The deeper loss inflected on the Houthi rebels by Israel’s strikes which killed their Prime minister and ministers, is psychological rather operational, according to an analysis published by Foreign Policy.
Fatima Abo Alasrar, a senior policy analyst at the Washington Center for Yemeni Studies, who wrote the analysis added that for years, the Houthis have relied on the perception that they are untouchable, able to absorb strikes and emerge stronger. But the sight of the rebels leader Abdul-Malik al-Houthi delivering a televised speech even as his ministers were being killed punctured that mythology of invulnerability.
The timing raises uncomfortable questions for the Houthis about how deeply Israeli intelligence has penetrated the organization, questions that extend far beyond this single operation.
Yet, despite the success of the operation, the strikes did not decapitate the movement. Houthi himself remains at the helm. The chief of the general staff, Major General Muhammad Abd al-Karim al-Ghamari—who manages the day-to-day war effort—is still alive. The Houthis’ security and intelligence services continue to function, as does their military command structure.
This survival is by design. The Houthis have built a system in which top titles can be filled by expendable figures. Prime ministers, ministers, and spokespeople are meant to be visible—and replaceable.
Where the strikes had their greatest impact was not in command continuity but in exposing the group’s fragility. The Houthis confirmed Rahawi’s death only on Saturday, two days after the Israeli airstrike that killed him. In the hours that followed the strikes, the Houthis enforced a strict information blackout and launched a disinformation campaign, working to suppress any mention of casualties. But as condolences were exchanged across social media, the news could not be contained.
The irony is particularly sharp: Just three days before his death, Rahawi had declared the regime “purged of traitors,” boasting of vigilance and cohesion. The arbitrary detentions that followed, including those of U.N. staff in Sanaa, were another sign of insecurity.
The Houthis’ paranoia has deep institutional roots—they operate hundreds of illegal detention facilities holding thousands of political prisoners.
Looking forward, the Houthis are unlikely to be strategically derailed. They will replace their fallen ministers with new placeholders, stage larger rallies, and issue louder threats. They will double down on deterrence by escalating attacks on Israel and in the Red Sea, seeking to prove that their capacity to strike remains intact. But the intelligence breach that enabled these strikes should worry not only the Houthis but the broader so-called Axis of Resistance: If Israeli intelligence can reach into Sanaa, it suggests vulnerabilities across the entire proxy network.
Inside Yemen, this means more arbitrary arrests, more propaganda, and a tightening of the culture of fear. For Israel, it means that deterrence can be achieved not only through intercepting missiles but by undermining the Houthis’ mythology of invulnerability. And for Iran, watching its most resilient proxy lose its aura of invulnerability, this suggests the proxy network model faces systemic vulnerabilities, not just tactical setbacks.
The bad news for both Yemen and Israel is that the Houthi system remains intact. There is no leadership vacuum, nor is there a crisis of succession. The good news is that the strikes cracked the veneer of control and the confidence that no one could touch the Houthis.
This is the next phase in Yemen’s war: not the fall of the Houthis but the erosion of their myths. What dies are the faces; what survives is the machinery of repression that keeps Yemen hostage. How long that machinery can continue to command belief is now the question.