RIYADH: At least 12 people were killed and 309 wounded in a Houthi attack on Riyadh’s King Khalid International Airport on Saturday, Saudi authorities said, as the Iran-backed group escalated its campaign against the kingdom.
Saudi authorities blamed the Houthis for the attack, while a Saudi-led military coalition vowed to respond.
The dead included four Saudis, two Bangladeshis and one person each from the United States, Jordan, Palestine, Syria, Sudan and Egypt, according to the Saudi civil aviation authority.
Hospitals were overwhelmed by casualties arriving in ambulances and helicopters, according to people briefed on the matter. Some of the injured were reported to be in critical condition.
The attack was the third targeting King Khalid International Airport that week and the deadliest in Saudi Arabia in more than a decade. Saturday’s strike occurred without warning, with no alert issued by the country’s threat warning system.
The two earlier attacks killed four people and caused extensive damage to a Saudi commercial aircraft parked on the tarmac.
The strikes have raised questions about vulnerabilities in Saudi Arabia’s air defences as the kingdom conducts an air campaign against the Houthis in support of a ground offensive by Yemen’s internationally recognised government.
Saudi Arabia and the Yemeni government have reported hundreds of strikes on Houthi-controlled territory. The group has said the attacks killed civilians, including women and children. These claims could not be independently verified by Reuters.
Flights suspended, diverted
All flights to Riyadh were diverted or cancelled on Saturday, temporarily disrupting operations at the airport serving a city of around eight million people, the Saudi civil aviation authority said.
The head of the Houthi media office said in a post on X that the group had “shut down Riyadh international airport”.
The Houthis have urged airlines to avoid Saudi airspace, declaring it a zone of military operations after the Saudi-backed Yemeni government launched an offensive against the group on Monday.
The US embassy in Riyadh said it was aware of the attacks and strongly advised American citizens to avoid the airport and surrounding areas.
An eyewitness said they saw an explosion followed by several injured people lying on the ground inside the airport. More than a dozen ambulances were seen heading towards the facility.
A video verified by Reuters showed ambulances at the site. An injured traveller told Reuters they had seen an object moving across the sky before part of the ceiling near a departure gate collapsed.
Trump says US may join Saudi strikes
US President Donald Trump said Washington was considering joining Saudi strikes against the Houthis following the latest attack.
Asked by reporters outside the White House whether the United States would participate in the strikes, Trump said: “We may. We’re going to look at it. We just found out about the recent attack, so we’ll make a decision. We move very quickly.”
Conflict in Yemen escalates
Saudi Arabia intervened in Yemen’s war in 2015, leading an Arab coalition seeking to drive the Houthis out of the capital, Sanaa. The group had seized the city the previous year, forcing government forces out.
The conflict reached a bloody stalemate, with fighting and famine killing hundreds of thousands of Yemenis. A 2022 agreement between Saudi Arabia and the Houthis helped freeze the fighting.
That truce unravelled over the summer, culminating in a rapid Houthi advance that wrested control of the Red Sea chokepoint of Bab el-Mandeb from Saudi-backed government forces.
The Yemeni government launched an offensive this week to retake the territory, making limited gains as the Houthis placed Taiz, the country’s third-largest city, under siege.
Major summits due in Riyadh
The latest attacks have disrupted air travel shortly before Riyadh is due to host major energy and investment conferences.
Flight-tracking website Flightradar24 showed flights to the Saudi capital being diverted or cancelled, with a helicopter at one point hovering over the airport.
Attacks on Thursday and earlier in the week had already prompted several airlines to suspend or cancel services to Riyadh.
Organisers of the upcoming conferences said before Saturday’s attack that the events would proceed as planned.
