Smoke plumes rose over Saudi Arabia’s capital Saturday after explosions were heard near Riyadh’s King Khalid International Airport, prompting the government to issue air-raid alerts as fighting with Iran-backed Houthi forces in neighboring Yemen escalates.
Saudi Arabia’s Civil Defense issued warnings to residents of Riyadh and the surrounding area early Saturday, telling people to remain indoors because of an aerial threat. The alert was lifted shortly afterward, although authorities urged residents to avoid gathering in crowds. Flames and thick black smoke were later seen rising from a fuel storage area near the airport.
The alert marked the first time Riyadh had received such a warning since fighting in Yemen intensified in July. Authorities also issued alerts in Jeddah and Yanbu, a major Red Sea industrial port that houses critical oil infrastructure.
The Houthis claimed Saturday that they had launched missile and drone attacks against several Saudi targets, including sites in Riyadh and an Aramco facility in Yanbu. The group said the attacks were retaliation for Saudi military operations against Houthi positions in Yemen. The Houthis also accused Saudi Arabia of conducting 26 airstrikes against them over a 24-hour period.
The latest fighting represents another escalation in the long-running conflict between Saudi Arabia and the Houthis, who control much of northern Yemen and large portions of the country’s Red Sea coastline. The group, which is backed by Iran, began attacking commercial shipping in the Red Sea and surrounding waters in November 2023, following Hamas’s Oct. 7 attack on Israel. Those attacks have disrupted shipping through the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, a strategic waterway connecting the Red Sea with the Gulf of Aden and the Arabian Sea.
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Map of the Bab el-Mandeb Strait chokepoint. Source: European Council on Foreign Relations; Graphic by Grace Hagerman/Washington ExaminerThe renewed fighting has taken on broader significance because of the disruption to oil shipments through the Strait of Hormuz, which has forced Saudi Arabia to rely more heavily on alternative routes.
The Bab el-Mandeb sits at the southern end of the Red Sea, between Yemen and the Horn of Africa. About 4.2 million barrels per day of crude oil, condensate and petroleum products passed through the strait during the first half of 2025, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. That was roughly half the volume recorded in 2023, as shipping companies diverted vessels away from the waterway because of Houthi attacks
Saudi Arabia has also increasingly depended on its 1,200-kilometer East-West Pipeline, which carries crude from the kingdom’s oil-producing east to the Red Sea port of Yanbu, allowing exports to bypass the Strait of Hormuz. The kingdom shut the pipeline earlier this month after attacks damaged infrastructure in the Riyadh and Medina regions. Saudi officials said the attacks caused injuries but did not publicly attribute them to the Houthis.
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The pipeline’s disruption is particularly significant because Saudi Arabia had been using it to reroute oil away from the Persian Gulf amid the wider regional conflict. The pipeline has historically been capable of carrying several million barrels of crude per day.
Oil prices have climbed above $100 per barrel during the disruptions, driven by fears that further attacks could constrain the amount of oil reaching international markets.
