Israel mocked the Houthi rebels of Yemen on Tuesday, with Israeli government spokesman Eylon Levy saying that the Iranian-backed terror group has the “self-awareness of cartoon villains.”
He cited the Houthis’ official slogan: ““Allah is Great, Death to America, Death to Israel, Curse on the Jews, Victory to Islam.”
More seriously, Levy said that Houthi threats to international shipping — 10% of which passes through the Bab-el-Mandeb Strait — were a danger “to the whole structure of international trade and international peace and security,” not just to Israel and the Arab world.
Levy spoke to reporters in the wake of a Houthi attack on a Norwegian-flagged tanker on the Red Sea, which was struck Monday by a cruise missile. The Houthis claimed that the ship was on its way to Israel, and said that they would hit all ships approaching Israel or linked to Israel in any way.
A new statement from Ansar Allah (Houthis) in the aftermath of a Norwegian-owned ship being hit by an anti-ship cruise missile launched from a part of Yemen controlled by Ansar Allah.
— Yashar Ali 🐘 (@yashar) December 12, 2023
Ansar Allah states that they only struck the ship after it ignored repeated warnings.
They… pic.twitter.com/jsUjlDDHTn
A blockade is an act of war under international law.
Levy also said that the attack on the Norwegian vessel was a “wake-up call” about the threat of Iranian aggression. Yemen is a poor and undeveloped country that could not develop advanced weapons systems on its own; the Houthis are Iranian proxies.
President Joe Biden delisted the Houthis as a terror organization within days of taking office, as part of a Democratic Party backlash against Saudi Arabia, which has fought the Houthis. Democrats tolerated Saudi human rights abuses for decades, including during Barack Obama’s presidency (when he famously bowed before the Saudi king in 2009), but became more aware of them after the Saudis supported former President Donald Trump’s foreign policy.
The Houthis have fired missiles at Saudi Arabia in recent years. Since Hamas attacked Israel on October 7, the Houthis have also fired missiles at Israel, and have seized vessels in the Red Sea, as well as firing missiles at both military and civilian vessels.
Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot on Sunday evenings from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET (4 p.m. to 7 p.m. PT). He is the author of the new biography, Rhoda: ‘Comrade Kadalie, You Are Out of Order’. He is also the author of the recent e-book, Neither Free nor Fair: The 2020 U.S. Presidential Election. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.
