DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) \u2014 Iranian-backed Houthi rebels claimed a missile launch toward Israel early Saturday, their first since the war in the Middle East started. The Israeli military said it intercepted the projectile. <\/p>\n
The war, now marking its one-month anniversary, erupted after the United States and Israel attacked Iran, which retaliated with strikes against Israel and neighboring Gulf Arab states. The conflict has upended global air travel, disrupted oil exports and caused fuel prices to soar. Iran\u2019s stranglehold on the Strait of Hormuz<\/a>, a strategic waterway, has also exacerbated the economic fallout of the war.<\/p>\n Israel struck Iran\u2019s nuclear facilities hours after threatening to \u201cescalate and expand\u201d its campaign against Tehran on Friday. Iran vowed to retaliate and struck a base in Saudi Arabia, wounding more than a dozen U.S. service members and damaging planes.<\/p>\n Before Saturday\u2019s attack, there appeared to be a breakthrough as Tehran agreed to allow humanitarian aid and agricultural shipments<\/a> through the strait. <\/p>\n Houthi involvement could further complicate the war<\/p>\n Brig. Gen. Yahya Saree, a military spokesman for the Houthis, said in a statement aired Saturday morning on the rebels\u2019 Al-Masirah satellite television that the Houthis fired a barrage of ballistic missiles targeting what he described as \u201csensitive Israeli military sites\u201d in southern Israel. The attack came hours after Saree signaled in a vague statement Friday that the rebels would join the war. <\/p>\n Sirens went off around Israel\u2019s southern city of Beer Sheba and the area near Israel\u2019s main nuclear research center as Iran and Hezbollah continued to fire on Israel overnight. Loud explosions also filled the air in Tel Aviv and Israel\u2019s Fire and Rescue Service said it was responding to 11 different impact sites across the metro area.<\/p>\n Saturday\u2019s assault calls into question whether the Houthis will again target commercial shipping traveling through the Red Sea corridor, as they did during the Israel-Hamas war, upending traffic in the Red Sea<\/a> through which about $1 trillion worth of goods passed each year before the war. The rebels also fired drones at Israel<\/a>.<\/p>\n The potential involvement of the Houthis in the war would also complicate the deployment of the USS Gerald R. Ford, the aircraft carrier that first went to port in Crete for repairs and on to Split, Croatia, where it arrived on Saturday. Sending the carrier back into the Red Sea could draw it into the same high tempo of attacks seen by the USS Dwight D. Eisenhower in 2024 and the USS Harry S. Truman in the 2025 American campaign against the Houthis.<\/p>\n The Houthis<\/a> have held Yemen\u2019s capital, Sanaa, since 2014, and so far had stayed out of the war as the rebels have had an uneasy ceasefire for years with Saudi Arabia, which launched a war against the group on behalf of Yemen\u2019s exiled government in 2015.<\/p>\n More than two dozen US troops have been wounded in Iranian attacks on Saudi base in the past week, AP sources say<\/p>\n More than two dozen U.S. troops have been wounded in Iranian attacks on Saudi Arabia\u2019s Prince Sultan Air Base in the past week, according to two people who have been briefed on the matter. Iran fired six ballistic missiles and 29 drones at the base in the Friday attack that injured at least 15 troops, including five seriously, according to the sources who were not authorized to comment publicly and spoke on the condition of anonymity.<\/p>\n The base, about 96 kilometers (60 miles) from the Saudi capital of Riyadh, came under attack twice earlier in the week, including a strike that wounded 14 U.S. troops, according to the people briefed on the matter. The base is run by the Royal Saudi Air Force but is also used by U.S. troops.<\/p>\n Attempts at diplomacy as US troops build up in the Mideast<\/p>\n The latest attacks happened after Trump claimed that talks on ending the war were going \u201cvery well\u201d and that he had given Tehran until April 6 to reopen the Strait of Hormuz<\/a>. Iran maintains that it has not engaged in any negotiations.<\/p>\n With the economic repercussions from the war<\/a> extending far beyond the Middle East, Trump is under growing pressure to end Iran\u2019s chokehold on the strait. <\/p>\n Pakistan said Saturday Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Egypt will send their top diplomats to Islamabad for talks aimed at ending the war.<\/p>\n Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar said in a statement that Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan, Turkey\u2019s Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan and Egypt\u2019s Foreign Minister Badr Abdelatty will arrive Sunday for a two-day visit to \u201chold in-depth discussions on a range of issues, including efforts to de-escalate tensions in the region.\u201d<\/p>\n Pakistan\u2019s Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif said Saturday he spoke with Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian for more than an hour, holding \u201cextensive discussions\u201d on regional hostilities and efforts aimed at end the war.<\/p>\n Trump envoy Steve Witkoff has said Washington delivered<\/a> a 15-point \u201caction list\u201d<\/a> to Iran for a possible ceasefire, with a proposal to restrict Iran\u2019s nuclear program and reopen the strait. Tehran rejected the proposal and presented its own five-point proposal<\/a> that included reparations and recognition of its sovereignty over the waterway.<\/p>\n Meanwhile, U.S. ships drew closer to the region carrying some 2,500 Marines, and at least 1,000 paratroopers from the 82nd Airborne<\/a> trained to land in hostile territory to secure key positions and airfields have been ordered to the Middle East.<\/p>\n Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the U.S. \u201ccan achieve all of our objectives without ground troops.\u201d<\/p>\n Death toll climbs<\/p>\n Iranian authorities say more than 1,900 people have been killed in the Islamic Republic, while 19 have been reported dead in Israel.<\/p>\n In Lebanon, where Israel has started an invasion in the south,<\/a> officials said more than 1,100 people have been killed since the start of the war.<\/p>\n Meanwhile, at least 13 U.S. troops have been reported killed, while in Iraq, where Iranian-supported militia groups have entered the conflict, 80 members of the security forces have died.<\/p>\n In the Gulf states, 20 people have been killed and four others in the occupied West Bank.<\/p>\n The U.N.\u2019s International Organization for Migration also said Friday that 82,000 civilian buildings in Iran, including hospitals and the homes of 180,000 people, were damaged.<\/p>\n Israel strikes Iranian nuclear facilities<\/p>\n Israel focused its attacks Friday on sites \u201cin the heart of Tehran\u201d where ballistic missiles and other weapons are produced, the military said. It said it also hit missile launchers and storage sites in Western Iran, while witnesses in eastern Tehran reported a partial power outage following airstrikes. <\/p>\n Iran\u2019s Atomic Energy Organization said the Shahid Khondab Heavy Water Complex in Arak<\/a> and the Ardakan yellowcake production plant in Yazd Province were targeted, IRNA reported. The strikes did not cause casualties and there was no risk of contamination, it said. <\/p>\n Yellowcake is a concentrated form of uranium after impurities are removed from the raw ore. Heavy water is used as a moderator in nuclear reactors.<\/p>\n The Israeli military later said raw materials are processed for enrichment at the Yazd plant and the strike was a major blow to Iran\u2019s nuclear program. Tehran vowed to retaliate.<\/p>\n Possible breakthrough to allow aid and agricultural shipments through Hormuz<\/p>\n Iran agreed to allow humanitarian aid and agricultural shipments<\/a> through the Strait of Hormuz following a request from the United Nations.<\/p>\n Ali Bahreini, the country\u2019s ambassador to the U.N. in Geneva, said Iran agreed to \u201cfacilitate and expedite\u201d such movement. <\/p>\n