After recent attacks by Houthi Rebels targeting Israel and the US, the internet collapses in war-torn Yemen

Web monitors said that early on Friday, internet service in Yemen—a country ripped apart by conflict—collapsed for no apparent reason.

The Houthi rebels in Yemen, who are now supported by Iran, are in charge of YemenNet, and the outage started early on Friday at 0000 GMT.

The outage was reported by CloudFlare, an internet services provider, and NetBlocks, a nonprofit that tracks outages on the internet. The two failed to provide an explanation for the outage.

The disruption was not immediately acknowledged by Yemeni telecommunications authorities or the Houthis.

The coalition headed by Saudi Arabia that is fighting the Houthis in Yemen caused a prior outage in January 2022 when it struck a telecommunications plant in the Red City port city of Hodeida. Word of a similar incident did not immediately surface.

Through the Red Sea port of Hodeida, the underwater FALCON cable provides internet service to TeleYemen in Yemen. Though most of Yemen’s population resides in the west near the Red Sea, the FALCON cable also lands in the far eastern port of Ghaydah.

A request for comment on Friday was not immediately answered by GCX, the firm that runs the cable.

The Houthis have been attacking Israel with drones and missiles as part of their airstrikes and ground operations against Hamas in the Gaza Strip, which coincided with the outage. This includes a purported attack on Thursday that was directed once again on the Red Sea port city of Eilat, Israel.

The Houthis, meantime, have also used a surface-to-air missile to bring down an American MQ-9 Reaper drone this week. This is just one of several incidents in the Middle East that have raised fears of a regional conflict breaking out.

The crisis in Yemen started in 2014 when the Houthis took control of much of the country’s north and Sanaa. After fleeing to the south, the internationally recognized government went into exile in Saudi Arabia.

Months after the Houthi takeover, a coalition headed by Saudi Arabia intervened, and the battle evolved into a regional proxy war between Saudi Arabia and Iran. The United States has long been active on the periphery, helping the monarchy with information gathering.

But the United States withdrew its backing when Saudi Arabia’s attacks killed civilians, drawing outcry from throughout the world. However, it’s believed that American drone attacks are still being used to target alleged members of Yemen’s local al-Qaida branch.

In addition to taking the lives of soldiers and civilians, the conflict has claimed the lives of over 150,000 people and resulted in one of the greatest humanitarian crises in history, killing tens of thousands more. A cease-fire that ended in October of last year has mostly held, but since a lasting peace has not yet been achieved, the Houthis are said to be gradually increasing their assaults.