According to the officials, rebel shelling in the city of Taiz first killed 23 civilians, which provoked airstrikes by the Saudi-led coalition that has been targeting the Shiite rebels, also known as Houthis, since March.
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Yesterday, Arab air strikes hit targets throughout northern Yemen, local officials said, as the front lines approach Houthi strongholds there.
Gains by pro-Hadi forces have put them in control of parts of the city between the Houthi- dominated north and the south, where Hadi supporters have been cheered by strategic gains in the past month.
A leading worldwide aid group has made a dramatic appeal to Yemen’s warring factions to halt attacks on civilians, a day after heavy fighting in a key southern city killed more than 65 people and wounded at least 23.
On March 26, Saudi Arabia and some of its Arab allies, including the UAE, Kuwait, Qatar and Bahrain, began to launch deadly airstrikes against the Houthi Ansarullah movement in an attempt to restore power to the fugitive former President Abd Rabbuh Mansour Hadi, a close ally of Riyadh.
Dozens of people, mostly civilians, have been killed in fighting and air strikes by a Saudi-led coalition in Yemen’s third city Taez, the global Committee of the Red Cross said Saturday.
“Those who survived the bombings are searching through the rubble with their bare hands in the hope of finding survivors, as well as the bodies of victims of the attack”, Salah Dongu’du, Medicins Sans Frontieres project coordinator in Taiz, said in a statement.
In other developments, two pilots in the Saudi-led coalition were killed when their Apache helicopter came down on the border with Yemen on Friday, the coalition said.
The skyline of Yemeni capital Sanaa is filled with black smoke yesterday as the Saudi-led coalition bombs an air base.
At least 65 civilians have been killed by air strikes in Yemen’s Taiz, including 17 people from one family, Doctors Without Borders (MSF) reported.
Saudi Arabia sees the Houthis as proxies for Iran, its rival for regional leadership.
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The southern port city of Aden was retaken from the Houthis last month with the help of heavy air strikes and weapons deliveries. The Houthis, however, still hold the capital Sanaa.
