Marib

Yemen’s Ministry of Information denounces Houthi attacks on Marib as ‘escalation’ that threatens lives and increases suffering.

Yemen’s Houthis have launched several strikes on the government-held city of Marib, also hitting residential neighbourhoods, according to local authorities.

The group hit the city with four ballistic missiles and four drones on Saturday, causing several injuries and damage to homes, vehicles and property, Marib’s provincial authority said.

A fifth ballistic missile later in the day also injured one person, Marib governorate officials said on X.

A sixth ballistic missile was launched by the Houthis towards Marib overnight, officials added early on Sunday.

It described the strikes as part of an “ongoing assault that threatens the lives of civilians, displaced persons’ camps, and residential neighbourhoods”.

Marib hosts the largest number of internally displaced people in Yemen, with more than two million of the roughly five million Yemenis forced from their homes over the course of the war living there.

Video footage verified by Al Jazeera showed destruction in the aftermath of Saturday’s strikes.

Yemen’s Ministry of Information said on X that the continued targeting of Marib’s densely populated areas marked a dangerous “escalation” that threatens lives and increases suffering.

The attacks on Marib came alongside clashes further south, where Yemeni government forces claimed drone strikes killed three fighters from the Iran-backed Houthis on Saturday, including field commanders, and wounded others along the Maqbanah front west of Taiz.

A separate strike destroyed a Houthi military vehicle in Jabal al-Zuhayb, killing several more fighters, a military source told the Yemeni News Agency (Saba).

The attacks are part of a rapid escalation that has gripped Yemen since early August, when Houthi missile and drone strikes on military camps in Marib and Hadramout killed at least 30 government soldiers, the deadliest single episode of the conflict in years.

Days later, Houthi missiles killed at least two civilians and wounded 14 in Marib, and further strikes killed seven people in the port city of al-Makha (Mocha).

The Houthis, backed by Iran, control much of Yemen’s northern territory, including the capital, Sanaa.

United Nations Special Envoy for Yemen Hans Grundberg warned the UN Security Council on Thursday that Yemen faces its highest risk of returning to full-scale war since the UN-brokered truce of April 2022, as fighting has intensified on multiple fronts and threatens to unravel more than four years of relative calm.

Health Minister Qassem Bahaibah says 14 injured, accuses group of targeting residential areas and displacement camps.

At least two civilians have been killed and 14 injured in the latest Houthi attack on the Yemeni government-held city of Marib, according to the internationally recognised government.

Qassem Bahaibah, Yemen’s health minister, denounced the Iran-aligned Houthis as a “terrorist militia” in a post on X on Friday, adding that the toll of casualties was preliminary.

Bahaibah said authorities had instructed all health facilities to raise their levels of alert and preparedness.

Friday’s attacks came the day after the Houthis killed at least 30 government soldiers in Hadramout and Marib provinces.

The government condemned Friday’s attack “in the strongest terms”, in a media statement issued by the Ministry of Public Health and Population.

“The deliberate targeting of safe residential neighbourhoods and camps of displaced people, and the resulting casualties among unarmed civilians, constitutes a flagrant violation of international humanitarian law and of all humanitarian values and covenants,” it said.

“It places the international community and humanitarian and human-rights organisations before their responsibilities, and calls for a serious and urgent stance that protects civilians and puts an end to their continued targeting.”

Marib hosts the largest number of displaced families in Yemen, according to the United Nations refugee agency.

Earlier on Friday, the Yemeni Defence Ministry said its forces had shot down several Houthi drones over Marib.

The Houthis did not immediately comment on the government’s statements.

The attacks came amid intermittent fighting on several front lines across Yemen since early July that has resulted in dozens of casualties on both sides.

The Houthis have also increased attacks on Saudi Arabia in recent weeks, following a sharp rise in tensions triggered by the US-Israeli war on Iran.

The Saudi-led coalition, which supports Yemen’s internationally recognised government, said on Friday that 11 people, including a four-year-old, were injured in a Houthi attack on the city of Najran in southwestern Saudi Arabia on Thursday.

Escalating tensions between the Houthis and Riyadh come as Saudi Arabia, Turkiye and Pakistan signed a joint defence pact on Friday, stating that an attack on any of the three countries would be treated as an attack on all.

The Iran-backed Houthis took control of Yemen’s capital Sanaa in 2014. Since then, they have been fighting the Saudi-backed, internationally recognised government in the port city of Aden.