Israel has renewed its aggression on Yemen with two major aerial attacks that targeted the capital, Sanaa, on Sunday, August 24, and Thursday, August 28.

At least 10 people were killed and 92 others wounded in Sunday’s onslaughts, in which Israeli warplanes struck an oil facility, a power plant, and a presidential palace in Sanaa.

The Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) claimed in a statement that Sunday’s strikes were launched in response to Ansar Allah’s repeated attacks against Israel.

The IOF’s offensive came two days after theYemeni resistance movement launched a ballistic missile attack on the central territories occupied by Israel on Friday, August 22, reportedly using a new projectile with a cluster bomb warhead.

On Thursday, Israeli fighter jets carried out new airstrikes, targeting a building southwest of Sanaa, allegedly used by Ansar Allah’s top leaders as a hideout.

Following the attack, some local Yemeni outlets reported the killing of top leaders affiliated with Ansar Allah, including Prime Minister Ahmed Ghaleb al-Rahawi, Defense Minister Mohamed al-Atifi, and Chief of Staff Mohammad al-Ghamari. Israel said on Friday, August 29 that it was still confirming whether it succeeded in assassinating them.

On Saturday, August 30, the Ansar Allah-led Presidency of the Yemeni Republic confirmed in a statement “the martyrdom of the Prime Minister in the Government of Change and Construction, Ahmad Ghaleb al-Rahawi alongside a number of his fellow ministers.”

The statement clarified that the Yemeni senior officials were targeted by “the Israeli criminal and treacherous enemy Thursday afternoon during a regular workshop, which is held by the government annually to evaluate its activities and performance.”

The Presidency also indicated that a number of other ministers sustained moderate and serious injuries in the assault, and that they have been receiving medical care ever since.

The names of the ministers who were killed or injured in the attack have not been disclosed by Ansar Allah yet. Moreover, it is still unknown whether Defense Minister Mohamed al-Atifi is among them.

However, the IOF seems to have failed in assassinating the Yemeni Chief of the General Staff, Major General Mohammed al-Ghamari, who defied Israel in a statement on Friday, declaring that the stance of Yemen in supporting the Palestinian people in Gaza will remain firm “regardless of the scale of aggression or sacrifices required”.

Al-Ghamari further threatened that the Israeli escalation “will be met with escalation.”

The head of the Ansar Allah-led Supreme Political Council, Mahdi al-Mashat, had also warned Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in a statement issued on Thursday, briefly after the Israeli strikes were carried out:

“You are dragging the Zionist entity to its end, and you have entered a challenge with a people whose struggle you are not equal to. We have foiled your conspiracies despite you, so wail as you wish. Your strikes will not shake a hair on the head of even our smallest children.”

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