An Israeli airstrike killed the prime minister of Yemen’s rebel-controlled government, the Iran-backed Houthi militant group said Saturday.
Ahmed al-Rawahi was killed Thursday alongside other ministers in a strike on the Yemeni capital, Sanaa, the rebels said in a statement.
“We declare the martyrdom of the fighter Ahmed Ghalib Al-Rahawi, Prime Minister in the Government of Change and Construction, along with a number of his fellow ministers,” it said.
Al-Rahawi, who had served as prime minister of the Houthi-led government since 2024, was killed during a government workshop evaluating “its activities and performance during a year of its work,” the statement added.
Following his death, Houthi President Mahdi Al-Mashat appointed Mohammed Ahmed Ahmed Muftah, the first deputy prime minister, to serve as acting prime minister.
The Israeli military said Thursday it “precisely struck a Houthi terrorist regime military target in the area of Sanaa in Yemen.” On Saturday, the IDF confirmed that Al-Rahawi "was eliminated in the strike, along with additional senior officials of the Houthi terrorist regime."
The Houthis have repeatedly fired missiles at Israel during its war with Hamas, framing their attacks on Israel and Red Sea shipping as part of an allied defense of Palestinians in Gaza.
In response to Houthi attacks, Israel has bombarded rebel-held areas in Yemen.
“Yemen endures a lot for the victory of the Palestinian people,” al-Rahawi said following an Israeli strike last week that struck an oil facility owned by the country’s main oil company, which is controlled by the rebels in Sanaa as well as a power plant.
The Aug. 24 strike came three days after the Houthis launched a ballistic missile toward Israel that its military described as the first cluster bomb the rebels had launched at it since 2023.
The prime minister hailed from the southern province of Abyan, and was an ally to former Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh. He allied himself with the Houthis when the rebels overran Sanaa, and much of the north and center of the country in 2014, initiating the country’s long-running civil war. He was appointed as prime minister in August 2024.
Al-Rahawi is the most senior Houthi official to be killed since the United States and Israel began their air and naval campaign in response to the rebels’ missile and drone attacks on Israel and on ships in the Red Sea. The U.S. and Israeli strikes killed dozens of people. One U.S. strike in April hit a prison holding African migrants in the northern Sadaa province, killing at least 68 people and wounding 47 others.
