World Health Organization Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus has revealed he was inside an airport in the capital of Yemen when Israeli forces launched a deadly strike on the facility.
On Friday, the Houthi-controlled SABA news agency reported that the rebels’ forces had targeted Israel’s Ben Gurion Airport in Tel Aviv. The Israel Defense Forces said they were not aware of the incident.
Israel attacked multiple targets in Yemen on Thursday, including the Sanaa International Airport, marking a major escalation in a mounting conflict with Iran-backed Houthi rebel forces there and as it ended the year locked in a multifront war across the Middle East.
Israeli forces launched the attack amid on the Sanaa airport amid a mounting exchange of fire with the Houthis, with the Israeli military intercepting a missile launched from Yemen a day before on Wednesday that injured multiple people injured. The Magen David Adom ambulance service said it had received reports of around nine people injured, according to Reuters.
Ghebreyesus said he and other WHO colleagues were preparing to board a flight just “meters” away from the area Israel hit.
“My UN and WHO colleagues are safe,” Ghebreyesus said in a statement published on X. He was in the country to negotiate the release of United Nations workers detained there and to assess Yemen’s humanitarian crisis.
“The air traffic control tower, the departure lounge — just a few meters from where we were — and the runway were damaged,” he said, adding that he and his team would have to wait for the the airport to be repaired before they could leave Yemen.
It was unclear whether they had been able to leave Sanaa as of early Friday morning.
Dr. Anees Alasbahi, spokesperson for the Houthis’ Ministry of Health in Sanaa, said in a statement that at least three people were killed and at least 13 others injured as a result of the strike. He added later that at least three other people were killed in another strike.
The World Food Programme said a WFP-contracted aircrew member was among those injured in the strike and was receiving medical treatment.
“Humanitarians are #NotATarget,” the organization said in a statement NBC News.
