Iran state television site hacked, made to announce death of Houthi leader

Iran, which backs the Houthis, has been critical of the recent escalation of tensions in Yemen and and has repeatedly called on Saudi Arabia to halt what it calls aggression.

By JPOST.COM STAFF
Cyber hackers [illustrative] (photo credit: REUTERS)
Cyber hackers [illustrative]
(photo credit: REUTERS)
The Twitter account of Iran's state television network announced the non-existent death of the rebel Houthi leader Malik Ali Houthi after being hacked overnight, Israel Radio reported Sunday.
A spokesman from the channel called the cyber-attack against their site "psychological warfare" meant to raise the morale of opponents to the Shi'ite Houthi campaign to seize control of the country.
No organization has yet to take responsibility for the cyber-raid.
Iran, which backs the Houthis, has been critical of the recent escalation of tensions in Yemen and has repeatedly called on Saudi Arabia and its allies, who have deployed ground forces and air-power against the Houthis, to halt what it calls aggression.
Yet Iran's support for the rebel Houthis, who captured Sana'a in September of last year and began their current push for full on revolution in January, extends beyond rhetoric.
On Friday, two members of Iran's Revolutionary Guard were reportedly captured by local militiamen in the city of Aden, which has become a focal point of the war.
According to the armed locals, who have been trying to beat back the Houthi advance on the city, the captured Iranians, who were serving in an advisory capacity to the Shi'ite rebels, are a captain and a colonel belonging to Iran's elite Quds Force.
Iran's state media emphatically rejected the claim that Tehran was meddling in Yemen, describing the conflict in Yemen as one between the Houthi's against "al-Qaida terrorists and forces loyal to fugitive President [Abd Rabu] Mansour Hadi."
According to the World Health Organization, over 540 people have been in killed in the last two weeks of fighting in Yemen, with about 2,000 injured. Aid agencies claim that some 100,000 have been displaced.
Iran has already involved itself in at least two conflicts in the Arab World, deploying its proxy Hezbollah in Syria in order to aid embattled Syrian President Bashar Assad and directly sending its Revolutionary Guard forces, led by General Qassem Suleimani, to Iraq in order to take territory from the Islamic State group.