Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday vowed a multi-phased response to Yemen’s Houthis after the rebels fired a missile towards Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion Airport, injuring six people and prompting several major airlines to suspend flights.
In a video published on Telegram, Netanyahu said Israel had “acted against” the Iran-backed rebels in the past and “will act in the future”, reported
“It will not happen in one bang, but there will be many bangs,” the Israeli prime minister said, referring to the promised retaliation, without going into further detail.
Also Read | Watch: Panic, sirens, crater in ground after Houthi missile hits Israel’s Tel Aviv airport
In a post later on X, he also said that Israel will respond to Houthis and their “Iranian masters”.
“Attacks by the Houthis emanate from Iran,” Netanyahu wrote on X. “Israel will respond to the Houthi attack against our main airport AND, at a time and place of our choosing, to their Iranian terror masters.”
Tel Aviv airport attack
Earlier on Sunday, the Israeli police said air traffic to the country’s main airport in Tel Aviv was briefly closed after a missile was launched from Yemen.
According to an AFP photographer, the missile hit near the parking lots of Terminal 3, the airport’s largest. The crater was just hundreds of metres (yards) from the tarmac.
A plume of thick smoke was seen rising earlier from near the airport after the missile was launched. Passengers were heard yelling and scrambling for cover, according to Reuters.
A senior Israeli police commander, Yair Hetzroni, showed reporters a crater caused by the impact of the missile, which airport authorities said had landed beside a road near a Terminal 3 parking lot, reported Reuters.
“You can see the scene right behind us here, a hole that opened up with a diametre of tens of metres and also tens of metres deep,” Hetzroni said, adding that there was no significant damage, according to Reuters.
The Houthi rebels, who have been striking Israel throughout the war in Gaza in solidarity with Palestinians, said in a video statement that the group fired a hypersonic ballistic missile at the airport, reported the Associated Press.
Israeli defense minister Israel Katz vowed retribution for the airport attack: “Whoever harms us, we will harm them sevenfold.”
Several airlines, including Air India, suspended flights to and from Tel Aviv after the incident.
