Israel 'Prepared for Any Scenario' as Conflicts Intensify in Gaza and Yemen

An Israeli security official has expressed the nation's readiness to engage militarily on multiple fronts after a series of escalations in the Gaza Strip and Yemen, two theaters of a regional conflict raging for more than 16 months.

⁠"The IDF is spread out in defence, including Aerial defence arrays, and prepared for any scenario," the Israeli security official said, referring to the Israel Defense Forces, in comments shared with Newsweek.

The remarks came shortly after Yemen's Ansar Allah, also known as the Houthi movement, announced on Tuesday the first ballistic missile attack against Israel since Israel and the Palestinian Hamas movement reached a ceasefire deal in January. The group had accused Israel last week of violating the truce by cutting off humanitarian assistance to Gaza, where Israel then conducted a series of large-scale strikes late Monday despite the cessation of hostilities.

While Ansar Allah claimed to have successfully struck the Nevatim Air Base on Tuesday, the Israeli official said that the Israeli Air Force had intercepted a missile launched from Yemen, following what the official described as "a precise, intelligence based, surprise preemptive strike, on various terror targets in the Gaza Strip," in which "Hamas was taken by surprise" the previous night.

The White House said it was consulted before the Israeli strikes on Gaza, while President Donald Trump's administration has also stepped up military action against Ansar Allah in Yemen.

Why It Matters

The renewed violence involving Gaza and Yemen mark the most serious test yet for Trump's inaugural promise to put an end to conflicts in the Middle East.

Trump had hailed the ceasefire and hostage release agreement reached between Israel and Hamas just days before he entered office in January, but the deal has since floundered amid disagreements over the next steps in the three-phase framework first outlined by then-President Joe Biden in May. Israel has demanded that the first phase be extended until Hamas released all of the nearly 60 hostages in the group's captivity, while Hamas has called for talks to advance toward the second phase, which would entail further prisoner swaps and negotiations toward a lasting resolution to the conflict.

Israeli Defense Foreign Minister Gideon Sa'ar said Tuesday following the Israeli strikes that Hamas had twice refused proposals put forth by White House Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff, while Hamas officials have placed the blame squarely on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for the unraveling of the talks.

Hamas Political Bureau member and spokesperson Basem Naim held Netanyahu "fully responsible for the repercussions of the treacherous aggression on Gaza, and for the defenseless civilians and our besieged Palestinian people, who are subjected to a brutal war and a systematic policy of starvation," in comments recently shared with Newsweek.

While Iran and other members of the Axis of Resistance coalition that intervened in support of Hamas throughout the conflict have limited their role to issuing condemnation amid the latest developments, Ansar Allah has opted to reignite its campaign of missile and drone strikes. Since the Hamas-led attack on Israel that sparked the war in October 2023, Ansar Allah has conducted dozens of strikes against Israel and targeted more than 100 commercial ships accused of doing business with Israel.

Ansar Allah's decision to restart operations drew a swift response from Trump, who ordered large-scale strikes across the group's positions in Yemen. The U.S. leader went on to threaten Iran directly over its Yemeni ally's action, marking a dramatic shift from his prior appeal for peace and denuclearization talks with Tehran.

What To Know

Ansar Allah military spokesperson Yahya Saree said Tuesday that the group had "successfully" struck Nevatim Air Base, one of the largest of its kind in Israel, "in response to the Israeli massacres against the Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip." The Israeli security official said that "a ballistic missile was launched from Yemen, and was successfully intercepted by the IDF outside of Israel's borders."

Both sides have often differed in their narratives of such operations, though several previous Ansar Allah attacks have been confirmed to have penetrated the IDF's state-of-the-art air defenses.

Ansar Allah and U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) also presented opposing portrayals of the latest clashes between the group and U.S. forces. After the U.S. strikes killed what Ansar Allah-affiliated media reported to be 53 people, including two children, the group said it had successfully conducted two waves of attacks against the USS Harry Truman aircraft carrier, though the Pentagon reported no damage.

In the wake of Trump's fiery threat to both Ansar Allah and Iran on Monday, a source within the Yemeni movement told Newsweek that the group "will not allow Trump to support the Zionist enemy in its crime of killing the people of Gaza with hunger and thirst."

"We will increase pressure on the Zionists, and if the Americans escalate, we will confront their escalation with an escalation they do not expect," the Ansar Allah source.

An Ansar Allah source had earlier told Newsweek that the group was "proceeding with extreme caution" in regard to the security of its leader, Abdul-Malik al-Houthi, "but at the same time, we are highly prepared to make sacrifices and cannot back down."

In Gaza, the Israeli security official said that the strikes late Monday "lasted approximately 10 minutes, with the participation of the Israeli Navy, and dozens of aircraft."

"We struck approximately 80 terror targets that posed a threat to Israel and the communities in the south," the Israeli security official said. ⁠"The operatives we struck were mid-ranking military commanders, ranging from company to battalion commanders, as well as prominent political leaders."

Among the dead, according to a separate source of information shared with Newsweek by an Israeli official, were Hamas Political Bureau Internal Affairs Minister Mahmoud Marzouk Ahmed Abu-Watfa and Hamas Internal Security Forces chief Bahajat Hassan Mohammed Abu-Sultan. The IDF also reported on the death of the head of Gaza's Hamas-ruled Government Administration Committee, Essam al-Da'alis.

The Gaza-based Palestinian Health Ministry reported that more than 400 people were killed in the Israeli strikes, with a number of victims still under the rubble.

What People Are Saying

Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz, during a visit to Tel Nof Airbase on Tuesday: "Hamas must understand that the rules of the game have changed and if it does not immediately release all the kidnapped men and women, the gates of hell will open and it will find the full might of the IDF in the air, at sea and on land, until its complete annihilation.

"We will not stop fighting until all the kidnapped are returned home and all threats to the residents of the south are removed."

Hamas, in a statement published Tuesday: "The Hamas Movement affirms that the Israeli occupation has reneged on the ceasefire agreement, evaded its obligations, and continued to perpetrate massacres against our people in Gaza; all amidst a shameful international silence.

"The occupation's claims that the resistance had made preparations to attack its troops are baseless and false pretexts to justify its return to the war and escalation of its bloody aggression. The occupation is trying to mislead the public opinion and create false justifications to cover its premeditated decision to resume its genocide against unarmed civilians; completely disregarding its commitments under the ceasefire agreement.

"The Hamas Movement remained committed to the agreement until the very last moment, and was keen on ensuring its continuation. Netanyahu, however, who is looking for a way out of his internal crises, preferred to reignite the war at the expense of our people's blood."

Ansar Allah military spokesperson Yahya Saree, in a statement on Tuesday: "The Yemeni Armed Forces will expand their scope of targets in occupied Palestine during the coming hours and days unless the aggression against Gaza stops.

"Yemen, its leadership, people and army, will not stand idly by while witnessing all these massacres against our people in Gaza. The Yemeni Armed Forces, with God's help, will mobilize all their capabilities and abilities to defend and support the oppressed in Palestine until these crimes against our people in Gaza stop.

"With God's help, they will continue to confront the criminal American enemy and prevent Israeli navigation until the aggression stops, the blockade is lifted and aid is allowed into the Gaza Strip."

Trump, in a statement published to Truth Social on Monday: "Let nobody be fooled! The hundreds of attacks being made by Houthi, the sinister mobsters and thugs based in Yemen, who are hated by the Yemeni people, all emanate from, and are created by, IRAN. Any further attack or retaliation by the "Houthis" will be met with great force, and there is no guarantee that that force will stop there.

"Iran has played 'the innocent victim' of rogue terrorists from which they've lost control, but they haven't lost control. They're dictating every move, giving them the weapons, supplying them with money and highly sophisticated Military equipment, and even, so-called, 'Intelligence.'

"Every shot fired by the Houthis will be looked upon, from this point forward, as being a shot fired from the weapons and leadership of IRAN, and IRAN will be held responsible, and suffer the consequences, and those consequences will be dire!"

What Happens Next

The sharp acceleration of U.S. and Israeli military action in the Middle East, matched with Ansar Allah's appetite for escalation makes for a volatile situation with the potential to once again draw Iran directly into the conflict. Iranian officials have repeatedly asserted their willingness to retaliate for any attacks against the Islamic Republic.

At the same time, Trump, who in 2018 abandoned the multilateral nuclear agreement reached with Iran a decade ago, has raised the possibility of pursuing a new "verifiable nuclear peace treaty" with Iran. But the prospect of revitalized diplomacy between Washington and Tehran remains uncertain as Iranian leadership has rejected Trump's offer to enter into talks while the country is still subject to "maximum pressure" sanctions over its nuclear program.