Houthi missiles reach Aramco's headquarters and the government palace in Aden
A week after the Riyadh airport attacks, the Houthis struck Saudi Arabia's oil company and the seat of Yemen's recognised government, and the UN Security Council condemned the escalation.
Last week, Hindsight reported that Yemen's war had reached the main airport of the Saudi capital. This week the Houthi movement's missiles reached two more centres of power: the headquarters of Saudi Aramco, the state oil company, and the palace in Aden that houses Yemen's internationally recognised government.
On 15th October the UN Security Council condemned what it called "continued and escalatory Houthi attacks against Saudi Arabia".1
Missiles on the palace in Aden
On Thursday 15th October the Houthis fired missiles at the al-Maashiq presidential palace in Aden, the southern port city that serves as the government's seat while the Houthis hold the capital, Sanaa. Information minister Moammar al-Eryani said five missiles were fired.2
The first reports, citing two government officials, said two security guards had been killed.2 The health minister, Qasem Buhaibeh, later said five people had been killed and 16 injured, and that "the dead and wounded included guards and civilian employees", according to Al Jazeera. Two of the dead were bodyguards of the prime minister, Shaya al-Zindani; the government said he and other officials were safe.34
The Houthis gave a different account of the target. Their military spokesman, Yahya Saree, said they had struck the "Saudi military operations headquarters" in Aden, as part of a policy of targeting "Saudi reinforcements wherever they were located".4 Reuters said it could not verify the Houthi claims.2
Al Jazeera's correspondent in Sanaa, Yousef Mawry, said the attacks on the government's headquarters were the "first of their kind" by the Houthis.3 The next day two missiles landed at Aden's airport, about 500 metres from a Yemenia airliner preparing to leave for Cairo, al-Eryani said. No casualties were reported.4
Aramco's head office is hit
On the evening of Tuesday 13th October, a Saudi energy ministry official said an Aramco administrative building in Dhahran, in the kingdom's Eastern Province, had been struck, causing a "limited fire" with "no casualties or fatalities".5
A company source gave Reuters a fuller picture: a ballistic missile had hit the Aramco headquarters complex, striking an office tower whose "top three floors were damaged". The Saudi-led coalition said fragments of a missile it had intercepted over Dhahran had fallen on a residential area.6
The same evening in Riyadh, Saudi civil defence said debris from two intercepted Houthi cruise missiles wounded four people, two women, a man and a child, and damaged 15 homes.5
On 14th October the Houthis claimed strikes on Aramco sites in Dhahran, an Aramco refinery in Riyadh and King Khalid International Airport, calling them "legitimate targets", and said attacks would resume "in the coming days".7 The airport, shut since the attack of 10th October, reopened on Sunday 18th October, though many foreign airlines have not yet resumed flights.8
By the coalition's count, the airport has been attacked at least 20 times in 11 days, and Houthi attacks on the kingdom have killed 17 people and injured more than 300.3
Can Saudi Arabia keep intercepting?
Saudi Arabia's defence depends on interceptor missiles. On 12th October The Wall Street Journal reported, citing Saudi officials, that the kingdom was running low on them and was moving missile defence batteries around the country to protect energy infrastructure and its palaces, according to The Times of Israel. The Saudi government did not respond to the newspaper, and there has been no official confirmation.9
Since the Iran war disrupted shipping through the Strait of Hormuz, Saudi Arabia has relied more heavily on its East–West pipeline to export oil from the Red Sea coast, Al Jazeera notes. On Friday 16th October the coalition said it intercepted a ballistic missile headed for Yanbu, the Red Sea oil hub at the end of that route.4
US President Donald Trump wrote that "the Houthis are behaving very badly", accusing them of "purposefully trying to drive up Oil Prices", probably at Iran's behest. After the airport attack he had said he was considering joining Saudi strikes against the Houthis.10
Saudi Arabia strikes back
On 13th October the coalition struck oil sites in Sanaa and the western provinces of Dhamar and Saada, which it said were used to support Houthi operations. Before one strike it issued its first evacuation order in the Yemeni capital since the war flared again in July.510 Early on Saturday 17th October it said it had destroyed two ballistic missile launchers east of Saada.4
The Houthi-run health ministry says 124 civilians have been killed and 327 wounded in what it calls "Saudi aggression" in Houthi-held areas since 3rd September. The figures have not been independently verified.4
The air campaign supports a ground offensive. On 4th October Rashad al-Alimi, head of the Presidential Leadership Council that leads the recognised government, announced "Operation Dawn of Yemen" to retake Houthi-held territory, including Sanaa. The coalition said 100 fighter jets took part. According to Al Jazeera, government forces have not yet reversed the Houthis' gains.4
Diplomacy without a channel
The Security Council's response was a presidential statement, which requires the agreement of all 15 members. It condemned strikes on airports and Aramco facilities, affirmed Saudi Arabia's right to self-defence and demanded that the Houthis "immediately cease their military escalation". It said that "sustainable peace in Yemen cannot be achieved through violence, coercion or the use of force", and backed the UN special envoy, Hans Grundberg, in seeking a negotiated settlement.1 Grundberg had told the Council on 9th October that Yemen had slid back into "full-scale war".4
Rayed Krimly, Saudi Arabia's deputy minister for public diplomacy, blamed Iran for encouraging the escalation and said the Houthis had rejected an offer to meet in Oman when hostilities resumed. Iran denied the claim, and its foreign ministry spokesman, Esmaeil Baghaei, offered again to mediate.4
An airport, an oil company's head office and a government palace are targets whose effect reaches far beyond the physical damage: to airlines, investors and Yemenis watching whether their government can protect itself. For Saudi Arabia, the harder question is not whether it can hit back, but whether it can keep defending a large country if, as reported, its interceptors are running short.
What remains unresolved
In a single week the Houthis reached Saudi Arabia's capital, its state oil company and the recognised government's seat in Aden, and Saudi Arabia answered with strikes on Houthi oil sites and launchers.
It is not established how far Saudi interceptor stocks have fallen, or whether allies will help replenish them. It is not yet clear whether the United States will join the strikes it has said it is considering, or whether the ground offensive announced on 4th October can change the front line.
The Security Council has called for the escalation to stop, but no talks are under way, and Saudi Arabia says the Houthis turned down the last offer of them.