The armed forces of Yemen’s internationally recognised government have accused the Iran-aligned Houthi movement of launching another round of ballistic missile attacks on the Red Sea port city of al-Makha and on residential areas in the central city of Marib, marking the latest in a rapidly escalating wave of violence that has pushed the country to the brink of renewed large-scale conflict.
Yemeni forces did not state whether the attacks on Monday caused any casualties, leaving the toll from the latest barrage unconfirmed .
A string of attacks
The latest strikes came just a day after Houthi missiles killed at least seven people and wounded 30 others in al-Makha, which is also known as Mocha. Those strikes caused extensive damage to the city’s port area, hitting buildings and commercial facilities along Yemen’s western coast .
The National Resistance Forces, which are aligned with the internationally recognised government and are based along Yemen’s government-controlled western coast, said four soldiers and three civilians were among those killed in Sunday’s assault on the Mocha seaport in Taiz province. The forces urged residents of al-Makha to remain indoors, accusing the Houthis of carrying out indiscriminate shelling .
Government forces said air defences intercepted six drones during the renewed Sunday assault, while two ballistic missiles fell into the sea without hitting their targets. Footage broadcast by the Houthi-affiliated Al Masirah TV showed several ballistic missiles and drones being launched .
Tit-for-tat escalation
Yemeni forces, in a series of posts on X, said they had targeted Houthi rebels and their sites in eastern al-Jawf province, northwestern Saada province and the al-Tibas area of central Marib province — underscoring the tit-for-tat nature of the fighting .
The exchanges are the deadliest in years in Yemen’s civil war and mark a major escalation in the conflict, which has been reignited by a surge in tit-for-tat strikes between the two sides .
A week of mounting violence
The latest attacks cap a week of intensifying violence that began on Thursday, when the Houthis attacked several Yemeni army positions in Marib and Hadramout, killing at least 30 government soldiers and wounding 15 others. Yemeni military sources said the Houthis fired eight missiles from al-Jawf governorate, north of Marib, targeting al-Thiniya and al-Abr in Hadramout and al-Rouk in Marib .
On Friday, Houthi attacks on Marib province killed at least 10 people, including eight members of government forces, while the Houthis launched more than 10 missiles and seven one-way attack drones targeting military camps in the province. Yemen’s health minister, Qassem Bahaibah, denounced the Houthis as a « terrorist militia » and said the toll of casualties was preliminary .
The Houthis said their operations targeted Saudi-backed forces, depots, vehicles and military equipment, and were carried out in response to what they described as a continued Saudi military buildup along Yemen’s western coast and in Taiz province .
UN warns of wider conflict
The surge in violence has drawn alarm from the United Nations. UN Special Envoy for Yemen Hans Grundberg said on Friday that the latest attacks in Marib and Hadramawt, together with renewed attacks on commercial shipping in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden, had left Yemen at its greatest risk of renewed large-scale conflict since the UN-brokered truce in April 2022 .
He urged all sides to exercise maximum restraint and engage in UN-led negotiations, warning that the violence risked drawing Yemen deeper into a wider regional confrontation .
The chairman of Yemen’s Presidential Leadership Council, Rashad Al-Alimi, accused the Houthis of waging a « systemic war » against government-controlled areas by attacking Mocha seaport, other ports, airports and camps for internally displaced people, during a meeting on Sunday with the new US Embassy charge d’affaires .
Background
The Houthis took control of Yemen’s capital, Sanaa, in 2014 and have since been fighting the internationally recognised government and a Saudi-led coalition. The group announced a maritime blockade on Saudi Arabia on July 20 and began attacking Saudi-linked ships in the Red Sea in the following days, reigniting a conflict that had been largely frozen under the 2022 truce .
Strategic Marib province is split between the Houthis and the Yemeni government, which controls the city of the same name as well as the area’s oil fields and facilities — making it a long-contested prize in the civil war .
Sources: Al Jazeera, Arab News, NBC News, Associated Press, France 24, and AFP reporting.