On Monday morning, three Houthi ballistic missiles hit the Al-Alam military camp in Shabwa province, southern Yemen, where new security and police recruits were training. AP says at least 20 were killed.
Xinhua reports 25 dead and more than 30 hurt, and officials say the toll may rise. The count has been climbing all day: Reuters, citing four government and medical sources, put the dead at at least 18, Sky News Arabia reported at least 30 killed, and Yemeni sources later on Monday put the toll at more than 40, with dozens more wounded still being counted across the province's hospitals. The first count from the camp was 15 dead and more than 30 wounded.
Government sources told Reuters the three missiles struck security forces during a morning training exercise at the camp in the Jardan district of Shabwa, an energy-rich province in Yemen's coastal south-central region. Local reports said the recruits belonged to a newly formed southern unit that was partway through its training course when the missiles hit.
The Houthis have not claimed the attack, which comes after their recent strikes on Saudi Arabia, where the group has targeted Riyadh's King Khalid International Airport and Saudi Aramco facilities in a campaign it says will continue deep inside the kingdom.
"I announce today the start of military operations to retake the remaining territories of the republic and extend the authority of the state and its institutions across the entire national territory." — Rashad al-Alimi, head of Yemen's presidential council, announcing the government offensive earlier this month
The recruits at Al-Alam were training for that fight. Fighting between the Saudi-led coalition backing Yemen's internationally recognised government and the Houthis, who control the capital Sanaa and much of the north, has escalated in recent weeks since the group advanced in September toward territory near the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, the shipping chokepoint at the mouth of the Red Sea. Government forces launched a campaign this month to recapture areas the Houthis hold near the strait, while the group besieges Taiz, and Reuters reports the conflict in Yemen has become another front in the wider regional conflict that began with U.S. and Israeli strikes on Iran in late February.
The war broke out in 2014 when the Houthis seized Sanaa and drove the government south. A Saudi-led military intervention the following year led to a bloody stalemate before a 2022 truce that held until this year. Yemen is already one of the world's worst humanitarian crises, and aid agencies are warning of rapidly deteriorating conditions as the fighting spreads — and as Monday's toll at Al-Alam continues to rise.
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