WHO chief says he didn’t know if he’d survive Israeli airstrike on Sanaa airport
Top UN official, in Yemen to try to negotiate release of staff held there, declines to engage in recriminations over attack but expresses surprise over targeting of civilian site
The head of the World Health Organization said on Friday he was not sure he was going to survive an Israeli airstrike on Yemen’s main airport a day earlier that came in response to repeated ballistic missile and drone attacks by the Iran-aligned Houthi rebel group on the Jewish state.
Speaking after his ordeal at the Sanaa International Airport on Thursday, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said the explosions that rocked the building were so deafening that his ears were still ringing more than a day later.
Tedros said it quickly became apparent the airport was under attack, describing people “running in disarray” through the site after approximately four blasts, one of them “alarmingly” close to where he was sitting near the departure lounge.
“I was not sure actually I could survive because it was so close, a few meters from where we were,” he told Reuters. “A slight deviation could have resulted in a direct hit.”
Tedros said he and his colleagues were stuck at the airport for the next hour or so as what he thought were drones flew overhead, feeding concern they could open fire again. Among the debris, he and colleagues saw missile fragments, he said.
“There (was) no shelter at all. Nothing. So you’re just exposed, just waiting for anything to happen,” he said.
The Houthi’s Al-Masirah TV publishes footage of the moment Israeli airstrikes hit the Sana’a International Airport yesterday, as well as the evacuation of WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus from the passenger lounge. pic.twitter.com/YmA4xixGcC
— Ariel Oseran أريئل أوسيران (@ariel_oseran) December 27, 2024
The Israel Defense Forces said that fighter jets struck Houthi targets along Yemen’s western coast and deeper within the country in the Thursday strikes.
The targets included “infrastructure used by the Houthi terror regime for its military activities” at Sanaa International Airport, and the Hezyaz power plant just outside the Houthi-controlled capital. Planes also hit infrastructure at the Hodeida, Salif and Ras Qantib ports on the coast, including another power plant.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said afterward that Israel was “just getting started” with the Houthis.
The Houthi-controlled Saba News Agency said three people died in the strikes on the airport and three were killed in Hodeidah, with 40 others wounded in the attacks.
The Houthi leadership has stepped up attacks in recent weeks following the exit of fellow Iran-backed terror group Hezbollah from the battlefield.
Speaking by telephone from Jordan, where he flew on Friday, helping to evacuate a UN colleague seriously injured at the airport for further medical treatment, Tedros said he had received no warning Israel could be about to strike the airport.
Today we managed to evacuate our @WFP_UNHAS colleague who was injured in yesterday’s attack on Sana’a airport in #Yemen. We are now in #Jordan, where he will receive further medical treatment.
Deepest gratitude to the UNHAS team for their service and swift evacuation from… pic.twitter.com/ut8tWIrZ74
— Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus (@DrTedros) December 27, 2024
The injured man, who worked for the UN Humanitarian Air Service, was now “OK” and in a stable condition, he said.
Tedros traveled to Yemen over Christmas to try to negotiate the release of UN staff and others held there. He acknowledged that he and his colleagues knew the trip was risky in light of the high tension between Israel and the Houthis.
But such was the window of opportunity to work for the release of the UN personnel that they believed they had to take it, said Tedros, a former Ethiopian foreign minister.
He said talks with Yemeni authorities had gone well and that he saw a chance that the 16 UN staff as well as employees of diplomatic missions and NGO workers held there could be freed.
He declined to engage in recriminations over the attack but said his itinerary had been shared publicly and expressed surprise that civilian infrastructure should have been targeted.
“So a civilian airport should be protected, whether I am in it or not,” he said, before observing there was “nothing special” about what he had faced in Yemen. “One of my colleagues said we narrowly escaped death. I’m just one human being. So I feel for those who are facing the same thing every single day. But at least it allowed me to feel the way they feel.”
“I’m worried about our world, where it’s heading,” Tedros added, urging world leaders to work together to end global conflicts. “I have never … as far as I can remember, seen the world really being in such a very dangerous state.”
The Thursday strikes marked the fourth time Israeli jets have attacked the Houthis in Yemen. They came nearly a week after Israeli jets carried out intense strikes along the Yemen coast and hit Sanaa for the first time.
Since December 16, the Houthis have launched five ballistic missiles and at least five drones at Israel, in what the terror group says is a campaign in support of Gaza amid Israel’s ongoing war there against the Hamas terror group. Many of the attacks occurred in the middle of the night, forcing millions in the Tel Aviv area to rush for shelter. Several people have suffered injuries while trying to reach safety.
The Houthis, a rebel group that is dedicated to the destruction of Israel and Jews, have launched more than 200 missiles and 170 drones at Israel in the past year, according to the IDF, in a campaign it says is in support of Palestinians in Gaza.
