SANAA, Yemen: Yemen’s Houthis have announced that the group’s Chief of Staff Mohammed Abdulkarim al-Ghamari — one of the group’s highest-ranking military officials — has been killed “while fulfilling his duties.”
The development comes on Thursday shortly after Israel claimed responsibility for the attack, with Defence Minister Israel Katz stating that al-Ghamari was killed in an Israeli airstrike.
The Houthis, in a statement, said that the conflict with Israel had not ended. Israel will “receive its deterrent punishment for the crimes it has committed”, it said.
“We will do the same against any threat in the future as well”, he added.
In August, Israel announced that it had targeted senior members of the Houthi group, including Mohammed Abdulkarim al-Ghamari, in airstrikes on the capital, Sanaa.
The strikes reportedly killed the prime minister of the Houthi-led government, along with several other ministers.
In a social media post on Thursday, Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz stated that al-Ghamari was killed in an Israeli strike.
Al-Ghamari’s death was announced six days into a fragile US-backed ceasefire between Israel and Hamas in Gaza.
The truce has halted Israel’s two-year war on Gaza, which has killed nearly 68,000 Palestinians and triggered a dire humanitarian crisis.
Israel has been accused by rights groups and a United Nations Commission of Inquiry of carrying out a genocide in Gaza.
Since Israel launched its war on Gaza in October 2023, Yemen’s Houthi movement has carried out multiple drone and missile attacks against Israel, claiming the assaults were acts of solidarity with Palestinians under attack. The group has also targeted commercial vessels in the Red Sea.
In response to these actions, the United States and the United Kingdom have conducted airstrikes on Houthi positions in Yemen, targeting sites linked to the group’s operations against international shipping lanes.
In its statement announcing al-Ghamari’s death, the group condemned repeated “brutal” attacks by Israel against the Yemeni people, residential neighbourhoods, economic facilities, and other civilian infrastructure, which have been faced “with patience, strength, steadfastness and resilience”.
Their statement said the Houthis had carried out 758 military operations deploying 1,835 munitions, including drones and missiles, during their campaign.
The Houthis’ leader, Abdel-Malik al-Houthi, praised al-Ghamari’s major role in Yemen’s military operations in support of Gaza.
Last week, after the ceasefire in Gaza was announced, al-Houthi said the group would monitor Israel’s compliance with the agreement and resume its support for Gaza if Israel failed to adhere to it.
