A drone launched from Yemen by the Houthi militant group struck the passenger hall of Ramon International Airport near the southern Israeli resort city of Eilat on Sunday, closing the airspace over southern Israel and forcing the suspension of flights, the Israeli military and airport authorities said.
The Israeli military said the Houthis launched multiple drones, some intercepted outside Israel, and that at least one reached the airport. The Israel Airports Authority reported the passenger hall was hit. Israel’s rescue service Magen David Adom said one person was lightly injured by shrapnel.
A deputy head of the Houthi media office, Nasruddin Amer, hailed the raid on social media, calling it “a unique, qualitative military operation” and warning that "enemy airports are unsafe, and foreigners must leave them for their own safety." The comments echoed earlier vows by the Iran-aligned rebels to escalate attacks on Israel and vessels in nearby Red Sea shipping lanes.
Sunday’s strike came about two weeks after an Israeli air campaign on Sanaa, the Houthi-held Yemeni capital, killed Ahmed al-Rahawi, the prime minister of the Houthi government, according to regional reporting. Israeli and U.S. officials have carried out air operations against Houthi targets in recent months amid concerns about the group’s efforts to strike Israel and disrupt commercial shipping.
In May, a Houthi missile struck near Israel’s main Ben Gurion Airport, lightly wounding four people and prompting many international carriers to suspend flights to Israel for months. Israeli forces later struck and destroyed the main airport in Sanaa.
Israeli officials and analysts have said the rebels in recent weeks have increased the tempo of attacks, launching projectiles daily and, in some instances, employing cluster munitions. Cluster munitions disperse multiple submunitions, which can be harder to intercept and raise the likelihood of penetrating air defenses, according to military assessments.
Ramon International Airport opened in 2019 and is about 19 kilometers (12 miles) from Eilat on Israel’s southern tip. It handles domestic and international flights but is far smaller than Ben Gurion Airport near Tel Aviv.
The airport strike occurred as Israel pursues a major military operation in Gaza City and as talks to secure a cease-fire and hostage releases remain stalled. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, speaking at a weekly cabinet meeting Sunday, said Israel would press forward with operations in Gaza City as part of efforts to dismantle what he termed the Iranian axis’s regional influence. "Our effort in Gaza on the last strongholds, actually the last important stronghold, Gaza City, is part of our effort to complete the crushing of the Iranian axis’s chokehold," he said.
Netanyahu also asserted that more than 100,000 Palestinians had left Gaza City ahead of the planned operation. That figure was disputed by international agencies. The United Nations said only a few thousand people were leaving each day last week and that some 41,000 people had evacuated since mid-August — out of roughly 1 million estimated to be in and around Gaza City.
Efforts to relaunch negotiations between Israel and Hamas have shown little progress. Bassem Naim, a member of Hamas’ political bureau, said the group would not disarm until a Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital is established, but that Hamas would consider a long-term truce and the release of hostages in exchange for the release of Palestinian prisoners and the full withdrawal of Israeli troops from Gaza. Naim said Hamas was awaiting Israel’s response to a 60-day cease-fire proposal put forward by Egyptian and Qatari mediators; the Israeli Prime Minister’s Office declined to comment on negotiations.
There remain about 48 hostages believed to be in Gaza, Israel says, roughly 20 of whom are thought to be alive. Militants seized some 251 people and killed about 1,200 in the Oct. 7, 2023, attacks that sparked the wider war.
On Sunday morning, local hospitals in Gaza reported at least 13 Palestinians killed in Israeli strikes, including six children and three women. Shifa Hospital in northern Gaza said eight people were killed in a strike on a school sheltering displaced people; the Israeli military said it had targeted militants in the area and warned civilians to evacuate beforehand. Five more people were reported killed in strikes on tents and apartment buildings in central Gaza and Gaza City; the Israeli military did not immediately comment on those strikes.
The Gaza Health Ministry, which does not distinguish between civilian and combatant casualties, said the overall death toll since the war began stood at 64,368 with 162,776 wounded.
The airport strike intensified concerns about the conflict’s spillover effects across the region and the safety of commercial aviation and maritime routes. Israeli authorities temporarily closed southern airspace and halted flights into and out of Ramon Airport while security assessments and possible repair operations proceeded.
The incident underscores the widening regional dimensions of the Israel-Hamas war, with Iran-aligned actors and allied militias in the Red Sea and Arabian Peninsula increasingly engaged in confrontations that raise the risk of a broader escalation.