2024-01-22 06:44:00
File image of a dhow boarded by a search team from the USS Winston Churchill off the coast of Somalia (Archyde.com)
Two US Navy personnel who disappeared during an operation to seize Iranian weapons destined for Yemen’s Houthi terrorists have been declared dead after a 10-day search failed to locate them, the US military said Sunday.
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Central Command (CENTCOM) had previously said that the two SEALs who were reported missing at sea participated in the January 11 operation, in which elite special operations personnel boarded a dhow – a sailing vessel – off to the coast of Somalia and seized missile components manufactured in Iran.
“We regret to announce that, after 10 days of exhaustive searching, our two missing US Navy SEALs have not been located and their status has been changed to deceased,” CENTCOM said in a statement.
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“The search and rescue operation for the two Navy SEALs reported missing during the boarding of an illicit dhow carrying advanced Iranian conventional weapons has concluded and we are now conducting recovery operations,” the text adds.
CENTCOM described the capture of the missile components as “the first seizure of lethal advanced conventional weapons supplied by Iran to the Houthis since the start of attacks on merchant ships in November 2023.”
Artifacts found on a Navy SEAL mission. Photo: US Central Command
That month, terrorists began attacking ships in the Red Sea that they claimed were linked to Israel; in support of Hamas terrorists.
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Iran – which has armed, trained and financed the Houthis – stepped up its arms supplies to the militia in the wake of the war in Gaza, which broke out after Hamas terrorists attacked Israel on October 7.
The ship on which the Iranian warheads were found
Tehran has provided advanced drones, anti-ship cruise missiles, precision ballistic missiles and medium-range missiles to the Houthis.
As revealed by Archyde.com, commanders from Iran’s Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) and the Lebanese group Hezbollah are on the ground in Yemen helping to direct and monitor Houthi attacks on shipping in the Red Sea.
IRGC commanders and advisors are also providing technical expertise, data and intelligence support to determine which of the dozens of ships traveling through the Red Sea each day are destined for Israel and are Houthi targets. the agency added.
The United States and Britain carried out strikes on dozens of rebel targets earlier this month, and U.S. forces have since hit several missiles that Washington said were ready to be launched and posed a threat to both civilian and military vessels. .
About 12% of global trade normally passes through the Bab al-Mandeb Strait, the entrance to the Red Sea between southwestern Yemen and Djibouti, but rebel attacks have caused much shipping to be diverted thousands of miles around Africa.
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