Paris, France – The Houthi rebels supported by Iran in Yemen have become bruised but provocative of an American bombing campaign which has blister, cementing their role of one of the most powerful non -state actors in the Middle East after a truce with Washington.
US President Donald Trump said the rebels “capitulated” after the seven -weekly in -response campaign that came in response to Houthi threats to renew the attacks on the Red Sea navigation on the blockade of Israel on Gaza.
Rebel leader Abdulmalik al-Houthi criticized Trump’s remarks on Thursday, calling for supporters to celebrate the “great failure of America” during Friday demonstrations and to label their campaign on the key shipping path a “total success”.
The rebels, which control the expanses of Yemen, are the greatest winners of this truce, said analysts to AFP, with a manager confirming that they will continue to target Israeli ships in the key sea key.
The Houthis – whose slogan calls for “death in America, death in Israel, a curse on the Jews” – shot on Israel and on shipping roads in the Red Sea since November 2023, saying that they do it in a demonstration of solidarity with the Palestinians of Gaza in the middle of the war, which broke out when thousands of hamlets took the south of Israc 1 take 251 hostages.
Houthi’s attacks on commercial navigation have largely ceased six months ago, although many international companies have released their ships to avoid the Red Sea. Attacks on Israel and other military targets were interrupted for several weeks earlier this year, but restarted when a cease-fire in Gaza collapsed in early March.
Israeli security forces on the site where a missile from Yemen struck an area of Ben Gurion airport on May 4, 2025. (Chaim Goldberg / Flash90)
This decision sparked an answer from the American army, which hammered the rebels with almost daily air strikes from March 15 to prevent them from threatening shipping in key water.
Since March 18, when the FDI has resumed its offensive against Hamas in the Gaza Strip after a cease-fire, the Houthis launched around 27 ballistic missiles and several drones in Israel, including a missile which struck inside the land of Ben Gurion airport on Sunday.
Israel responded on Monday and Tuesday with massive air strikes against the port and the airport controlled by Houthi in Yemen.
Trump announced on Tuesday on Trump that the Houthis agreed to stop attacking shipping routes to the Red Sea and said the United States would stop attacks against the group supported by Iran.
“It is at best a very unstable agreement. The ambitions of the Houthis in the Red Sea against Israel and in the region in general will not end, “said Thomas Juneau, specialist in the Middle East at the University of Ottawa.
“This allows President Trump to claim victory, but ultimately, it is a very limited victory,” he said.
The demonstrators burn us and the Israeli flags during a solidarity rally with Palestinians in the Gaza Strip and by condemning the American strikes, in the capital controlled by Yemen, the capital Sanaa on April 18, 2025. (Mohammed Huwais / AFP)
The Yemeni rebels have supervised the ceasefire as a victory, announcing regularly throughout the climbing that they have shot down the MQ-9 drones and at least three F-18 planes.
These losses highlight “billions spent by the United States,” said Mohammed Albasha, of the Basha Risk report, based in the United States, noting that “none of their senior commanders were injured”.
The recent agreement has failed to limit the ambitions of the Houthis.
“On the ground, the anti-houxes forces did not have the capacity to carry out operations on the ground without the Emirati and Saudi support,” said Albasha.
“The two Gulf states have publicly opposed an offensive on the ground given their continuous understanding with the Houthis,” he added.
The group operating from difficult to access mountain bastions resisted a decade of war against a well -armed and Saudi coalition.
“The nature of Houthi domination and how they work makes them doubly resistant to air strikes,” said Michael Shurkin of the Royal United Reflection Group Institute (RUSI).
“The Houthis as an organization are dispersed and count on tribal networks. These are classic and competent guerrilla warfares in the asymmetrical war,” he added.
A man holds a grenade launcher powered by rockets while the Yemenis attend the funeral of people killed in American strikes reported the previous week, in the Yemeni capital controlled by the Houthis Sanaa, on May 1, 2025. (Photo by Mohammed Huwais / AFP)
With Hamas and Hezbollah decimated by Israel, the Houthis have become the strongest ally of Iran.
“Their importance has increased,” said Juneau, adding that they had become “more essential to Iran’s eyes”.
Clara Broekaert, researcher at the Soufan Center, said: “The current break presents a strategic opportunity for the Houthis to reposition and reposition.”
But the rebels have retained a certain autonomy of their Iranian contributor.
A senior member of the Revolutionary Guards is part of one of the essential decision -making organizations of the Houthis, according to Juneau.
Tehran provides them with “missile and drone technologies, military support and intelligence”, but the rebels are “not puppets acting on the whim of Iran,” he said.
“The dependence works in both directions” between Iran and the rebels, he said, adding that “this gives the Houthis an important negotiation power”.
A document photo provided by the office of the supreme chief of Iran, the Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, shows him the reception of Mohammed Abdulsalam (L), spokesperson for the Houthis Movement of Yemen, in Tehran on July 30, 2024. (website of the Iranian Supreme Leader / AFP))
Camille Lons, a member of the European Council for Foreign Relations, said that the group allows Tehran to “maintain pressure points, to preserve assets and regional networks in Yemen”.
A relatively unknown decade ago, the Houthis remained largely under the radar of Western intelligence services.
Their attacks, often with assembled drones and missiles, are simple but effective, which considerably reduces the delivery volumes of the Red Sea, because the freight companies have avoided the route.
It is difficult to assess the extent of their arsenal or how the last American campaign has affected their military capacities.
“The hypothesis is that the know-how for sophisticated weapons comes from Iran,” said Jeremy Binnie of the British private intelligence company Janes.
“A certain local manufacture takes place to reduce the burden of smuggling networks, although the measure that occurs is not particularly clear,” he said.
The Conflict Armament Research Group (CAR) said that the group “tried to use hydrogen fuel cells to feed their” drones. If the experience succeeds, it would be the first non -state actor to do so.
“It is no longer a small group manufacturing underdeveloped weapons,” said Lons, stressing the increase in the “complexity of what Houthis are able to produce by themselves”.
