Yemen’s rebels say they captured post inside Saudi Arabia

SANAA, Yemen – Yemen’s Houthi rebels and allied troops have captured a Saudi military post in the border region of Jizan, according to military officials from the Shiite movement.

They said the Houthi rebels and their allies attacked the post with artillery, rockets and light arms before taking it over in a Sept. 11 battle.

A Saudi military spokesman has denied the Houthi claim as “lies,” but a 15-minute video clip posted on social media networks and aired late Wednesday by the Houthis’ al-Masirah TV purportedly shows the shelling of the hilltop post and the attacking force examining weapons and ammunition left behind by the Saudi soldiers who fled.

“We will fight them with their weapons,” said one member of the assailing force.

The clip also showed Saudi soldiers abandoning their fortified positions and later helping their wounded into the back of an armoured vehicle. The attacking force set ablaze a Saudi vehicle at the post.

Jizan is one of several southern Saudi regions that some Yemenis claim were illegally annexed by Saudi Arabia in the last century. It is not clear, however, whether the attack on the Jizan post is the start of a wider campaign to capture and hold Saudi territory in that region.

Yemen has been torn by civil war pitting its internationally-recognized government and a Saudi-led coalition against the Houthi rebels and troops loyal to a former president.