Berbera sits on the Gulf of Aden, 160 miles south of the Bab el-Mandeb. Opposite Djibouti and Somaliland lies Houthi-controlled Yemen. Backed by Tehran, the Houthis have attacked Israeli shipping in the Red Sea and have threatened to shut the strait entirely.
Israel can answer that threat from Berbera. The infrastructure is already there. Berbera International Airport holds a 2.6-mile long, Soviet-built runway, originally designed to handle strategic bombers and capable today of receiving heavy transport aircraft, fighter jets, and drone platforms for round-the-clock surveillance of the Bab el-Mandeb. Adjacent to it, is both a deepwater commercial port and a separate naval base run by the United Arab Emirates. The Emirates initially established its presence in 2017 to support its operations during Yemen’s civil war. A highway connects the port and airport to the Ethiopian border.
Berbera International Airport holds a 2.6-mile long, Soviet-built runway, originally designed to handle strategic bombers.
The intelligence layer is already operational. Multiple current and former officials—including three Somali officials, a former Somali security official, a European Union security official, and a Somaliland official—told Drop Site News that Israel has established an intelligence presence at Berbera International Airport. A unit of Somaliland’s presidential guard has returned from training in Israel. Intelligence officers have received training there. A separate contingent of Somaliland maritime personnel was sent to Kenya. Jama Abdullahi Igal Gabuush, a foreign policy adviser to Somaliland’s President Abdirahman M. Abdullahi Irro, told Israel’s Channel 14 that security cooperation had begun.
CNN reported that Somaliland provided Israel with a covert military position during the recent war with Iran, allowing Israeli aircraft a potential refueling point on long-range missions. The London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies assessed that Berbera’s ongoing military infrastructure upgrade paves the way for Israeli army access to the site. Commercial satellite imagery analyzed by open-source intelligence investigators shows a significant expansion of military infrastructure at and around the Berbera air base over the past three months, with extensive excavation, new ammunition depots, and at least a dozen underground bunkers carved into the surrounding terrain.
One location under consideration for an Israeli installation is high terrain approximately 60 miles west of Berbera—ground with line-of-sight across the Gulf of Aden toward Yemen. A facility at that elevation, equipped with Israeli radar and surveillance systems, would give Israel continuous monitoring of Houthi maritime and missile activity. Combined with combat aircraft on the Berbera runway and naval access at the port, it would allow Israel to project force against the Houthis from the south without relying on overflight rights across Arab airspace.
Somaliland’s government messaging has been vague. Its foreign ministry initially said it would not host an Israeli military base. A foreign ministry official subsequently told Israel’s Channel 12 that the idea was being discussed. The Minister of the Presidency told Bloomberg there would be “an analysis at some point” on the question. Nothing, Hargeisa has made clear, is off the table.
Commercial satellite imagery ... shows a significant expansion of military infrastructure at and around the Berbera air base over the past three months.
The strategic geometry that makes Berbera valuable to Israel also makes it a target. Houthi leader Abdul Malik al-Houthi has warned that “any Israeli presence in Somaliland” would be “a military target for our armed forces.” The United Arab Emirates’ own Berbera facilities are within range of Houthi short-range ballistic missiles. Turkey, which has deployed its drillship Çağrı Bey to Somali waters under naval escort and trained an estimated 16,000 soldiers at Camp TURKSOM, has branded Israel’s Somaliland recognition unlawful.
Washington has not moved. The State Department’s June 2026 report to Congress reaffirmed that, from Washington’s perspective, Somaliland is part of Somalia. Nevertheless, AFRICOM commander General Dagvin Anderson visited Hargeisa and Berbera in November 2025, citing counterterrorism cooperation. Somaliland’s top diplomatic representative in Washington has said that U.S. military interest has been so sustained that “every month, there has been a delegation from AFRICOM to Hargeisa.” In effect, an ally is building a military presence at a chokepoint the United States has an interest in keeping open, while Washington defers to a Mogadishu government that has condemned the arrangement and shoots its own opposition in the streets.
Israel does not need Washington’s permission to negotiate at Berbera. But a base, if agreed, will require logistics, overflight, and resupply chains that run through America-aligned networks. The question is whether the United States will treat Berbera as an allied asset or continue to pretend it has no position.
