President Joe Biden says he “privately” delivered a message to Iran on Saturday about its backing of the Houthis in Yemen.
As the president left the White House on Saturday to visit Camp David, he was asked about the message being sent to Iran from the U.S. strikes against the Houthis, to which he replied, “We delivered it privately and we’re confident we’re well prepared.”
This statement may have been an attempt to reiterate a previous comment he made Friday in Allentown, Pennsylvania, about reaching out to Iran. “I’ve already delivered the message to Iran,” Biden said. “They know not to do anything.”
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After another U.S. missile strike in Yemen on Saturday morning local time, the Houthis insisted that there was no significant impact on their military capabilities, and promised a strong response.
“This new strike will have a firm, strong and effective response,” Houthi spokesperson Nasruldeen Amer told Al Jazeera.
The strike targeted a Houthi radar site on a military base in Sana’a, Yemen’s capital. Two U.S. officials said that the location of the latest strike was chosen because it posed a threat to vessels in the Red Sea.
The U.S.S. Carney deployed Tomahawk style missiles to “degrade” the Houthi capabilities, and prevent them from continuing their months-long campaign to “attack and harass” Israeli-affiliated vessels, according to a statement from U.S. Central Command.
Another Houthi spokesperson, Mohammed Abdulsalam, told Reuters that none of the U.S.-led strikes had weakened the Houthis’ ability to continue their maritime campaign in support of Palestinians.
This latest strike occurred just one day after American and British forced launched a series of strikes on Houthi facilities in Yemen.
On Friday hundreds of thousands of protesters gathered in Sana’a, denouncing Israel and the United States.
Meanwhile, Israeli president Benjamin Netanyahu said Saturday that the border between Gaza and Egypt must be closed before the war is over. “We’ll destroy Hamas, we’ll demilitarize Gaza, and military equipment and other deadly weapons will continue to enter this southern opening—so of course we need to close it,” he said.
The area Netanyahu is referring to is the Philadelphi corridor, which he said needed to be under Israeli control to prevent the movement of people and weapons between Israel and Egypt.
