US President Donald Trump on Saturday said that Yemen’s Iran-allied Houthi fighters do not want to fight with the United States and have asked Washington not to intervene, amid renewed fighting in Yemen and growing tensions around the Red Sea shipping corridor.
“The Houthis called us and they don’t want to fight with us,” Trump told reporters during a visit to Dublin, Ireland.
“They don’t want us to go after them,” he added, saying that “everything’s gonna work out fine and dandy” in the region.
Trump also said he had spoken to Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, whom he described as a “friend”.
According to US outlet Axios, bin Salman called Trump twice on Thursday to request US strikes on the Houthis, but the American president declined.
AFP
reported that the Houthis have taken control of Yemen’s entire Red Sea coast after capturing three strategic islands in a lightning offensive. The development has further cemented their hold on the Bab al-Mandab Strait at the southern entrance to the Red Sea.
The waterway has become an important artery for Saudi Arabian oil exports after Iran largely cut off shipments through the Gulf with its blockade of the Strait of Hormuz at the start of the Middle East war.
The Houthis have recently declared their own maritime blockade of Riyadh’s Red Sea ports. They also targeted Saudi Arabian oil facilities this week with a massive drone and missile attack.
On Sunday, Houthi fighters said they had used drones and missiles to attack a military base in southern Saudi Arabia as renewed fighting with Yemen’s government forces forced growing numbers of civilians to flee.
The attack at the southern Sharurah base targeted “weapons depots and command and control centres that are managing the aggression against our nation and people”, Houthi military spokesman Yahya Saree wrote on X.
The date of the operation was not specified. Clashes have increased this week between the Iran-allied Houthis and Yemeni government forces, which are backed by Riyadh.
On Saturday, government forces said they had struck Houthi fighters in the Red Sea city of Mocha, and later attacked other Houthi positions in the southwestern part of Yemen.
The Yemeni military said its Air Force had carried out three airstrikes in the Taiz region targeting positions and barracks of the Houthi group.
The government news agency Saba also reported that Yemeni forces had destroyed vehicles and weapons and killed members of the Houthi militia near the port of Mocha. It quoted a spokesman for the forces as saying they had also struck Houthi targets just outside the city.
The Houthis, meanwhile, said on Saturday evening that over the previous 48 hours, “Saudi enemy aircraft conducted 129 airstrikes” on areas under their control.
The renewed fighting comes after a week-long Houthi offensive that culminated in the group capturing the remainder of Yemen’s Red Sea coast and several strategic islands.
Yemen’s civil war, which began in 2014 with the Houthi capture of the capital Sanaa, had been dormant since a ceasefire in 2022 but roared back to life in July.
Saudi Arabia first entered the war on the side of Yemen’s internationally recognised government in 2015 and continues to support the Aden-based administration.
The latest fighting has also triggered a fresh displacement crisis. The UN’s migration agency said on Saturday that 76,000 people had fled the fighting since July, with the figure quadrupling since the previous week. About 1,400 people had fled to Djibouti, according to the country’s minister of economy and finance.
The renewed fighting has killed more than 500 people, according to sources on both sides.
The fall of Mocha to the Houthis on Thursday drove many residents to Aden, where the internationally recognised government is based. One displaced resident said the Houthis ordered them to leave within half an hour.
Another displaced resident, who escaped with his 11 children and a few possessions, said he had not found a single free house in Aden, “not even a shelter”.
On Saturday night, Saudi authorities said a Houthi projectile had fallen in an area near the border, hours after alerts were issued warning of possible attacks. Saudi civil defence authorities said the incident resulted in two injuries and material damage to a mosque, several buildings and vehicles.
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