World
US Navy confirms Iran's involvement in Yemen Houthi rebel ship attacks
- The U.S. Navy’s top Mideast commander, Vice Adm. Brad Cooper, has confirmed that Iran is “very directly involved” in ship attacks carried out by Yemen’s Houthi rebels.
- Cooper said attacks associated with Iran have expanded beyond the Persian Gulf and the Strait of Hormuz.
- The Houthi attacks on merchant shipping are described as the most significant seen in two generations, posing an international threat.
Iran is “very directly involved” in ship attacks that Yemen’s Houthi rebels have carried out during Israel’s war against Hamas, the U.S. Navy’s top Mideast commander told The Associated Press on Monday.
Vice Adm. Brad Cooper, the head of the Navy’s 5th Fleet, stopped short of saying Tehran directed individual attacks by the Houthis in the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden.
However, Cooper acknowledged that attacks associated with Iran have expanded from previously threatening just the Persian Gulf and its Strait of Hormuz into waters across the wider Middle East.
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“Clearly, the Houthi actions, probably in terms of their attacks on merchant shipping, are the most significant that we’ve seen in two generations,” he told the AP in a telephone interview. “The facts simply are that they’re attacking the international community; thus, the international response I think you’ve seen.”
U.S. Navy Vice Adm. Brad Cooper, who heads the Navy’s Bahrain-based 5th Fleet, speaks in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, on Feb. 21, 2023. Iran is “very directly involved” in attacks by Yemen’s Houthi rebels on shipping over Israel’s war on Hamas in the Gaza Strip, Cooper said on Monday. (AP Photo/Jon Gambrell, File)
Iran’s mission to the United Nations and the Houthi leadership in Yemen’s capital, Sanaa, did not respond to a request for comment. However, the Houthis later claimed to have attacked a U.S.-flagged vessel, without offering many details.
Since November, the Iranian-backed Houthis have launched at least 34 attacks on shipping through the waterways leading up to Egypt’s Suez Canal, a vital route for energy and cargo coming from Asia and the Middle East onward to Europe.
The Houthis, a Shiite rebel group that’s held Sanaa since 2014 and been at war with a Saudi-led coalition backing Yemen’s exiled government since 2015, link their attacks to the Israel-Hamas war. However, the ships they’ve targeted increasingly have tenuous links to Israel — or none at all.
In recent days, the U.S. has launched seven rounds of airstrikes on Houthi military sites, targeting air bases under the rebels’ control and suspected missile launch sites.
However, risks for the global economy remain as many ships continue to bypass that route for a longer trip around Africa’s southern tip. That’s meant lower revenue for Egypt through the Suez Canal, a vital source of hard currency for the country’s troubled economy, as well as higher costs for shipping that could push up global inflation.
As Cooper took command of the 5th Fleet in 2021, the threat to shipping focused primarily around the Persian Gulf and its narrow mouth, the Strait of Hormuz, through which a fifth of all oil traded passes. A series of attacks blamed on Iran and ship seizures by Tehran followed the collapse of Iran’s nuclear deal with world powers.
In his interview with the AP, the Navy commander acknowledged the threat from Iran’s proxies and that its distribution of weapons extended from the Red Sea out to the far reaches of the Indian Ocean. The U.S. has blamed Iran for recent drone attacks on shipping, and a U.S.-owned cargo vessel came under attack from the Houthis in the Gulf of Aden last week.
So far, Iran has not directly gotten involved in fighting either Israel or the U.S. since the war in Gaza began on Oct. 7. However, Cooper maintained Iran had been directly fueling the Houthi attacks on shipping.
“What I’ll say is Iran is clearly funding, they’re resourcing, they are supplying and they’re providing training,” Cooper said. “They’re obviously very directly involved. There’s no secret there.”
Cooper described the ship attacks striking the Mideast as the worst since the so-called Tanker War of the 1980s. It culminated in a one-day naval battle between Washington and Tehran, and also saw America accidentally shoot down an Iranian passenger jet, killing 290 people.
Back then, American naval ships escorted reflagged Kuwaiti oil tankers through the Persian Gulf and the strait after Iranian mines damaged vessels in the region. Cooper said authorities had no current plans to reflag ships and escort them past Yemen.
Instead, the U.S. and its allies employ a “zone defense, and every once and a while we shift to a one-on-one,” he said.
Cooper’s reference to the tensions from more than three decades ago underlines just how precarious the situation in the wider Mideast has become as worries of a regional conflict over the Israel-Hamas war grow.
Monday night, Houthi military spokesman Brig. Gen. Yahya Saree in a recorded address claimed an attack on the Ocean Jazz, a U.S.-flagged ship managed by Seabulk, a company in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. The firm declined to comment when reached by the AP. The Ocean Jazz had been in the Red Sea heading south.
Cooper spoke to the AP from the sidelines of a drone conference in Abu Dhabi, the capital of the United Arab Emirates. Under his command of the 5th Fleet, the naval force has created Task Force 59, a drone fleet to bolster its patrol of waterways in the region.
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Today, a variety of drones provide the 5th Fleet coverage across some 10,000 square miles of Mideast waters the Navy otherwise wouldn’t have eyes on, Cooper said. That helps its efforts to interdict suspected drug and weapons shipments.
U.S. forces this month seized Iranian-made missile parts and other weaponry from a ship bound for the Houthis in a raid that saw two Navy SEALs go missing. The U.S. military’s Central Command said Sunday it now believes the SEALs are dead.
While not directly saying his fleet’s drones played a part in the seizure, Cooper hinted at it.
“They are specifically designed to conduct interdiction operations,” he said. He added: “There’s no squeaking anything by it.”
Cooper’s command is set to end in February with the upcoming arrival of Rear Adm. George Wikoff in Bahrain. He noted the Navy and merchant shippers still face a serious threat from the Houthis as he prepares to leave.
“What we need is a Houthi decision to stop attacking international merchant ships. Period,” Cooper said.
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By David E. Sanger, Coleman Lowndes, Nikolay Nikolov, Edward Vega and June Kim
January 14, 2026
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JOHANNESBURG: A staggering and growing wave of persecution against Christians across sub-Saharan Africa has been laid bare in the latest Open Doors’ World Watch List for 2025. The report says three out of four Christians murdered worldwide are killed in Nigeria.
Fourteen of the top 50 countries worldwide where verified deaths could be reasonably linked to victims’ Christian faith are in sub-Saharan Africa. Open Doors is a global Christian charity supporting Christians persecuted for their faith.
The organization states that one in seven Christians in the world face high levels of persecution. But that figure rises to one in five in Africa.
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Woman in Benue State Christian refugee camp. The camp is inhabited by Christians who fled anti-Christian violence. (Open Doors)
Nigeria
Africa’s most populous nation is also ranked as the seventh worst in the world for persecution in all its forms. According to Open Doors, out of the 4,849 Christians killed for their faith globally in the year up to the end of Sept. 2025, 3,490 of these were murdered in Nigeria — 72% of the total.
Muslims have also been killed in Nigeria. But the latest data from the report shows Christians have been “disproportionately targeted.” These are four of the affected states — there are others:
In Benue State in north-central Nigeria, 1,310 Christians were killed compared with 29 Muslims.
In Plateau State in north-central Nigeria, 546 Christians were killed compared with 48 Muslims.
In Taraba State in northeast Nigeria, 73 Christians were killed compared with 12 Muslims.
In north-western Kaduna State, 1,116 Christians were abducted in 2025, compared with 101 Muslims.
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Funerals for some 27 Christians who were reportedly killed by Islamist Fulani tribesmen in the village of Bindi Ta-hoss, Nigeria on July, 28, 2025 (Courtesy: Christian Solidarity International (CSI))
“The latest figures should leave us in no doubt: there is a clear religious element to this horrific violence,” Henrietta Blyth, CEO of Open Doors U.K. told Fox News Digital.
Blyth added, “For many thousands of Christians, this will come as no surprise. Those who witnessed their families being killed, and their homes razed to the ground by Islamist Fulani militants report being told by their attackers that ‘we will destroy all Christians.’”
“It’s surely time to dismiss the idea that this violence is somehow ‘random,’” Blyth stated. “If we don’t recognize the clear religious element to the violence, it won’t be possible to properly address this tragic situation.”
Mohammed Idris, Nigeria’s minister of information and national orientation, told Fox News Digital this week, “The loss of life in any form is unacceptable, and the Nigerian government recognizes the pain felt by all affected families and communities.”
Pope Leo XIV condemned the killings of up to 200 people in Yelewata community in Nigeria. (Associated Press)
The minister continued, “Nigeria has consistently maintained that its security challenges stem from a convergence of criminal insurgency, armed banditry, resource competition, and localized communal disputes, not from state-directed or institutional religious persecution. The government remains focused on upholding its constitutional duty to protect all citizens and on advancing security reforms that improve coordination, accountability, and civilian safety nationwide.”
At the time of writing, the new World Watch List had not been released to the minister, but he did share his thoughts on Middle Belt killings, “With respect to the Middle Belt states, the Nigerian government has long stated that violence in this region is primarily driven by long-standing disputes over land and resources, organized banditry, and criminal networks that prey on vulnerable communities, Christian and Muslim alike.”
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He concluded, “while some attacks tragically take on communal or identity dimensions, framing the Middle Belt crisis as a systematic campaign against Christians does not reflect the full security reality on the ground and risks obscuring the role of criminal actors who exploit instability for profit and power.”
The Evangelical church in Omdurman, Sudan after being bombed even though it was not in a combat zone or used by any warring forces. (Open Doors)
Sudan
Some 150,000 are estimated to have died in the civil war that has engulfed this nation since 2023. Open Doors reports, “the situation for the nation’s 2 million Christians is especially grim.”
“We are considered as the enemy by both (opposing) factions, who accuse us of being allied with the other side,” Rafat Samir, general secretary for the Sudan Evangelical Alliance, told Fox News Digital. We are told ‘you don’t belong here’ and driven from our homes. To make matters worse, Christians are often excluded when aid is distributed.” A particular pattern can be seen across sub-Saharan Africa, Open Doors states. The report claims, “Islamist militants enter the vacuums in law and order left by a weak junta and civil conflicts. It means they can operate with impunity across parts of Burkina Faso, Mali, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Central African Republic, Somalia, Niger and Mozambique. Their stated aim is to create ‘Sharia states’ operating under their deadly interpretation of Islamic law.”
Church leaders of the Pentecostal Church in the northeast of Khartoum, stood by as their church building was demolished. The demolition was done under the premise that any building not complying with regulations would be destroyed in July 2025 in Sudan. (Open Doors.)
Elsewhere in the world, North Korea remains top of the list for having the world’s worst persecution of Christians, with Open Doors stating, “If Christians are discovered, they and their families are deported to labor camps or executed.”
A huge spike in reported violence against Christians in Syria has followed the fall of Bashar al-Assad’s presidency in Dec. 2024, and has led the country to jump to number six on the list. China is number 17, with churches driven underground by surveillance and heavy regulation.
In this photo released by the Syrian official news agency SANA, a Civil Defence worker inspects the damage inside Mar Elias church where a suicide bomber detonated himself in Dweil’a in the outskirts of Damascus, Syria, Sunday June 22, 2025. (SANA via AP)
The reporting period for the World Watch List ended some two months before President Trump ordered U.S. forces to bomb Muslim militants in northwestern Nigeria on Christmas Day to try to stop the killing of Christians.
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Jo Newhouse from Open Doors sub-Saharan Africa, told Fox News Digital, “The U.S. airstrikes (against Jihadi groups in Nigeria) have thrown many of the militant groups in the area into a state of panic. They have been scattering and attacking civilians as they come across soft targets, hoping that they can rebuild their resources through looting and kidnapping.”
“Many Christians across the northern states are in a state of flux, unable to find any safety or stability. They bear the scars of living under the perpetual risk of death, destruction and displacement,” Newhouse said.
Published on
The European Parliament is set to hold a debate about the allocation of public defence funds to Hungary over fears that the money may be misused by Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, who faces a difficult election in April.
The money in question is part of the EU’s Security Action for Europe (SAFE) programme, a €150 billion loan scheme that enables member states to finance the purchase of defence equipment.
This is a part of the plan to boost Europe’s defences in the light of both Russian threats and the uncertainty of support from the United States.
Hungary has requested €17.4 billion in SAFE funds to boost its army. This would be the third biggest SAFE allocation among the member states, even though most of the EU’s regular payments to Hungary are suspended because of rule of law deficiencies and corruption risks.
The Greens in the European Parliament initiated the debate, which has gained the support of mainstream political parties.
“I’m really frustrated that the European Commission chose Hungary as the third largest beneficiary of this whole SAFE programme, which means that Hungary will get €16 billion for its defence industry without any human rights rule of law conditionality,” Greens-EFA MEP Tineke Strik told Euronews.
The debate will take place next Tuesday at the plenary session in Strasbourg, and will not be followed by a resolution.
Treading carefully
MEPs critical of Orbán argue that the EU should impose robust safeguards before transferring the SAFE funds to his government.
The EU has already suspended €17 billion out of €27 billion previously earmarked for Hungary, with payments made conditional on improvements in justice, rule of law and anti-corruption efforts.
EU budget Commissioner Piotr Serafin told the European Parliament last December that the same conditions might be applied to SAFE funds as well, but the 15% down payment could be allocated without conditions.
On Monday, Euronews reported that the European Commission has postponed most upcoming decisions related to Hungary in order to avoid any perception of interference in the current election campaign. But because boosting defence spending is a strategic goal of the von der Leyen Commission, SAFE is an exception.
If approved by the EU Council, the first of the defence payments could happen during the first quarter of this year, just before Hungary’s crucial parliamentary election on April 12.
“This is a huge present to Orbán, because he will get a big part of it before the elections in Hungary,” Strik said. “And because of the lack of conditions, he can use it for his own campaign and sell it as a sign of the legitimacy of his regime.”
“This is really a toxic present for democracy in Hungary.”
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