Thirteen people were killed and more than 300 wounded when Riyadh's international airport came under attack, with Yemen's Houthi movement asserting responsibility. Saudi authorities indicated that a follow-up assault on the same facility produced further casualties.
A fire broke out at Terminal 4 of Riyadh's international airport on Sunday after what coalition forces described as an unidentified projectile struck the facility, according to their statement. Casualty figures had yet to be confirmed, with the Saudi civil aviation authority noting that a damage assessment remained under way.
A cruise missile aimed at the area around King Khalid International Airport in Riyadh was reported to have been brought down by air defence systems, according to a statement from the coalition. A statement released afterwards noted that one drone had been brought down and neutralised over the kingdom's Eastern Province.
The strikes exposed gaps in Saudi Arabia's air-defence architecture at a time when the kingdom is conducting an aerial bombardment campaign against the Houthis, a group aligned with Iran that is simultaneously engaged in ground combat in Yemen against the Yemeni government, which receives Saudi backing.
Flight operations at the airport remained suspended following Saturday's incident, while a gathering of international energy delegates pressed ahead in Riyadh on Sunday.
During a televised address on Sunday, Houthi military spokesperson Yahya Saree announced that the group had carried out the previous day's attack, stating that strikes had been directed at the airport in Dammam, located in Saudi Arabia's Eastern Province, along with two facilities belonging to oil company Saudi Aramco.
Aviation authorities in Saudi Arabia acknowledged late Sunday that King Fahd International Airport in Dammam had been struck, noting that evaluations of the damage and inspections of the facility's infrastructure were already under way.
A passenger seated on a taxiing plane at Dammam airport reported to a broadcaster that, at roughly 8:30pm on Sunday, what appeared to be a projectile landed on the tarmac near several stationary aircraft and ignited a fire. Passengers were brought back to the gate aboard the aircraft, according to the witness, and subsequently directed to vacate the terminal entirely.
Data pulled from Flightradar24 on Sunday evening pointed to a pattern of delayed and cancelled flights at Dammam airport, a hub ranked third among the kingdom's busiest and positioned to serve the main city of its petroleum-producing eastern region.
A notice distributed by the Houthis that Sunday called on airlines, ground staff, and passengers to steer clear of airports across Saudi Arabia, with the group placing accountability for any failed interceptions on Riyadh.
Over recent weeks, airstrikes attributed to Saudi Arabia have targeted Houthi positions while Riyadh has backed a Yemeni government push to retake territory along the Red Sea coast that Houthi forces captured the previous month. Houthi officials reported Sunday that 124 airstrikes attributed to Saudi Arabia had struck Yemeni territory over the preceding 24-hour period, with the capital Sanaa and the northern province of Saada among the locations hit.
The Houthi-run foreign ministry in Yemen conveyed through Al Masirah television that any continuation of Saudi military operations in the country would draw a proportional response, with the ministry's statement invoking the principle of reciprocity and indicating that an end to what it described as Saudi aggression and interference remained the condition for de-escalation.
Trump indicated that the administration was weighing direct participation alongside Saudi Arabia in operations against the Houthis, a conflict he described as connected to the broader confrontation with Iran that began in February involving the United States and Israel.
Families across Riyadh received word that classroom attendance at all schools would give way to remote learning for the stretch from Sunday through Thursday.
Among those who lost their lives in the attack on Saturday, Saudi authorities confirmed, were four citizens of Saudi Arabia, two from Bangladesh, and individuals holding nationality from the United States, Jordan, Palestine, Syria, Sudan, and Egypt. A fatality among those wounded in the attack was confirmed by the Indian embassy in Riyadh on Sunday, pushing the overall death toll to 13. Two prior strikes on the airport, both falling within that same week, left a total of four people dead.
