Saudi Jets Bomb Residential Areas in Yemen’s Sana’a


TEHRAN (Tasnim) - Saudi warplanes attacked the Yemeni capital, targeting residential buildings and areas near the presidential palace, a day after several families were targeted in deadly bombings.

On Friday, the Jabal al-Nahdain neighborhood in central Sana’a came under aerial attacks which also targeted areas around the presidential palace in al-Sabeen, Yemeni media reports said, Press TV reported.

The fresh attacks came as a video emerged of Saudi airstrikes in the Dhahyan district of the northwestern Sa’ada province on Thursday.

At least 20 people, including eight children, were killed and some 35 others injured in those bombings which reportedly targeted several families.

According to a tweet on the Doctors without Borders (MSF) website, Saudi jets bombed three villages in Sa’ada. The group reported deaths of five people, including an ambulance driver from the MFS hospital.

Yemeni sources have said at least 18 medical staffers were killed in those attacks. 

Separately, an oil facility operated by Yemen's Houthis was hit in a Saudi airstrike in the Red Sea port city of Ras Isa. A news agency run by the Saudi-backed fugitive Yemeni government, www.sabanew.net, put the death toll at 16.

Medical sources said at least 30 people were also wounded in the airstrikes. Reuters, quoting an unnamed source, said the bodies had been either burned or mutilated.

Meanwhile, several local news outlets said Yemeni forces had killed two Saudi military troops, identified as Khaled al-Oleighi and Abdu Mohammed Dalak, during clashes near the kingdom's border city of Najran on Thursday. 

Three other Saudi troops were also killed by Yemen's Ansarullah fighters and allied army units near the al-Tawal border crossing, which links Yemen’s northwestern province of Hajjah to Saudi Arabia’s Jizan, the al-Masirah TV said.

Qatar's Al Jazeera TV also said three of its journalists had been kidnapped in Yemen’s southwestern province of Ta’izz while reporting on the casualties there. The Doha-based channel said the three had been last seen on Monday.

Saudi Arabia launched its military campaign in Yemen in late March after former president Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi fled to the kingdom in the face of Houthi advances.

More than 8,200 people have been killed and over 16,000 others injured since the attacks began. The war has also taken a heavy toll on the impoverished country’s facilities and infrastructure.