The Israeli Air Force on Sunday carried out strikes in Yemen’s Houthi-held capital of Sanaa, reportedly killing at least four people and injuring scores, in response to the Iran-backed group’s repeated attacks on Israel.
The strike came shortly after the military said that an IAF investigation into a Friday night ballistic missile attack from Yemen found that, for the first time, the Houthis used a projectile with a cluster bomb warhead. Part of the missile hit a home in central Israel, causing damage. The woman living there had taken refuge in her reinforced shelter and was unharmed.
In a statement, the Israel Defense Forces said the strikes on Sunday in Sanaa targeted a military compound where Yemen’s presidential palace is located, a fuel depot, and two power stations.
The IDF said the strikes came as a response to the Houthis’ ballistic missile and explosive drone attacks on Israel, the latest on Friday.
According to the military, the Yemeni presidential palace in Sanaa is “located within a military site from which the military operations of the Houthi terrorist regime forces are conducted.” Some local media reported that the palace had been abandoned for years.
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The two power plants that were targeted “served as a significant electricity supply facility for military activities,” the IDF said.
The IDF said that the Houthis’ use of the plants “constitutes further proof of how the Houthi regime uses civilian infrastructure for military purposes.”
The strikes killed four people and injured 67 in a “near-final toll,” a Houthi health ministry spokesperson said on X.
The strikes involved around a dozen IAF aircraft, including fighter jets and refuelers. Multiple refueling operations were carried out during the lengthy flight to and from Yemen.
Some 35 munitions were dropped on the four targets, according to the IDF.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Defense Minister Israel Katz, and IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir observed the strike from the IAF’s command center at the military headquarters in Tel Aviv.
“Whoever attacks us, we will attack him,” said Netanyahu. “Whoever plans to attack us — we attack him. I think the entire region is learning Israel’s strength and determination.”
“The Houthi terrorist regime is learning the hard way that it will pay and is paying a very heavy price for its aggression against Israel,” he added in a video statement released by his office.
L-R: Defense Minister Israel Katz, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir, and IAF chief of staff Brig. Gen. Omer Tischler at the IAF’s command center, August 24, 2025. (Elad Malka/Defense Ministry)
Katz, meanwhile, claimed Israel “destroyed the Houthi presidential palace in Yemen,” though there have been no such reports out of Yemen. Netanyahu only indicated that the IAF struck the palace.
“We continue to impose an air and naval blockade and are hitting infrastructure targets that are used to promote Houthi terrorism,” said Katz. “For every missile they launch at Israel, the Houthis will pay many times over.”
Sunday’s strike marked the 15th time that Israel has attacked the Iran-backed Houthis in Yemen, located some 1,800 kilometers (1,100 miles) away.
Most of the strikes have been carried out by Israeli Air Force fighter jets, though the previous one, on August 17, was carried out by Israeli Navy missile boats, the second such strike.
In the past week, the Houthis have launched two ballistic missiles and at least one drone at Israel.
The Houthis last attacked Israel on Friday night with a ballistic missile that was not intercepted.
According to assessments in the IAF, the missile’s warhead broke up in the air during its descent, deploying several sub-munitions. One munition struck the yard of a home in the central town of Ginaton, causing slight damage.
The munitions do not have their own propulsion or guidance and simply fall to the ground, where they are designed to explode on impact.
A fragment of a Houthi missile that broke apart and fell in Ginaton, August 22, 2025. (Ynet screenshot)
The military said that the failure to intercept the projectile was under investigation and that it was unrelated to the type of warhead the missile was carrying. The IAF had launched interceptor missiles in an attempt to shoot down the smaller fragments falling down.
“The air defense systems, with an emphasis on the upper layer, are capable of dealing with and intercepting such missiles, as they have intercepted in the past,” the IDF said.
Iran launched ballistic missiles with cluster bomb warheads at Israel at least twice during the 12-day war in June — those that the IAF failed to intercept.
The Houthis in Yemen are supplied by Iran.
Ilana Hatoumi, whose home was hit by a part of a Yemeni missile fired at Israel, speaks to Channel 12, August 24, 2025 (Video screenshot; used in accordance with Clause 27a of the Copyright Law)
Ilana Hatoumi, whose home in central Israel was damaged in the attack on Friday, told Ynet news shortly after the strike: “I was sitting in the shelter, I heard a boom, everything exploded, and that’s it.”
“The glass is gone. We’re fine, I’m healthy. Nothing happened, everything can be fixed, it’s only material damage,” she said.
On Sunday, she elaborated in a Channel 12 interview: “There were two explosions at home… The entire home shook… The power went out… I thought it was very close, but I didn’t imagine it was in my home.”
“I came out to a shattered kitchen. All the windows, all the floor, the floor was filled with glass.” She said other rooms also suffered damage, and she surveyed it with a flashlight due to the power being out.
In June, after an Iranian ballistic missile scattered small bombs in central Israel, an Israeli military official said the cluster bomb warhead poses a threat to a much wider area than Iran’s other warheads, but the explosion from each of the cluster bombs is far smaller.
A munition from an Iranian cluster bomb that fell in central Israel, June 19, 2025. (Courtesy)
Additionally, many of the sub-munitions from Iran’s cluster bomb missiles did not explode, according to the military official. The unexploded ordnance still poses a danger to anyone who happens upon them.
Human rights groups have long campaigned for cluster bombs to be banned due to the random, indiscriminate nature of the threat they pose, unlike other types of munitions that can be used to precisely target combatants or military assets while minimizing harm to civilians.
In total, 112 countries have signed a 2008 convention banning the production, storage, sale, and use of cluster munitions. Iran and Israel are not among them.
The text of the 2008 Convention on Cluster Munitions says cluster bombs “kill or maim civilians, including women and children, obstruct economic and social development… impede post-conflict rehabilitation and reconstruction (and) delay or prevent the return of refugees and internally displaced persons… for many years after use.”
The Houthis — whose slogan calls for “Death to America, Death to Israel, [and] a Curse on the Jews” — began attacking Israel and maritime traffic in November 2023, a month after the October 7 Hamas massacre.
They held their fire during a ceasefire that was reached between Israel and Hamas in January 2025. By that point, they had fired over 40 ballistic missiles and dozens of attack drones and cruise missiles at Israel, including one that killed a civilian and wounded several others in Tel Aviv in July, prompting Israel’s first strike in Yemen.
Since March 18, when the IDF resumed its offensive against Hamas in the Gaza Strip, the Houthis in Yemen have launched 71 ballistic missiles and at least 23 drones at Israel. Several of the missiles have fallen short.
Lazar Berman and Reuters contributed to this report.
