The missiles, it said, however, caused no damage.
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In the mountainous region of Nihm, east of Sanaa, forces loyal to Hadi’s government escalated fighting with Houthi militias and allied forces, as part of a new campaign supported by the Saudi-led coalition to seize Sanaa, now under Houthi control.
“This sale will increase the Royal Saudi Land Force’s interoperability with USA forces and conveys US commitment to Saudi Arabia’s security and armed forces modernization”, the agency said in a notice to lawmakers posted on its website.
In a report from last April, Reuters quoted United Nations investigators who said that air strikes by the Saudi-led coalition are responsible for two-thirds of the 3,200 civilian deaths in Yemen, or approximately 2,000 deaths, and that Saudi forces have killed twice as many civilians as other forces in Yemen.
Since March 2015, Saudi Arabia and some of its Arab allies have been launching 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.
Tribal sources said air strikes hit rebel positions on Wednesday around their northern stronghold province of Saada.
Houthi rebels said that Saudi warplanes launched over 50 sorties Wednesday targeting the Nehem district, northeast of the capital city of Sanaa.
The attack was the first on the capital in five months, the first in the country for three months, and itself came days after UN-backed peace talks broke down over the weekend.
At least 15 workers of a food factory including six women, were killed and eight wounded in a series of Saudi-led airstrikes in Sanaa on Tuesday.
Even as fresh civilian deaths were reported in a Saudi Arabian attack on Yemen, the Pentagon has approved the sale of up to 153 tanks, hundreds of machine guns and other military gear in a deal worth $1.15 billion to the country.
The US, UK, France and Turkey have backed the coalition with logistics, intelligence and even “boots on the ground”, ostensibly to counter the Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) terrorists in south-central Yemen.
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In April of this year, the Yemeni government and the Houthis entered into UN-sponsored peace talks in Kuwait aimed at resolving the conflict, in which more than 6,400 people have been killed and another 2.5 million forced to flee their homes.
