The US has launched a major military operation against the Yemeni-based Houthi militants, President Donald Trump said on Saturday. The effort involves air strikes on their “bases, leaders, and missile defenses,” he said, adding that it was aimed at restoring freedom of navigation in the adjacent waters.
In a statement on Truth Social, Trump accused the Houthis of waging an “unrelenting campaign of piracy, violence, and terrorism against American, and other, ships, aircraft, and drones.”
According to the president, the militants have been hindering international commercial navigation in the Suez Canal, the Red Sea, and Gulf of Aden.
“It has been over a year since a U.S. flagged commercial ship safely sailed,” Trump said and demanded the Houthis stop their attacks. “If they don’t, hell will rain down upon [the militants] like nothing you have ever seen before,” he warned.
The president also warned Iran against providing any support to the Yemeni-based group or “threatening” the US. “Support for the Houthi terrorist must end immediately,” he wrote, adding that the US would otherwise hold Iran “fully accountable and, we won’t be nice about it.”
Tehran has yet to comment on the development.