Houthi strikes hit Yemen and Saudi as Iran hardens Hormuz terms

Houthi strikes hit Yemen's Mokha port and a Saudi Aramco site as Iran set new Hormuz conditions. The flare-up deepened regional instability, complicating shipping, diplomacy and the Gaza war.

In Short

• Missiles and drones struck Mokha port, killing seven and injuring civilians
• The attack damaged piers, buildings, goods and food supplies at Mokha
• Saudi Arabia reported a Jazan Aramco facility fire with no casualties

Fresh Houthi attacks in Yemen and Saudi Arabia on Sunday added to tensions across the Middle East, as fighting and diplomatic friction continued to affect key regional waterways, weapons supplies and the war in Gaza. A strike on Yemen's Red Sea port of Mokha killed people and damaged infrastructure, while Saudi Arabia reported a fire at an Aramco facility in Jazan.

At the same time, Iran set out fresh conditions linked to any reopening of the Strait of Hormuz and the resumption of talks with the United States. In Washington, the Pentagon said it was pushing to speed up weapons production, and in Israel, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said there would be no withdrawal from Gaza until Hamas disarms.

The National Resistance Forces, a Yemeni government-allied force, said at least seven people, including four troops and three civilians, were killed in the Houthi attack on Mokha, while 15 civilians were injured. Fayed al-Noman, assistant undersecretary of the information ministry, said the Houthis fired missiles and drones at the port, severely damaging its buildings and pier as well as commercial goods and food supplies. Mokha is one of the main ports under Yemen's internationally recognised government and has been renovated in recent years to handle shipping that avoids Houthi-held ports in Hodeida.

The Houthis later claimed the attack, saying they fired "a large number of ballistic missiles and drones" targeting military enforcement and warehouses in the area. Houthi military spokesperson Yahya Saree said the group also targeted an Aramco refinery in Jazan with a drone, calling it a response to Saudi drones entering Yemen's airspace over Hajjah and Saada. Earlier on Sunday, Saudi Arabia's Energy Ministry reported a fire at a facility belonging to the Aramco refinery, said there were no casualties and that the fire had been extinguished, but did not say what caused it.

The latest Houthi attack follows a series of missile and drone strikes on Saudi Arabia and its shipping in the Red Sea. The escalation threatens to reignite Yemen's civil war more than four years after a 2022 truce halted major fighting in the country.

On the Strait of Hormuz, two people familiar with the talks said Iran and Oman were working to finalise a temporary deal that would reopen the waterway through new routes, with ships entering through a path close to Iran and leaving through one close to Oman. They said ships would pass through without fees or tolls during the interim period. According to the two people, the agreement is meant to restore an earlier separate deal between the US and Iran and restart a 60-day period for negotiations on Iran's nuclear programme. They said the deal has the backing of members of the Gulf Cooperation Council and, if finalised, is expected to be announced jointly by Iran, Oman, the US and the International Maritime Organisation of the United Nations, though they stressed the terms could still change.

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said negotiations with Oman on "new maritime routes" through the Strait of Hormuz were "in the final stages". "This, however, does not mean that the Strait of Hormuz will reopen," Araghchi told reporters in Tehran on Sunday. "An agreement on the routes may be reached, but reopening the strait is subject to a number of other conditions, which have been conveyed through intermediaries."

Iran's Supreme National Security Council said the Strait of Hormuz would not open until the US "corrects its behaviour", and set out demands that included an end to US threats against Iran, a permanent end to the war with Iran and its armed allies in the region, the lifting of the naval blockade of Iranian ports and a withdrawal of US forces from the area. The statement by council secretary Mohammad Bagher Zolghadr was published by Iran's state broadcaster. US Central Command said the blockade had redirected 53 commercial vessels, disabled two and boarded two through Saturday. On wider contacts with Washington, Araghchi said an "exchange of messages through intermediaries" was continuing, but that this did not amount to negotiations. "From our perspective, negotiations cannot resume until the violations of the memorandum of understanding have ended and the United States has remedied the provisions of the memorandum that it violated," he said.

In the US, Pentagon spokesperson Sean Parnell said on Saturday that the department was working to increase munitions purchases to provide "the weapons our warfighters need at the pace the threat demands". A new analysis by the Centre for Strategic and International Studies said the war with Iran had further reduced already low US stockpiles of advanced missile interceptors. Parnell said the drive for faster delivery was part of a broader modernisation effort that had begun before the five-month-old conflict.

Iran's semiofficial Mehr news agency also released an undated video that apparently showed Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei. The Associated Press said it could not independently verify when or where the footage was filmed. Mehr had shared a video in March that appeared to have been recorded at the same event, apparently a jurisprudence class. Khamenei is understood to have stopped publicly teaching in 2024, and has reportedly not been seen in public since sustaining serious injuries during the opening stages of the US-Iran war. It was not clear why the footage was released on Sunday.

In Israel, Netanyahu told the weekly cabinet meeting that the military "will not carry out any withdrawal until Hamas is genuinely disarmed". He said Israel was discussing plans for Gaza with the United States, adding that some American ideas were acceptable to Israel and others were not, in further resistance to the deal announced by President Donald Trump.

Overall, Sunday saw the Middle East crisis widen on several fronts, with the Houthis intensifying attacks around the Red Sea, Iran linking the Strait of Hormuz and future talks to new conditions, the Pentagon seeking faster weapons production and Israel hardening its position on Gaza.

With PTI Inputs

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