Israel-Hamas War- Israeli strike Houthi targets in Yemen - World DNA - WION - video Dailymotion

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00:00All right, for more on this, we're now being joined by Colonel David B. DeRoche. He is

00:05a professor at Near East South Asia Center for Strategic Studies, National Defense University.

00:09Sir, thank you so much for joining us on World DNA. Always a pleasure to have you. Now, sir,

00:14my first question to you is, given all the developments, would you say that the war in

00:19West Asia has entered a new phase? Do you reckon this is an escalation like we've never

00:23seen before?

00:25Well, it's the first time Israel's responded. You know, as your report noted, there had

00:31been several hundred attacks launched from Yemen into Israel, but they had all been either

00:39intercepted or were inconsequential. So this is the first time they actually managed to

00:43kill an Israeli. I think Israel wants this to be a deterrent. I think that the Houthis

00:52on their part welcome having some sort of Israeli attack because it allows them domestically

00:58to portray any opposition to their rule, which is not extremely popular in Yemen, to be portrayed

01:05as supporting the Israeli government, which is broadly unpopular in the country. So it's

01:12a complicated situation. It could end here. My suspicion is that there will be another

01:17attack in a few more months as the Houthis' domestic situation deteriorates.

01:23Right, sir. There have always been fears of a wider regional conflagration. Will other

01:29Houthi empathizers in the region, Hezbollah, the Islamic resistance, we're talking about

01:35the axis of resistance here. Do you think they will jump in to retaliate now?

01:40Not on behalf of the Houthis. I mean, you know, the different proxy forces that Iran

01:46has has different degrees of independence, and the Houthis are probably the most independent.

01:52So they take their cues not from each other, but from Iran. I think it is possible, though,

01:59that they're struggling to remain relevant. They all want to be seen as at the forefront

02:03of resistance to Israel. So, you know, Lebanese Hezbollah, of course, has got more involved.

02:09The various Iraqi militias have remained relatively quiet. The Houthis, I think, did this as a

02:15means of reasserting their relevance and possibly trying to make a claim on Iranian

02:22resources if, as is currently predicted, President Trump returns and imposes maximum pressure

02:31on Iran. Iran will have much less money to spend on weapons and supporting its proxies.

02:36So the Houthis want to be seen as in the first rank of their proxies.

02:41Right, sir. Now, despite all the developments, we've seen that the tone of the Israeli prime

02:45minister has not changed. He vows to fight on and continue his attacks. Retaliatory attacks

02:51is what he calls them. Now, at the same time, there is growing pressure on the prime minister.

02:57How do you assess that?

03:00I think it's nothing that he can't deal with. I mean, the prime minister's goals remain pretty

03:06much constant from what they were on October 7th, which is to destroy the ability of Hamas

03:12to project power inside Israel. I think in order to do that, he's going to have to eventually

03:19have occupied all of Gaza for a period of some time while they systematically destroy the tunnels,

03:25the weapons networks, etc. That means that they're going to have to eventually take all of

03:31Rafah. And then the operation will shift from an offensive force against a conventional force,

03:38which is what Hamas amounted to, to a counterinsurgency confined mostly within

03:43Gaza. And I think we're going to see that happen within the next few months.

03:48All right, Colonel DeRoche, thank you so much for joining us on World DNA with your insights on this.

03:53Thank you.