Houthis say they targeted Saudi oil sites with missiles and drones

Yemen's Houthi rebels said they launched missile and drone attacks against Saudi oil facilities on Saturday, adding another front to fighting involving regional allies of the United States and Iran.

Houthi military spokesman Yahya Saree said in a video statement that the group targeted facilities operated by Saudi oil company Aramco in Jizan and Yanbu. He also threatened a wider Houthi response if Saudi Arabia attacked the group.

Houthi media earlier said a strike on Jizan had caused fires. AFP said it verified a video circulating on social media that showed dark clouds rising above an Aramco refinery in the city.

Saudi Arabia did not directly comment on the reported attack. The kingdom's civil defence issued warnings for Jizan, on Saudi Arabia's southwest coast, and Yanbu, farther north.

The Greek air force press office said a surface-to-air battery operated by Greek personnel in Saudi Arabia shot down two ballistic missiles and later a drone launched from Yemen toward Yanbu on Saturday morning.

The Houthis had accused Saudi Arabia, a US ally, of a dangerous escalation after Riyadh struck Houthi targets in Yemen on Friday. A Yemeni security source said the Saudi strikes hit sites including a naval base in the port city of Hodeida and a military camp on Kamaran Island.

A 36-year-old Hodeida resident named Faiza told AFP that the strikes sounded like loud thunder and that she heard three distinct explosions. She said she did not want to believe the area had returned to strikes.

The Houthis have fought Yemen's internationally recognised, Saudi-backed government since 2015. The conflict has killed hundreds of thousands of people and caused a major humanitarian crisis, but fighting had been largely frozen since a UN-negotiated truce in 2022.

This week the Houthis announced a maritime blockade of Saudi Arabia and struck Saudi tankers in the Red Sea. The report said the threat to shipping comes alongside Iran's blockade of the Strait of Hormuz, a central flash point between Tehran and Washington.