DUBAI, United Arab Emirates >> The Houthi militia in Yemen has vowed to retaliate after President Donald Trump ordered large-scale military strikes on targets controlled by the group that it says killed at least 53 people.

The group, which is backed by Iran, said that women and children were among those killed in the strikes Saturday, the most significant U.S. military action in the Middle East since Trump took office in January.

For more than a year, the Houthis have launched attacks against Israel and threatened commercial shipping in the Red Sea in solidarity with their ally Hamas, which led the Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel that set off the war in the Gaza Strip. The Houthis suspended the campaign in January after a ceasefire was reached in Gaza but have vowed to step up attacks again after Israel instituted a blockade on aid to the enclave this month.

The U.S. airstrikes targeted Houthi-controlled areas across Yemen, including the capital, Sanaa, as well as Saada, al-Bayda, Hajjah and Dhamar provinces, according to reports from Houthi-run media channels. The strikes killed at least 53 people and wounded 98, including many children and women, the Houthi-run Health Ministry said late Saturday.

The casualty figures could not be independently verified, and the United States has not given any estimates for the number of people killed or wounded in the strikes.

The rebels on Sunday claimed to have targeted the USS Harry S. Truman carrier strike group with missiles and a drone.

According to a U.S. official, the Houthis did fire drones and at least one missile in response to the U.S. attack. The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to provide updated information on operations, said that beginning at about midnight local time in Yemen, the Houthis fired 11 drones and at least one missile over a period of about 12 hours. Ten of the drones were intercepted by U.S. Air Force fighter jets and one was intercepted by a Navy F/A-18 fighter jet. The missile fell into the water far from the ship, and nothing came close to hitting either the carrier or the warships in its strike group.

On Sunday, Michael Waltz, Trump’s national security adviser, described the U.S. weekend attacks on Yemen as successful and effective. “We hit the Houthi leadership, killing several of their key leaders last night, their infrastructure, the missiles,” he said on “Fox News Sunday.” He cast the Houthis as “essentially al-Qaida with sophisticated Iranian-backed air defenses and antiship cruise missiles and drones” that have attacked the entire global economy.

U.S. Central Command, which posted a video of a bomb leveling a building compound in Yemen, said that Washington had employed precision strikes to “defend American interests, deter enemies and restore freedom of navigation.”

U.S. airstrikes also targeted a power facility in the northwestern town of Dahyan, causing a nightlong electricity blackout, residents said.

The Houthi-run Al-Masirah television channel reported that 13 people were killed and nine others wounded in airstrikes on al-Jeraf, a district in Sanaa considered a stronghold of the group. In Saada province, in the northwest, 10 people, including four children, were killed when airstrikes hit two buildings, the report said.

Residents in Sanaa shared images and videos on social media showing shattered windows and fireballs rising from sites that were struck. Others posted anguished messages as the airstrikes hit.

Abdul Rahman al-Nuerah, a resident of Sanaa, said the blasts had shattered the windows of his home and terrified his four children. “I instantly embraced and comforted them,” al-Nuerah said by telephone. “Children and mothers are afraid and still in shock.”

Mohammed al-Bukhaiti, a senior Houthi leader, vowed retaliation against the United States, calling the strikes unjustified. “We shall respond to the escalation by escalating,” he wrote on social platform X.

The Houthi rebels, who control most of northern Yemen, had temporarily halted attacks in the Red Sea when a ceasefire took effect in Gaza in January. But last week, they said they would target any Israeli ships violating their ban on Israeli vessels passing through the Red Sea, the Arabian Sea, the Bab el-Mandeb and the Gulf of Aden.

The Bab el-Mandeb is a strait between the Horn of Africa and the Middle East that connects the Red Sea to the Gulf of Aden, which opens into the Arabian Sea and the Indian Ocean.

Trump said in a statement on his Truth Social platform that the strikes were also intended as a warning to Iran, the Houthis’ main backer.

“Support for the Houthi terrorists must end IMMEDIATELY!” he wrote. He also warned Iran against threatening the United States, saying, “America will hold you fully accountable, and we won’t be nice about it!”

Some military analysts and former U.S. commanders said Sunday that a more aggressive campaign against the Houthis, particularly against Houthi leadership, was necessary to degrade the group’s ability to threaten international shipping. “This is long, long overdue,” Gen. Kenneth McKenzie, a retired head of the Pentagon’s Central Command, said in a telephone interview Sunday.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said Sunday that the United States would conduct an “unrelenting” campaign of strikes against the Houthis until the militant group ceased its actions in the Red Sea.

“This isn’t a one-night thing. This will continue until you say, ‘We’re done shooting at ships. We’re done shooting at assets,’” Hegseth told Fox News on Sunday. “This campaign is about freedom of navigation and restoring deterrence.”

Iran strongly condemned the strikes.

Esmaeil Baghaei, a spokesperson for Iran’s Foreign Ministry, called them a violation of international law regarding the use of force and respect for national sovereignty.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov on Saturday told Secretary of State Marco Rubio that all sides should cease from the “use of force” in Yemen and enter a “political dialogue,” according to the Russian Foreign Ministry. Moscow has condemned past U.S. and British strikes on Yemen.

Hezbollah, another armed proxy for Iran in the region, voiced its condemnation of the U.S. strikes on Yemen and described it as a “war crime,” according to a statement Sunday.

This report includes information from the Associated Press.