Houthi Missile and Drone Barrage Wounds 73, Ignites Fires at Saudi Oil Facilities

For weeks, the fighting between Yemen's Houthi movement and Saudi-backed forces had stayed largely contained inside Yemen's own borders. On Tuesday, it crossed into Saudi Arabia itself — dozens of ballistic missiles and drones aimed at oil facilities, an air base, and an airport across four Saudi cities, in what officials are calling the heaviest such attack in years.

The strikes hit Abha, Jazan, Najran, and Khamis Mushait, in Saudi Arabia's southern region near the Yemeni border. Houthi missiles reportedly struck Abha International Airport, King Khalid Air Base, and multiple Aramco facilities — including sites near Najran and Abha, and the 400,000-barrel-per-day refinery in Jazan, one of the kingdom's largest.

More than 70 people were wounded and fires broke out at several of the targeted sites, forcing at least some oil operations to temporarily shut down.

The attack is the clearest sign yet that a four-year truce in Yemen's civil war, which unraveled in July, is not coming back anytime soon. Weeks of escalating clashes between Houthi forces and the Saudi-backed government in Yemen preceded Tuesday's strikes, which the Houthis have framed explicitly as retaliation for Saudi strikes on their positions inside Yemen.

Saudi Arabia has vowed to retaliate, though as of publication no counter-strikes had been confirmed.

Brent crude jumped 2.2% to $99.16 a barrel and West Texas Intermediate rose 3.3% to $94.46 within hours of the news breaking — a reminder that any disruption to Saudi oil infrastructure, even a partial and temporary one, still moves global energy markets instantly.

The attack lands amid a broader regional escalation that has also drawn in the United States and Iran in recent weeks, adding another front to an already volatile stretch for Gulf security.

The photo above is a file image of a Saudi Aramco refinery and does not depict any facility struck in Tuesday's attack.