CAIRO — A coalition of forces in Yemen led by Saudi Arabia carried out new airstrikes Tuesday on the Houthi rebel-held Yemeni capital of Sanaa, the Houthi-run broadcaster Al Masirah and residents said.
Houthi officials appeared to have anticipated the attack there. The Bab el-Mandeb is another area key to the flow of oil out of the Persian Gulf. On Tuesday, Yemen’s interior ministry said in a statement on X that Houthi strikes over the past day on Taiz, a major city in the country’s southwest, had killed six people and injured 18 amid ongoing battles in the region.
The oil company said its storage facilities were empty and that a Saudi strike would not affect oil reserves or supplies for residents. Still, witnesses in the city said lines of cars formed at some gas stations amid fears of a shortage. The warning and the attack show “the Saudis’ aims of upping the ante and striking deep in the heart of Houthi-controlled territory while attempting to control the narrative by presenting themselves as more careful and humanitarian actors than the Houthis,” said Adam Baron, a fellow at the Washington-based New America institute. “The Kingdom will not allow any threat to its security or to freedom of maritime navigation in the Red Sea and Bab al-Mandab Strait,” the Cabinet said in a statement carried by Saudi state-owned Al-Ekhbariya television.
In a rare statement earlier, the coalition had urged civilians in the Houthi-controlled capital to leave the Yemeni Oil Company site, on a hill overlooking the capital, and nearby storage areas ahead of a possible strike.
But he said the fighting was fiercest over control of the Kahboub mountains, which overlook Bab al-Mandab and Aden, seat of the internationally backed government. The commander said his forces have called for reinforcements. In a statement published by the Houthi-controlled SABA news agency, the Houthi-run foreign ministry referred to Saudi Arabia as the “Kingdom of the Horn of Satan” and said the kingdom “must realize that security, stability, and sovereignty must belong to everyone; otherwise, no one will enjoy them.”
