Yemen’s Ansarullah movement says the country’s attacks against American targets baffled the United States air defense systems, thus resulting in “friendly fire” that brought down an American warplane.

Mohammed al-Bukhaiti, a member of the group’s Political Bureau, made the remarks to Qatar’s Al Jazeera television network on Saturday.

“Our attacks confused the US’s air defenses, and caused the country’s fighter plane to crash due to friendly fire,” he said.

The official described Yemen’s pro-Palestinian attacks against American and Israeli targets as “effective,” saying the strikes had succeeded in achieving their intended results since their onset last October.

The forces have been conducting numerous such strikes since October 7, 2023, when the Israeli regime began taking the Gaza Strip under a United States-backed genocidal war that has so far claimed the lives of at least 45,259 Palestinians, mostly women and children.

The strikes have been targeting the American military assets that are deployed off Yemen’s coastline, strategic and sensitive targets across the occupied Palestinian territories as well as the Israeli ships and the vessels heading towards the occupied territories.

Bukhaiti’s remarks came after Yemen’s Defense Minister Mohammed Nasser al-Atifi warned Washington that the country was capable of sinking the US’s naval fleets, and was in possession of weapons that it had refused to deploy so far.

Yemen’s pro-Palestinian strikes have mounted enormous pressure on the Israeli regime by forcing the vessels trying to ship military hardware and other commodities to the occupied territories to take the longer route around Africa.

The operations have, among other things, effectively shut down the port of Eilat, which is located in the southernmost tip of the occupied territories.

Bukhaiti said the operations have mounted an economic siege against the Israeli regime and afflicted damage on its security.

He, meanwhile, pointed to the intense deadly attacks that the US, the UK, and the regime have been conducting against Yemen as a means of trying to stop its pro-Palestinian strikes.

“We are likely to receive painful blows, but the more the enemy mobilizes its forces against us, the more certain we become of achieving victory.”

Whenever Yemen comes under Western and Israeli aggression, “it emerges stronger and triumphant from the situation, and its internal unity increases,” the official noted.

“We are prepared to pay the price of standing by the side of Gaza, and are not afraid of the enemy’s targeted killing operations.”

‘The real terrorists’

Referring to the West’s designation of Ansarullah as a “terrorist organization,” Bukhaiti said, “The terrorists are actually those who perpetrate crimes in Gaza, and those who support them.”

“Our operations seek to stop the genocide in Gaza. The Zionist regime is incapable of confronting us alone, and is, therefore, seeking help from those who support it.”