A strike on a fuel storage facility on the outskirts of Sanaa — the capital under Houthi control — was attributed to the Saudi-led coalition by its spokesperson, Maj Gen Turki al-Maliki. Al-Maliki alleged that the Yemen Petroleum Company's al-Sabaha facility had been drawn into the conflict by Houthi forces, who were said to be drawing on its resources to sustain operations — among them, missile and drone strikes directed at Saudi Arabia.
Before the operation got underway, the coalition put out a public notice directing civilians to vacate the area, characterising the planned action as a "special operation." Media outlets affiliated with the Houthis reported that the facility had already sustained a hit before al-Maliki's confirmation was issued.
Responding to what it described as provocations, the Houthi movement put Saudi Arabia on notice that facilities including Riyadh's airport, an Aramco refinery in the capital, and the company's base of operations in Dammam could face retaliatory strikes.
Convening under Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman's chairmanship, the Saudi cabinet released a communiqué attributing responsibility to the group — characterised in the statement as backed by Iran — for multiple attacks on the kingdom in which fatalities occurred. Fourteen fatalities were recorded across two separate strikes on King Khalid International Airport in Riyadh — thirteen people lost their lives when a missile reached the facility on Saturday, and one additional person died in a comparable incident there the next day.
Three drones intercepted north of Riyadh were reported destroyed by coalition forces, according to a statement released that Tuesday.
Rockets and drones have been directed at airports, oil and gas infrastructure, and military installations across Saudi Arabia, according to statements from Houthi officials, who framed the campaign as a response to air strikes carried out against areas under their administration in western Yemen, including the capital Sanaa. Air strikes delivered by the Saudi-led coalition have backed ground forces aligned with Yemen's internationally recognised government along the Red Sea coastline and at multiple other active fronts.
Queues formed at petrol stations across Sanaa on Tuesday after the military coalition issued notice of an intended operation at the al-Sabaha oil facility, with a reporter from a state broadcaster observing that people in the area had become concerned about potential interruptions to fuel availability. The Yemen Petroleum Company, which operates under Houthi authority, released a statement seeking to reassure the public that no petroleum stocks were present at the facility at the time of the incident, and that protective measures had been activated to manage any emergency and maintain uninterrupted fuel access for residents.
The current conflict has its roots in 2014, when Houthi forces pushed the internationally recognised government out of Sanaa. Fighting intensified from 2015 onward, when a coalition of Arab states led by Saudi Arabia stepped in militarily to reinstate the recognised government's authority.
Hostilities between the Houthis and Saudi Arabia re-emerged in July, when the group declared a "maritime embargo" targeting the kingdom and launched a series of missile and drone strikes against Saudi airports, petroleum infrastructure, and vessels operating in the Red Sea, effectively ending an informal truce that had held for four years. The group pointed to what it described as a Saudi-imposed blockade on areas under its control, along with an air strike on Sanaa airport that it attributed to Riyadh, as the basis for its retaliatory actions.
Tensions intensified in September when Houthi forces moved to take control of a stretch of Yemen's south-western coastline bordering the Red Sea, including territory near the Bab al-Mandab Strait — a narrow passage through which a substantial portion of international maritime trade flows. Oil prices moved upward in the wake of that territorial advance, which came after roughly half a year of armed conflict involving the US, Israel, and Iran.
Forces aligned with the government announced that a counter-offensive, backed by aerial support from Saudi Arabia, had restored their hold over high ground commanding the Bab al-Mandab strait.
Death toll figures from Yemen point to hundreds of fatalities recorded between August and the present, though the precise count remains unverified. According to the UN human rights office, the toll encompasses a minimum of 54 non-combatants, with roughly half of that number being children. UN figures show that suspected cholera infections nearly tripled over a three-week span — climbing from 217 recorded cases to 647 — while displacement across the country has left upwards of 216,000 people without stable shelter.
