Yemen's Houthis say they attacked Israel, US destroyers

(Reuters) -Yemen's Iran-aligned Houthi militants said on Friday they had targeted the Israeli cities of Tel Aviv and Ashkelon along with three U.S. destroyers in the Red Sea with missiles and drones in support of Gaza and Lebanon.

The Israeli army said it had intercepted a missile fired from Yemen which had triggered sirens to sound in central Israel.

The Houthis' military spokesperson said operations would not halt until Israel's offensives in Gaza and Lebanon stop. The group attacked Tel Aviv with a ballistic missile and launched a drone towards Ashkelon in southern Israel, Yahya Sarea said.

"We will carry out more military operations against the Israeli enemy to triumph for the sake of our brothers' blood in Palestine and Lebanon," he added in a televised speech.

Sarea also said, in a separate televised speech, that the group had simultaneously targeted three U.S. destroyers in the Red Sea with 23 ballistic and winged missiles and a drone while the vessels were on their way to support Israel.

U.S. Navy warships going through the Bab al-Mandab Strait intercepted a number of projectiles, including missiles and drones, fired by the Houthis, a U.S. official said.

The official, speaking on the condition of anonymity and citing initial information which can change, said there was no damage to any of the three warships in the area.

Israeli strikes have killed more than 600 people in Lebanon since Monday, with the conflict between Israel and Iran-backed Hezbollah at its most intense in more than 18 years.

Hezbollah has been firing rockets into Israel for almost a year in support of allied Palestinian militant group Hamas, which is fighting Israel in Gaza. More than 41,000 Palestinians have been killed in the Israeli assault on Gaza, according to health officials there. The war was triggered by an attack on Israel by Hamas militants who killed 1,200 people and abducted more than 250 hostages according to Israeli tallies.

(Reporting by Dubai Newsroom, Mohammed Ghobari in Aden, and Philip Stewart in Washington, Editing by Toby Chopra and Hugh Lawson)