A Houthi offensive that pushed Yemeni government forces off a stretch of the Red Sea coast has sent families fleeing the town of al-Khokha, even as the government’s army said it had killed or wounded 1,540 Houthi fighters in 24 hours of operations across the country.
When waves of government troops began retreating from the front lines near al-Khokha, a Red Sea town between Hodeidah and Mocha, two of Saeed Hassan’s sons rushed to alert their father about the unusual movements.
“I told them that it could be a tactical withdrawal and that there was nothing to worry about,” Mr. Hassan, 58, told Al Jazeera at a flat in Mukalla, the southern city where he and several related families have taken refuge after a week on the road.
The army’s account of the past 24 hours describes fighting on a far larger scale. Government forces carried out nearly 500 military operations, killing or wounding 1,540 Houthi rebels, according to a military spokesman, Colonel Majed Abdullah al-Nazili, who spoke on Friday evening. Warplanes, drones, artillery, missiles and rocket launchers were used against Houthi positions in various parts of Yemen, he said.
The figures came from the army, a party to the fighting, and could not be independently verified. Government forces also closed a key crossing connecting Houthi-held al-Houban with the government-held city of Taiz.
The displacement along the coast comes as Saudi Arabia weighs a wider campaign: officials say Riyadh is planning an offensive to retake the Bab el-Mandeb strait, with Yemeni forces leading the assault and more than 100,000 troops possibly mobilized.