At least 11 people died when Houthi missiles and drones hit Mokha, Yemen’s port city on the Red Sea, according to a medical source, amid a wider escalation that also reached Saudi oil infrastructure. The source counted three civilian and eight military deaths.
Thirty-two people were wounded, including six civilians, the medical source said. Two sources with forces aligned to Yemen's internationally recognised government separately reported more than 40 military injuries in addition to eight troop deaths. Earlier government media accounts had put the toll at seven dead and about 35 wounded, indicating that figures were still being updated.
The medical account placed every civilian casualty at Mokha port. Forces aligned with the Aden-based government control that facility, according to the medical account. Port director Abdulmalik al-Sharabi said the Houthis used about 25 drones against the facility. He identified employee housing, a customs hangar and other economic sites among the targets and said attacks were continuing while damage was assessed.
Houthi military spokesperson Yahya Saree said the group had attacked Saudi troops and equipment around Mokha with missiles and drones. Government military sources described several waves against the city, installations outside it and positions on islands near the Bab al-Mandab Strait. Some locations housed Saudi forces, one source said, with no reported casualties among Saudi personnel. People in the area described a succession of blasts over both the port and Mokha itself.
In another incident, Hodeidah governor Hassan Taher survived a ballistic missile strike near his home in Al-Khokha, south of Hodeidah province. Government media and a local source said the missile landed nearby, with no immediate report that Taher had been hurt.
The Houthis also struck a Saudi Aramco oil installation in Jazan on the Saudi Red Sea coast. Saudi Arabia's Energy Ministry said the resulting fire was extinguished. Saree said that attack answered what he called Saudi drone incursions into northwestern Yemen.
The violence followed a prolonged reduction in Yemen's civil-war fighting under a United Nations-backed truce agreed in 2022. That lull began breaking down in July as conflict involving Iran, the United States and their regional partners widened. The Houthis subsequently announced a maritime blockade of Saudi Arabia and attacked Saudi-linked vessels and energy infrastructure, presenting those operations as responses to Saudi military activity.
Mokha and Al-Khokha occupy a strategically important part of Yemen's coast near Bab al-Mandab, the narrow passage connecting the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden. The port casualties and attacks on nearby positions therefore combined a local human toll with renewed risk around a major international shipping route.
