Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthis release 12 UN staff but continue detaining over 50 others, accusing them of “spying for Israel and the US.”
In a partial and politically charged concession, Houthi rebels in Yemen on Wednesday released 12 United Nations employees and allowed three others to move freely inside the UN compound in Sanaa — days after raiding the facility and detaining dozens of international staff, according to The Associated Press.
The freed personnel were flown out of Sanaa aboard a UN humanitarian aircraft, with several relocated to Jordan to resume their duties. Yet, the crisis is far from over: more than 50 UN employees remain in Houthi custody, alongside humanitarian workers from other international NGOs and diplomatic missions.
“The UN, at all levels, continues to be seized with the matter,” the office of UN Secretary-General António Guterres said in a statement. “We renew the Secretary-General’s call for their immediate and unconditional release.”
The Iran-aligned Houthis, notorious for destabilizing Yemen and threatening maritime routes in the Red Sea, have a long record of targeting UN and aid organizations. In this case, the militants accused the detained UN staff of spying for Israel and the United States, a claim widely dismissed by diplomats as a fabricated pretext to justify repression and intimidate foreign agencies.
The detentions came just a day after the Houthis stormed another UN office in Sanaa. Although all personnel there were reported safe, the rebels confiscated communication devices, servers, and computers from multiple facilities, effectively crippling aid coordination across rebel-held zones.
An anonymous UN source confirmed that the abducted staff represent multiple agencies — including the World Food Programme (WFP), UNICEF, and the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) — all of which operate on the front lines of Yemen’s hunger and displacement crises.
This latest incident underscores how the Houthis continue to weaponize humanitarian access as leverage against the international community, while echoing Tehran’s propaganda narrative against Israel. Western diplomats note that the Houthis’ anti-Israel rhetoric has sharply escalated since Hamas’ October 7 massacre and Israel’s subsequent war on terror in Gaza — rhetoric that now manifests in direct assaults on global institutions.
Israel and its allies have long warned that the Houthis function as a forward arm of Iran’s regional proxy network, mirroring Hezbollah in Lebanon and militias in Iraq and Syria. The seizure of UN personnel fits that broader pattern — intimidation cloaked as ideology.
As of now, the world’s premier humanitarian body finds itself negotiating not with a government, but with a terrorist movement entrenched in power and emboldened by impunity. For Israel’s security partners and democratic nations alike, this episode is yet another reminder that Iran’s proxies are willing to target anyone — even UN peace workers — under the banner of anti-Israel hatred.
