The “supreme leader” of Iran, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, effusively celebrated the terrorist Houthi organization of Yemen on Tuesday for its ongoing attacks on commercial shipping transiting through the Red Sea, crediting it with hurting “the vital channels of the Zionist regime.”
The Houthis — a Shiite jihadist group bankrolled by Iran — declared war on Israel in October to support Hamas in the aftermath of its murder, gang-rape, torture, and abduction rampage against Israel on October 7. As part of that war, the group announced it would attack commercial ships with ties to Israel but has instead targeted unrelated commercial ships, as well as American and other Western assets.
The Houthi campaign against international commerce has prompted some of the largest shipping companies in the world to avoid the Red Sea and Suez Canal entirely, rerouting around the southern tip of Africa – a far more expensive and time-consuming voyage. The Financial Times documented a 90-percent drop in ship traffic between January 2023 and January 2024 as of January 10. As a result, shipping costs have risen rapidly and are expected to affect the cost of goods around the world.
Houthi forces board the cargo ship Galaxy Leader on November 19, 2023, in the Red Sea. (Houthi Media Center via AP)
The Houthis are not the legitimate government of Yemen, though the Iranian government addresses them as such. The group, which calls itself “Ansarullah,” staged a violent attempt at seizing power in Sana’a in 2014, triggering an ongoing civil war against the legitimate government of the country that continues to this day. In addition to targeting the Yemeni military and committing human rights atrocities against Yemeni civilians, including the recruitment of child soldiers, the Houthis waged war against Saudi Arabia, which intervened in Yemen on behalf of the government and became the target of Houthi airstrikes as a result.
Khamenei celebrated the chaos caused by his proxy force during remarks on Tuesday at an event with “Friday prayer leaders,” according to the Iranian state outlet PressTV.
“The Yemeni nation and the Ansarullah government did a great job … They damaged the vital channels of the Zionist regime. The United States threatened [them], but they were not afraid of the U.S.,” Khamenei said, adding that the terrorist group “deserves admiration and appreciation.”
“Their job is rightly and fairly an example of jihad,” Khamenei continued. “We hope that these efforts, acts of resistance, and activities will continue until victory.”
Khamenei also took a moment to celebrate Hamas once again for perpetrating the October 7 massacres, claiming Hamas was successfully withstanding Israel’s self-defense efforts in Gaza and referring to the Israeli government as “an oppressive, ruthless, bloodthirsty wolf that has lost the battle and is being disintegrated.”
“The oppressed and strong Gazans were able to influence the world with their battles, and today, the world views these people, their fighters, and the resistance group as heroes,” he concluded.
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Houthi leaders have vowed to continue their terrorist activity in the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, which connects the Red Sea to the Gulf of Aden. The organization expanded its war against Israel to threats to attack all American and British ships in the region after the two nations executed a series of airstrikes against Houthi targets in Yemen to deter further disruption of shipping on January 12. According to the United States Central Command (CENTCOM), the strikes targeted “radar systems, air defense systems, and storage and launch sites for one-way attack unmanned aerial systems, cruise missiles, and ballistic missiles.”
The strikes, leftist American President Joe Biden declared, were a “clear message that the United States and our partners will not tolerate attacks on our personnel or allow hostile actors to imperil freedom of navigation in one of the world’s most critical commercial routes.”
Houthi forces board the cargo ship Galaxy Leader on November 19, 2023, in the Red Sea. (Houthi Media Center via AP)
“The acts of aggression by the U.S. and UK will not go unanswered, and we will make them serve as a lesson for the entire world,” Houthi Information Ministry Adviser Tawfiq al-Hamiri responded shortly after the strikes occurred, threatening to “end the U.S. hegemony forever.”
The Houthi campaign to violently seize power in Yemen has persisted for nearly a decade. The group is overtly anti-American; its slogan is “Allahu Akbar, Death to America, Death to Israel, Curse on the Jews, Victory to Islam.” Despite its intention to threaten American interests and consistent participation in terrorist activities, the Biden administration removed the group from the State Department’s list of designated Foreign Terrorist Organizations (FTOs) in 2021 as one of Biden’s first acts in office.
“We are reviewing the FTO — Foreign Terrorist Organization — finding on the Houthis. As you know, we — we delisted them,” Biden’s National Security Council Coordinator for Strategic Communications John Kirby said Friday. “And we have announced that we’re reviewing that — that decision right now. No decisions have been made yet.”
Apparently dismissing Kirby and the State Department’s efforts, Biden himself told reporters on Friday, “It’s irrelevant whether they’re designated.” Biden also said that despite delisting them, he believed the Houthis to meet the criteria of a foreign terrorist organization.