Ground operation is aimed at taking back the strategic port of Mokha, which Iran-backed rebels have used to disrupt oil-tanker traffic
By David S. Cloud and Saleh al-Batati
Saudi and Yemeni forces pressed a counteroffensive against Houthi fighters Monday, officials said, seeking to oust the rebels from the strategic port city of Mokha and ease the threat to energy exports through the narrow Bab al-Mandeb Strait.
Around 100 jet fighters were providing air cover to Yemeni ground troops as they pushed north along the coast in a flanking move toward Mokha in a dawn operation, said Maj. Gen. Turki al-Maliki, a spokesman for the Saudi-led military coalition in Yemen.
Al-Maliki said coalition naval forces destroyed weapons depots and warehouses containing explosive-laden boats and naval mines in Yemen's Hodeidah province to prevent the Houthis from targeting vessels in the strait and the Red Sea.
In response, the Houthis launched missile and drone attacks against multiple targets in Saudi Arabia, including King Khalid International Airport in Riyadh, an Aramco refinery in Rabigh, and multiple Saudi military installations, said Houthi military spokesman Yahya Sare'e. He warned commercial air carriers that "Saudi airspace has now become a theater for our operations."
Saudi-led forces have conducted 60 airstrikes and missile attacks against Houthi-held San'a, Yemen's capital, and other targets since launching the offensive, Sare'e said.
Since taking the city last month, the Houthis have attacked Saudi energy facilities and threatened Saudi ship traffic through the 18-mile wide entrance to the Red Sea, raising concerns in Riyadh, Europe and Washington about further disruptions to regional oil supplies.
Col. Majid al-Nuzaili, a Yemeni military spokesman, said the operation included pro-government forces known as the Giants Brigades and had succeeded in gaining control over the strait, but that claim couldn't be separately confirmed.
The escalating fighting in Yemen, the worst in the country in years, shows how the Iran war is fueling instability throughout the Middle East and heightening the risk to global energy flows after Tehran's closure of the Strait of Hormuz in March caused the worst oil-supply jolt in recent history.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio told reporters on Monday: "The Saudis have come under Houthi attack and see the threat that that poses, and they have a right to defend themselves. And obviously the Yemeni forces are going to try to retake territory that they were ousted from."
The Houthis seized Mokha early last month, expanding their territory closer to the narrowest parts of the Bab al-Mandeb Strait and threatening Saudi oil exports. The stepped-up attacks on Monday against Saudi Arabia underscored the Houthi willingness to escalate the conflict further, analysts said.
"They want to push back against their losses by striking Saudi to show they still have the capacity to disrupt the kingdom's economy," said Adam Baron, a fellow at the New America Foundation in Washington who specializes in Yemen and the Persian Gulf.
Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman last month asked Trump for military help against the Houthis, but the president has limited the U.S.'s involvement to providing intelligence and other indirect support, according to a U.S. military official.
For the U.S., opening another active military front against the Houthis risks overextending U.S. forces and deepening the risks to international shipping, analysts said. The Houthis have largely avoided targeting American or international commercial ships in the region following a 2025 ceasefire with the U.S.
The Houthis are among an array of militia groups throughout the Middle East that receive weapons and training from Iran and its Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps as a part of Tehran's strategy to project power in the region. But they had remained largely on the sidelines of the war between the U.S. and Iran until a ceasefire in Yemen unraveled in July.
The war began in 2014, when the Houthis swept into San'a. A Saudi-led coalition entered the war on behalf of Yemen's internationally recognized government in 2015. The conflict has killed more than 150,000 people, displaced millions and pushed the Arab world's poorest nation to the brink of famine.
"We will continue on the principle of reciprocity -- escalation for escalation -- to its ultimate end, until the Saudi regime stops its reckless interference with what remains of our lives. It will pay the price through its security and economy, and we will meet pain with pain," said Abdul-Malik al-Ajri, a senior Houthi official, wrote in a social-media post Monday.