coalition

Houthi-affiliated media report that seven people were wounded in strikes on the city of Hodeidah.

The Saudi-led coalition in Yemen says air defences intercepted a Houthi missile, while fighting continues to rage along key fronts between the armed group and forces loyal to the internationally recognised Yemeni government.

Defences “intercepted and destroyed a ballistic missile” targeting Saudi Arabia’s southern region, said coalition spokesman Major General Turki al-Maliki in a statement on Monday.

Earlier, he said defences destroyed a drone launched toward the southern region on Sunday evening.

Also on Monday, the Saudi Civil Defence authority issued and then lifted alerts warning of “potential danger” in the city of Abha, as well as the provinces of Khamis Mushait, Taif and Najran.

The authority warned residents against “filming, publishing or sharing information” related to missile and drone attacks.

In Yemen, a media outlet affiliated with the Houthi armed group, also known as Ansar Allah (Arabic for Supporters of God), reported that seven people were wounded in Saudi-led coalition air strikes on Hodeidah on the Red Sea coast.

Four people were wounded in the attacks on Ras Isa port dock, while three others suffered injuries in a strike on an oil company site in the governorate’s Bajil district, Houthi media reported.

There was no comment on the reports from the Saudi-led coalition.

Humanitarian crisis

The latest clashes come as Yemeni government forces keep up their campaign to regain positions from the Iran-aligned Houthis in the strategic northern governorate of al-Jawf.

Yemeni army spokesman Colonel Majed Abdullah al-Nazili said on Sunday evening that government forces conducted 1,272 “targeting operations” against Houthi fighters, fortifications and weapons supplies over 24 hours.

Operations are ongoing in al-Jawf, neighbouring Marib and al-Bayda to the south, added al-Nazili. Government forces killed roughly 500 Houthi fighters and destroyed or disabled nearly 170 vehicles, equipment or heavy weaponry.

Al Jazeera could not independently verify the claims.

In southwest Yemen, the Houthis continue to besiege the city of Taiz, blocking the entry of food, fuel and medical supplies, in what authorities warn is a mounting humanitarian crisis.

Taiz Governor Nabil Shamsan has called for urgent help for the city’s deteriorating health facilities. He said 120 health centres have stopped operating and another 66 are close to shutting down since the Houthis cut off supply routes to the city in early October.

Nour al-Din al-Mansouri, a member of the committee facilitating the work of the Taiz Siege Affairs Office, told Al Jazeera that at least 23 trucks were damaged or overturned in the past two weeks while seeking alternative routes to Taiz.

The city is Yemen’s third-largest and home to about one million of the country’s roughly 43 million people.

Full-scale fighting reignited in Yemen in September, when the Houthis made crucial gains that tightened their grip on the Red Sea coast.

Yemen’s internationally recognised government launched a campaign called Operation Dawn of Yemen last month to regain Houthi-held sites and restore government control over other territories held by the group, which seized the capital Sanaa in 2014.

Israel has only ever been governed by coalitions. Can you put one together that reaches 61 of the Knesset’s 120 seats?

Israelis voted on October 27, but there appears to be no clear winner.

The next government, like every government in Israel’s history, will have to be a coalition.

The question now is who can secure at least 61 of the Knesset’s 120 seats to form a government and become Israel’s next prime minister.

Al Jazeera has built an interactive tool that lets you test different combinations of parties. Start with any of the four exit polls or enter your own seat numbers. Then add parties until your coalition reaches 61 seats. You can add an entire bloc at once or select parties individually.

Who is ahead?

Initial counting by the Central Elections Committee put Likud ahead as the largest single party, with 27 seats.

Netanyahu’s bloc was projected to win 54 seats, against 50 for Eisenkot’s.

Four exit polls published on election night showed how close the race is.

Kan 11 and Channel 13 put Benjamin Netanyahu’s bloc and Gadi Eisenkot’s opposition bloc level at 51 seats each. Channel 12 gave Netanyahu 52 seats to Eisenkot’s 49, while Channel 15 was most favourable to the incumbent, projecting 55 seats for Netanyahu’s bloc against 49 for the opposition.

How many seats are needed?

Israel’s parliament, the Knesset, has 120 seats. Parties win seats in proportion to their share of the national vote, provided they clear the 3.25 percent threshold to enter parliament.

A government needs the support of at least 61 politicians to secure a majority.

Neither of the main blocs has reached that number in the exit polls or the initial count. The next step is to find enough parties willing to join forces to make up the difference.

Why is forming a government so difficult?

The Arab-led parties Ra’am and the Joint List could hold the balance of power, with exit polls putting their combined support at between 16 and 19 seats.

But the political obstacles are considerable. Netanyahu has described a coalition with Arab parties as “shameful”, while leading figures in the Jewish-led opposition have also ruled out governing with them.

That leaves potential coalitions that may work on paper but face serious political barriers.

Which parties belong to each bloc?

Netanyahu’s bloc spans Likud, the ultra-Orthodox parties Shas and United Torah Judaism, and the far-right parties Religious Zionism, led by Bezalel Smotrich, and Otzma Yehudit, led by Itamar Ben-Gvir.

Eisenkot’s opposition bloc includes his Yashar party, the Together list associated with former prime ministers Naftali Bennett and Yair Lapid, Avigdor Liberman’s Yisrael Beytenu and Yair Golan’s Democrats.

What happens next?

Once the results are certified, the president gives the mandate to the member of the Knesset considered most likely to assemble a majority.

That politician has 28 days to form a government, with a possible extension of up to 14 days. If they fail, another lawmaker can be given a chance. If no one can form a government, Israel may have to hold another election, as it did repeatedly between 2019 and 2022.

Netanyahu, Israel’s longest-serving prime minister, with 19 years in office across three stints, remains caretaker prime minister while coalition negotiations unfold. He is also standing trial on corruption charges, which he denies.

Official results are due on November 4. Negotiations to form a government could take considerably longer.

Coalition says it destroyed ballistic missile launchers as well as tunnels and a depot used by the Houthis to store missiles.

The Saudi-led coalition fighting Yemen’s Houthis has said it carried out a military operation “aimed at neutralising sources of threat”, as the armed group claimed attacks on infrastructure in Saudi Arabia and Yemen.

Coalition spokesman Turki al-Maliki said on Monday its forces destroyed four ballistic missile launchers and five tunnels used by the Houthis to store missiles.

In a post on X, he also said coalition forces attacked a missile depot, adding that the operation “focused on cutting off Houthi militia supply lines between areas under their control”.

The operation also targeted Houthi “fortifications, gatherings of their members, and their military equipment along the front lines inside Yemen”.

The Houthis – also known as Ansar Allah, Arabic for Supporters of God – have carried out a wave of strikes in recent weeks against Saudi airports and other infrastructure. This follows a major escalation in fighting in Yemen’s war, in which Saudi Arabia is supporting the internationally recognised government fighting the Houthis.

A Houthi attack on Riyadh’s King Khalid international airport this month killed 13 people and wounded more than 300, the deadliest attack on the kingdom in more than a decade.

The attacks led to the airport’s temporary closure, forcing the postponement of Saudi Arabia’s flagship investment conference until 2027 and disrupting travel plans for thousands of passengers.

The airport reopened and flights resumed on Sunday with the Houthis warning travellers to avoid the facility, calling it a “military target.”

Houthis claim new attacks

The Houthis later claimed they attacked the airport “with a ballistic missile, striking the target with precision”, according to a post by Houthi military spokesman Yahya Saree on social media on Monday.

Al-Maliki said on Monday that Saudi air defences “intercepted and destroyed a ballistic missile launched by the terrorist Houthi militia towards Riyadh.”

Saree also said that the Houthis had struck oil pumping stations in Saudi Arabia with drones.

In a separate statement, Saree also claimed responsibility for more ballistic missile attacks on “enemy” forces and weapons depots in Yemen.

He said the attacks targeted positions in the Salah al-Din area of Aden governorate and the al-Wahat area of Lahij governorate.

Yemen’s war reignited in the summer when the Houthis announced a maritime blockade on Saudi Arabia, which intervened in 2015 to lead a coalition aimed at restoring the internationally recognised government that was ousted from the capital Sanaa by the Houthis in 2014.

A 2022 truce that had halted most fighting collapsed last month, as the Houthis launched a lightning offensive, seizing much of Yemen’s Red Sea coast from government forces and also attacking Saudi energy facilities and airports.

Yemen’s government forces this month launched the “Operation Yemen Dawn” counteroffensive, aimed at recapturing territory held by the Houthis.

‘Everything is shaking’

As operations resumed at Riyadh airport, Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis met Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS) and discussed a key air defence system.

Mitsotakis “responded favourably to the kingdom’s request to keep the Patriot system in Saudi Arabia, given the current challenging circumstances”, his office said, referring to a battery of the US-made air defence system deployed by Greece to Saudi Arabia in 2021, which protects energy infrastructure in Yanbu, on the Red Sea coast.

On Sunday, the Saudi-led military coalition said air defences intercepted at least 10 ballistic missiles.

The kingdom’s civil defence agency said two people were injured in the south by falling debris, also reporting damage to several buildings and vehicles.

Images released by the kingdom’s official press agency showed a building with part of its upper facade destroyed, exposing metal rods. Another image captured large windows shattered, with shards of glass strewn across the pavement and part of the road.

US President Donald Trump has accused Houthi rebels of targeting Saudi infrastructure to inflate energy prices before the US midterm elections.