea, without any of them causing damage.

These developments came after the Houthi leader, Abdul-Malik al-Houthi, vowed to expand the scope of attacks against Israeli ships and ships linked to Israel “to an extent that the enemy does not expect,” and pledged to prevent ships linked to Israel from crossing from the Indian Ocean to the Cape of Good Hope.

Al-Houthi said - in a recorded television speech on Friday - that their operations, which have been targeting ships in the Red Sea, Bab al-Mandab and the Arabian Sea for months in support of the resistance in the Gaza Strip, will continue and extend to prevent ships linked to Israel from even passing through the Indian Ocean towards the Cape of Good Hope.

In response to the attacks, the United States and Britain, along with other countries, launched military operations against the Houthis under the name “Guardian of Prosperity,” and Washington and London say that the air strikes aim to weaken the group’s ability to threaten maritime navigation in the Red Sea.

International shipping companies were forced to stop their operations in the Red Sea or divert their operations to avoid Houthi strikes.

Since last November 19, the Houthi group has said that it has been targeting ships owned or operated by Israeli companies or transporting goods to and from Israel, in support of the Palestinian resistance in its confrontation with the Israeli aggression on Gaza. The group has expanded the circle of its attacks to include American and British ships after the start of the raids on Yemen. Last January.

Source: Al Jazeera + agencies