Tel Aviv: A drone launched by Yemen’s Houthi rebels struck Israel’s southern airport Sunday, breaching the country’s air defences, shattering glass windows, injuring one person, and forcing a temporary shutdown of commercial airspace, the Israeli military said.
The damage to Ramon Airport appeared limited and flights resumed within hours. The Houthis claimed responsibility for the strike.
The attack follows Israeli strikes on Yemen’s rebel-held capital that killed the Houthi prime minister and other top officials in a major escalation of the nearly 2-year-old conflict between Israel and the Iran-backed militant group.
Meanwhile, a breakthrough Israeli Supreme Court decision ruled that Israel was not providing Palestinian detainees in its custody with enough food to ensure basic sustenance.
It ordered the state to “guarantee basic living conditions in accordance with the law” for the thousands of Palestinians in its detention facilities. Many of them have been arrested as part of Israel’s campaign against Hamas in Gaza and the West Bank since the group’s deadly October 7, 2023, attack on Israel.
Sunday’s ruling, made in response to a petition by Israeli human rights groups alleging starvation in Israeli prisons, marked a rare instance of Israeli legal restraint on its own war policies that have drawn indignation and outrage abroad.
Houthi rebels escalate attacks on Israel
After Israel’s killing of Houthi Prime Minister Ahmed al-Rahawi last Thursday, the militants vowed to escalate their attacks targeting Israel and merchant ships navigating the vital Red Sea trade route.
On Sunday, one of several Houthi drones launched from Yemen slipped through Israel’s defence system and crashed into the passenger terminal at the Ramon International Airport near the resort city of Eilat, the Israeli Airports Authority said, sending smoke plumes billowing, diverting flights over southern Israel and inflicting light shrapnel wounds on a 63-year-old man.
Houthi military spokesperson Brig Gen Yahya Saree said the group fired eight drones at Israel in a sign the rebels “will escalate their military operations and not back down from their support for Gaza”.
He warned that Israeli airports “are unsafe and will be continuously targeted”.
The Israeli military said it intercepted three Houthi attack drones near Israel’s border with Egypt and was investigating why it failed to detect the fourth drone that struck Ramon Airport as a hostile aircraft.
The drone did not set off air raid sirens at the airport.
The Houthis have stepped up their aerial attacks on Israel in recent months, including by deploying warheads with cluster munitions that scatter smaller bomblets over a large area and can evade Israeli air defences.
Saying that they were acting in solidarity with the Palestinians, the Houthis began firing missiles and drones into Israel after the October 7 Hamas-led attack on southern Israel ignited the Israeli military’s devastating campaign in Gaza.
Hamas militants killed 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and abducted over 250 in the attack.
While frequent, the aerial attacks from Yemen have not caused significant damage in Israel. But in rare cases they have managed to hit strategic targets like airports.
In May, a Houthi missile struck near Israel’s main Ben Gurion Airport, prompting international airlines to cancel flights to Tel Aviv for months.
Israel destroys another high-rise in Gaza
The Israeli military said it razed another high-rise building in Gaza City Sunday, shortly after military spokesperson Avichay Adraee ordered the evacuation of people from Al-Ra’iya Tower, a seven-story building in a southern Gaza City neighbourhood, and from nearby tents.
It’s the third Gaza City high-rise levelled in as many days as Israel ramps up its offensive to take control of what it portrays as the last remaining Hamas stronghold, urging Palestinians to flee parts of Gaza City for a designated humanitarian zone in the territory’s south.
Many Palestinians say they’re too wounded, weak or exhausted to uproot themselves again for jam-packed, increasingly unsanitary encampments in the south that aid workers say are unprepared to handle the influx.
“Every time we move to a place, we get displaced from it,” said Shireen Al-Lada, who fled south from eastern Gaza City after her house in the once-bustling urban neighbourhood of Zeitoun was destroyed.
Israel said the building targeted on Sunday had been used by Hamas for intelligence-gathering activities. Hamas denied the accusations, calling it “a false pretext meant to justify bombing residential blocks”.
Over 64,000 people have been killed in the Gaza Strip since the war began, according to the Gaza Health Ministry that does not distinguish between civilians and combatants.
Trump claims Israel has accepted his ceasefire proposal
US President Donald Trump Sunday claimed on social media that Israel has accepted his terms for a ceasefire in Gaza and urged Hamas to do the same.
There was no immediate Israeli confirmation of his claim, nor response from Hamas. The Israeli prime minister’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
“I have warned Hamas about the consequences of not accepting. This is my last warning, there will not be another one,” Trump wrote.
It wasn’t clear exactly what Trump’s proposal involved or how it could cut through the deadlock in negotiations between the two sides. Both Israel and Hamas have laid out roadmaps to end the war that appear irreconcilable.
AP
