Saudi Arabia Must Take the Initiative to End the War

Saudi Arabia’s King Khalid International Airport in Riyadh came under a major drone and missile attack on Saturday night by Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi armed group. At least 12 people, including two Bangladeshis, were killed and 309 were injured. The victims included four Saudi nationals, two Bangladeshis, and one each from the United States, Egypt, Jordan, Syria, Palestine and Sudan. Airport operations were temporarily suspended following the attack. We condemn such attacks. A senior Houthi official has claimed responsibility for the strike.

A few days before the attack, Houthi rebels had urged airlines to avoid Saudi airspace except for routes over the holy cities of Mecca and Medina. The strike on King Khalid International Airport followed shortly after that announcement.

The day after the attack, the Saudi-led military coalition and Yemeni government forces launched heavy airstrikes on several strategic military bases in the Houthi-controlled capital, Sanaa. Yemeni forces also began a major offensive against Houthi positions along the coast. According to the Houthis, the Saudi-led coalition has carried out hundreds of airstrikes across their territory in recent weeks. The air campaign, which began on September 3, has killed 91 people in Yemen, most of them women and children.

Senior Houthi official Mohammed al-Bukhaiti confirmed that the group’s forces carried out Saturday’s attack in Riyadh. He claimed it was retaliation for Saudi airstrikes on civilian infrastructure and other targets in Yemen. Al-Bukhaiti said the Houthis launched the attack to make the world understand that Yemen’s airports, seaports, wedding and funeral venues, hospitals and markets must not be attacked or damaged. He added that the same rules applied to civilian institutions everywhere in the world.

International security analysts fear that the renewed conflict between Saudi Arabia and the Houthis could spread across the Middle East and even threaten African countries. This raises an important question: why has Saudi Arabia become involved in the conflict again?

In early 2014, Houthi rebels captured Yemen’s Saada governorate and later seized the capital, Sanaa. President Abdrabbuh Mansur Hadi was ousted and fled to Saudi Arabia, where he took refuge. In March 2015, at Mr. Hadi’s request, a Saudi-led military coalition launched an unsuccessful campaign against the Houthis to restore his government. The United States supported the effort.

The Houthis follow the Shia tradition of Islam and receive support from Iran. Yemen has become a major battleground in the geopolitical rivalry between Saudi Arabia and Iran as both countries seek to maintain their influence in the Middle East.

According to international analysts, Saudi Arabia should not have intervened in Yemen’s internal politics. The country entered the conflict largely through force and devastated one of the poorest Muslim-majority nations through repeated attacks. Violence, hunger and disease have killed more than 100,000 people in the brutal war. The United Nations has described Yemen as facing one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises. The World Food Programme (WFP) has said that five million people in Yemen are facing famine, while four million have already been displaced by the war.

Yet world leaders, human rights organisations and the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), the largest body of Muslim-majority countries, have remained largely silent about the suffering of the Yemeni people. Despite its sustained and devastating air campaign, the Saudi-led coalition has failed to defeat the Houthis. The group remains in control of much of northern Yemen. International analysts say neither side can win the war. Instead, it has become an “endless war”.

A ceasefire between the Saudi-led coalition and the Houthis began on March 30, 2022, under United Nations mediation. Initially agreed for two months, it was subsequently renewed twice. The truce brought some relief and relative calm to Yemen, lasting until the Iran-US-Israel war began in February this year. The conflict then spread across the region.

More recently, the Houthis sent Saudi Arabia a two-week ceasefire proposal through Oman. Instead of accepting the proposal, the Saudi-led coalition launched further attacks against the group. Analysts believe that if Saudi Arabia had agreed to the truce, renewed attacks and escalation might have been avoided.

Saudi Arabia is often accused of treating poorer Muslims with disregard because of its wealth and power. Its military coalition has killed and injured large numbers of people in Yemen, displaced millions and pushed the country towards famine. Rather than consistently working to protect the wider Muslim world, Saudi Arabia is often seen as prioritising its own interests and those of the United States and its allies. Critics argue that its military actions have contributed to the killing of fellow Muslims, while it has done little to promote unity across the Muslim world.

Somaliland is another example cited in the debate over Saudi Arabia’s role in Muslim affairs. After decades of civil war in Somalia, the region declared independence in 1991. For nearly 35 years, no country formally recognised it. On December 26, 2025, Israel became the first country to recognise Somaliland, with US support. The Somali government condemned the move as an attack on its sovereignty and an unlawful act. Saudi Arabia, however, has remained silent on the issue.

Tensions between Saudi Arabia and the Houthis also increased after the group accused the Saudi monarchy of being responsible for the bombing of Sanaa airport in July. The Saudi-backed Yemeni government later acknowledged responsibility for the bombing, saying it was intended to prevent an unauthorised Iranian aircraft from landing.

The Houthis had long been angered by Saudi Arabia’s restrictions and blockade of Yemeni airspace. In response, they announced a policy of “blockade for blockade” and imposed restrictions on Saudi shipping in the Red Sea. Houthi leaders believe they can inflict even greater damage on Saudi Arabia than the damage Saudi Arabia can cause them.

This suggests that the cycle of retaliation and warfare is heading towards an endless escalation. Muslims are gaining nothing from this conflict except further suffering and loss of life. Muslims are killing fellow Muslims while Western powers watch from the sidelines.

Saudi Arabia must recognise this reality and understand that Western powers may be using it as a pawn in their own strategic interests. As an influential country in the Muslim world, Saudi Arabia should take responsibility for ending the war through dialogue and mutual understanding, in the interests of its own people and the wider Muslim world—not simply in support of Western objectives.

It must avoid falling into what critics describe as a Western trap, stop actions that lead to the deaths of fellow Muslims and abandon aggression driven by wealth and power. Saudi Arabia should change its policies and work to strengthen unity and brotherhood among Muslim countries.

Its pursuit of this conflict has raised fears of wider instability across the Middle East and even Africa. If the war spreads further, Saudi Arabia must accept responsibility for the consequences. The country should act now to help end the fighting before more lives are lost and the crisis grows beyond control.