Yemen’s Houthi rebels fired a missile that struck an American shipping carrier Monday — the day after launching one toward a US destroyer — in their latest attack along Middle Eastern trading routes, officials said.

The rebels later issued an ominous statement saying they now consider US and British ships “legitimate targets,” after the countries launched strikes against them in Yemen last week.

“The United States is on the verge of losing its maritime security,” warned a Houthi spokesman, Nasruldeen Amer, to outlet Al Jazeera. “The ship doesn’t necessarily have to be heading to Israel for us to target it; it is enough for it to be American.”

The Eagle Gibraltar, a Marshall Islands-flagged carrier owned by the Connecticut-based firm Eagle Bulk, was struck by one of the group’s anti-ship cruise missiles in the Gulf of Aden off the coast of Yemen, according to US Central Command.

The US cargo ship sustained minor damage and did not report any injuries and continued on its scheduled route, officials said.  

The missile that struck the ship, which was carrying steel products, was one of three fired toward the Red Sea on Monday, according to the UK-based maritime security entity Ambrey, CNN reported. Two of the missiles didn’t reach the sea.

Houthi Brig. Gen. Yahya Saree ​later said in a live video statement that his Lebanon militants “carried out a military operation targeting an American ship in the Gulf of Aden, with a number of appropriate naval missiles.” 

Sare​e boasted that the strikes were “accurate and direct.”

Eagle Bulk Shipping, a publicly traded firm on the New York Stock Exchange, confirmed to the outlet that its ship was hit “by an unidentified projectile” about 100 miles offshore. The company did not respond to The Post’s request for comment. 

The attack came just a day after a Houthi missile was fired in the direction of the USS Laboon, an Arleigh Burke-class destroyer operating in the southern region of the Red Sea, US Central Command said. 

The rocket was intercepted and shot down by a US fighter jet operating in the area. 

“An anti-ship cruise missile was fired from Iranian-backed Houthi militant areas of Yemen toward USS Laboon,” Central Command said in a statement. “There were no injuries or damage reported.”

Central Command stopped short of saying that the destroyer was specifically targeted in the attack, a pattern the US has stuck to since the Houthi attacks began in November. 

The missile came from the area around Hodeida, a Red Sea port city long held by the Houthis and where the rebel group alleged a Western-led airstrike took place Sunday.

The US denies knowing of any airstrike in Hodeida, suggesting the blast may have been from the Houthis’ own missiles misfiring. 

The attack against the USS Laboon and Eagle Gibraltar marks the first time America has acknowledged fire by the Houthis since the US and UK launched a series of airstrikes Friday after warning of “consequences” over the rebel group’s assaults on shipping vessels. 

The US-led airstrikes hit 28 locations and struck more than 60 targets with its own cruise missiles and bombs launched via fighter jets, warships and submarines.

The strikes hit the Houthis weapon depots, radars and command centers – including ones in remote mountain areas – US officials said. 

The rebel group has yet to reveal the scope of the damage it sustained over the airstrikes, with officials only acknowledging that the attacks killed five of its fighters and injured six others.  

The US launched a follow-up strike Saturday against a Houthi radar site. 

The Houthis, a Shiite rebel group allied with Iran, has targeted a critical corridor linking Asian and Mideast energy and cargo shipments to the Suez Canal and Europe that threatens global shipping.  

The Iran-backed rebels, who seized Yemen’s capital in 2014, began their assault in the Red Sea in November as a show of support for Palestinian Hamas terrorists in their ongoing war against Israel in Gaza.

Ambrey, the private security firm that helped identify the Eagle Gibraltar in Monday’s attack, suggested that the missile fire was “in response to US military strikes on Houthi military positions in Yemen.” 

The rising tensions along the Red Sea have sparked fears that the war in Gaza will spill over to the entire region as Hezbollah, an Iran-backed terror group, continues to launch its own missile strikes against Israel.   

With Post wires