CAIRO (AP) — The Iranian-backed Houthi rebel group in Yemen launched a wave of attacks on Saudi Arabia on Tuesday, wounding more than 70 people and igniting fires at oil facilities and utilities in the kingdom, authorities said.
The attack was a major escalation in renewed fighting between an important U.S. ally and the Iranian proxy group. It also threatened to further destabilize a region rocked by nearly three years of wars and deliver a new blow to the global economy.
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Weeks of clashes have added pressure to limited global oil supplies as the Houthis target a shipping route Saudi Arabia has used to transport oil to world markets while the Strait of Hormuz is throttled due to the U.S.-Iran war. Tuesday’s attacks hit Saudi oil facilities connected to an alternative route, the Bab el-Mandeb, a strategic waterway off the southern tip of the Arabian Peninsula that connects the Red Sea to the Gulf of Aden.
The attacks early Tuesday came hours after the rebels blamed Saudi Arabia for an airstrike that hit a prison in Yemen’s northern province of Jawf. At least seven people, including a child, were killed and seven others were wounded.
The rebels hit “civilian and economic facilities” in the Saudi cities of Abha, Jazan, Najran and Khamis Mushait, said Maj. Gen. Turki al-Malki, a spokesperson for the Saudi-led coalition fighting in Yemen.
Seventy-three people were wounded, including women and children, he said, calling the attacks a “serious escalation” and vowing retaliation.
The attacks ignited fires at several oil facilities and utilities in Saudi Arabia’s southern region, the kingdom’s Energy Ministry said, adding that operations at the oil facilities and utilities were temporarily suspended.
The southern region houses major oil facilities, including a 400,000-barrel-per-day oil refinery in Jazan, which is one of Saudi Arabia’s largest. The Houthis previously attacked the Abha airport.
The ministry said firefighters were battling the fires Tuesday morning.
In a prerecorded video statement, Brig. Gen. Yahya Saree, the Houthis military spokesman, said they fired dozens of ballistic missiles and drones at oil and economic facilities, as well as an air base in southern Saudi Arabia.
He said they targeted Jazan City for Primary and Downstream Industries, a major industrial and logistics hub on Saudi Arabia’s southwestern Red Sea coast. The rebels also aimed at Aramco facilities in Najran and Abha, as well as King Khalid Air Base in Khamis Mushait.
Saree blamed Saudi Arabia for the escalation, warning that “every aggression against our country and people will be met with a firm response.”
While visiting Moscow Tuesday, Saudi Arabia’s foreign minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan accused the Houthis of resorting to violence to serve their interests over those of Yemen, despite the Kingdom offering a chance to negotiate for peace.
He added during a joint press briefing with his Russian counterpart, Sergei Lavrov, that the latest escalation by the Houthis against the Kingdom is part of a series of provocations and that Saudi Arabia will not hesitate to defend itself
The new fighting has threatened to reignite the country’s civil war, which began in 2014 when the Houthis seized the capital, Sanaa, and much of northern Yemen and forced the government into exile. A Saudi-led coalition intervened the following year to try to restore the government to power.
The war has killed at least 150,000 people, according to U.N. estimates, and at times pushed the country to the brink of famine.
A truce four years ago had eased fighting between the Houthis and the Saudi-backed government and its allies. But in recent weeks, the two sides have increasingly been battling on the ground.
The flare-up has killed at least 194 people and wounded over 880 others between Aug. 23 and Sep. 5, said the World Health Organization. It also displaced more than 21,000 people, including 18,500 in Taiz and Hodeida in southwestern Yemen, over the past 27 hours, according to the United Nations.
“Families are arriving with nothing: no shelter, no food, no way to know if it’s safe to go back,” said Abdusattor Esoev, head of the International Organization for Migration's mission in Yemen. “Many of these are people who have already been displaced once, twice, even four times before.”
The latest escalation stemmed from a Houthi attempt in July to fly a plane from Tehran to Yemen’s capital, Sanaa, challenging a decade-long air and naval blockade by the Saudi-led coalition. A coalition airstrike struck the runway of the Sanaa airport, preventing the landing of the flight.
The Houthis responded with missile and drone attacks on Saudi Arabia, and attacks on Saudi shipping in the Red Sea, ending a 2022 truce that had largely halted fighting.
The rebels also launched attacks on Saudi-allied forces inside Yemen, prompting government forces to respond with attacks on the Houthis across Yemen’s west coast and elsewhere in the country.
Government forces have reclaimed territory from the Houthis in the provinces of Hodeida and Taiz, and attacked the rebels in the northern province of Jawf as well as the central provinces of Marib and Bayda.
The Houthis are part of a network of Iranian-backed proxies across the region that have stepped up attacks on regional shipping, Israel and neighboring countries in recent years in response to Israel’s wars in Gaza and Lebanon, and more recently during the U.S.-Israeli war on Iran.
The rebels often act in coordination with Iran but also have carried out operations independently to promote their own interests.
