RIYADH, Saudi Arabia – Iran-aligned Houthi rebels in Yemen say they attacked a drone and missiles on Sunday with a drone port and a major oil missile in Saudi Arabia. Saudi authorities said the strike did not cause any casualties or damage.
The Saudi Ministry of Energy said that an attack “coming from the sea” targeted oil tanks in the port of Ras Tanura. He condemned what he called “repeated acts of sabotage and hostility” aimed at supplying the world with energy.
“All indications are Iran,” said an adviser to the Saudi royal court, who said he had been informed of the matter. He said it was unclear whether the origin was Iran or Iraq, but that it did not come from Yemen.
Iranian officials did not immediately respond to a request for comment. An Iraqi official said he was unaware of any connection between his country and the attack.
In 2019, a drone and missile attack on the heart of Saudi Arabia’s oil industry temporarily halted the kingdom’s gross production. At the time, the Houthis claimed responsibility, but the United States said the attack was launched from Iraq or Iran, which denied the allegations.
Yahya Saree, a spokesman for Houthi forces fighting the Saudi-led military coalition in Yemen, said the group used 10 drones and a ballistic missile in an attack on the eastern province of Saudi Arabia on Sunday, as well as four drones. and six missiles heading south to the Saudi regions of Assyria and Gizan.
The Houthis intensified airstrikes on Saudi Arabia following the inauguration in January of President Biden, who pledged to end the six-year civil war in Yemen and recalibrate Washington’s relationship with Riyadh.
The Biden administration has said it wants to reintroduce the 2015 nuclear deal and then negotiate a deeper and broader deal with Tehran that also addresses Iran’s position and military activities in the Middle East.
Saudi Arabia is leading a military coalition that intervened in the conflict in Yemen, which is now facing one of the worst humanitarian crises in the world. The coalition launched a new round of airstrikes on the capital Sanaa earlier on Sunday, warning that targeting Saudi civilians was “a red line”.
Hussein Nasser, the father of two children living in Sanaa, said the coalition’s bombing of a nearby military base shattered the windows of dozens of homes in his neighborhood, injuring several people. “Five airstrikes at the same time while people and their children were having lunch,” he said.
Following the Ras Tanura incident, the port was operating normally, according to several shipping sources. “Loads continue normally,” said a manager at a shipping agency there who refused to be named. He did not know that any distribution center would be hit.
Ras Tanura is home to Saudi Aramco’s oldest and largest oil refinery and the world’s largest offshore oil rig. The 550,000-barrel-a-day refinery supplies more than a quarter of the kingdom’s fuel supply.
Shrapnel from a ballistic missile, which the Houthis said was firing on military targets near the town of Dammam, fell near Aramco’s residential area in the vicinity of Dhahran, the Saudi statement said.
An Aramco employee living in the area said he saw two projectiles intercepted above the head of the Saudi air defense, which relies heavily on US Patriot anti-missile systems. Nearby residents reported that the windows of their homes had shaken or even shattered.
Images shared on social media showed bright bursts of light in the sky over Saudi Arabia’s oil-rich eastern province and later white smoke.
—Benoit Faucon and Saleh al-Batati contributed to this article.
Write to Summer Said at [email protected] and Stephen Kalin at [email protected]
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