A Houthi terrorist enters the cockpit of a ship traveling along the Red Sea towards Israel. Photo: Handout via Reuters

Tensions are building in the Red Sea following the shooting down of two drones by a French naval frigate on Sunday as Iranian-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen doubled down on threats to attack Israel-bound vessels.

A statement from the French navy on Sunday confirmed that the frigate Languedoc, which operates in the Red Sea, had carried out the “interception and destruction of these two identified threats.”

The French action came hours after Brig.-Gen. Yahya Saree, the Houthis’ military spokesman, said that the rebel movement — whose slogan is “Death to America, Death to Israel, curse the Jews, and victory to Islam” — would prevent commercial ships from navigating the Red Sea on their way to Israel regardless of nationality. On Sunday, Iranian state media reported that a merchant vessel from an unspecified country had been prevented from reaching Israel by Houthi forces.

According to Saree, “a proper interaction was carried out with the ship, but it did not pay heed to our warnings.” He added that the vessel was subsequently “blocked from passing through and was forced to turn back,” in comments reported by the pro-Iranian Al-Mayadeen TV network in Lebanon.

Separately, in a lengthy thread on X/Twitter, Saree said that Houthi forces would “prevent navegating [sic] all the ships heading to the Zionist entity [sic] from any nationality, if the food and medicine keep not accessing the Gaza Strip, and they will become a legitimate target for our armed forces.”

He continued: “Out of concern for the safety of maritime navigation, we warn all ships and companies to avoid dealing with Israeli ports.”

Houthi forces have carried out several attacks on ships heading to Israel since the eruption of the war in Gaza triggered by the Oct. 7 Hamas pogrom in southern Israel.

Last week, two direct attacks on Israeli ships in the Bab Al-Mandab Strait off Yemen’s coast were launched as a gesture, Saree said, from the “free people of our Arab and Islamic nation to stand fully with the choices of the Palestinian people and their steadfast resistance.”