Houthis Falsely Claim Joint Attack on Israel with Iraq Militias—even as Houthi Attacks on Ships Intensify, Hurting Egypt

WASHINGTON DC, United States (Kurdistan 24) – The Iranian-backed Houthis in Yemen claimed on Thursday to have attacked Israel in conjunction with Iranian-backed militias in Iraq. The claim was made by a Houthi spokesman, Yahya Saree. 

Israel denied Saree’s claim later on Thursday, marking the second time in a week that Saree has simply told a bald-faced lie, making the Houthis appear a far more formidable force against the U.S. and Israel than they have been in reality. 

But that does not mean that the Houthis and their assaults are without significant consequence. 

Yemen, Egypt Suffer Most from Houthi Attacks 

The Houthis have intensified their assaults on shipping in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden, claiming their attacks support the Palestinians in Gaza. But the biggest victims of the Houthi attacks have been Arab countries: Yemen, itself, as well as Egypt.

In that respect, the Houthi attacks on shipping resemble the attacks on foreign franchises in Iraq, which hurt, more than anything else, the Iraqi economy, particularly prospects for much-needed foreign investment.

Read More: U.S. Calls on Iraq to fully investigate Attacks on U.S. Franchises

Whether the Houthi attacks or the attacks in Iraq, they have had little impact on the course of the war between Israel and Hamas. They have done the greatest damage to their own people.

Yemen “has long been one of the poorest countries in the Middle East and North Africa,” according to the World Bank. Currently, it “is facing one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises,” the Bank said. 

Yemen’s civil war, which started in 2014, two years after the overthrow of long-time dictator Ali Abdullah Saleh in the so-called Arab Spring, “has inflicted massive economic and social costs on the country and its people,” the Bank stated. 

“From 2015 to 2022, the country experienced a staggering 52 percent contraction in real GDP per capita, currently leaving two-thirds of the population, around 21.6 million individuals, in need of humanitarian assistance,” the Bank explained.

For Egypt, tolls on ships transiting the Suez Canal are a major source of revenue for the government. Passage of ships through the Canal has dropped significantly since Hamas’s Oct. 7 cross-border attack on Israel, which triggered the ongoing war, now entering its eighth month, and along with that war, the Houthi assaults, which began a month later.

According to British statistics cited by Al-Monitor, traffic through the Suez Canal fell 66% from mid-December to the beginning of April. 

Egypt is not a wealthy country, and it is heavily dependent on revenues from ships transiting the Canal. The response of international shipping companies to the Houthi attacks has been to reroute their vessels, taking the much longer, but much safer, route around Africa. 

In mid-February, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi explained that Suez Canal revenues had "decreased by 40 to 50 percent" since the start of the year, because of the Houthi attacks.

“The canal is one of the main sources of foreign currency for Egypt which is gripped by a severe financial crisis,” the Voice of America explained. Last week, Sisi announced a cabinet reshuffle to deal with Egypt’s economic problems.

Yahya Saree’s Lie: Striking Israel

On Thursday, in a televised speech, Saree claimed that the Houthis had carried out two military operations, targeting the Israeli port of Haifa, in conjunction with the Islamic Resistance in Iraq. 

“The first targeted two ships carrying military equipment in the port of Haifa, while the second targeted a ship that violated the decision to ban entry to the port,” Saree continued.

His statement, however, was entirely invented. Israel was quick to deny it, as the industry journal, The Maritime Executive, noted. But that did not stop Iranian media from disseminating the false claim!

“Iran’s Mehr news agency published a photo of an explosion and a report of ‘several powerful blasts’ of unknown origin in Haifa,” the shipping journal reported. 

It added, “Reuters is saying there were no reports of an incident in Haifa, while noting that ‘previous claims by Iran-backed groups have later been proven to be exaggerated or fabricated.’”

Yahya Saree’s Lie: Striking a U.S. Aircraft Carrier

Indeed, last Friday Saree told another whopper. He claimed that the Houthis had attacked a U.S.aircraft carrier, the U.S.S. Dwight D. Eisenhower. Saree’s claim followed a major U.S.-U.K. attack that had occurred the day before. 

Saree’s false claim was reported by major Arab media, as if it were true. But such a strike would have been a significant event—and there was no independent corroboration of it.

So Kurdistan 24 asked the U.S. Defense Department, if the Houthi claim was true. The Pentagon gave a clear and unequivocal answer: no!

“There is no truth to that claim,” a Pentagon spokesperson replied.

Last Thursday, the day before Saree claimed that the Houthis had struck a U.S. aircraft carrier, U.S. and British forces “conducted strikes against 13 Houthi targets in Iranian-backed Houthi terrorist-controlled areas of Yemen,” as CENTCOM announced.

The joint U.S.-U.K. attack was prompted by an increase in Houthi assaults on international shipping.

Read More: Houthi Attacks on Red Sea Shipping Intensify

The allied attack caused significant losses, as the Houthis acknowledged, and presumably, that is what prompted Saree’s fraudulent claim. 

But it did not stop the Houthis’ attacks, or attempted attacks, on international shipping. They have continued on a regular basis.

On Thursday, for example, CENTCOM announced that it had destroyed eight Houthi drones over the Red Sea and two Houthi uncrewed surface vessels in the Red Sea.

In addition, a Coalition ship downed another Houthi drone, while the Houthis launched an anti-ship ballistic missile over the Red Sea, which fell harmlessly into the water.

And that was just on one day! This situation has prompted some criticism, because the U.S. response does not appear to be very effective.

Gen. Frank McKenzie’s Criticism

Gen. Frank McKenzie is a former CENTCOM commander. On Sunday, he spoke with CBS’s Face the Nation and expressed significant criticism of the Biden administration’s approach to the Houthis.

“I would argue that we’ve been too passive,” he said. “We’ve allowed the Houthis really to dominate global maritime communications by closing down, effectively, the Suez Canal.” 

McKenzie complained that the Biden administration was reactive, on the defense—failing to shape the confrontation.

“We’ve essentially been catching and not pitching in this conflict” McKenzie said, using a baseball analogy, “despite deploying multibillion dollar warships in the Red Sea.”

“We need to go after the source of the attacks,” he continued, “and the source of the attacks is Houthi leadership and command and control facilities in Yemen.”