Houthis hit Riyadh airport again as Saudi-Houthi attacks near daily

Since the renewed escalation of the Yemen conflict, the Iran-backed Houthis and Saudi Arabia attack each other almost daily, Deutsche Welle reports. On Monday, 26 October, the Houthi militia again attacked Riyadh's airport, according to its spokesman Yahya Saree, who said a “ballistic missile” was used. He added that the Houthis also hit oil pumping stations with drones.

On Sunday the Houthis said they had attacked Riyadh's international airport again, only hours after flights resumed. In a Houthi attack on the airport on 10 October, 13 people were killed and more than 300 injured. After it reopened, the Houthis warned travelers that it remains a “military target.” The closure was a heavy blow to Saudi Arabia and forced it to cancel an important international business conference.

Coalition strikes

The Saudi-led military coalition said it hit several launchers and depots of the pro-Iranian militia in Yemen. According to coalition spokesman Turki al-Maliki on X, four ballistic-missile launch pads, a missile depot and tunnels used by the Houthis were destroyed, in order to cut off military supplies between Houthi-held areas. Front-line fortifications and equipment were also targeted. Earlier al-Maliki said coalition air defense intercepted and destroyed a ballistic missile fired at Riyadh.

The Yemeni government accused the rebels on Sunday evening of shelling camps for displaced people on the outskirts of Aden, but presented no evidence.

Wider context

The Yemen fighting has become an increasingly destabilizing front in the conflict between the US and Israel on one side and Iran on the other, with Saudi Arabia, allied with the US, at its center. It has ended a UN-brokered truce that had largely held since 2022. Saudi Arabia intervened in the Yemeni civil war in 2015 at the head of a coalition supporting the internationally recognized government, after the Houthis took the capital Sanaa a year earlier. More in world news.