Air strikes kill civilians in Yemen’s al-Jawf province

Air strikes in northern Yemen have killed at least seven civilians, residents and a Houthi official said, the third such incident since June as violence resurges in the war-damaged country.

A Houthi rebel health ministry spokesperson said attacks by the Saudi-led coalition hit residential homes in the al-Hazm district, al-Jawf province, killing nine people including two children and two women. Residents said seven people were killed.

Coalition spokesman Colonel Turki al-Malki said the reports will be investigated.

“We take this report very seriously and it will be fully investigated as all reports of this nature are, using an internationally approved, independent process,” said al-Malki.

The military alliance intervened in Yemen in March 2015 soon after the Iran-aligned Houthi movement removed the Saudi-backed government from power in the capital, Sanaa.

Violence has picked up since the expiry in late May of a temporary ceasefire prompted by the coronavirus pandemic, with the Houthis repeatedly staging missile-and-drone attacks on Saudi cities and the coalition retaliating with air strikes.

Earlier this week the Houthis launched attacks at Saudi border cities in what they called a response to air strikes that killed 10 civilians in the Hajjah region. The coalition later said it would investigate.

In June, an air strike killed at least 12 people, including four children, in Yemen’s Saada province, according to the Houthis and a United Nations official. The coalition said it had struck a vehicle carrying armed combatants.

The UN last month removed the Western-backed coalition from a UN blacklist several years after it was first accused of killing and wounding children in Yemen.

The conflict – largely seen in the region as a proxy war between Saudi Arabia and Iran, has killed more than 100,000 people and caused what the UN describes as the world’s largest humanitarian crisis. The Houthis say they are fighting a corrupt system.