Netanyahu spoke in response to aerial attacks from Yemen and Lebanon.
By JNS
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday vowed to “exact a heavy price” from the Houthis in Yemen and “change the balance of power” along Israel’s northern border following rocket attacks from Yemen and Lebanon.
“The Houthis should have known by now that we exact a heavy price for any attempt to harm us. Those who need a reminder are invited to visit the port of Hodeidah,” said Netanyahu at the beginning of the weekly Cabinet meeting.
In July, a Houthi drone killed a man in central Tel Aviv, in response to which Israel struck Yemen’s Hodeidah port. The Iranian terrorist proxy has launched dozens of drones and missiles at Israel in support of Hamas in Gaza since Oct. 7.
The Houthis on Sunday again fired a surface-to-surface missile from Yemen into Israel, Netanyahu said. It was intercepted over the country’s center.
Terrorists in Lebanon, where Hezbollah controls the country’s south, also launched dozens of rockets and a drone into northern Israel on Sunday, resulting in no injuries.
The IDF said on Saturday night that the Israeli Air Force had struck Hezbollah weapons storage facilities in the Beqaa and Baalbek areas, deep inside Lebanon.
Israel and Hezbollah have been engaged in hundreds of exchanges of fire since the terrorist group escalated hostilities on Oct. 8 in solidarity with Hamas’s terrorist onslaught the previous day. In October, Israel evacuated some 60,000 residents of communities near Lebanon, who remain in state-paid accommodations.
“I am attentive to the residents of the north. I am talking with them and with community leaders in the north. I see their distress, I hear their cries,” Netanyahu told the ministers. “The status quo will not continue. This requires a change in the balance of power on our northern border. We will do everything necessary to return our residents safely to their homes. I am committed to this, the government is committed to it and we will not settle for less than that.”
The prime minister invited Israel’s enemies to study the condition of Hamas in Gaza, where Israel has killed some 17,000 terrorists since Oct. 7 as it hunts for more in a massive operation focused on Hamas’s network of tunnels.
The IDF killed an additional estimated 1,000 terrorists inside Israel on or immediately after Oct. 7.
“Anyone who attacks us will not escape our arms. Hamas is already learning this in our determined action that will lead to its destruction and the release of all our hostages,” Netanyahu said.