Houthis claim missile strike on Riyadh airport as explosions heard in Saudi capital

Yemen's Houthis said on Thursday they targeted King ​Khalid ​International Airport in the Saudi capital Riyadh with a ballistic missile.

There was no immediate confirmation of the strike or any damage or casualties from Saudi Arabia at this time.

Several explosions echoed across Riyadh on Thursday, according to witnesses.

Diplomats were instructed to shelter in place in their respective embassies, as witnesses said international schools were also taking precautions.

An earlier drone attack on the same airport killed one person, with another two killed in a separate strike on the airport in the southwestern city of Abha, Riyadh said on Thursday, as flight delays continued into the second day.

The attack on Abha airport killed Moroccan and Algerian residents and wounded 28 other people, while the attack on King Khalid airport killed a Sudanese national and wounded eight other people, officials said.

The Saudi General Authority for Civil Aviation did not blame any party for the attacks at the two international airports.

The spokesperson for the Saudi-led coalition fighting the Houthis, Major General Turki al-Malki, said forces intercepted a ballistic missile north of Riyadh and destroyed a platform in Yemen’s capital of San'aa that had been used to launch attacks on the Saudi capital.

The group formally known as Ansar Allah has claimed repeated attacks targeting Saudi airports in recent days, along with salvos aimed at critical infrastructure and military sites across the kingdom.

Strikes on Saudi facilities pose a threat to crucial shipping alternatives to the Strait of Hormuz, where traffic has been curtailed due to the Iran war.

Saudi Arabia has also accused the Houthis of targeting Islam's holiest sites in Mecca and Medina, allegations the group rejected as "fabrications and lies propagated by the criminal al-Saud regime."

The Houthis are Zaydi Shia Muslims, a specific branch of Islam historically rooted in northern Yemen that is theologically distinct from both the Twelver Shia Islam dominant in Iran and Saudi Arabia's Wahhabi-influenced Sunni tradition.

Any confirmed attack on either Mecca or Medina would put the perpetrators beyond the pale in the eyes of virtually the entire Muslim world, Shia and Sunni alike.

Houthi strikes have further escalated as Saudi Arabia and Yemeni government forces launched a major ground and air offensive aimed at retaking territory that the group seized a month ago along Yemen’s western Red Sea coast and on the Bab el-Mandeb strait.

On Monday, officials said forces of the Saudi-led coalition recaptured several key areas around the strait, through which about 12% of global trade transits.

“The Houthis believe that they can maximise Saudi economic costs and compel Saudi Arabia to surrender to Houthi demands by striking civilian infrastructure, such as oil facilities and airports,” the Washington-based Institute for the Study of War think tank wrote in an analysis.

The fighting in Yemen has in recent weeks become the most active front of the wider regional war, which for months has seen violence repeatedly shift focus across the beleaguered Middle East.

More than 200,000 people have been displaced since the Yemen war escalated again in July, according to UN data.