The United Arab Emirates intercepted a ballistic missile that was launched by Yemen’s Houthi rebels early Monday as Israel’s president was visiting the nation, officials said, representing the third such attack in recent weeks.
The attack carried out during the visit of Israeli President Isaac Herzog only increases the tensions that affect the Persian Gulf, which has suffered a series of attacks due to the failure of Iran’s nuclear agreement with world powers and the outbreak of the war in Yemen, which has lasted one year.
As negotiators in Vienna now try to salvage the deal and UAE-backed forces put pressure on the Houthis, the rebels are waging their most far-reaching attacks to date. These attacks represent a major challenge for the UAE, which has long advertised itself to international businesses as a safe corner in a dangerous region.
The Emirati state news agency WAM reported the interception, stating that “the attack did not cause any losses, as the ballistic missile remnants fell outside populated areas.”
It was not immediately clear where the remains of the missile fell. The country’s civilian air traffic control agency said there was no immediate effect on air travel in the UAE, home to Emirates and Etihad airlines.
The country’s top prosecutor has already threatened that people who film or publish footage of such an incident will face criminal charges in the UAE, an autocratic federation of seven sheikhs from the Arabian Peninsula. That makes reporting such incidents even more difficult for journalists.
In the absence of such videos, the Emirati Ministry of Defense released black-and-white images that it said showed the destruction of a ballistic missile launcher in Yemen’s Al Jawf province about 30 minutes after the attack. In another incident last week, a similar attack on Al Jawf was launched in the minutes after, leading analysts to suggest that the Emiratis may be receiving intelligence assistance from Western countries for their attacks.
Al-Jawf is located about 1,350 kilometers (840 miles) southwest of Abu Dhabi.
Houthi military spokesman Yehia Sarei tweeted that the rebels would make an announcement about an attack in the next few hours that reached “deep in the UAE.” He did not elaborate. The Houthi’s satellite news channel Al-Masirah later reported that airstrikes had begun targeting Sanaa, Yemen’s rebel-held capital.