On March 18, the Israel Defense Forces restarted offensive operations in Gaza after a protracted ceasefire.
As the conflict turned hot once again, many Israelis experienced a massive surge in the frequency of air raid sirens. Residents in the Jerusalem area, the central region and the Judaean Foothills have been running to the bomb shelters more frequently than even at the start of the war, as near-daily rocket attacks have become the norm.
However, the origin of the missiles has not been Gaza, where most of the active combat is happening, but rather in Yemen, where the Houthi rebels have committed to an active war of attrition to supplement their year-and-a-half-long blockade of the Red Sea.
Israel’s efforts in curbing the Houthis’ aggression have so far been fruitless.
“We are groping for a weakness that we can exploit to prevent them from shooting missiles. We are not successful so far,” Efraim Inbar, former head of the Jerusalem Institute for Strategy and Security (JISS), told JNS.
“Israel has not developed a comprehensive strategy yet; there are retaliations, but this is not a deterrent because the Houthis are still firing,” Daniel Ayalon, former deputy foreign minister, former ambassador to the U.S., and chairman of Silver Road Capital financial advisory firm, echoed Inbar’s sentiments.
This rebel group, which was merely two years ago an irrelevant collection of tribes fighting an endless civil war in the dunes of the Arabian Peninsula, has evolved into a complex global security threat.
This node in the Iranian terror network has sprouted tentacles of its own, with fighters in Syria, Iraq, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Somalia and Djibouti. The Houthis’ systematic expansion into the Horn of Africa has completed their plan to control both sides of the Bab el-Mandab strait and has elevated the Houthis to masters of one of the world’s most important waterways.
Houthi operations since Oct. 7
Since Oct. 7, 2023, the Houthis have launched more than 200 ballistic missiles and over 170 drones into Israel. The rate of attack has recently increased, with 43 ballistic missiles and 10 drones being fired since fighting in Gaza restarted in March.
Although the vast majority of these missiles have been shot down by Israel’s Arrow 3 or THAAD systems, the daily barrages send millions of Israelis to the bomb shelters as their long range makes determining a specific target difficult, thereby forcing the activation of sirens across Israel.
Despite the general ineffectiveness of the Houthi strikes, some missiles and drones have managed to penetrate Israel’s air defense systems.
In three separate strikes, projectiles hit a playground, an apartment building and a field outside Ben-Gurion International Airport, leading to one fatality and approximately 36 injuries.
On numerous occasions, Israeli officials have underscored that Yemen is a critical theater of the current war and must be addressed promptly and decisively. “We are not willing to sit on the sidelines and let the Houthis attack us. We will hit them far more, including their leadership and all the infrastructure that allows them to hit us,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on May 16.
Defense Minister Israel Katz agreed, saying, “The Houthis will suffer heavy blows from Israel if they continue to fire at us. The IDF is prepared for any mission.”
In addition to direct attacks on the homeland, the Houthis have tried to strangle Israel economically by blockading the Red Sea. Since Oct. 7, 2023, the Houthis have attacked more than 100 merchant vessels with missiles and drones. These attacks have been carried out all over the Red Sea, the Bab el-Mandab, the Gulf of Aden, and even deep into the Indian Ocean.
The U.S. Navy has also come under repeated attack, fending off more than 170 missiles in the last 20 months. These attacks have resulted in the sinking of two ships, the death of four sailors and the injury of dozens more, exclusively in the merchant fleets. Additionally, 25 sailors were kidnapped and held in Houthi captivity for 430 days.
A peripheral result of these wanton aggressions has been the sharp decline in Red Sea trade, with almost $1 trillion and 2,000 ships being diverted from their regular shipping routes.
The evolution of Israel’s strategy
Israel’s initial strategy for the Houthi problem was essentially forced, as the Biden administration insisted that it would take the lead on the response to the aggression from Yemen.
President Joe Biden reneged on his decision to remove the Houthis from the U.S. terror list and in December 2023, he formed a massive coalition of 16 countries, including NATO members as well as Sri Lanka, New Zealand and the Seychelles to patrol the threatened waters.
“These strikes are in direct response to unprecedented Houthi attacks against international maritime vessels in the Red Sea—including the use of anti-ship ballistic missiles for the first time in history. These attacks have endangered U.S. personnel, civilian mariners and our partners, jeopardized trade and threatened freedom of navigation,” Biden said of the coalition efforts in January 2024. In the course of the U.S. operations, two Navy Seals were killed.
All the while, the Biden administration pressured Israel not to respond. The coalition was bloated and ultimately ineffective at curbing Houthi aggression, although they kept up a steady drip of airstrikes on terrorist targets.
In July, a Houthi drone killed an Israeli in Tel Aviv, leading to two Israeli counterstrikes; however, with so many resources tied up in fighting in Gaza and Lebanon, these strikes also produced a limited effect.
The vast majority of all coalition and Israeli attacks focused on the Yemeni port of Hodeidah and the city of Sanaa and its airport.
With the election of Donald Trump in November, many Israelis were hopeful that the Houthi saga would soon come to a close.
This evaluation was supported by most analysts and political leaders. “If the Houthis keep firing on commercial ships and the Biden administration keeps dithering, President Trump will come in and end this quickly. They won’t be launching missiles by February,” Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) said in an interview shortly after the election.
John Bolton, a former Trump national security advisor, agreed, saying, “If Trump wins again, I expect him to hit the Houthis hard—no patience for maritime terrorism, no delusions about diplomacy.”
In November, Hezbollah fell off the chessboard, massively freeing up Israeli military resources. By December, in preparation for the incoming Trump administration, Israel ramped up its efforts in Yemen with a series of large airstrikes.
On March 15, many of the prophecies began turning true as the U.S. launched “Operation Rough Rider” under the leadership of Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth.
Trump announced the operation with his trademark tough rhetoric. “No terrorist force will stop American commercial and naval vessels from freely sailing the waterways of the world. Your time is up, and your attacks must stop, starting today. If they don’t, hell will rain down upon you like nothing you have ever seen before,” he said.
Spirits were high in Israel as the Houthi problem seemed destined to go away. The Americans hit hard, striking hundreds of targets in the coming months and killing approximately a thousand Houthi terrorists. However, the rocket fire didn’t die down, and the American efforts seemed to be in vain.
During the course of the operation, the U.S. lost three F-18 fighter jets and seven Reaper drones, and spent more than $1.5 billion on logistics and munitions to little effect. In addition, the conflict was marred by the Signalgate political scandal, where a group of American national security leaders used the Signal messaging service to discuss imminent military operations against the Houthis in Yemen.
By May, the Trump administration was signaling a loss of interest in the campaign. On May 6, the U.S. announced a secret ceasefire deal, mediated by Oman and negotiated without Israel’s knowledge. “We hit them very hard. They had a great capacity to withstand punishment. You could say there’s a lot of bravery there,” Trump said of the Yemeni terror group.
The terms of the deal guaranteed protection for U.S. vessels in exchange for a cessation of hostility; however, aggression against non-U.S. shipping was not covered.
This development returned Israel to square one. Since early May, Israel has faced daily rocket attacks. Israel has declared its intention to fight on despite the U.S. withdrawal and has carried out a series of additonal strikes in Yemen, leading to the destruction of the Yemeni civil air fleet and most of Sanaa airport. However, these strikes seem to have little effect on the Houthis’ determination to continue striking Israel.
Alternative strategies
A critical tactic that has already been publicly discussed by Israeli officials is the expansion of the assassination campaign against Houthi leaders.
“If the Houthis continue to fire missiles toward the State of Israel, they will suffer painful blows—and we will also target terror leaders as we have done with Deif and the Sinwars in Gaza, Nasrallah in Beirut, and Haniyeh in Tehran. We will hunt down and eliminate Houthi leader Abdul al-Malik al-Houthi in Yemen as well,” Katz said of the leader of the Houthi clan on May 16.
The Americans already ushered in this trend when they claimed to have killed an unidentified top Houthi missile commander in “Operation Rough Rider.”
Saudi Arabia is the only country with a public bounty on Houthi leaders, including a $30 million one on al-Houthi.
“It is important to have a price on the head of the Houthi leaders. If al-Houthi and a few others were taken out, it would make a major difference,” Ayalon explained. Many experts believe that the lack of successful operations against Houthi leaders stems from a lack of on-the-ground intelligence in the Yemeni theater.
“They are far away, and we don’t have the intelligence currently to find targets that really hurt them,” Inbar said.
An alternative strategy focuses on utilizing local proxies to dismantle the Houthi group in offensive infantry operations. “The strategy should be helping and supporting other Yemeni groups to take out or to participate in fighting the Houthis,” Ayalon said.
The current lines, frozen from the Yemeni civil war, leave the Houthis with control of a mere 28% of Yemen’s territory, leaving the other 72% in the hands of the Presidential Leadership Council—the executive body of Yemen’s internationally recognized government—and the Southern Transitional Council, a UAE-backed secessionist group.
Both of these factions are sworn enemies of the Houthis and have sufficient arms and personnel to pose an existential threat to the Houthis.
Both groups have also signaled an open willingness to work with Western partners to overthrow the Houthis in infantry operations. “As long as the source of these threats is on land, the solutions start from the land,” Rashad al-Alimi, chairman of Yemen’s Presidential Leadership Council, said at the 2025 Munich Security Conference.
Concrete preparations for a land assault on the city of Hodeidah by the PLC were initiated before the U.S.-Houthi ceasefire led to a nixing of the plan.
Some critics say that it may be dangerous to arm unknown rebel groups, and point to the U.S.-armed Afghan Mujahideen, which later turned into the Taliban, and Al-Qaeda. Ayalon said that while he understood the concern, partnering with other Yemeni groups was a calculated risk.
“It is clear right now that the imminent and present danger is from the Houthis, and they have to be taken out first. After that, we’ll have to watch how the new government in Yemen will act,” he said.
A third approach seeks to indirectly weaken the Houthis by cutting off their supply of Iranian weapons and finance. U.S. anti-smuggling operations in the Gulf of Aden, combined with the destruction of most Houthi ports, has severely weakened their capacity to receive Iranian weapons by sea.
However, much of the smuggling land routes through Oman are still operational. Smugglers use border points between Oman and Yemen, such as the Sarfait crossing, to transport weapons overland.
Yemeni authorities have intercepted shipments, including 800 Chinese drone propellers, indicating the use of this route for smuggling advanced weapon components. The Houthis leverage relationships with tribes along the Oman-Yemen border to facilitate the clandestine movement of weapons through remote and less-monitored areas.
Strict enforcement of the maritime blockade and targeting the Omani smuggling routes, in combination with political and military pressure on Oman, would impose severe duress on the Houthi rebels.
“The Houthis are dependent on Oman. Maybe we should deal with Oman in a more coercive way. This is an important road that the Iranians are using for resupplying the Houthis, we should address our efforts in that direction,” Inbar explained.
Regardless of which strategy is chosen, experts agree that it is critical to continue applying direct military pressure. “Any strategy must be in combination with hitting them hard and inflicting military losses on the Houthis,” Ayalon said.