DUBAI: Houthi attacks on Yemen’s Marib province killed at least 10 people Friday, according to a minister and military source, as the militia escalated strikes on the oil-rich region a day after their deadliest attack in years.
The latest violence has raised the spectre of a return to war in the Arabian Peninsula’s poorest country, where a 2022 truce between the Houthis and the internationally recognized government had largely held before unraveling last month.
A Yemeni military source told AFP that Houthi attacks in Marib province killed eight members of government forces and wounded 12 others.
The health minister for the government said the militia had shelled residential areas and displacement camps in Marib city, killing at least two civilians and wounding 14 others.
The Iran-backed militia later claimed an attack on a government-held military camp in Marib province.
Health minister Qasim Buhaibeh said in a post on X that “shelling by the terrorist Houthi militia today, Friday, targeting residential neighborhoods and displacement camps in the city of Marib, has resulted — according to an initial toll — in the deaths of two civilians and injuries of varying severity to 14 others.”
The Houthis had also launched “more than 10 missiles and seven one-way attack drones targeting military camps in Marib” province, the Yemeni military source told AFP, requesting anonymity to discuss sensitive matters.
Strategic province
The militia said Thursday that they had attacked several sites in response to a build-up of government forces.
Thursday’s attacks with missiles and drones killed at least 58 government troops, mainly in Marib, an army source told AFP earlier, one of the deadliest incidents between the two sides in years.
The Yemeni military source had previously said artillery exchanges and clashes were taking place in Sirwah and on the Al-Kasara front, north of Marib city, where Houthi drones were spotted.
The militia also hit an arms depot in the region.
Strategic Marib province is split between the Houthis and the Yemeni government, which controls the city of the same name as well as the area’s oil fields and facilities.
The Houthis in 2021 resumed an offensive seeking to take the energy-rich province, but the fighting was largely halted after a nationwide truce was agreed in 2022.
Yemen, which has been embroiled in more than a decade of war, last month became the latest front to be sucked into the US-Iran conflict, as the Tehran-backed Houthis upended the 2022 truce.
Houthis welcomed an Iranian plane directly to the Yemeni capital Sanaa, triggering a series of tit-for-tat attacks. They later announced a maritime blockade of Saudi Arabia and began hitting its tankers.
Last month, the Houthis also killed 16 soldiers in an attack on government-aligned forces south of the port city of Hodeidah, two medical officials told AFP.
