(Dave DeCamp, Antiwar.com) President Trump on Monday issued a new threat to Iran, saying that he will hold Tehran accountable for Houthi attacks. The warning came after US officials acknowledged that the Houthis, officially known as Ansar Allah, act independently from Iran and are unlikely to take orders from Tehran.
“Let nobody be fooled! The hundreds of attacks being made by Houthi, the sinister mobsters and thugs based in Yemen, who are hated by the Yemeni people, all emanate from, and are created by, IRAN. Any further attack or retaliation by the ‘Houthis’ will be met with great force, and there is no guarantee that that force will stop there,” Trump wrote on Truth Social.
🚨 Statement from @POTUS: pic.twitter.com/x94WfqMSNM
— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) March 17, 2025
“Every shot fired by the Houthis will be looked upon, from this point forward, as being a shot fired from the weapons and leadership of IRAN, and IRAN will be held responsible, and suffer the consequences, and those consequences will be dire!” the president added.
Over the weekend, when Trump ordered a major round of airstrikes on Yemen, which killed at least 53 people, US officials told The Washington Postthat the Houthis were independent actors.
“US officials have said that while Iran has provided significant support to the Houthis, they see the group as an independent actor that might not necessarily respond to Tehran’s instructions to stand down its maritime attacks,” the Post reported.
The Houthis have an arsenal of drones and missiles that are similar to Iranian ones, but they are believed to be produced domestically in Yemen. “The Houthis also have established their own substantial, independent weapons production capability,” the Post report said.
Iran has always denied US allegations that it arms the Houthis, a position it reiterated when it rejected Trump’s earlier threats related to Yemen. The US airstrikes on Yemen over the weekend provoked Houthi attacks on the aircraft carrier USS Harry Truman, which US officials said were intercepted.
The Houthis ceased their attacks on Israel and Red Sea shipping once the Gaza ceasefire was reached on January 19. But last week, the group announced it was re-imposing its blockade on Israeli shipping in response to Israel imposing a full blockade on Gaza in violation of the ceasefire. That announcement appears to have been what triggered the US bombing of Yemen.
In response to the US bombing of Yemen, Abdul Malik al-Houthi, leader of Ansar Allah, said both US military and commercial vessels in the region will now be targeted by Houthi missiles and drones. Ansar Allah did not back down in the face of hundreds of missile strikes launched by President Biden from January 2024 to January 2025.
During his previous administration, President Trump supported a brutal Saudi/UAE war against the Houthis and used his veto power to kill legislation passed by Congress to end US involvement in the conflict. According to UN numbers, which are considered a low estimate, the US-backed war killed at least 377,000 people, with more than half dying of starvation and disease.
The US-backed Saudi war on Yemen involved a brutal blockade, a heavy bombing campaign, and a ground campaign. During that time, the Houthis only became a more capable fighting force.
Before the US backed the Saudi-UAE war on Yemen in 2015, the Houthis were actually a partner of the US in the fight against al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP). A report from The Wall Street Journal in January 2015 (the Saudi intervention started in March 2015) explained how the US was cooperating with the Houthis.
The report reads: “The US has formed ties with Houthi rebels who seized control of Yemen’s capital, White House officials and rebel commanders said, in the clearest indication of a shift in the US approach there as it seeks to maintain its fight against a key branch of al-Qaeda.”
After entering the war against the Houthis, the US was then on the same side as al-Qaeda. A report from The Associated Press in 2018 found the US-backed coalition supported militias that “actively recruit al-Qaeda militants, or those who were recently members, because they’re considered exceptional fighters.”
This article originally appeared at Antiwar.com.
