The United Arab Emirates has intercepted two ballistic missiles aimed at Abu Dhabi
DUBAI, UAE – The UAE intercepted two ballistic missiles aimed at Abu Dhabi in the early hours of Monday, its state news agency reported, the latest attack on the UAE capital.
A spokesman for Yemen’s rebel Houthi militia later said they had launched attacks aimed at both the UAE and Saudi Arabia, without giving further details.
The attack in Abu Dhabi, after another last week with the deaths of three people and six injured, further escalates tensions in the Persian Gulf as Yemen’s civil war drags on for years.
That war, which pits Iran-backed Houthis rebels against a Saudi-led coalition, has become a regional conflict as negotiations over Tehran’s broken nuclear deal with world powers continue. The collapse of the agreement has led to years of attacks across the region.
State News Agency WAM reported that missile fragments fell harmlessly over the capital, Abu Dhabi.
The Emirates “is ready and prepared to deal with any threat and to take all necessary measures to protect the state from all attacks,” WAM told the UAE’s Ministry of Defense.
Videos posted on social media show that the capital’s sky lights up before dawn on Monday, with points of light that look like interceptor missiles in the sky. The videos corresponded to well-known features of Abu Dhabi.
The missile fire disrupted traffic at Abu Dhabi International Airport, home of long-haul carrier Etihad, for about an hour after the attack.
No one immediately claimed responsibility for the attack. However, the attack came a week after Yemeni Houthis rebels demanded an attack on the Emirates capital against the airport and a National Oil Co. fuel tank. of Abu Dhabi in the Mussafah district.
New high-resolution satellite photographs obtained by The Associated Press of Planet Labs PBC showed that repair work is still ongoing at the fuel tank on Saturday. Emirati officials have not posted pictures of the attacked sites, nor have they allowed journalists to see them.
In recent days, a Saudi-backed coalition backed by the United Arab Emirates has unleashed punitive airstrikes on Yemen, killing the world’s poorest Arab country and killing more than 80 people. detention center.
The Huthis had threatened to take revenge on the UAE and Saudi Arabia for the attacks. On Sunday, the Saudi-led coalition said a ballistic missile fired by Houthi landed in an industrial area of Jizan, Saudi Arabia, slightly injuring a foreigner.
A Houthi military spokesman did not immediately respond to questions from the PA about Monday’s attack. Mohammed Abdul-Salam, a Houthi spokesman, later tweeted: “The Yemeni armed forces will reveal in the next few hours the details of a military operation in the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia.”
The Iranian hardline newspaper Kayhan, whose editor-in-chief was named by Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, published a front-page article on Sunday citing Huthi officials that the UAE would be attacked again. with a headline: “Evacuate the UAE commercial.” Towers.”
In 2017, the newspaper had faced a two-day ban on publication after it published a headline saying Dubai was the “next target” of the Huthis.
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Associated Press writers Isabel DeBre in Dubai, Amir Vahdat in Tehran, Iran, and Samy Magdy in Cairo contributed to this report.
