Soldier with Yemen's exiled government opens fire, killing two Saudi troops, wounding another

Yemeni soldier kills two Saudi troops in rare insider attack, praised by Houthi official for targeting invaders.

A soldier for Yemen's exiled government opened fire on Saudi troops as they exercised in eastern Yemen, killing two of them and wounding another in a rare insider attack during the kingdom's nearly decadelong war there, officials said on Saturday (November 10, 2024).

The assault in eastern Hadramawt province comes as a yearslong cease-fire between Saudi Arabia and Yemen's Houthi rebels largely has held despite the militants' ongoing attacks against shipping in the Red Sea corridor. While the Houthis did not claim the attack, at least one Houthi official praised it as being “the beginning and an indication of a harsh future awaiting the invaders.” Meanwhile, US warplanes carried out new strikes targeting Houthi positions that lasted into early Sunday morning, the American military said. The strikes come after the militants likely shot down yet-another American reconnaissance drone over the country.

The attack on the Saudi troops took place on Friday (November 8, 2024) night in Seiyun, a city some 500 kilometers (310 miles) east of Sanaa. As troops worked out at a Saudi-led base there, the soldier opened fire, killing an officer and a noncommissioned officer, the state-run Saudi Press Agency said, citing a military statement.

“The Joint Forces Command underscores that this Lone Wolf' cowardly attack does not represent the honorable members of the Yemeni Ministry of Defense,” the statement added. The dead and the other wounded Saudi solider have been brought back to the kingdom, it added.

Aidarous al-Zubaidi, the leader of Yemen's successionist Southern Transitional Council, identified the soldier who carried out the attack as belonging to the First Military Region, which is based out of Seiyun.

Police in the area published pictures of the soldier, saying there was a 30-million-Yemeni-rial reward for information leading to the soldier's arrest. That's worth around $15,000 on the black market.

Authorities offered no motive for the attack. Al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula, the militant group's Yemen branch, long has operated around Hadramawt. However, the group did not immediately claim the attack. A recent United Nations expert report has said that the al-Qaida group and the Houthis have begun to “coordinate operations directly with each other."