The Middle East: Huthi rebels report attacks in Saudi Arabia and Yemen
The Islamist Huthi militia is reporting attacks on a Saudi refinery and on a port facility in Yemen. There are reports of damage and casualties.
Tensions between Saudi Arabia and the Iran-backed Yemeni Houthi rebels are escalating further. The Islamist rebels announced they had attacked a refinery of the state-owned Saudi oil company Aramco in the southwestern Saudi region of Jazan. A Houthi military spokesman said the drone attack on the facility was a "precise hit". The militia justified the attack by claiming that Saudi drones had violated Yemeni airspace.
The Saudi Energy Ministry confirmed that a fire had broken out at an Aramco facility in Jazan. Emergency services extinguished the blaze and there were no injuries. However, the ministry did not specify the cause of the fire.
The Houthi militia also reported attacks in Yemen. The Houthi rebels announced they had launched a large-scale military operation in western Yemen. Numerous rockets and drones were used against troop gatherings and weapons depots in the government-controlled region of Mocha. Weapons and equipment were destroyed and dozens of people were injured or killed, including Saudi citizens.
A Yemeni Information Ministry employee confirmed the attack and told the news agency dpa that damage had occurred at port facilities. There were earlier media reports of Houthi militia attacks on the Mocha port in western Yemen.
Saudi Arabia has been fighting the Houthi militia alongside the internationally recognized Yemeni government for years. The Islamist militia formally overran Yemen, a poor country on the Arabian Peninsula, in 2014 and plunged it into a civil war. A ceasefire came into effect in 2022, but smaller clashes continued.
The conflict between Saudi Arabia and the Houthi militia has escalated again in the wake of the Iran war. The conflict had recently escalated with air attacks on the Houthi-controlled capital Sanaa. The Houthis have also recently attacked several Saudi Arabian ships or forced them to change course.
On Friday night, the Islamists also attacked targets directly in Saudi Arabia, injuring at least 11 people. In further Houthi attacks in the Yemeni province of Marib, at least two civilians were killed, according to government reports.
Translated by urgent.news. Machine-written — may contain errors; check the original before relying on it.
