Latest (early Sunday local time): Saudi air defences intercepted and destroyed two ballistic missiles fired by Yemen’s Houthi militia toward Khamis Mushayt, and a drone was intercepted and destroyed in the Riyadh region, coalition officials said, according to Arab News. Civil defence alerts warning of a hostile aerial threat were sent to residents in Riyadh and the south at about 1:30 a.m. local time and lifted a few minutes later, and the danger notices for Khamis Mushayt and nearby Abha were later stood down. On Saturday the coalition also said it had destroyed two ballistic missile launchers in Yemen’s Saada governorate.
Saudi Arabia intercepted and destroyed four drones in the hours before Saturday evening, over the Riyadh, eastern and southern regions of the kingdom, Saudi-led coalition spokesman General Turki al Maliki said on X, according to Deutsche Welle’s Spanish service, which cites AFP and dpa reporting. The report describes no casualties and no damage in Saudi Arabia from the intercepted drones.
In the early hours of Sunday, Riyadh residents received a mobile phone alert warning of a hostile aerial threat, journalists cited in the report said, and the alert was lifted minutes later. The article places the interception in a campaign of near-daily attacks since the start of October by Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi fighters, though the quoted Saudi statement does not itself name the attackers.
The same report says Saudi airstrikes in Yemen killed nine civilians on Saturday, bringing the toll in the preceding 24 hours to 12, including three children who died overnight, citing the Houthi-linked press agency, which is not an independent source. Houthi military spokesman Yahya Saree said Riyadh carried out 53 strikes in Sanaa and six other provinces in 24 hours, the report says, and in Cairo, President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi said Egypt was ready to defend Riyadh if the kingdom requested it.