Head of WHO at Yemen airport during Israeli air strikes

The head of the World Health Organization (WHO) and other UN staff were at Yemen’s international airport in Sanaa on Thursday during an Israeli air strike.

In a social media post, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said he and staff were about to board a plane when the airport came under aerial bombardment.

“One of our plane’s crew members was injured,” he wrote, adding that two people at the airport were killed.

The strikes – which also hit power stations and ports – have killed at least three people with more than a dozen injured, according to Houthi-run media. The Iran-backed rebel group described the attacks as “barbaric” after Israel claimed responsibility for the strikes.

It is unclear whether the fatalities were civilians or Houthi rebels.

In a statement, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said its “fighter jets conducted intelligence-based strikes on military targets belonging to the Houthi terrorist regime on the western coast and inland Yemen”.

It targeted “military infrastructure” at Sanaa International Airport as well as the Hezyaz and Ras Kanatib power stations, and sites in the Al-Hudaydah, Salif and Ras Kanatib ports on the west coast, the IDF said.

In comments shortly after the strikes, Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said it would “continue to cut off the terror arm of the Iranian axis of evil until we complete the job”, adding “we are only just starting with [the Houthis]”.

Mohammed Ali al-Houthi, head of the Houthis’ supreme revolutionary committee, called the strikes “barbaric” and “aggressive”.

He said that “confrontations with American and Israeli arrogance” will continue until the conflict in Gaza stops.

Several people injured by the strikes at the airport in Sanaa told Houthi-run broadcaster Al Masirah that the runway was struck three times before the airport’s control tower was also hit.

One man, who identified himself as Dr Abbas Rajeh, said the police hospital he works in treated 10 patients after the attacks – one had already died, another was in critical condition, and others had minor injuries or broken bones.

Iran described the strikes as a “clear violation of international peace and security”.

Houthi rebels have been attacking Israel since the first months of the Gaza war, which began in October 2023.

A Houthi missile strike injured more than a dozen people in Israel last week.

Israel has carried out intermittent strikes against Houthis in retaliation.

Earlier this week, Israel’s defence minister said the country was preparing to “strike hard” at the Houthis, warning it would “decapitate” the group’s leadership.

The Houthis are an armed political and religious group backed by Iran. The group has ruled large parts of western Yemen, including the capital Sanaa, since ousting the internationally recognised government in 2015.