The military escalation in Yemen has widened, with government forces announcing strikes on Houthi targets in Sana'a and Saada and battlefield gains in Taiz province, while the Houthis and the Coalition to Support Legitimacy exchanged conflicting accounts over an alleged attack on an Aramco facility in the Saudi capital, Riyadh.
Government strikes and announced targets
Government forces said their strikes targeted vital Houthi positions in the capital Sana'a and Saada province. A spokesman for the forces said the group's capabilities would not be beyond their reach and that operations would continue to destroy them. Houthi-affiliated media, meanwhile, reported that Sana'a and Saada had come under missile fire and a series of air strikes, saying a communications network had been hit in the Saqayn and Marran districts of Saada province.
Local press sources also reported hearing the sound of 8 explosions caused by air strikes in Sana'a. Yemeni army military spokesman Majed al-Nazili said the forces had carried out 257 precise targeting operations in Sana'a, Midi, Baqim, al-Jawf, Ma'rib, al-Bayda and Lahj, adding that the operational effort had focused particularly on the fronts in Taiz province.
Al-Nazili added that the operations were carried out using warplanes, drones, artillery and missiles, targeting command-and-control centres, gatherings and supply lines. According to figures he announced, the strikes neutralised at least 700 Houthi fighters and destroyed 170 combat vehicles.
In response, Houthi military spokesman Yahya Saree announced that the group had shelled an Aramco facility in Riyadh with ballistic missiles and drones, saying the attack was retaliation for the targeting of Sana'a. He added that Sana'a and other provinces had been subjected to 60 air strikes over 24 hours, bringing the total number of strikes, according to his account, to 1420. Saree said the operation had “achieved its objective successfully”, claiming that it had caused fires to break out at the targeted sites.
Denial of the Riyadh attack and gains in Taiz
However, Major General Turki al-Malki, spokesman for the Coalition to Support Legitimacy, denied the Houthi account of an attack on Riyadh, describing it as misleading and aimed at diverting attention from the group's losses and growing public anger towards it. On the ground, the Taiz military axis announced that government forces had taken control of the areas of al-Maqarrama and al-Zakira in the al-Shamayatayn district south of the province, as well as Sam'a Fort.
He said the capture came after fierce battles that killed and wounded dozens of Houthis, and aimed to control the routes leading to Taiz city and cut the bypass routes used by the group. The Yemeni army also announced that it had repelled Houthi attacks on Jabal Han, Hadhran and the western fronts of Taiz city, saying the clashes had left dozens of group members dead and wounded.
Escalation spreads as displacement worsens
In al-Jawf province, government forces said their air defences had shot down 4 Houthi drones on the al-Shahla front in the east of the province. The current escalation comes as part of a wave of military operations that began in July, after the Houthis announced a naval blockade of Saudi Arabia and attacks on ships and sites.
Fighting intensified during September as the group advanced in Hudaydah and Taiz, captured the city of Mokha and then reached Mayyun Island in the Bab al-Mandab strait. The spread of fighting from Ma'rib and al-Jawf in the north to Taiz and Lahj in the south, alongside the escalation in Saada, worsened displacement in the cities of Hays and Khokha in Hudaydah province and in 4 districts of Taiz province, most notably Mokha and Bab al-Mandab.
This is adding to the humanitarian crisis that has continued in Yemen since the war broke out in 2014 and the coalition intervened in 2015.
