American among 12 dead after Iran-backed Houthis strike Saudi airport
One American was killed in a Houthi missile attack that rocked Riyadh International Airport Saturday, leaving 12 dead and over 300 wounded.
President Trump warned the US military was considering joining Saudi Arabia in response to the terror group’s strikes that shut down the airport and sent scores of people to the hospital, some in critical condition.
Trump said he plans to speak to Saudi Prince Mohammed Bin Salman, CBS News reporter Jennifer Jacobs posted on X.
Several people were seen lying injured on the ground inside the airport, with blood stains covering the floor.
“All injured individuals are receiving the necessary medical care at several hospitals,” the Saudi General Authority for Civil Aviation said in a statement.
Four Saudi citizens were killed along with individuals from the US, Egypt, Jordan, Sudan, Bangladesh and one Palestinian, according to the agency.
The attack marks the deadliest on a Gulf Arab country since the start of the Iran war in February.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio condemened the attack, and said the US stands with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
“These reprehensible attacks demonstrate a blatant disregard for innocent civilian life. They must stop now,” Rubio said in a statement on X.
Residents heard at least two loud blasts that shook the capital, as plumes of black smoke emanated from the airport, and more than a dozen ambulances raced through.
“Everyone was running,” a witness told Agence France Presse as the airport was being evacuated.
The attack on a passenger terminal at King Khalid Airport was caused by the Iranian-backed Houthis, a diplomatic source told the news agency.
Asked Saturday if Washington would provide military support to Saudi Arabia in retaliating against the continued offensives from the terror group, Trump left the door open.
“We may,” he told reporters. “We’re going to look at it. We just found out about the recent attack, so we’ll make a decision. We move very quickly.”
The Saudi Civil Aviation Authority announced the temporary suspension of flights.
“This attack comes amid the ongoing blatant attacks targeting civil aviation facilities in the kingdom,” it wrote in a statement on X.
The Houthis claimed responsibility for the attack Saturday, saying it was retaliation for Saudi Arabia’s renewed bombing campaign with the rebel group across the border in Yemen.
All flights to Riyadh were either diverted or cancelled, with airlines including Kuwait Airways, Etihad Airways and Qatar Airways shuttering travel between their respective hubs and the Saudi Arabia capital into Monday.
Nearly 300 flights were cancelled Saturday, according to flight tracking sites.
Four people, including a Saudi pilot, were killed in two other Houthi strikes on the airport this week in an unprecedented barrage on the Kingdom that has opened a new front in the war in Iran.
It also comes during a marked escalation in renewed fighting between Yemen’s Saudi-backed government forces and the Houthi terrorists.
The Yemen-based Houthis — one of Tehran’s proxy groups — have renewed hostilities with Saudi Arabia, which supports Yemen’s government, after the rebels seized key stretches of the Red Sea coast — adding to the turmoil rattling already-shaken oil markets.
Meanwhile, Yemeni government forces said they had driven the Houthis from the strategic Bab el Mandeb Strait as they pushed to reclaim Red Sea coastal territory — a claim the rebels denied.
“The Bab al-Mandeb has been cleansed of the remnants of the terrorist Houthi militia,” Saudi Arabia’s ambassador to Yemen, Mohammad Al-Jaber, wrote on X Friday.