Live updates: Follow the latest on Israel-Gaza
Yemen's Houthi rebels said on Tuesday that they have fired missiles and drones towards Israel in retaliation for the Gaza war, signalling a new front in the conflict by one of the Iran-backed militias in the Middle East.
“Our armed forces launched a large batch of ballistic and winged missiles and a large number of drones at various targets of the Israeli enemy,” said the heavily armed group.
“This operation is the third in support of our oppressed brothers in Palestine, and we will continue to carry out more qualitative strikes with missiles and drones until the Israeli aggression stops.”
Pentagon Press Secretary Brig Gen Pat Ryder said the Israeli military had shot down the missile.
“We are aware that the Houthis did fire a medium-range ballistic missile or cruise missile targeting Israel. Israel did take it down,” he told reporters.
“This is something that we will continue to monitor. As we’ve said before, we want to prevent a broader regional conflict.”
Despite being 1,600km away, experts have warned that the Yemeni rebels could emerge as a threat to Israel as it expands its military assault in Gaza, more than three weeks after the surprise attack by Hamas.
The militia that holds the capital of war-torn Yemen has been accused by the Pentagon earlier this month of launching a series of missiles and drones that were intercepted by a US Navy ship in the Red Sea.
Last week, projectiles struck two Egyptian towns near Israel. Israeli authorities blamed the attack on an “aerial threat” in the Red Sea region, likely referring to the Houthis, who control northern Yemen and parts of its western coast.
On Tuesday, Israel's air defence systems intercepted a missile launched from the Red Sea region, its army said. Jets also shot down other targets, it added.
The claim by the Houthis is the first since the beginning of the conflict and marks an escalation in the multilayered conflict.
“This is an escalation, a new front opening, as Iran threatens with a regional response while Israel intensifies its attack,” Maged Al Madhaji, co-founder of the Sanaa Centre for Strategic Studies, told The National.
Yemen’s rebels have bolstered their fighting capabilities since the civil war erupted in the country in 2014, posing a serious threat to its neighbours.
“Houthis can handle the price more than any other Iran ally in the region
Maged Al Madhaji,
co-founder of the Sanaa Centre for Strategic Studies
Up until the end of 2018, the Houthis frequently used ballistic missiles they captured from army depots. But in the past five years, they have shifted to small, long-range, explosive unmanned aircraft that can evade radar detection.
“Houthis can handle the price more than any other Iran ally in the region – they will pay the cheapest price” to any retaliation, Mr Al Madhaji said.
The launch of the missiles and drones coincides with pro-Iranian militant groups attacking US bases hosting American troops in Syria and Iraq.
Three days after the Hamas attack on October 7 that killed about 1,400 in Israel, the rebels’ leader Abdel-Malek Al Houthi warned that his militia is “ready to engage” with the co-ordination of Iran allies in the region.
Iran said it was “natural” for the Tehran-backed groups to attack Israel in light of its war, warning of a wider spillover if no ceasefire is reached.
The remarks were made on Tuesday by Iran's top diplomat Hossein Amirabdollahian in Qatar's capital Doha, where he met his Qatari counterpart as well as Emir Sheikh Tamim to discuss a push for a diplomatic breakthrough.
THE BIO
Age: 33
Favourite quote: “If you’re going through hell, keep going” Winston Churchill
Favourite breed of dog: All of them. I can’t possibly pick a favourite.
Favourite place in the UAE: The Stray Dogs Centre in Umm Al Quwain. It sounds predictable, but it honestly is my favourite place to spend time. Surrounded by hundreds of dogs that love you - what could possibly be better than that?
Favourite colour: All the colours that dogs come in
Attacks on Egypt’s long rooted Copts
Egypt’s Copts belong to one of the world’s oldest Christian communities, with Mark the Evangelist credited with founding their church around 300 AD. Orthodox Christians account for the overwhelming majority of Christians in Egypt, with the rest mainly made up of Greek Orthodox, Catholics and Anglicans.
The community accounts for some 10 per cent of Egypt’s 100 million people, with the largest concentrations of Christians found in Cairo, Alexandria and the provinces of Minya and Assiut south of Cairo.
Egypt’s Christians have had a somewhat turbulent history in the Muslim majority Arab nation, with the community occasionally suffering outright persecution but generally living in peace with their Muslim compatriots. But radical Muslims who have first emerged in the 1970s have whipped up anti-Christian sentiments, something that has, in turn, led to an upsurge in attacks against their places of worship, church-linked facilities as well as their businesses and homes.
More recently, ISIS has vowed to go after the Christians, claiming responsibility for a series of attacks against churches packed with worshippers starting December 2016.
The discrimination many Christians complain about and the shift towards religious conservatism by many Egyptian Muslims over the last 50 years have forced hundreds of thousands of Christians to migrate, starting new lives in growing communities in places as far afield as Australia, Canada and the United States.
Here is a look at major attacks against Egypt's Coptic Christians in recent years:
November 2: Masked gunmen riding pickup trucks opened fire on three buses carrying pilgrims to the remote desert monastery of St. Samuel the Confessor south of Cairo, killing 7 and wounding about 20. IS claimed responsibility for the attack.
May 26, 2017: Masked militants riding in three all-terrain cars open fire on a bus carrying pilgrims on their way to the Monastery of St. Samuel the Confessor, killing 29 and wounding 22. ISIS claimed responsibility for the attack.
April 2017: Twin attacks by suicide bombers hit churches in the coastal city of Alexandria and the Nile Delta city of Tanta. At least 43 people are killed and scores of worshippers injured in the Palm Sunday attack, which narrowly missed a ceremony presided over by Pope Tawadros II, spiritual leader of Egypt Orthodox Copts, in Alexandria's St. Mark's Cathedral. ISIS claimed responsibility for the attacks.
February 2017: Hundreds of Egyptian Christians flee their homes in the northern part of the Sinai Peninsula, fearing attacks by ISIS. The group's North Sinai affiliate had killed at least seven Coptic Christians in the restive peninsula in less than a month.
December 2016: A bombing at a chapel adjacent to Egypt's main Coptic Christian cathedral in Cairo kills 30 people and wounds dozens during Sunday Mass in one of the deadliest attacks carried out against the religious minority in recent memory. ISIS claimed responsibility.
July 2016: Pope Tawadros II says that since 2013 there were 37 sectarian attacks on Christians in Egypt, nearly one incident a month. A Muslim mob stabs to death a 27-year-old Coptic Christian man, Fam Khalaf, in the central city of Minya over a personal feud.
May 2016: A Muslim mob ransacks and torches seven Christian homes in Minya after rumours spread that a Christian man had an affair with a Muslim woman. The elderly mother of the Christian man was stripped naked and dragged through a street by the mob.
New Year's Eve 2011: A bomb explodes in a Coptic Christian church in Alexandria as worshippers leave after a midnight mass, killing more than 20 people.
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From Europe to the Middle East, economic success brings wealth - and lifestyle diseases
A rise in obesity figures and the need for more public spending is a familiar trend in the developing world as western lifestyles are adopted.
One in five deaths around the world is now caused by bad diet, with obesity the fastest growing global risk. A high body mass index is also the top cause of metabolic diseases relating to death and disability in Kuwait, Qatar and Oman – and second on the list in Bahrain.
In Britain, heart disease, lung cancer and Alzheimer’s remain among the leading causes of death, and people there are spending more time suffering from health problems.
The UK is expected to spend $421.4 billion on healthcare by 2040, up from $239.3 billion in 2014.
And development assistance for health is talking about the financial aid given to governments to support social, environmental development of developing countries.
Living in...
This article is part of a guide on where to live in the UAE. Our reporters will profile some of the country’s most desirable districts, provide an estimate of rental prices and introduce you to some of the residents who call each area home.
Five famous companies founded by teens
There are numerous success stories of teen businesses that were created in college dorm rooms and other modest circumstances. Below are some of the most recognisable names in the industry:
- Facebook: Mark Zuckerberg and his friends started Facebook when he was a 19-year-old Harvard undergraduate.
- Dell: When Michael Dell was an undergraduate student at Texas University in 1984, he started upgrading computers for profit. He starting working full-time on his business when he was 19. Eventually, his company became the Dell Computer Corporation and then Dell Inc.
- Subway: Fred DeLuca opened the first Subway restaurant when he was 17. In 1965, Mr DeLuca needed extra money for college, so he decided to open his own business. Peter Buck, a family friend, lent him $1,000 and together, they opened Pete’s Super Submarines. A few years later, the company was rebranded and called Subway.
- Mashable: In 2005, Pete Cashmore created Mashable in Scotland when he was a teenager. The site was then a technology blog. Over the next few decades, Mr Cashmore has turned Mashable into a global media company.
- Oculus VR: Palmer Luckey founded Oculus VR in June 2012, when he was 19. In August that year, Oculus launched its Kickstarter campaign and raised more than $1 million in three days. Facebook bought Oculus for $2 billion two years later.
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