Saudi fighter jets respond to latest Yemeni raid on UAE facilities

The air raids targeted Libby neighborhood in Ma'een district of Sana’a late Monday, leaving at least 14 citizens dead and 11 others injured, Yemen's al-Masirah television reported.

The network’s correspondent in Sana'a said search for survivors under the rubble of a house continued in Libby, where five other residential houses were also damaged in the airstrikes.

The Saudi airplanes also targeted September 11 Park in northern Sana’a.
Al-Masirah said the kingdom had carried out more than 50 air raids on several areas across Yemen, including the central Ma'rib province, over the past 24 hours.

“The coalition’s warplanes waged 31 raids on al-Wadi, al-Jubah and Harib districts of Ma’rib province, while eight airstrikes hit Ain district of Shabwa province and seven other targeted Sawma'ah district of al-Bayda province,” the network said.

Two air raids hit al-Yatama area in the Khab Washa'f district of the northern Jawf province, and two others targeted Magbanah district in the southwestern province of Ta'izz.

Saudi-led coalition aircraft also attacked al-Jarrahi district in the south of the Red Sea port city of Hudaydah and launched another raid on Haradh district in the northern province of Hajjah.

Earlier in the day, the Yemeni army launched an operation deep inside the United Arab Emirates in retaliation for its role in the Saudi-led war on the impoverished country.

Abu Dhabi police said three fuel tanker trucks had exploded in the industrial Musaffah area, near the storage facilities of the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC), and that a fire had also broken out at a construction site at Abu Dhabi International Airport.

At least three people were killed and six others wounded in the attack, according to Emirati authorities.

Spokesman for the Yemeni Armed Forces Brigadier General Yahya Saree confirmed the retaliatory attack and said Yemeni troops had launched the military operation “deep inside the UAE.”

Providing details about "Operation Hurricane Yemen", Saree said in a statement that it was successfully carried out with five ballistic missiles and a large number of drones in response to the recent escalation of the US-Saudi-Emirati aggression.

“Operation Hurricane Yemen targeted the Dubai and Abu Dhabi airports, the Musaffah oil refinery in Abu Dhabi and a number of important and sensitive Emirati sites and facilities,” the statement said.

"The armed forces are implementing today what they promised and they renewed their warning to the coalition countries that they will receive more painful blows," it added.

The statement also warned foreign citizens and their companies, as well as other residents of the UAE to stay away from strategic sites and facilities for their own safety.

"We will not hesitate to expand the scope of targets to include more important sites and facilities in the coming period, declaring that the UAE is an unsafe state as long as its aggressive escalation against Yemen continues,” Saree underlined.

Saudi Arabia, backed by the United States and regional allies, launched the war on Yemen in March 2015, with the goal of bringing the government of former Yemeni president Abd Rabbuh Mansour Hadi back to power and crushing the Ansarullah movement.

The war has left hundreds of thousands of Yemenis dead and displaced millions more. It has also destroyed Yemen’s infrastructure and spread famine and infectious diseases there.

Despite heavily-armed Saudi Arabia’s incessant bombardment of the impoverished country, the Yemeni armed forces and the Popular Committees have grown steadily in strength against the invaders and left Riyadh and its allies bogged down in the country.