Yemeni forces press Houthi supply lines in Taiz as Red Sea front widens

Yemeni government forces have expanded their offensive against the Iran-backed Houthi movement, carrying out a mix of air and ground operations across the southwestern province of Taiz over the past 24 hours. The campaign, announced by the government's Military Media Centre, is the latest phase of a renewed countrywide war that has shattered a four-year pause and placed the strategic Bab al-Mandeb Strait — and Saudi Arabia itself — squarely in the crosshairs.

According to the Military Media Centre, airstrikes hit Houthi positions at five separate locations in the province, while dozens of Houthi fighters, including several field commanders, were reported killed or wounded in clashes near Taiz. The spokesman said government forces also struck weapons sites and ammunition depots at Mafraq Ma'wiyah and Al-Dhukrah in the east, a Houthi gathering in the Hayfan district in the south, and military vehicles in the Gurab area in the northwest, as well as positions in the Al-Wazi'iyah district in the west of the province.

Ground operations formed the other half of the effort. Government troops said they repelled Houthi infiltration attempts along the Al-Ahtoub front and at Hadran, and responded with artillery fire against Houthi concentrations at the Al-Kadha and Al-Aqroud fronts. Several Houthi military vehicles were reported damaged in the exchanges. Al Jazeera could not independently verify these battlefield claims, a caveat that has become standard in reporting on the conflict, where both sides routinely issue operational claims that cannot be checked on the ground.

Al Jazeera's Maha Ali, reporting from Taiz on Saturday, said government forces were claiming advances in the southern part of the governorate, including the seizure of several areas and elevated ground. Among the positions named was Jabal Bazel, a mountaintop that would place Houthi supply lines within targeting range. Ali assessed that the movement pointed to significant and potentially decisive ground operations unfolding within hours, though the strategic significance of such high ground depends on whether it can be held and exploited.

The fighting in Taiz matters far beyond its provincial boundaries. Taiz sits astride the country's southern approach to the Red Sea corridor, and control of the surrounding highlands has implications for movement of both troops and materiel along the coast. Fighting has erupted there in waves since July, breaking a period of relative calm that followed a UN-brokered ceasefire in 2022 — a truce that had held long enough for Yemenis to begin rebuilding and for regional shipping to partially normalise.

The renewed violence has produced a mounting humanitarian toll. Some 130,000 people have been displaced since the fighting erupted in July, according to the figures cited in the report. For a country already described as impoverished, with a healthcare system battered by years of war, new waves of displacement add pressure to strained camp infrastructure and raise the risk of further disruption of basic services such as water, food and medical care.

Houthi territorial gains in recent weeks have shifted the balance of the conflict in the group's favour. The movement has seized the strategic Red Sea coastal city of Mocha and expanded its control over the Bab al-Mandeb Strait, a global maritime chokepoint linking Europe to Asia. Government forces govern largely the south and east of Yemen, while the Houthis hold vast swathes of the north and west, leaving the country divided and the front lines shifting.

That strategic reversal has pushed the government to mobilise. Rashad al-Alimi, the head of the Presidential Leadership Council, has called on citizens to enlist in the fight against the Houthis, and has expressed confidence that government forces can restore control over the whole country. Related announcements have included offers of amnesty to Houthi defectors, signalling an effort to erode the movement's fighting force from within as well as on the battlefield.

The Houthis, in turn, have accused Saudi Arabia of carrying out strikes inside Yemen, and have vowed to prevent Saudi tankers from using Bab al-Mandeb. That chokepoint has become critical for Riyadh because it is serving as an alternative route to the Strait of Hormuz, which Tehran has effectively closed in response to the US-Israel war in February. With roughly a fifth of global oil transiting Hormuz, the redirection of Saudi traffic through the Red Sea gives the Houthis enormous leverage over a major artery of world trade.

Government forces have also accused the Houthis of using Iranian air defence systems that they say cannot distinguish between military and civilian targets. Brigadier General Majed al-Nazili, the official spokesperson for the Yemeni government forces, said the weapons operate using a heat-tracking system and are capable of striking both military and civilian aircraft, endangering civil aviation and passengers on international flight paths over the Red Sea. The claim raises questions about the safety of commercial aviation in one of the world's busiest air corridors.

The threat has already extended well beyond Yemen's borders. Early on Saturday, the Saudi-led coalition in Yemen said its air defence systems intercepted and destroyed two ballistic missiles and two drones launched by the Houthis towards the capital Riyadh and the city of Khamis Mushait. The attacks followed Houthi strikes on Saudi territory since the escalation earlier in the month, and prompted Riyadh to turn to its allies, including Pakistan and Turkiye, for support.

Diplomatic efforts have so far produced condemnation rather than action. Addressing the United Nations General Assembly on Saturday, Saudi Foreign Minister Faisal bin Farhan Al Saud called on the international community to condemn Houthi actions against the kingdom and inside Yemen. Yemen's Vice President Abdullah Abdulkader al-Alimi-Bawzer warned that the Houthis were using shipping security "as a tool for blackmail", saying it was "taking hostage the entire global economy".

The Gulf Cooperation Council has echoed those concerns. GCC Secretary-General Jassim Mohammed al-Budaiwi strongly condemned the recent Houthi attacks against Saudi Arabia, describing them as a flagrant violation of the kingdom's sovereignty and a direct threat to civilian safety and regional stability. Iran has denied having any role in the Yemen conflict, and President Masound Pezeshkian addressed the actions of the Houthis in comments to Al Jazeera, with his full remarks reported separately.

With front lines active in Taiz, the Red Sea approach choked, and the Houthi dispute over Mocha and Bab al-Mandeb unresolved, the risk is that a localised Taiz operation becomes part of a much wider regional confrontation. The immediate questions for the coming days are whether government forces can consolidate the high ground they say they have taken, and whether the Houthis can sustain the momentum of their recent coastal gains — developments that will determine whether the Red Sea corridor stays open to commercial traffic or becomes an active theatre of war.