27 killed, 36 wounded in strikes near Sanaa as fighting widens in Yemen
Key Facts
The Houthi-run health ministry’s spokesman said 27 people were killed and 36 others wounded in air strikes that hit homes in a village near Sanaa on Saturday, November 7, the Associated Press reported. The spokesman said most of the dead and wounded were women and children, and added that the toll could rise as search and rescue operations continued. The agency could not independently verify the Houthis’ account of the strikes. Saudi Arabia’s information ministry did not immediately respond to the agency’s request for comment. The toll follows a deadly strike on a market in Taiz governorate on Friday, two successive developments that reflect the widening clashes over two days.
In Friday’s strike, November 6, at least 30 people were killed when air strikes hit a market in southwestern Yemen, according to a Houthi official quoted by the Associated Press. The Houthi-run health ministry’s spokesman said eight more people were wounded in the strikes targeting Al-Hadhara market in Al-Wazi’iyah district in Taiz governorate. Saudi-backed Yemeni forces and the Houthis traded accusations over responsibility for the market strike. The agency could not independently verify either side’s claims, leaving responsibility for the attack disputed between them. Houthi authorities had thus reported a death toll from the market strike before announcing the toll from the strikes near Sanaa the following day, with sources providing no independent verification of responsibility in either incident.
In a separate statement carried by Reuters on November 7, the Houthi-run health ministry said the toll from strikes it accused Saudi Arabia of carrying out on a village near Sanaa had risen to 33 killed and 39 wounded. This differs from the preliminary figures the Associated Press reported from the same spokesman — 27 killed and 36 wounded — reflecting an announced update to the figures during the day. Reuters also could not independently verify the account of the strikes carried by the Houthis’ Saba news agency. The attribution of the strikes to Saudi Arabia remains an accusation by the Houthi side, not an incident independently verified by either news agency. Saturday’s account concerned homes in a village near Sanaa, not military sites as stated in an unconfirmed description of the strikes.
The strikes follow the resumption of fighting between the Iran-backed Houthis and their Saudi-backed opponents after a years-long truce collapsed during the summer, the Associated Press reported. The agency linked the escalation to air strikes carried out by Yemeni government forces and the Saudi-led coalition on the Houthi-controlled Sanaa airport in July, saying they ended the 2022 ceasefire agreement. In October, a Houthi attack on a government camp killed 73 recruits, according to a Yemeni government official quoted by the agency, which described it as the deadliest attack since fighting resumed in the summer. These events show that the latest strikes are part of a series of reciprocal clashes, rather than an isolated incident in Taiz or near the capital. The available information did not include a single independent death toll for the two latest strikes.
The World Health Organization had recorded 674 deaths and 2,998 injuries in the broader escalation between August 6 and September 18, according to United Nations data in Yemen. The organization said more than 122,000 people had been displaced across eight governorates by September 24. These are cumulative figures for a period broader than the latest strikes and do not represent the toll for Friday and Saturday. The Associated Press also quoted the United Nations as saying the conflict had killed at least 150,000 people, in addition to widespread deaths from hunger and disease outbreaks. These humanitarian figures place the latest clashes in the context of a protracted crisis whose impact has extended beyond the direct casualties of fighting to displacement, hunger and disease.
In Taiz, the United Nations humanitarian coordinator in Yemen warned in October that road closures and insecurity were preventing vital supplies, including fuel, from reaching the city and surrounding areas. He said this threatened residents’ access to essential services and goods. Continued strikes and security risks make the movement of supplies an urgent humanitarian issue in the governorate, which saw the Al-Wazi’iyah market strike on Friday. The United Nations statement did not specify when road restrictions might change or fuel deliveries improve. The available information also provided no details on the course of search and rescue efforts near Sanaa after the preliminary toll was announced.