Saudi air strikes hit medical center in Yemen

Saudi Arabia’s airstrikes against Yemen have entered their twenty-fifth day, with Saudi air strikes hitting a medical center in central Yemen in one of the latest attacks.

The airstrike on Sunday completely destroyed al- Jahlan medical building in Sirwah district of the Ma'rib Province, but there is still no word on possible casualties, according to a report published by Arabic-language Yemen Press news agency.

Saudi warplanes also pounded the compound of al-Saqr football club, a military camp as well as the airport in the southwestern city of Taiz.

Separately, five civilians, among them four women, sustained injuries when a mortar shell fired by Saudi forces slammed into Jabal al-Jarrah region of Yemen’s central Shabwa Province.

Saudi fighter jets also bombarded a number of military sites belonging to popular committees, who support Ansarullah fighters of the Houthi movement, in the capital, Sana’a, late on Saturday, Yemen-based Arabic-language Watten news agency reported. 

Three aerial assaults were also carried out against al-Daylami airbase in the capital.

Saudi warplanes also struck various areas in the northwestern city of Sa’ada, located 240 kilometers (150 miles) north of Sana’a.

The strikes destroyed a grocery market, commercial districts as well as food stores in the city. There were no immediate reports on the extent of casualties and the damage inflicted. 

Meanwhile, medical sources say clashes between al-Qaeda-linked militants and fighters of the popular committees, as well as Saudi airstrikes have left at least 27 people dead in the southwestern city of Taiz.

The sources, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the dead included 19 members of the popular committees and a number of militants.

Saudi Arabia’s air campaign against Yemen started on March 26 - without a United Nations mandate - in a bid to restore power to Yemen’s fugitive former president, Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi, a staunch ally of Riyadh.

The Houthis say Hadi’s government failed to properly run the affairs of the country and contain the growing wave of corruption and terror. 

Earlier this week, Colonel Sharaf Luqman, the spokesman for Yemen’s armed forces and Popular Committees, said civilians and Yemeni infrastructure have been the target of the Saudi aggression, during which over 2,600 people have been killed so far.

The United Nations has called for an immediate “humanitarian pause” of at least a few hours each day to allow deliveries of urgently needed aid to the conflict-weary country.

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