For more than a year, the Houthis, an Iranian-backed militant group that controls northern Yemen, have been firing drones and missiles at Israel, and disrupting trade with attacks on commercial ships in the Red Sea.
This month, the pace of Houthi attacks on Israel has increased — as have Israeli and U.S. retaliations. But the Houthis, who have already withstood years of bombardment by a Saudi-led coalition, appear to be undeterred.
The Houthis are Shiite militants who have been fighting Yemen’s government for about two decades. They overran the Yemeni capital, Sana, in 2014, forcing the country’s internationally recognized government to flee to the southern city of Aden.
A Saudi-led coalition launched a military intervention to oust the militants but failed, leaving the Houthis in power in northern Yemen, in a civil war that has killed hundreds of thousands and led to one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises.
The Houthis are opposed to Israel and the United States. They see themselves as part of the Iranian-led “axis of resistance,” along with Hamas in the Gaza Strip and Hezbollah in Lebanon.
