Houthi Missile Suspected in Another Ship Attack

A British cargo ship was damaged and set on fire in the Gulf of Aden last week, and Yemen’s Houthi rebels are being blamed. US Central Command and the British military say the ship was hit by a Houthi missile. One crew member was injured in the attack.

On February 22, MV Islander, a 16,000-ton cargo ship flagged in Palau but British-owned, was sailing through the Gulf of Aden off the south coast of Yemen when two ballistic missiles were fired at her from southern Yemen. One of the missiles hit the ship, starting a fire and injuring a crew member. The ship was sailing from Thailand to Egypt and had been broadcasting messages warning that there were Syrian crewmen on board, apparently in an attempt to deter Houthi attacks. That clearly didn’t work, but as of February 23, the ship was moored in the Egyptian port of Al Aladabiyah.

The Houthis, an Iranian-backed insurgent group with a reputation for brutality and fanaticism, have been attacking ships in the Gulf of Aden and the Red Sea since last November. They claim the attacks are in support of the Palestinians, although none of the vessels they’ve hit so far were actually headed for Israel. The real motive for the attack is likely to be to pressure the West into reining in Israel’s campaign against the Hamas terrorist group, which is also backed by Iran.

US and British forces have now carried out several strikes against Houthi radar sites and missile launchers, but so far it hasn’t deterred the group from firing drones and missiles at ships. On February 23, US Central Command reported that US forces had shot down three Houthi attack drones operating near vessels in the Red Sea. Four missile destroyers — three US and one British — are currently operating in the region, and have shot down dozens of drones and missiles over the last three months.