Saudi-backed forces recapture key areas around strait from Houthis in Yemen

Government offensive launched under air cover by Saudi military coalition aims to retake all Houthi-held territory

Forces of the Saudi-led coalition fighting in Yemen have recaptured several key areas around Bab al-Mandab strait from Iran-backed Houthi rebels, Yemeni officials said on Monday.

The officials said forces allied with the internationally recognized government have retaken the crucial town of Dhubab just north of the strait. They also captured the towns of Bab and Hadeid, said the officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to reporters. Witnesses said they saw government tanks and forces entering the towns.

However, the offensive came just after the rebels said they had captured more territory in the south-western part of Yemen, taking the key town of Turbah in a blow to the Saudi-backed forces as they advanced toward the strategic provincial capital of Taiz, Yemen’s third-largest city.

Marco Rubio told reporters that it was expected that the Saudi-backed government in Yemen would hit back at the rebels to reclaim territory. Asked if the Saudi-led coalition coordinated the action with the United States, the US secretary of state said that Saudi Arabia and the US had a defense agreement but would not offer more details.

The new push sets an ambitious goal for the embattled government, which recently lost swathes of the country’s Red Sea coastline and areas around the Bab al-Mandab strait – a chokepoint for international shipping – after a lightning offensive by the Iran-backed Houthis.

The statement came just hours after the Houthis cut a vital supply route linking the besieged city of Taiz with the government’s interim capital, Aden, according to four security sources.

“We were informed that the Houthis had taken control of the al-Safiya area, where they cut the main road and took control of the police station,” a police source in the area said.

Sources from both sides told AFP on Sunday that fighting in and around the western province of Taiz had killed more than 70 people over the past day.

Taiz city itself remains under the control of government forces but has long been besieged from the north, east and west by Houthi fighters and remains one of the main fronts in Yemen’s long-running civil war.

The attacks were in response to what the Houthis claimed were 50 Saudi-led ‌air and missile strikes in Yemen in the past 12 hours.

Saudi oil exports were already under pressure due to Iran’s blockade of the strait of Hormuz in the Gulf.