Yemen: 100 Houthis killed, vehicles destroyed in coalition air raids in Marib

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Yemeni army reinforcements arrive on the southern front of Marib to join fighters loyal to Yemen’s government. (AFP file photo)
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A picture taken from a Yemeni pro-government position shows smoke billowing during fighting with Houthis on the Al-Juba frontline south of Marib. (File/AFP)
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Updated 20 December 2021
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Yemen: 100 Houthis killed, vehicles destroyed in coalition air raids in Marib

  • Iran’s ambassador in the Yemeni capital Sanaa departed the city on Saturday onboard an Iraqi medical aircraft
  • Movement’s spokesman said successful Iraqi mediation between Iran and Saudi Arabia led to the evacuation

AL-MUKALLA: The Arab coalition announced on Sunday that it had carried out 19 air raids over the past day, killing 100 Houthi fighters and destroying 14 military vehicles in Marib province.

On the ground, heavy fighting between government troops and Houthis broke out on Saturday and Sunday outside the city of Marib, local official and media reports said.

The heaviest fighting was recorded in Juba district, south of Marib, where the Houthis intensified attacks in a bid to overwhelm the government’s defenses on a strategic mountain range that overlooks parts of the city.

The Houthis failed to register any territorial gains on Sunday and were forced to retreat after suffering heavy losses, officials said.

Thousands of combatants and civilians have been killed since February when the Houthis renewed an offensive to seize control of the energy-rich city, the government’s last bastion in the north.

Separately, Iran’s ambassador in the Houthi-held Yemeni capital, Sanaa, departed the city on Saturday onboard an Iraqi medical aircraft, the movement’s spokesperson and local media said.

Mohammed Abdul Salam said that a successful Iraqi mediation between Iran and Saudi Arabia led to the medical evacuation of Hassan Erlo through Sanaa airport, denying media reports about tensions between the movement and Iran and rumors that he was wounded in airstrikes by the Arab coalition.

“An Iranian-Saudi understanding through Baghdad led to the evacuation of the the Iranian ambassador to Sanaa on an Iraqi plane due to his health condition,” Salam said on Twitter.

FASTFACT

The Houthis failed to register any territorial gains on Sunday and were forced to retreat after suffering heavy losses.

In Tehran, the Iranian Foreign Ministry said that its ambassador was flown back home after contracting COVID-19 during his stay in the capital.

The Wall Street Journal reported on Friday that the Houthis sent a request to the Arab coalition to permit the evacuation of the Iranian ambassador, a move that was interpreted as suggesting a possible rift between the Yemeni rebels and Iran.

Hassan Erlo, an officer in Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, traveled to Yemen in October last year and was later named as Iran’s ambassador to the Houthis.

Yemeni officials and experts believe that Erlo orchestrated the militia’s deadly offensive to capture the central city of Marib and also commanded other Iranian, Iraqi and Lebanese officers who provided the rebels with military guidance.


Israel military says three projectiles fired from north Gaza

Updated 7 sec ago
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Israel military says three projectiles fired from north Gaza

JERUSALEM: The Israeli military said it identified three projectiles fired from the northern Gaza Strip that crossed into Israel on Monday, the latest in a series of launches from the war-ravaged Palestinian territory.
“One projectile was intercepted by the IAF (air force), one fell in Sderot and another projectile fell in an open area. No injuries were reported,” the military said in a statement.

Sudan army air strike kills 10 in southern Khartoum: rescuers

Updated 35 min 46 sec ago
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Sudan army air strike kills 10 in southern Khartoum: rescuers

  • Strike targeted a market area of the capital’s Southern Belt ‘for the third time in less than a month’
  • War between Sudan’s regular army and the paramilitary forces has killed tens of thousands of people

PORT SUDAN, Sudan: Ten Sudanese civilians were killed and over 30 wounded in an army air strike on southern Khartoum, volunteer rescue workers said.
The strike on Sunday targeted a market area of the capital’s Southern Belt “for the third time in less than a month,” said the local Emergency Response Room (ERR), part of a network of volunteers across the country coordinating frontline aid.
The group said those killed burned to death. The wounded, suffering from burns, were taken to the local Bashair Hospital, with five of them in a critical condition.
Since April 2023, the war between Sudan’s regular army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) has killed tens of thousands of people.
In the capital alone, the violence killed 26,000 people between April 2023 and June 2024, according to a report by the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.
Khartoum has experienced some of the war’s worst violence, with entire neighborhoods emptied out and taken over by fighters.
The military, which maintains a monopoly on the skies with its jets, has not managed to wrest back control of the capital from the paramilitary.
Of the 11.5 million people currently displaced within Sudan, nearly a third have fled from the capital, according to United Nations figures.
Both the RSF and the army have been repeatedly accused of targeting civilians and indiscriminately shelling residential areas.


Israel says Hamas has not given ‘status of hostages’ it says ready to free

Updated 06 January 2025
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Israel says Hamas has not given ‘status of hostages’ it says ready to free

  • A Hamas official gave a list of 34 hostages the group was ready to free

JERUSALEM: Israel said on Monday that Hamas had so far not provided the status of the 34 hostages the group declared it was ready to release in the first phase of a potential exchange deal.
“As yet, Israel has not received any confirmation or comment by Hamas regarding the status of the hostages appearing on the list,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said in a statement after a Hamas official gave a list of 34 hostages the group was ready to free in the first phase.


Shooting attack on a bus carrying Israelis in the occupied West Bank kills 3

Updated 06 January 2025
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Shooting attack on a bus carrying Israelis in the occupied West Bank kills 3

  • The attack occurred in the Palestinian village of Al-Funduq, on one of the main east-west roads crossing the territory

JERUSALEM: A shooting attack on a bus carrying Israelis in the occupied West Bank killed at least three people and wounded seven others on Monday, Israeli medics said.
Israel’s Magen David Adom rescue service said those killed included two women in their 60s and a man in his 40s.
Violence has surged in the West Bank since Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023 attack out of Gaza ignited the ongoing war there.
The attack occurred in the Palestinian village of Al-Funduq, on one of the main east-west roads crossing the territory. The identities of the attackers and those killed were not immediately known. The military said it was looking for the attackers, who fled.
Palestinians have carried out scores of shooting, stabbing and car-ramming attacks against Israelis in recent years. Israel has launched near-nightly military raids across the territory that frequently trigger gunbattle with militants.
The Palestinian Health Ministry says at least 835 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli fire in the West Bank since the start of the war in Gaza.
Israel captured the West Bank, Gaza and east Jerusalem in the 1967 Mideast war, and the Palestinians want all three territories for their future state.
Some 3 million Palestinians live in the West Bank under seemingly open-ended Israeli military rule, with the internationally recognized Palestinian Authority administering population centers. Over 500,000 Israeli settlers live in scores of settlements, which most of the international community considers illegal.
Meanwhile, the war in Gaza is raging with no end in sight, though there has reportedly been recent progress in long-running talks aimed at a ceasefire and hostage release.
The war began when Hamas-led militants stormed across the border in a massive surprise attack nearly 15 months ago, killing some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and abducting around 250. Some 100 hostages are still inside Gaza, at least a third of whom are believed to be dead.
Israel’s air and ground offensive has killed over 45,800 Palestinians in Gaza, according to local health authorities, who say women and children make up more than half of those killed. They do not say how many of the dead were militants. The Israeli military says it has killed over 17,000 fighters, without providing evidence.
The war has destroyed vast areas of Gaza and displaced 90 percent of the territory’s population of 2.3 million, often multiple times. Hundreds of thousands are enduring a cold, rainy winter in tent camps along the windy coast. At least seven infants have died of hypothermia because of the harsh conditions, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry.
Aid groups say Israeli restrictions, ongoing fighting and the breakdown of law and order in many areas make it difficult to provide desperately needed food and other assistance.


New Syria foreign minister begins first visit to UAE: state media

Updated 06 January 2025
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New Syria foreign minister begins first visit to UAE: state media

Damascus: Syria’s new foreign minister Asaad Al-Shaibani landed in the United Arab Emirates Monday on his first visit to the country since rebels toppled president Bashar Assad last month, official news agency SANA said.
“Shaibani, accompanied by defense minister Murhaf Abu Qasra and intelligence chief Anas Khattab, has arrived in the United Arab Emirates,” SANA reported.
Shaibani also posted a picture of himself on X stepping off a plane, and said he looked forward “to building constructive bilateral relations.”
The officials took office after Islamist-led rebels swept into Damascus in early December, toppling Assad after more than 13 years of civil war.
Their trip to the UAE comes after they visited its Gulf neighbors Qatar on Sunday and Saudi Arabia last week.
Both Qatar and Turkiye, which backed the anti-Assad opposition, reopened their embassies in Damascus in the aftermath of Assad’s flight to Moscow.
Turkiye has long maintained a working relationship with the HTS rebels, leaving it with a direct line to Damascus.