Pompeo Affirms Support for Arab Coalition in Yemen, Says Iran Behind Continuation of War

US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. (Reuters)
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. (Reuters)
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Pompeo Affirms Support for Arab Coalition in Yemen, Says Iran Behind Continuation of War

US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. (Reuters)
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. (Reuters)

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo underlined on Monday US support for the Saudi-led coalition in Yemen, blaming Iran for the civil war.

“The support we’re providing to the Saudis as they attempt to engage these dangerous missiles systems is in America’s best interest,” said Pompeo, according to The Hill newspaper.

He blamed Iran, saying the war is “Iranian led” and that Tehran has “chosen to direct” the Houthis not to withdraw from the port of Hodeidah as agreed to last year.

“The Houthis, who continue to refuse to comply with the agreements they have signed up for in Stockholm, Sweden, refused to move back from the port in Hodeidah,” he stressed.

He said weapons used by Houthis are smuggled into Yemen from Iran in addition to the missiles launched at Saudi territory and that affect civil aviation.

“The United States has an obligation to protect our citizens, so the support that we’re providing to the Saudis as they attempt to engage these dangerous missile systems is in America’s best interest,” he told the newspaper.

He said the US military support also aims at countering al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula and ensuring protection of the US from the terror risk inside Yemen, pointing to the reasons why US President Donald Trump vetoed a Congress resolution to end support for Yemen.

When asked whether ISIS still poses a threat, Pompeo said it undoubtedly still does.

“We have made significant progress. I give our coalition partners – we built a coalition of over 80 countries, called the Defeat ISIS Coalition, an enormous global coalition to take down that caliphate. That coalition remains,” he responded.

On whether the US was seeking regime change in Iran, Pompeo said the US administration wants it “to make a set of decisions that are very different from the ones they’re making today.”

He highlighted the 12 demands by the US administration back in May 2018, stressing that they are all reasonable and simply call on Iran to behave like a normal country.

“They’re simple things like don’t kill people in Europe, don’t conduct assassinate – it’s not outrageous.”

He also wondered “whether it is outrageous to ask Iran not to support militias in Iraq to try and destabilize the Iraqi government so the Iraqi people have an independent, sovereign nation of their own.”



Blinken Calls for Push to Get Gaza Truce Deal over ‘Finish Line’

 Smoke rises following an Israeli airstrike in the Gaza Strip, as seen from Sderot, southern Israel, Monday, Jan. 6, 2025. (AP)
Smoke rises following an Israeli airstrike in the Gaza Strip, as seen from Sderot, southern Israel, Monday, Jan. 6, 2025. (AP)
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Blinken Calls for Push to Get Gaza Truce Deal over ‘Finish Line’

 Smoke rises following an Israeli airstrike in the Gaza Strip, as seen from Sderot, southern Israel, Monday, Jan. 6, 2025. (AP)
Smoke rises following an Israeli airstrike in the Gaza Strip, as seen from Sderot, southern Israel, Monday, Jan. 6, 2025. (AP)

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken called on Monday for a final push for a Gaza ceasefire before President Joe Biden leaves office, after a Hamas official told Reuters the group had cleared a list of 34 hostages as first to go free under a truce.

"We very much want to bring this over the finish line in the next two weeks, the time we have remaining," Blinken told a news conference in South Korea, when asked whether a ceasefire deal was close.

Israel has sent a team of mid-ranking officials to Qatar for talks brokered by Qatari and Egyptian mediators. Some Arabic media reports said David Barnea, the head of Mossad, who has been leading negotiations, was expected to join them. The Israeli prime minister's office did not comment.

It remains unclear how close the two sides remain, with some signs of movement but little indication of a shift in some of the key demands that have so far blocked any truce for more than a year.

US President-elect Donald Trump has said there would be "hell to pay" in the Middle East if hostages held by Hamas were not freed before his inauguration on Jan. 20, now viewed in the region as an unofficial deadline for a truce deal.

According to Gaza health officials, nearly 46,000 Palestinians have been killed in Israel's assault on Gaza. The assault was launched after Hamas fighters stormed Israeli territory in October 2023, killing 1,200 people and capturing more than 250 hostages, by Israeli tallies.

More than 100 hostages are still believed to be held in Gaza, and Hamas says it will not free them without an agreement that ends the war with Israeli withdrawal. Israel says it will not halt its assault until Hamas is dismantled as a military and governing power and all hostages go free.

A Hamas official told Reuters the group had cleared a list submitted by Israel of 34 hostages who could be freed in the initial phase of a truce. The list provided by the official included female soldiers, plus elderly, female and minor-aged civilians.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office said the list had been given by Israel to Qatari mediators as far back as July, and Israel had so far received no confirmation or comment from Hamas about whether the hostages on it were alive.

For Michael Levy, whose brother Or was one of the 34 names on the list, there was little comfort.

"The way I see this list is the way I saw all the recent rumors about an upcoming deal," he told Reuters. "For me, as long as my brother is not here and the hostages are not here in Israel, it's just a rumor."

BABY DIES OF COLD

Israeli forces, which have intensified their operations in recent weeks, continued bombardments across the enclave, killing at least 48 people and wounding 75 over the past 24 hours, according to the Gaza health ministry.

Harsh winter weather continued to exact a toll on the hundreds of thousands displaced into makeshift shelters, with officials saying a 35-day-old baby had died of exposure, at least the eighth victim of the cold in the past two weeks.

Officials from Al-Awda Hospital in Nuseirat in the central Gaza Strip said an Israeli airstrike at a school compound sheltering displaced families had wounded at least 40 people.

While Israel's military says Hamas has largely been destroyed as an organized military force, its fighters continue to hold out in the rubble of Gaza, which has been largely reduced to wasteland by the months of bombardment.

On Monday, two Israeli soldiers were severely wounded in northern Gaza, and three rockets were fired from Gaza, one of which hit a building in the nearby Israeli city of Sderot without casing casualties, Israeli police said.

Separately, the World Food Program said Israeli forces had opened fire on one of its convoys as the vehicles moved from central Gaza to Gaza City in the north. There was no immediate comment from the Israeli military.

In the Israeli-occupied West Bank, a separate Palestinian territory where violence has also surged since the start of the Gaza war, gunmen killed three Israelis and wounded several others when they opened fire on a car and bus near the Israeli settlement of Kedumim.