Houthis fail to make gains in Marib/node/1849906/middle-east
Houthis fail to make gains in Marib
A grab from an AFPTV video taken on April 25, 2021, shows a fighter loyal to Yemeni government firing a gun from an armoured vehicle during clashes in Marib. (AFP)
Arab coalition warplanes targeted rebel gatherings and military equipment, with at least 10 Houthis killed in Al-Makhdra after troops attacked their locations
Updated 27 April 2021
Saeed Al-Batati
AL-MUKALLA: The Yemeni army and allied tribesmen have pushed back Houthi assaults on Marib city, an army spokesman said Tuesday as he denied media reports that the rebels were getting close to their target.
Maj. Gen. Abdu Abdullah Majili said the rebels had failed to make major gains in their continuing offensive and had lost hundreds of fighters, including many military leaders.
“Until now the Yemeni national army and tribesmen are inflicting heavy defeats on the Houthis, foiling their attacks, killing their fighters and destroying their equipment,” he told Arab News, adding that the Houthis were still sending reinforcements to the battlefield in their bid to defeat government troops. “The Houthis are spreading lies and rumors as part of their psychological warfare to compensate for their setbacks on the battlefields.”
On Sunday the AFP news agency reported that the Houthis had made gains after seizing control of Al-Kasara, which is northwest of the city.
Yemeni military officials and journalists visited Al-Kasara, interviewing soldiers and tribesmen who denied the Houthis were making progress.
“We are stationed in our barricades and our hands are on the trigger,” a soldier called Mohammed told the army’s official news site. “We will keep fighting off the Houthis on all fronts and not allow them to make any advance toward Marib.”
The Defense Ministry said on Tuesday that government forces had mounted a counteroffensive in Al-Mashjah, west of Marib, and killed many Houthis.
Arab coalition warplanes targeted rebel gatherings and military equipment, with at least 10 Houthis killed in Al-Makhdra after troops attacked their locations.
More than 2,000 rebels and government troops have been killed since early February, when the Houthis resumed their offensive to take control of oil-rich Marib.
On Monday senior military and security officials attended a funeral procession for military judge Maj. Gen. Abdullah Al-Hadhri, who was killed in fighting with the Houthis in Marib.
Abdu Rabbo Meftah, deputy governor of Marib, said the offensive had pushed the number of displaced people to more than 2.3 million after thousands abandoned their camps close to the battlefields and took shelter in overcrowded camps in the city.
In the southern city of Taiz, troops seized control of several villages in Maqbanah district after clashes with the Houthis.
They were now battling to push the rebels from the district’s center, Taiz army spokesman Abdul Basit Al-Baher told state media on Tuesday.
The fighting came as the UN’s Special Envoy for Yemen Martin Griffiths called for the assault on Marib to stop and demanded that the warring factions comply with UN peace efforts.
“The parties must prioritize the needs of the Yemeni people, stop fighting and engage seriously with the UN’s efforts,” he said. “I will continue to pursue my good offices with the support of regional and international stakeholders to stop military hostilities, alleviate humanitarian suffering and find a peaceful and sustainable settlement to end the conflict in Yemen.”
Israel says it has launched ‘broad wave’ of strikes on Iran, as Tehran widens its response across the region
US military says 17 Iranian navy ships destroyed, struck nearly 2,000 targets in Iran thus far
US and Israeli attacks have killed 787 people in Iran: Iranian Red Crescent
Updated 04 March 2026
Agencies
JERUSALEM/DUBAI/TEHRAN: Israel early Wednesday launched new attacks on Iran as the US military said it has hit nearly 2,000 targets inside the Islamic republic, which tried to impose a cost by expanding a missile and drone barrage across the region.
With global energy prices on the rise, President Donald Trump said the US Navy was ready to escort oil tankers through the Strait of Hormuz, the vital chokepoint into the Gulf that Iran has threatened to seal off.
Israel’s military said it launched a “broad wave of strikes” after midnight across Iran, which in the hours before had launched three separate missile barrages at Israel, causing mild injuries to a woman in Tel Aviv.
The US military has destroyed 17 Iranian ships, including a submarine, and struck nearly 2,000 targets in Iran, the commander of the US Central Command said on Tuesday.
“Today, there is not a single Iranian ship underway in the Arabian Gulf, Strait of Hormuz, or Gulf of Oman,” US Central Command’s Brad Cooper said in a video posted to X.
Cooper said the US military has “severely degraded Iran’s air defenses” and taken out hundreds of ballistic missiles, launchers and drones.
The video showed missiles and jets launching from US ships, and targets exploding on the ground.
Cooper noted that Iran has launched over 500 ballistic missiles and more than 2,000 drones in retaliation.
But he said the US is “hunting” Iran’s last remaining mobile ballistic missile launchers to eliminate their “lingering launch capability.”
Cooper said the operation has involved more than 50,000 troops, 200 fighter jets, two aircraft carriers and bombers, and “more capability is on the way.”
“We’ve just begun,” Cooper said, adding that the US military is targeting “all the things that can shoot at us.”
“These forces bring a massive amount of firepower, representing the largest buildup by the US in the Middle East in a generation,” he said in the video message, describing the first day’s barrage as bigger than the so-called “shock and awe” against Saddam Hussein’s Iraq in 2003.
U.S. Navy guided-missile destroyers are delivering unrelenting, overwhelming firepower from regional waters. DAY and NIGHT. pic.twitter.com/3YTiFkFc1V
The US and Israeli attacks have killed 787 people in Iran, according to the Iranian Red Crescent, a toll that could not be independently confirmed.
Iran vowed to inflict a heavy price in retaliation. Drones struck adjacent the US consulate in Dubai, starting a fire but inflicting no casualties, and against the US military base at Al-Udeid in Qatar.
The attacks came a day after strikes on the US embassies in Riyadh and Kuwait City and on a US air base in Bahrain.
“We are saying to the enemy that if it decides to hit our main centers, we will hit all economic centers in the region,” Islamic Revolutionary Guard General Ebrahim Jabbari said.
Iranian attacks have killed at least nine people and wounded dozens in the Gulf region, according to various reports quoting local authorities.
Mourners gather at Kuwait's Sulaibikhat cemetery on March 3, 2026, during the funeral of Kuwait Army soldiers who were killed in an Iranian strike. (AFP)
Among the latest death was an 11-year-old girl who was killed after shrapnel fell in a residential area in Kuwait City, health authorities said Wednesday.
The Kuwait army said in a statement the shrapnel fell over a house and left casualties while forces were intercepting “several hostile aerial targets” over the country.
The Health Ministry said in a separate statement that the child died of her wounds at the hospital.
The child’s mother and three other relatives were injured and being treated at the hospital, it said.
Vessel hit in Gulf of Oman
A vessel was hit by a projectile early Wednesday in the Gulf of Oman off the United Arab Emirates, an agency of the UK military said.
There were no reported casualties.
The United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations Center said the vessel was struck 8 miles east of Fujairah, one of the UAE’s seven emirates.
The attack damaged the vessel’s steel plating.
No fire or water intake was reported, it said.
Tankers are seen off the coast of the Fujairah, United Arab Emirates, on March 3, 2026. President Trump said the US Navy was ready to escort oil tankers through the Strait of Hormuz , which Iran has threatened to close. (REUTERS)
Iran hits US embassies
The US State Department said Tuesday it’s preparing military and charter flights for Americans who want to leave the Middle East. Several other countries also arranged evacuation flights for their citizens.
An attack from two drones on the US Embassy in Riyadh caused a “limited fire,” according to the Saudi Arabian Defense Ministry, and the embassy urged Americans to avoid the compound.
An Iranian drone struck a parking lot outside the US consulate in Dubai, sparking a small fire, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said in Washington. He said all personnel were accounted for.
The United Arab Emirates said it has intercepted the vast majority of more than 1,000 Iranian missile and drone attacks against it.
US embassies in Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Lebanon said they were closed to the public.
The US State Department ordered the evacuation of non-emergency personnel and family in Kuwait, Bahrain, Iraq, Qatar, Jordan and the United Arab Emirates. And US citizens were urged to leave more than a dozen Middle Eastern countries, though many were stranded because of airspace closures.
The US military has confirmed six deaths of American service members.
Four of the American soldiers killed were identified as Capt. Cody A. Khork, 35, of Winter Haven, Florida; Sgt. 1st Class Noah L. Tietjens, 42, of Bellevue, Nebraska; Sgt. 1st Class Nicole M. Amor, 39, of White Bear Lake, Minnesota; and Sgt, Declan J. Coady, 20, of West Des Moines, lowa, who received a posthumous promotion in rank. They were assigned to the Iowa-based 103rd Sustainment Command.
Ghost town
In Tehran, residents who have not fled remained shut away in their homes for fear of the US-Israeli bombardment.
The Iranian capital is normally home to around 10 million people, but in recent days “there are so few people that you’d think no one ever lived here,” said Samireh, a 33-year-old nurse.
Authorities had previously urged people to leave the city, and police officers, armed security forces and armored vehicles have been stationed at main junctions, carrying out random checks on vehicles.
In the more upmarket north of Tehran, the meowing of cats and chirping of birds replaced the usual din of traffic jams.
Iranian authorities said a strike on a school in the city of Minab on the first day of the war killed more than 150 people.
