Israeli airstrikes hit Yemen’s main airport as a civilian Airbus 320 with hundreds of passengers on board was landing and a U.N. delegation was waiting to leave, the U.N.’s top humanitarian official in Yemen said Friday.

The WHO Director-General said the explosions that rocked the building were so deafening that his ears were still ringing more than a day later.

The head of the World Health Organization said Saturday he only narrowly escaped death in fatal Israeli strikes on the airport in Yemen's Huthi rebel-held capital.Otherwise, if the missile deviated just slightly,

General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus says he and colleagues "escaped death narrowly" when an Israeli airstrike targeted Yemen's main airport.

The head of the World Health Organization said he was about to board a flight in the Yemeni capital when the airport came under bombardment.

Israel has banned the pan-Arab Al Jazeera network and accused six of its Gaza reporters of being militants. The Qatar-based broadcaster denies the allegations and accuses Israel of trying to silence its war coverage, which has focused heavily on civilian casualties from Israeli military operations.

The Israeli military said the airstrikes targeted infrastructure that the Houthis have used to bring Iranian weapons and officials into Yemen.

The head of the World Health Organization said on Friday (December 27) he was not sure he was going to survive an air strike carried out by Israel a day earlier during a series of attacks on the Iran-aligned Houthi movement.

Flights were scheduled to resume again on Friday at Sanaa international airport, officials said, a day after the airport was hit by Israeli strikes.

Israel intensified strikes on the Iran-backed Houthi group in Yemen, hitting the capital’s airport and two power stations.