US-UK aggression on Yemen renewed: 9 attacks on Hodeidah in 24h

By Al Mayadeen English
9 Feb 2024 09:39
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The US-UK aggression on Yemen continues to focus on the city of Hodeidah, with the US Central Command announcing its targeting of explosive-laden unmanned boats and cruise missiles prepared for launch.

This image provided by the US Navy shows an aircraft launching from USS Dwight D. Eisenhower (CVN 69) during flight operations in the Red Sea, January 22, 2024. (AP)

The US-UK aggression was renewed on Yemen early this Friday morning, with two airstrikes targeting the Jabbanah area, north of Hodeidah city, and the Taif area, in the al-Durayhimi directorate south of the coastal province on the Red Sea, west of Yemen.

In the past 24 hours, the US-UK aggression targeted the Hodeidah province with 9 airstrikes, 7 of which hit the Rass Isa area in the al-Salif directorate, while two airstrikes targeted the al-Shabakah area south of the al-Salif port northwest of Hodeidah.

The renewed US-UK aggression on Hodeidah comes shortly after the leader of the Ansar Allah movement, Sayyed Abdul-Malik al-Houthi, confirmed that US-British attacks on Yemen will not succeed in reducing the capabilities of the Yemeni armed forces, pointing out that the 86 attacks targeted Yemen this week.

The US Central Command announced Thursday that it had carried out strikes targeting four explosive-laden unmanned boats and seven mobile anti-ship cruise missiles, "which were prepared to be launched against ships in the Red Sea from areas controlled by the Houthi group in Yemen."

The statement said that the US forces "identified these missiles and USVs in Houthi-controlled areas of Yemen and determined they presented an imminent threat to U.S. Navy ships and merchant vessels in the region."

MintPress: How US-corporate media pushes for war in Yemen

A MintPress News study focusing on major US media outlets’ coverage of the Yemeni Red Sea blockade has found a wide bias in the press, as the latter described the blockade as an aggressive, hostile act of terrorism by Ansar Allah, while also painting them as tools for the Iranian government and simultaneously presenting the US as the victim being dragged into war.

The study, conducted on four leading American outlets: The New York Times, CNN, Fox News, and NBC News showed that these outlets, together, pave the way for the rest of the media system introducing a certain rhetoric representing the corporate media spectrum in its entirety. The term "Yemen" was used in the Dow Jones Factiva global news database to collect the fifteen relevant articles published between December 2023 and January 2024 from each of the mentioned outlets, a total of 60 articles, to be read and studied.

The study concluded that US media paint a deceiving manipulated perception for the benefit of US imperialism. One example is the use of the word "Houthis" rather than "Ansar Allah" in all 60 articles in the study. The purpose is to paint the movement badly and as Mohammed Ali al-Houthi, Head of Yemen’s Supreme Revolutionary Committee described it to MintPress "an attempt to frame the broad masses in Yemeni society that belong to our project."

Almost half the articles studied, 22 out of 60, did not present Ansar Allah as a governmental force. The New York Times described them as a “tribal group”, CNN as a “ragtag but effective” rebel organization, and NBC News as a “large clan” of “extremists”. Fourteen articles took it more seriously in serving the US government rhetoric about Ansar Allah and using the word “terrorist”.