Iran-backed Houthi rebels have released video purporting to show the interior of Mokha port following their claim of full control over the strategic Yemeni city, as fighting in the country's southwest intensifies and fears grow of a return to large-scale civil war.
Houthi-controlled Al-Masirah TV broadcast footage showing what it described as military facilities, damaged vessels and port hangars inside Mokha, a coastal city in southwestern Yemen situated near the Bab el-Mandeb Strait — one of the world's most critical maritime chokepoints, linking the Red Sea to the Gulf of Aden and carrying a significant share of global shipping and energy trade. Houthi officials said their fighters had also seized two nearby islands, as Saudi-backed government forces mounted efforts to retake territory following the rebels' rapid advances in the area.
The escalation has triggered a severe humanitarian emergency. The International Organization for Migration reports that nearly 94,000 people have fled their homes since the fighting intensified this month, with the heaviest displacement — more than 48,000 people — concentrated in the Taiz and Lahj governorates. Over 2,000 civilians have crossed the sea to neighbouring Djibouti, a small nation on the Horn of Africa, while around 200 schools in southwestern Yemen have been repurposed as emergency shelters.
The human cost of the renewed violence has been stark. The World Health Organization says more than 500 people were killed in a single week of fighting, a toll that has alarmed international observers and relief agencies.
The battle for Mokha carries outsized strategic significance beyond Yemen's borders. Control of the port and its proximity to the Bab el-Mandeb Strait gives any dominant force leverage over one of the most heavily trafficked maritime corridors in the world, with implications for global energy supplies and trade security. Separately, Houthi officials announced ballistic missile and drone strikes targeting military infrastructure inside Saudi Arabia, prompting the Saudi Civil Defence authority to issue alerts for several cities including Khamis Mushait, Abha, Jeddah and Mecca, before subsequently declaring the threat had passed. The combination of ground advances, cross-border strikes and mounting civilian suffering has raised alarm that Yemen's fragile situation may be deteriorating toward a new and more destructive phase of conflict.