By Al-Fassel | 2025-04-11

The Houthis' attempts to portray the target of a US strike that eliminated key leadership figures in Yemen's al-Hodeidah province as a "tribal gathering" have been exposed as false by high-level official sources and media reports.

The incident comes as US forces continue an air campaign against the Iran-backed group in response to its attacks on Red Sea shipping routes.

In an April 4 post on social media, US President Donald Trump shared aerial footage showing people assembled in formation before being hit by an airstrike.

"These Houthis gathered for instructions on an attack," he wrote.

Houthi media claimed the gathering was "a social Eid visit."

But Yemen's Minister of Information Moammar al-Eryani provided extensive evidence supporting the military nature of the target, and Al-Arabiya al-Hadath news channel also refuted the group's claim.

The strike targeted a high-level Houthi leadership meeting in al-Saqf area south of al-Jabaliya in the al-Tuhayta axis, killing around 70 fighters, including key field commanders, the channel reported.

The Houthis' al-Tuhayta axis commander Najib al-Kushri (aka Abu Luqman), fifth military region deputy commander Abdallah Suhail, and southern axis maintenance chief Fayiz al-Kushri were among the dead, its sources said.

Also killed were finance chief Hassan al-Mutawakkil, al-Sumud Brigades operations official Rauf Sharafeddine, and southern axis military intelligence chief Aqil al-Shahari.

According to military analysts, "al-Tuhayta axis command has temporarily collapsed, creating a leadership vacuum," the channel reported.

Military target

In an April 5 post on X, al-Eryani said the strike hit within a "closed" military zone less than 10km from contact lines where the Houthis had erected barriers preventing civilian access.

"Under the supervision of experts from the Iranian Revolutionary Guard (IRGC) and the Lebanese Hizbullah, the militia created two sea channels in the al-Faza and al-Majlis areas, from the middle of the palm farms to the Red Sea," he said.

The location and design of these channels "reflects the use of the area for strategic military purposes," he said.

The target site served as "a major focal point for preparing and launching Houthi terrorist attacks against commercial ships and oil tankers in the Red Sea and Bab al-Mandab," al-Eyrani explained.

He noted that the site featured a network of tunnels, missile platform hideouts, explosive boat facilities and earthen barriers securing militia movements.

Several prominent Houthi leaders were killed in the strike, he confirmed, along with IRGC experts whose names the militia concealed "for fear of affecting the morale of its fighters."

If the gathering was truly a tribal event as the Houthis claimed, al-Eyrani observed, "the militia would have been quick to publish photos and names of the dead, as it has done on previous occasions."