Israel's military says it is investigating an alleged drone attack and why the country's defenses failed to intercept the “aerial target.”
Yemen's Houthi fighters have claimed responsibility for an alleged drone attack in Tel Aviv, Israel, that killed one person and injured at least 10, according to reports.
A spokesman for the Houthi armed forces said in a social media post on Friday that the Yemen-based group had “attacked 'Tel Aviv' in occupied Palestine.”
The Israeli military said it had opened an investigation into the huge explosion near the US Embassy office in the city and would determine why the country's air defence systems were not activated to intercept the “aerial target”.
Israel's air force has increased patrols to “protect the country's skies,” the military added in a post on social media.
Israeli police said the body of a man was found in an apartment near the blast and that the circumstances were being investigated.
Images from the blast site showed broken glass strewn across the city's pavements as crowds of onlookers gathered near a building bearing the scars of the explosion. The site was sealed off with police tape.
مشاهد جديدة من مكان وقوع الانفجار وسط تل أبيب#Love #فيديو image.twitter.com/GM5BQf3TIS
— الجزيرة فلسطين (@AJA_Palestine) July 19, 2024
New scenes from the site of the explosion in central Tel Aviv.
Yemen's Houthis have repeatedly launched drones and missiles toward Israel and at Israeli-linked ships in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden in a show of support for the Palestinians amid Israel's war in Gaza.
Until the attack early Friday morning, all Houthi attempts to attack Israel were intercepted by Israeli defenses or Western allies with forces stationed in the region, the Associated Press news agency reported.
Hezbollah in southern Lebanon has also stepped up its attacks on military targets in northern Israel, saying it is also acting in solidarity with Palestinians amid Israel's war in Gaza, which has killed nearly 39,000 people.
