Yemen’s grinding conflict took another volatile turn on Friday, when two missiles fired by Houthi forces landed near the runway at Aden International Airport, roughly 500 metres from a passenger aircraft that was preparing for takeoff. Yemen’s Information Minister, Moammar al-Eryani, said all passengers and crew escaped unharmed, but described the strike as a grave violation of international law and norms.
The incident came barely a day after a deadly Houthi strike on the presidential palace in Aden, seat of Yemen’s internationally recognised government. In a statement carried by a military source, the Houthis claimed they had targeted what they described as a Saudi forces command headquarters at the Badr camp near Aden, along with a weapons depot.
Hours later, a spokesman for the Saudi-led coalition announced that two ballistic missile launch platforms used by the rebels had been destroyed in Saada province, a Houthi stronghold in northern Yemen. Saudi Civil Defence separately urged the public not to film or share footage and information related to missile and drone interception operations, citing operational security concerns.
On the ground, fighting has intensified on several fronts. Government forces say they have advanced in Marib province, where military spokesman Majed al-Nazili claimed more than 430 Houthi fighters had been neutralised within 24 hours, alongside more than a hundred vehicles and military assets destroyed or disabled. In Taiz, besieged for weeks after Houthi forces cut the main road south to Aden, the army says it repelled several large-scale assaults and captured a drone team affiliated with the rebels.
The Saudi-led coalition also said it intercepted missiles and drones over Riyadh and other parts of the kingdom. Saudi Arabia has long accused Iran of arming and directing the Houthis, a charge Tehran again denied on Friday while offering to mediate between the rebel movement and Riyadh. The war, which began in 2014 after Houthi forces seized the capital Sanaa, had eased somewhat following a UN-brokered truce in 2022, before the rebels declared a naval blockade of Saudi ports and the Bab al-Mandeb strait this summer.
Friday’s exchange underscored how fragile the security picture in the region remains, with strikes, counterstrikes and competing claims piling up week after week, and no negotiated settlement yet in sight.
