AL-MUKALLA: Yemen’s army troops and allied tribesmen attacked the Iran-backed Houthis in two contested areas in Marib province in the first major counterattack since early last week, Yemen’s army commanders and state media said on Sunday.

Loyalists, backed by air support from Arab coalition warplanes, mounted a counteroffensive on Houthis in Murad Mountain and Al-Jeda’n, killing, wounding and capturing dozens of rebels and pushing the Houthis away from strategic locations near Marib city, Gen. Abdu Abdullah Majili, Yemen’s army spokesman, told Arab News by telephone on Sunday. 

“The national army troops and the tribesmen have taken the upper hand on the battlefields of Murad Mountain and Al-Jeda’n, where they assaulted the Houthis and managed to seize control of new areas as well as weapons,” Majili said, adding that government forces are still on the defensive in Serwah district, battling relentless Houthi assaults.

Since early last week, Houthis have resumed an unprecedented offensive on Yemen’s central city of Marib, an oil and gas-rich city and the government’s last stronghold in the northern part of Yemen, triggering heavy clashes with army troops and local tribesmen.

The continuing raging attack by the Houthis on Marib is the latest in a series of sporadic attempts by the rebels to capture the strategic city since January last year. 

Local media reports say that more than 100 Houthis and government troops have been killed in the previous 48 hours in fierce clashes in Al-Jeda’n, Serwah, Murad, Al-Mashjah and Helan, in Marib province. 

Comparing the current Houthi offensive on Marib with the previous attacks in 2020, the Yemeni army spokesman said that the current attack is more aggressive and the Houthis more determined to invade Marib, despite suffering heavy defeats.

“The national army is fighting off continuing attacks by the Houthis. We have foiled all of their suicidal attacks,” Majili said.

The government official did not give an exact figure for government forces killed in the fighting, only saying that a number were “martyred.”

Official media outlets have said over the last couple of days that Yemeni President Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi and his Deputy Ali Mohsen Al-Ahmer have mourned the death of several army commanders who were killed in fighting in Marib.

In a bid to woo the Yemeni army commanders and tribal leaders in Marib to switch sides, Abdullah Yahya Al-Hakim, head of the Houthis’ military intelligence, said on Saturday that the movement would pardon their enemies who desert the city. He added that they pushed toward Marib to punish government forces for “kidnapping” women, in reference to the eight female Houthi spies who were arrested in Marib last month.

Meanwhile, Yemen’s Foreign Ministry has repeated its call to the international community and the UN to condemn the Houthi attacks on Marib, government-controlled areas in Hodeidah and Saudi Arabia, stressing that the Houthis are contradicting their commitments to peace initiatives and previous agreements.

“Houthi violations in Hodeidah and attacks on Marib, which is a shelter for millions of internally displaced people fleeing Houthi oppression, coincide with their continued targeting of Saudi Arabia. It all confirms again how Houthis don’t care about agreements and seeking peace,” the ministry said in a statement on Sunday.