Is the Next Middle East War in Yemen?

U.S. and Israeli airstrikes target Houthis positions in Yemen as missile hits Tel Aviv.

On Saturday, Dec. 21, a ballistic missile fired from the Iranian-backed Houthis rebels in Yemen landed between two high-rise apartment buildings in southern Tel Aviv. The explosion blew out windows in surrounding apartments, resulting in glass shard injuries to 16 people. Luckily, no one was killed. At the scene, medic Yosef Kourdi of the Magen David Adom emergency medical service noted “significant blast damage to nearby buildings.” Around 3:45 AM on Saturday, the high-altitude missile triggered sirens across Israel’s densely populated center, forcing millions out of bed and into bomb shelters minutes before the missile impacted. Video footage posted on social media captured the incoming missile landing in an empty playground between two buildings. Hours later, U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) confirmed that fighter jets took off from the USS Harry S. Truman positioned in the Red Sea and carried out strikes on Houthis missile storage facilities and command centers throughout Yemen to “disrupt and degrade Houthis operations.” The U.S. attack marked the second round of airstrikes carried out against the Houthis last week. On Thursday, a squadron of Israeli Air Force (IAF) fighter jets, refuelers, and reconnaissance planes traveled over 1,200 miles to drop over 60 munitions on Houthis military targets along Yemen’s western coast, and attacking sites in the rebel-controlled capital of Sana’a for the first time. While the F/A 18 Super Hornet jets from the “Red Rippers” Squadron out of Norfolk, Virginia, took off from Truman’s flight deck on Saturday morning, the carrier group encountered a wave of drones and anti-ship cruise missiles fired from western Yemen. The carrier group’s surface-to-air defense systems repelled the oncoming assault but resulted in friendly fire on two F/A 18s. “The guided-missile cruiser USS Gettysburg, which is part of the USS Harry S. Truman Carrier Strike Group, mistakenly fired on the F/A-18s,” CENTCOM confirmed over the weekend. The downed pil...