• Residents of Marib reported hearing an explosion north of the city near a sizable camp for IDPs
• Houthi missile assault on Marib came hours after the militia proclaimed it launched a salvo of drones against Israel

Saeed Al-Batati

AL-MUKALLA: A Houthi-fired missile landed near a refugee camp for internally displaced persons in the central Yemeni city of Marib on Thursday morning, the most recent in a series of similar Houthi drone and missile attacks on government-controlled regions of the country.

Residents of Marib reported hearing an explosion north of the city, outside a sizable refugee camp, where the missile impacted. The missile did not cause any human or property losses.

Although the UN-brokered truce that went into effect in April 2022 has significantly reduced hostilities, the Houthis have continued to launch missiles and explosive-laden drones at Marib, Taiz, and other government-controlled areas in Yemen, killing dozens of civilians.

The Houthi missile assault on Marib came hours after the militia proclaimed it launched a salvo of drones against Israel, the second such announcement in two days.

Yemenis have condemned the Houthis for attacking civilian gatherings in Marib and other Yemeni cities and demanded that they be shielded from the lethal attacks.

Abdullah Ismael, a Yemeni commentator, said the Houthis launched missile and drone assaults against Israel to whitewash their image and the atrocities they have committed since the first day of their military seizure of Yemen.

“Houthi missiles, drones, mines, and crimes are designed to murder and injure Yemenis exclusively. Their unsightly visage cannot be whitened or erased by empty bellicose rhetoric, deceptive statements, or the combined efforts of all the world’s cleansers,” Ismael said on the social media platform X.

Walid Al-Rajhy, a Yemeni journalist and director of the Sheba Media Centre in Marib, estimated that 1,000 Houthi missiles were fired at displaced people and other civilian neighborhoods over the past several years, with 200 being intercepted and the remaining 800 landing in the city, killing and injuring a large number of people, including children and women.

“Just as Palestinians resist Israeli occupation, which kills them with missiles and aircraft, Yemenis resist Iranian occupation, which also kills them with missiles and aircraft,” Al-Rajhy said on X.