DUBAI, February 2. /TASS/. Houthis from Yemen’s rebel movement Ansar Allah have launched a missile attack on the southern Israeli city of Eilat, Yahya Saree, the movement’s spokesman, said.

"The Yemeni armed forces carried out a military operation, hitting with several ballistic missiles certain facilities belonging to the Israeli enemy in the area of Umm al-Rashrash (Arabic name of Eilat - TASS) in the south of occupied Palestine," he said on the Houthi-owned Al Masirah television channel.

Earlier, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) reported that its air defenses had intercepted a surface-to-surface missile over the Red Sea. The IDF press service said that the Israeli military used the Arrow air defense system to intercept the missile.

Following the escalation of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in the Gaza Strip, the Yemen-based Houthis warned that they would carry out strikes on Israeli territory and would bar any ships associated with the Jewish state from sailing across the Red Sea and the Bab el-Mandeb Strait until the operation in the Palestinian enclave ended. Since mid-November 2023, the Yemeni rebel group has attacked dozens of civilian ships in the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden.