Airwars assessment
During the evening of Saturday, July 20th, 2024, seven civilians were killed and at least 83 others were wounded by a declared Israeli air raid on oil storage facilities in the Hudaydah Port, Yemen.
Six of the civilians killed were named by several sources as Nabil Nasher Abdo Abdullah, Ahmed Abdullah Musa Jaylan, Abdulbari Muhammad Youssef Ezzi, Salah Abdullah Muqbil Al Sarari, Abu Baker Hussein AbdullahAl Fakiyya, and Idrees Dawoud Hassan Ahmed. According to at least three sources including @YenNews1 on X, the six men were engineers, and were employed at the Marine and Laboratory department of Yemen Petroleum Company which has facilities at the Hudaydah Port.
Abu Islam Mu’azul Jumluli also memorialised Mukhtar al-Sabri, who he described as “dear engineer, a friend of a lifetime and a guide to men. He was and still is dear, precious, loyal and gone” along with an image of a man in a hard-hat in what appears to be the port area and a screenshot of a recent WhatsApp exchange between the men.
A Facebook post on behalf of Yemeni Pioneers Center for Training and Consulting wished condolences to Lubna Nabil on the death of her father Nabil Nasher and a post from Tamim Rabat pointed out that Nabil was carrying out his engineering work at the port when he was killed, along with an image of Nabil.
Ghadir Tayrah posted on Facebook that her uncle Abdullah was injured in the bombing of the oil facilities, and had suffered second-degree burns.
Alaa Al-Maqbouli identified their cousin Abdulrahman Yousef Maqbouli as another one of the wounded in the strike, adding that “Despite the grief and pain he feels and his pain as a result of the burns he suffered, he still asks [about] his friends and colleagues who were with him.” Alaa went on to describe Abdulrahman as “one of the very, very rare young men who you find in difficult situations” and that he is “a kind, humble, helpful and sociable young man,” along with a story of Abdulrahman’s generosity during Alaa’s wedding preparations. Ahmed Al-Masoudi reported Alaa’s post along with a wish for a speedy recovery and an image of Abdulrahman being treated for his injuries, including bandages on both arms, his feet, and his abdomen.
@TVAlmasirah posted on X the results of a preliminary toll on the day of the incident claiming the attack wounded 84 people, then later quoted Head of the Al-Thawra Hospital Authority in Hodeidah, Dr. Khaled Suhail, who stated that three people had been killed and 87 others were injured. Another post by @Almasirahbrk shared a report by the national Ministry of Health, which claimed the attack wounded 83 people, while three civilians were still reported missing. A graphic video posted by Al Masirah satellite channel on Telegram showed one man being treated in a medical facility for an injury to his leg, two other men receiving IVs for their injuries, and a fourth man with bandages on both arms.
Photos and videos shared by at least eight different sources on X and Facebook show huge fires in the port, injured civilians and consequent material damage. According to a tweet from @NoonPost, the airstrikes hit “two sites in the port, the first being the energy infrastructure, where about 20 facilities were bombed, which is expected to cause a fuel crisis” while other sources pointed out that the port was out of service following the strikes. Al Masirah satellite channel spoke with Mohammed Al-Maoudah, a local reporter from Al Hudaydah, who stated that there were three strikes on oil, gas, and petroleum storage facilities in the port, which resulted in outbreaks of fires in the oil facility. Additional strikes also reportedly targeted the thermal power station in the city, resulting in power outages in several districts.
Human Rights Watch (HRW) also released a report detailing that Israeli forces reportedly “damaged or destroyed at least 29 of the 41 oil storage tanks at Hodeidah port, as well as the only two cranes used for loading and unloading supplies from ships. The airstrikes also destroyed oil tanks connected to the Hodeidah power plant, causing the power plant to stop operating for 12 hours.” An oil industry official told HRW that the oil tanks in the port are not owned by the Houthis – they are owned by Yemeni businessman and are sometimes used by aid organizations.
Alarabiya News reported on July 27th that one of the fuel tanks, tank No. 38 (oil), that had been struck on July 20th just exploded, two days after rescue crews had finally extinguished the fires which continued for give days.
The Israeli Defense Forces declared their involvement in the strike, announcing that “A short while ago, IDF fighter jets struck military targets of the Houthi terrorist regime in the area of the Al Hudaydah Port in Yemen in response to the hundreds of attacks carried out against the State of Israel in recent months.” According to Yemeni archive, based on statements released by the IDF, a dozen Israeli aircrafts, including F-15, F-16, and F-35 fighter jets carrying out airstrikes against 10 targets.
Human Rights Watch also reported that a remnant collected by Mwatana at the site of the strikes “bore the markings of Woodward, a US manufacturing company, and matches remnants collected in other contexts of the GBU-39 series bomb made by the US company Boeing.”
The incident occured in the evening.
The victims were named as:
Summary
Sources (46) [ collapse]
Media
from sources (49) [ collapse]
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Source: @YenNews1
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Source: @Roaastudies
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Source: @AJArabic
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Source: @Noon
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Source: Tameem
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Source: @AJArabic
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Source: @mog_Russ
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Source: @skynewsarabia
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Source: @nBQQk9fKlPpcZWU
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Source: @alabbedi21
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Source: @althamy21508416
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Source: @althamy21508416
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Source: @althamy21508416
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Source: Husaien
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Source: Husaien
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Source: Abo islam -
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Source: Abo islam -
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Source: Abo abad -
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Source: Abo abad -
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Source: Ghadir Tayrah
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Satellite image of Al Hudaydah port - source MarineTraffic. Image was captured by Yemeni Archive on 7 August 2024.
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Source: Alarabiya
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Source: Human Rights Watch
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The top screenshot, captured from a video shared by the Ansar Allah Al Houthi Telegram channel, is compared with the bottom satellite image from Airbus via Google Earth Pro on 7 May 2023. The markings on the images were added by Yemeni Archive. Images were captured by Yemeni Archive on 13 August 2024.
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The top image is a satellite image from Airbus via Google Earth Pro showing the oil tanks in the Port of Al Hudaydah on 7 May 2023; the bottom image is a satellite image from Maxar on 21 July 2024 showing the same oil tanks burning. The markings on the image were added by Yemeni Archive. Images captured by Yemeni Archive on 23 August 2024.
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Screenshots of satellite images by Maxar Technologies via France24 show a view of oil tanks in the port of Al Hudaydah on July 2, 2024 in the top image, and burning oil tanks in the same port on July 21, 2024 in the bottom image.
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The top satellite image is from Airbus via Google Earth Pro. Captured by Yemeni Archive on 22 August 2024. The markings on the top image were added by Yemeni Archive.
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The bottom screenshot of two cranes that were damaged at Al Hudaydah port was shared by the IISS website on 2 August 2024. Captured by Yemeni Archive on 22 August 2024. The bottom image has original markings from IISS analysts.
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Satellite images from Al Hudaydah port the following day show the damage and the ongoing fire, as reported by the Times of Israel. Captured by Yemeni Archive on 28 August 2024.
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Source: أحمد المسعودي -
Source: Yemen Petroleum Company
Israeli Military Assessment:
Original strike reports
A short while ago, IDF fighter jets struck military targets of the Houthi terrorist regime in the area of the Al Hudaydah Port in Yemen in response to the hundreds of attacks carried out against the State of Israel in recent months.