January 11, 2024 Israel-Hamas war

US President Joe Biden said strikes by the United States and United Kingdom against Houthi-controlled areas in Yemen are “in direct response to unprecedented Houthi attacks against international maritime vessels in the Red Sea.”

"These attacks have endangered U.S. personnel, civilian mariners, and our partners, jeopardized trade, and threatened freedom of navigation," the president said in a statement Thursday.

He said the strikes were carried out by the US and the UK with support from Australia, Bahrain, Canada, and the Netherlands, according to the statement.

Biden said the attacks by Houthi rebels in the Red Sea have had a wide impact, affecting commercial shipping from more than 50 countries.

The Houthi attacks on Red Sea shipping on Tuesday marked the final straw for US President Joe Biden giving the green light to the US to move forward with what culminated in the attacks tonight against the Houthis in Yemen, though preparations have been ongoing for some time, a senior US official told CNN.

On Tuesday, the US Navy shot down 21 Houthi missiles and drones launched from Yemen, according to a statement from US Central Command, in one of the largest Houthi attacks to take place in the Red Sea in recent months.

The official said Thursday night that US vessels were among the targets on Tuesday. 

There were no ships damaged in the attacks and no injuries as a result of the massive drone and missile launch, CENTCOM said.

The United States and the United Kingdom military hit more than a dozen Houthi targets in Yemen on Thursday, a US official told CNN. The locations were chosen for their ability to degrade the Houthis continued attacks on vessels in the Red Sea, the official said.

These included radar systems, drone storage and launch sites, ballistic missile storage and launch sites, and cruise missile storage and launch sites.

The US fired the missiles from aircraft, ships and a submarine, according to US officials.

The submarine was the USS Florida, which entered the Red Sea on November 23, an official told CNN. Like the surface ships that participated in the attack, the sub fired Tomahawk land-attack missiles, they said.

The attacks were conducted by the US and the UK, another US official said. Multiple other nations supported the effort, according to another official.

This post has been updated with details about the US submarine involved in the attack.

CNN's Oren Liebermann contributed reporting to this post.

The US and British military have launched strikes against multiple Houthi targets in Houthi-controlled areas of Yemen, government officials told CNN late Thursday.

They mark a significant response after the Biden administration and its allies warned that the Iran-backed militant group would bear the consequences of repeated drone and missile attacks on commercial shipping in the Red Sea.

Here’s what we know about the Houthis and why they are getting involved in the war.

Read more about Yemen's Iran-backed Houthi rebels.

CNN's Oren Liebermann, Haley Britzky, Natasha Bertrand and Jennifer Hansler contributed to this report.

The United States and United Kingdom launched strikes against multiple Houthi targets in Houthi-controlled areas of Yemen, officials from each country told CNN. The strikes were from fighter jets and Tomahawk missiles. 

The strikes are a sign of the growing international alarm over the threat to one of the world's most critical waterways.

Senior administration officials briefed congressional leadership earlier Thursday on the US plans, according to a congressional source.

For weeks, the US had sought to avoid direct strikes on Yemen because of the risk of escalation in a region already simmering with tension, and the concern of potentially upsetting a delicate ceasefire between the militant group and Saudi Arabia that was achieved after years of war.

But the White House had made clear the repeated Houthi attacks on international shipping lanes in the southern Red Sea were intolerable. 

Though the US has carried out strikes against Iranian proxies in Iraq and Syria since the outbreak of the war in Gaza, this marks the first known strike against the Houthis in Yemen.

In a speech Thursday, Houthi leader Abdul Malek Al-Houthi said any US attack on Yemen ”will not go unanswered,” cryptically warning that the response will be “much more” than attacking US ships in the sea.

This post has been updated with information about the UK's participation in the strikes.

British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak is holding a full cabinet call on Thursday evening amid speculation that the United Kingdom, the United States and Western allies could take military action against Houthi rebels following attacks in the Red Sea, according to UK's PA Media. 

UK Foreign Secretary David Cameron was seen entering the office of the prime minister shortly before 8 p.m. local time (3 p.m. ET), according to PA media. 

It is understood that opposition leader Keir Starmer and shadow defense secretary John Healey will be briefed after the call, the outlet said.

UK Defence Secretary Grant Shapps warned on Wednesday the Iranian-backed group to "watch this space" if disruptions continue in the key shipping route and that further action would be taken if attacks persist.  

CNN reached out to the Downing Street press office Thursday evening, but the press office said it won't comment on reports about a possible meeting or UK military action. 

Inside the Scottish National Party (SNP): Politicians have been advocating to recall parliament if the UK government is preparing to take military action against the Houthis before Monday.

"The UK does not have a good record of military intervention in the Middle East. It is therefore incumbent that Westminster is recalled, MPs briefed and allowed to debate and scrutinise any decision to pursue military action that the UK Government is proposing," Scotland's First Minister Humza Yousaf said on X. 

The SNP's Westminster leader, Stephen Flynn, also said on social media that "it is incumbent upon the UK Government to appraise Parliament as soon as possible and MPs must therefore be recalled to Westminster."

"Based solely upon media reports this is quite clearly a very complex and serious situation that is developing at speed," Flynn said. 

Dozens of people were killed in Gaza following a series of Israeli airstrikes in the southern part of the enclave in the last 24 hours, several officials said.

In the early hours of Wednesday, an airstrike targeting a house in Khan Younis, in southern Gaza, killed seven people and injured at least 25 others, the Al-Nasser Medical Complex said.

Several civil defense and medical personnel were also injured after an Israeli airstrike that struck a residential building near the hospital, Gaza’s Civil Defense said in a statement. Videos obtained by CNN show civil defense crew members being treated inside the medical center.

Also near Khan Younis, six people were killed and brought to the European Hospital on a “horse cart,” the hospital said.

In another incident, journalist Khader Zaanoun, who is in Gaza City, told CNN that he spoke with a doctor at Al-Shifa Medical Complex. Dr. Mu’taz Salah told him that Israeli army snipers fired at hundreds of civilians on the coastal Haroun Al-Rasheed road, in the Sheikh Ajleen area west of the city. 

At least five people were killed and 21 others were injured, Zaanoun said.

CNN has reached out to the Israel Defense Forces for comment regarding allegations they have targeted rescue personnel. The IDF has also not responded to CNN’s request for comment on the incidents in Khan Younis and Gaza City.

A rising death toll: The number of people killed in Gaza since October 7 from Israeli attacks as of Wednesday is at least 23,469, the Hamas-run Gaza Health Ministry said. CNN cannot independently verify casualty figures due to limited access to the area.

A White House official discussed efforts to increase the flow of humanitarian assistance to civilians in Gaza with the newly appointed United Nations Gaza aid coordinator on Thursday.

Deputy National Security Adviser Jon Finer expressed "strong U.S. support" for Sigrid Kaag and her new role, according to a readout from the White House.

The officials "discussed mutual efforts to increase the amount of humanitarian assistance reaching civilians in Gaza, as well as steps that can more sustainably meet the needs of Gazan civilians in the longer term," the readout said.

Kaag was named to the position in December after it was created through a UN Security Council vote.

She was finance minister and deputy prime minister of the Netherlands before resigning her position to join the UN effort in Gaza.

The Israel Defense Forces said a tunnel it uncovered beneath the southern Gaza city of Khan Younis was used by Hamas to hold Israeli hostages.

The tunnel was connected to an underground system of other tunnels beneath a civilian area in Khan Younis and had "ventilation systems, electrical supply and plumbing," the IDF said in a statement Thursday.

CNN cannot independently confirm hostages were held in those tunnels.

Some background: A CNN team was taken into a tunnel under Khan Younis by the IDF earlier this week. The journalists went down multiple sets of stairs and saw a small room in the underground tunnels, and a functional bathroom about 20 meters (roughly 65 feet) underground.

The Israeli military has previously released statements on the discovery of Hamas-made tunnels, which Hamas called "an integral part of the resistance."

In another IDF statement on Thursday, the Israeli military said thousands of tons of concrete and metal were used to build hundreds of kilometers of underground tunnels in the enclave. CNN cannot independently verify this claim.