Gulf Ministers Condemn Houthi Attacks on Saudi Arabia as Yemen Fighting Displaces Hundreds of Thousands
Foreign ministers from the Gulf Cooperation Council have issued a strong condemnation of repeated attacks by Yemen’s Iran-aligned Houthi fighters targeting Saudi Arabia, pledging full institutional support to defend the kingdom’s security. The six-nation political and economic bloc, which comprises Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates, released the joint declaration on Sunday following a high-level ministerial meeting held in Manama, Bahrain.
The council’s statement explicitly declared that an assault on any single member state impacts the security of all six nations. In doing so, the bloc invoked its joint defense agreement and firmly backed Saudi Arabia’s sovereign right to protect its territory and population. This unified regional posture coincided with military reports from the Saudi-led coalition indicating that air defense units intercepted and shot down two drones early Sunday near Riyadh and within Saudi Arabia’s Eastern Province. Coalition officials noted that another drone had been successfully intercepted near the capital hours prior, though that specific launch was not attributed immediately to a distinct party.
During their convening in Manama, Gulf ministers accused the Houthi movement of executing deadly strikes directed at civilian airports and vital economic infrastructure. To counter the persistent aerial and ground assaults, the ministers called for stricter enforcement of existing United Nations arms embargoes against the group and urged the international community to formally designate the Houthi movement as a terrorist organization. Furthermore, the council welcomed an October 15 statement issued by the United Nations Security Council, which had previously condemned Houthi strikes targeting Saudi territory alongside emerging threats directed at commercial shipping lanes in the Red Sea.
Diplomatic pressure mounted concurrently from Yemen’s internationally recognized government, which submitted formal appeals to the UN Security Council demanding decisive action against Houthi offensives targeting residential homes and state infrastructure. In formal letters dispatched to UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres and the rotating October president of the Security Council, Aglaia Balta, Yemeni authorities highlighted a specific strike directed at the presidential palace located in Aden, the temporary administrative base of the government. In parallel diplomatic developments on Sunday, UAE Vice President Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed Al Nahyan hosted Saudi Defence Minister Prince Khalid bin Salman Al Saud in Abu Dhabi for bilateral discussions centered on regional security architecture, as reported by the state news agency WAM.
On the ground, military engagements intensified across multiple contested fronts as Saudi-backed Yemeni government forces prosecuted active offensives. The Yemeni military reported that Houthi combatants launched missiles targeting the central city of Marib on Sunday, while government troops simultaneously claimed territorial advances further south in Taiz. Casualties mounted across the active zones; government-aligned commanders confirmed that eight soldiers were killed during heavy engagements in Lahij province on Saturday. Government forces additionally reported killing 12 Houthi fighters in southern Taiz, though these figures could not be independently verified through external sources.
This current escalation of hostilities follows a series of territorial gains achieved by Houthi forces along Yemen’s strategic Red Sea coast over the preceding month. In response, government forces mounted a counteroffensive aimed at reclaiming ground lost to the group, which originally seized the national capital of Sanaa in 2014.
The human toll of the renewed fighting has proven severe, with the International Organization for Migration reporting that the conflict has uprooted more than 233,000 individuals across Yemen. Among the displaced population, approximately 121,000 people are concentrated within Taiz province, where critical supply lines and transportation routes have been severely disrupted by ongoing combat operations.
Civilians inside Taiz face mounting hardships amid deepening shortages of basic necessities. Reports from the city indicate that cooking gas is completely unavailable and local food inventories are rapidly dwindling as Houthi forces maintain a blockade blocking supplies from entering through the city’s western entrance. A local administrative office monitoring the siege estimated that essential food prices have surged fivefold.
The humanitarian crisis has similarly engulfed the local healthcare infrastructure. The World Health Organization warned that the 12 hospitals operating in Taiz possess sufficient fuel reserves to sustain operations for only four more days and have completely exhausted their stocks of surgical supplies. Critical shortages of medical oxygen and essential pharmaceuticals have further compounded the emergency as the municipality struggles to manage an ongoing cholera outbreak.
