Houthis behaupten Angriff auf Riad Flughafen

Houthis claim attack on Riyadh airport Yemen's Houthi rebels said they attacked "sensitive" sites in the Saudi capital Riyadh with missiles and drones on Saturday, hours after flames and a large plume of smoke were seen near the city's main airport. The claims came amid heightened tensions between the two sides, with Saudi Arabia having issued alerts overnight warning of potential danger around Riyadh. Reuters video and photographs showed a huge pillar of black smoke rising in the area, with the airport highway, main terminal building and other facilities in the foreground. At one point in the video, flames were visible rising from behind what appeared to be fuel tanks. While the Iranian-backed Houthis have launched repeated attacks against Saudi Arabia since July, Saturday's claim appeared to be their first reported strike on Riyadh since the current escalation began. The Houthi statement indicated that the attacks were in response to an alleged Saudi attack on the Yemeni capital Sanaa. They said they had also struck an Aramco facility in the Red Sea city of Yanbu, a key Saudi oil export hub. The group did not specify what they had targeted in Riyadh, but claimed to have used a combination of missiles and drones. The Saudi-led military coalition fighting the Houthis said its air defenses had destroyed a missile fired by the Yemeni group toward Riyadh early on Saturday. In a statement, the coalition also said it had foiled attacks targeting civilians in the Saudi cities of Bish and Farasan in the southwest and Taif in the west, as well as Yanbu on the Red Sea coast. It did not confirm whether there was any damage. Saudi civil defense sent the alerts by phone overnight for potential danger of aerial attacks in Riyadh and the city of Al-Kharj east of the capital, before issuing an all-clear on Saturday morning. A Reuters journalist in Riyadh's Olaya area heard booms before the all-clear was sent. Although some alerts had been issued in Riyadh this year after the start of the US-Iran war, these were the first since the escalation with the Houthis began in July. The fighting between the Houthis and Saudi Arabia has developed as a new theater of conflict in the wider war that began with US and Israeli strikes against Iran at the end of February. US President Donald Trump has rebuffed Saudi requests for direct US military intervention against the Houthis. A US State Department security alert issued on Saturday for Americans living in the region highlighted the increased risk of attacks. The Houthi and Saudi Arabia have accused each other of mounting intensifying attacks in recent weeks. Strikes on Saudi Arabia have disrupted critical oil infrastructure, fuelling alarm over threats to global energy supplies. Yahya Saree, a spokesperson for the Houthi military, said the group had fired a "large number of ballistic and cruise missiles and drones" targeting "sensitive sites" in Riyadh and facilities for Saudi Arabia's national oil company in Yanbu, a crucial Red Sea terminal. Saree said the attacks were retaliation for more than 700 Saudi airstrikes in Yemen, where the kingdom has been backing government forces trying to wrest back territory from a lightning Houthi offensive. Saudi Arabia has not acknowledged launching any airstrikes in recent days, and Saudi officials generally say that such strikes are being carried out by the Saudi-backed Yemeni government. Saudi authorities did not respond to a request for comment Saturday. Starting in 2015, Saudi Arabia led a bombing campaign to rout the Houthis but failed to push the group out of power, leaving Yemen in fragmented control of government forces and the militants. A truce reached in 2022 has unraveled amid worsening fighting in recent months, as the Houthis have sought to seize strategic territory in Yemen and enforce a naval blockade on Saudi Arabia in the Red Sea. The attacks on Riyadh were described as a "huge" escalation by Farea Al-Muslimi, a Yemen specialist at Chatham House, a London-based research institution. He noted the significance of the Houthi strikes on the Saudi capital, indicating a shift in the dynamics of the ongoing conflict.