AFP :
Israeli air strikes hit rebel-held Sanaa’s international airport and other targets in Yemen on Thursday as the head of the UN’s World Health Organization said he and his team prepared to fly out.
Yemen’s civil aviation authority said the airport planned to reopen on Friday after the strikes that it said occurred while the UN aircraft “was getting ready for its scheduled flight”.
The Israeli military did not immediately respond to a request for comment on whether they knew at the time that WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus was there. Israel’s attack came a day after the Iran-backed Huthi rebels claimed the firing of a missile and two drones at Israel.
Yemen’s Huthis have stepped up their attacks against Israel since late November when a ceasefire took effect between Israel and another Iran-backed group, Lebanon’s Hezbollah.
The Huthis Al-Masirah TV said the Israeli strikes killed six people, after earlier Huthi statements said two people died at the rebel-held capital’s airport, and another at Ras Issa port.
The strikes targeting the airport, military facilities and power stations in rebel areas marked the second time since December 19 that Israel has hit targets in Yemen after rebel missile fire towards Israel.
In his latest warning to the rebels, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel would “continue until the job is done”.
“We are determined to cut this branch of terrorism from the Iranian axis of evil,” he said in a video statement.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres denounced the “escalation” in hostilities between Israel and the Huthis and called the Sanaa airport strikes “especially alarming”.
