On Thursday, August 29, 2025, Israel carried out an airstrike in Yemen that killed Houthi Prime Minister Ahmad Ghaleb al-Rahawi along with several senior officials.
The strike targeted a villa in Beit Baws, an ancient village in southern Sanaa, where Houthi leaders had gathered to watch a speech by Abdul Malik al-Houthi, the group’s secretive leader.
Among the confirmed dead were the energy, foreign, and information ministers, while the status of the defense minister remains unclear. Israeli intelligence sources believe the entire Houthi cabinet, 13 ministers in total, including the prime minister, may have been eliminated, though this assessment is not yet definitive.
Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu approved the strikes, with military Chief of Staff General Eyal Zamir overseeing the operation. Katz hailed it as an “unprecedented knockout blow” to Houthi leadership.
The attack marked the first time Israel has eliminated top Houthi officials and came just days after another strike, which followed the interception of Houthi drones launched toward Israel.
Al-Rahawi was appointed Houthi prime minister in August 2024. A native of Abyan province and member of the General People’s Congress party, he previously served on the Houthi-controlled Supreme Political Council and had ties to former Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh.
Although aligned with the Houthis after their takeover of Sanaa in 2014, Al-Rahawi was seen largely as a figurehead, tasked with day-to-day civilian affairs rather than the inner circle led by Abdul Malik al-Houthi.
He survived several assassination attempts in the past, Al-Qaeda even blew up his home in 2015, but on August 29, 2025, Israel succeeded where others had failed. Deputy Prime Minister Mohammed Miftah has since been named acting leader.
This marks the first time Israel has eliminated senior Houthi leadership, a significant shift from previous strikes in Yemen that primarily targeted infrastructure.
The strike came three days after the Houthis fired a ballistic missile at Israel, their first cluster bomb attack since 2023. The Houthis have escalated hostilities since the Gaza war, launching repeated assaults on Israel and Red Sea shipping in solidarity with Palestinians.
Between November 2023 and January 2025, they targeted over 100 merchant vessels with missiles and drones, sinking two ships and killing four sailors. In July 2025, three crew members were killed aboard the Eternity C cargo ship.
Human Rights Watch has documented that Houthis openly threatened non-military vessels, actions that amount to war crimes. The detention of captured crews also raises accusations of hostage-taking in violation of international humanitarian law.
The Trump administration upgraded the Houthis’ designation to a Foreign Terrorist Organization in 2025 and reimposed sanctions in response to their escalating attacks. The group’s slogan openly declares, “Death to America, Death to Israel, Curse the Jews, Victory for Islam,” first adopted after the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq.
Since March 2025, the Houthis have launched 72 ballistic missiles and at least 23 drones at Israel. In July 2024, one missile struck Tel Aviv, killing a civilian and injuring several others.
The Houthis form part of Iran’s “Axis of Resistance,” an informal coalition of Tehran-backed militant groups including Hezbollah, Islamic Resistance in Iraq, the Popular Mobilization Forces, and at times Hamas. These organizations operate under Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), whose Quds Force serves as the regime’s primary vehicle for exporting terrorism, supplying weapons, training, and financing across the region. Iran has supported the Houthis
Iran has supported the Houthis since at least 2011, expanding aid after the Saudi-led coalition entered Yemen in 2015.
U.S. and allied forces have intercepted numerous Iranian arms shipments bound for Houthi territory, including a cache of 750 tons of weapons—anti-ship and anti-aircraft missiles, drones, warheads, and Farsi-language manuals.
In 2023 alone, the U.S. Navy seized dhows carrying heavy machine guns, sniper rifles, Russian-made anti-tank missiles, and thousands of assault rifles. Beyond weapons, Tehran has invested heavily in the Houthis’ war effort, providing $90 million in aid in 2016 and training more than 1,100 Houthi fighters in IRGC facilities, including 250 at the Quds Force garrison in Hamedan.
Iran’s proxy network extends far beyond Yemen. Since the 1990s, Tehran has supported Hamas, giving up to $50 million annually along with military and economic aid, including bonuses for attacks on Israel.
The IRGC, Quds Force, and Hezbollah trained Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad operatives to fire Iranian-made Fajr-5 rockets at cities like Jerusalem and Tel Aviv.
Hezbollah, Iran’s most prominent proxy, was founded in 1982 and has received more than $700 million annually from Tehran in recent years.
Between 2012 and 2020, the State Department estimated Iran provided over $16 billion to Hezbollah, the Assad regime, and other proxies. Hezbollah has also shared drone warfare expertise with the Houthis and trained other allied groups.
According to IRGC commander General Qassem Soleimani, the Quds Force had recruited and organized over 200,000 militant Shia youth across the Middle East by 2016.
This vast proxy network allows Iran to compensate for its limited conventional military power, project influence across the region, and attack Israel, the United States, and their allies while avoiding direct accountability.
Following the Israeli strike that killed Houthi Prime Minister Ahmad al-Rahawi, Houthi leaders confirmed his death, vowed revenge, and pledged to continue their campaign against Israel, a campaign that intensified after Hamas’ October 7 attacks.
Despite their slogan of Death to America and Israel, the Houthis, Hamas, and Hezbollah appear to be dying at an accelerated rate while inflicting almost no damage on the United States or Israel since October 7, 2023.
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