Houthis Fire Missiles at Saudi Arabia, Breaking Truce Over Airport Bombing

Yemen’s Houthi movementfiredmissilesatSaudiArabiaafter accusing the kingdom of bombing an airport under their control on Monday,breakinga four-year truce in the conflict between the kingdom and the Iran-aligned group. SaudiArabiainterceptedmissiles“launched by the terrorist Houthi militia toward the southern region,” the spokesperson for aSaudi-led military coalition in Yemen said on X. Houthi military spokesperson Yahya Saree said they had targeted the international airport inSaudiArabia‘s Abha, the capital of a mountainous southern region bordering Yemen where manySaudis escape the summer heat. The strikes are the first claimed by theHouthisagainstSaudiArabiasince an informal truce went into effect in March 2022 following Houthi attacks onSaudienergy infrastructure. Monday’s violence threatened renewed conflict onSaudiArabia‘s southern border after Iranian drone and missile attacks targeting its eastern regions and Riyadh subsided following an April truce in theIran conflict. The country’s size relative to other much smaller Gulf states meant it fared better during the war, continuing to export oil via a pipeline from the east to its west coast on the Red Sea, bypassing the Strait of Hormuz. A wider conflict with theHouthis, who have in the past targeted Red Sea shipping, could challenge that. TheSaudigovernment’s communication office did not immediately respond to a request for comment. IRANIAN PLANE Earlier Monday, the Houthi movement, which controls northern Yemen, accusedSaudiArabiaof launching airstrikes against the international airport in Sanaa and had vowed to retaliate.TheHouthiscalled Monday’s attacks “blatant aggression” and said they had ended a period of de-escalation. They also warned airlines against flying inSaudiairspace until the “siege” on Sanaa airport was lifted. The strikes on Sanaa airport were claimed by Yemen’s internationally recognized government, which is heavily backed by Riyadh, where many of its members reside. The Yemenigovernment’s defence ministry said the runway at Sanaa International Airport had been targeted to prevent an Iranian plane from landing in violation of Yemeni sovereignty. It said government forces would respond to any hostile aircraft violating Yemen’s airspace “by all available means”, and held Iran responsible. An armed forces spokesman later said the aircraft had landed at Houthi-controlled Hodeidah airport. It was unclear whether any attempt had been made to stop it from landing in Hodeidah, about 150 km (93 miles) southwest of Sanaa, on Yemen’s Red Sea coast. YEARS-LONG WAR FLARES UP Another minister said theHouthiswere detaining another plane, belonging to the International Committee of the Red Cross, at Sanaa airport. Hachem Osseiran, ICRC spokesperson for the Middle East, told Reuters all ICRC staff and the crew of the plane were safe and accounted for, declining to comment further. In recent days an ICRC-mediated prisoner exchange deal between theHouthisand Yemen’s internationally recognised government fell through, with both sides exchanging blame in a sign of growing tension. Yemen has faced civil war and proxy warfare from outside powers for more than a decade after theHouthisseized the capital and forced the internationally recognised government to relocate to the south. TheSaudi-led coalition intervened in 2015 against theHouthis, triggering one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises. Violence flared again late last year after a separatist movement backed by the United Arab Emirates swept through territory in the south, splintering theSaudi-led coalition created to fight theHouthis. Still, the 2022 truce betweenSaudiArabiaand theHouthishas largely held, despite regional escalation tied to theIsrael-Gaza war,where theHouthisfired on numerous Red Sea ships, as well as the Iran war. -Reuters