SANAA — The
Saudi-led coalition killed 14
people in air strikes on
Yemen's rebel-held capital, a medical source said
Tuesday, after an attack by
Huthi insurgents on the UAE sent regional tensions
soaring.
اضافة اعلان
Sanaa residents were combing the rubble for
survivors of the strikes that leveled two houses, hours after the Huthis had
killed three people Monday in a drone and missile attack on the UAE capital Abu
Dhabi.
Huthi Brigadier General Abdullah Qassem
Al-Junaid, director of the rebels' air force academy, was killed along with
family members, the rebels' Saba news agency said.
Coalition forces launched further strikes on
Sanaa on Tuesday.
"The search is still going on for
survivors in the rubble," said Akram Al-Ahdal, a relative of several of
the victims.
The UAE, part of the Saudi-led coalition
fighting the Iran-backed rebels, had vowed a tough response to Monday's attack,
the first deadly assault acknowledged inside its borders and claimed by the
Yemeni insurgents.
The attack on the renowned Middle East safe
haven of UAE, which opened a new front in the seven-year war, followed a surge
in fighting in Yemen including battles between the rebels and UAE-trained
troops.
Crude prices soared to seven-year highs
partly because of the Abu Dhabi attacks, which exploded fuel tanks near storage
facilities of oil giant
ADNOC. The Huthis later warned UAE residents to avoid
"vital installations".
Yemen, whose nearly seven-year-old war has
killed hundreds of thousands, occupies a strategic position on the Red Sea, a
vital conduit for oil from the resource-rich Gulf.
After the attacks, Saudi Arabia's ruler,
Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, and Abu Dhabi
Crown Prince Mohamed bin Zayed
agreed in a phone call to "jointly stand up to these acts of
aggression", UAE state media said.
'No end in sight'
The Abu Dhabi attack marked a new phase in
the Yemen war and further reduced hopes of any resolution to the conflict,
which has displaced millions in what was already the Arabian peninsula's
poorest country.
The United States pledged to hold the Huthis
accountable, while Britain, France, and the EU also condemned the assault.
The targeting of Abu Dhabi followed intense
clashes in Yemen, including advances by the UAE-trained Giants Brigade, who
drove the rebels out of Shabwa province.
The defeat dealt a blow to the Huthis'
months-long campaign to capture neighboring Marib, the government's last
stronghold in the north.
Earlier this month, the Huthis hijacked the
UAE-flagged Rwabee in the Red Sea, charging that it was carrying military
equipment -- a claim disputed by the coalition and the UAE.
The ship's 11 international crew are being
held captive.
Yemen's civil war began in 2014 when the
Huthis seized the capital Sanaa, prompting Saudi-led forces to intervene to
prop up the government the following year.
The conflict has been a catastrophe for
millions of its citizens who have fled their homes, with many on the brink of
famine in what the UN calls the world's worst humanitarian crisis.
The UN has estimated the war killed 377,000
people by the end of 2021, both directly and indirectly through hunger and
disease.
"There is no end in sight for the Yemen
war," Elisabeth Kendall, a researcher at the
University of Oxford's
Pembroke College, told AFP.
"Rather, the conflict is escalating and
new fronts are opening up, both domestically and now regionally."
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