WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump said the U.S. would stop its bombing campaign against Houthis in Yemen after a ceasefire was facilitated by Oman, even as the group pledged to keep targeting Israel over its Gaza campaign.

“They just don’t want to fight,” Trump said in an Oval Office Tuesday morning during a meeting with Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney. “And we will honor that, and we will stop the bombings, and they have capitulated. But more importantly, we will take their word.”

The precise terms of the agreement weren’t released and it wasn’t immediately clear if the move would lead to the resumption of commercial shipping through the Red Sea. Traffic has plummeted through the key waterway since late 2023 as Houthis targeted vessels as Israel ramped up its campaign against Hamas.

The White House and U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth later in the afternoon reposted a statement on X by the Omani foreign minister that said his government had coordinated a ceasefire between the U.S. and the Houthis.

“In the future, neither side will target the other, including American vessels, in the Red Sea and Bab al-Mandab Strait, ensuring freedom of navigation and the smooth flow of international commercial shipping,” the minister, Badr Albusaidi, said in the post.

A representative for the Houthis, Mohammed al-Bukhaiti, said in an interview that the agreement “has to do with the U.S. aggression on Yemen and not with our operations to support Gaza, which would continue.” Mohammed Al-Houthi, member of the group’s political council and cousin of its leader, said in an X post that the U.S. halt “will be evaluated on the ground first.”

A Houthi attack on Israel’s main airport Sunday triggered a suspension of flights and prompted Israel to strike the airport in Sanaa, Yemen’s capital. Al-Bukhaiti vowed a retaliatory strike against Israel later Tuesday.

The Houthis began attacking commercial vessels in the Red Sea after Israel launched a campaign against Hamas in the Gaza Strip, paralyzing a vital waterway. Those attacks have largely dried up since late 2024 as shippers routed vessels in other directions, though the group has continued to target U.S. warships.

In March, the Houthis said they would resume attacks on Israeli ships, which they had halted for the duration of a ceasefire in Gaza. Days later, Trump began a military campaign against the rebel group. Last week, the Pentagon said U.S. forces had struck more than 1,000 targets on that campaign, dubbed Operation Rough Rider.

The aggressive U.S. attacks have stirred accusations that the U.S. isn’t doing enough to avoid civilian casualties, and the Yemen Data Project, a nonprofit group that tracks the campaign, said earlier that the strikes had killed 500 civilians so far.

“It seems optimistic to me to start putting up a ‘Mission Accomplished’ banner,” said Jon Alterman, director of the Middle East Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. “I think you have to look with caution and skepticism to see how their behavior changes.”

A National Security Council spokesperson declined to comment further following Trump’s remarks.

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(With assistance from Courtney McBride and Jordan Fabian.)

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