CAIRO — Saudi Arabia said Saturday that its navy had evacuated 86 Arab and Western diplomats from the port city of Aden in southern Yemen, as a Saudi-led coalition conducted a third day of airstrikes against the Iranian-backed Houthi movement.
Separately, Saudi Arabia confirmed that an American helicopter had rescued two Saudi pilots who ejected from an F-15 fighter over waters south of Yemen. The official Saudi Press Agency said the pilots had ejected because of a “technical fault†and were “in good health.â€
The evacuation of the diplomats from Aden reflected the spreading chaos in Yemen as the Houthi-allied forces continued to advance, even under the pressure of the Saudi bombing. The breakdown of order has potentially grave consequences for the United States, because Yemen had been a central theater of the war with Al Qaeda, but the factional fighting has now forced the United States to withdraw its forces as well.
Aden is Yemen’s second largest city and had been the provisional headquarters of President Abdu Rabbu Mansour Hadi, the Saudi-backed Yemeni leader, since the Houthi forces overran the capital, Sana, in January. Mr. Hadi fled last month to Aden to make a last stand among his supporters in the south, but he, too, has now left Yemen, attending a meeting of Arab leaders on Saturday in Sharm el Sheikh, Egypt.
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Map
Annotated maps showing the Houthi rebels’ drive south, U.S. airstrikes and historical divisions.
The Houthi movement, based in northwestern Yemen, follows a form of Shiite Islam and has received financial support from Iran, the region’s Shiite power and the chief rival to Saudi Arabia. The Houthi surge has alarmed the Saudis about the possibility of an Iranian-backed group digging in on the southern tip of the Arabian Peninsula.
But the Houthis have also struck an alliance with Yemen’s former strongman, Ali Abdullah Saleh, who retained significant support among the Yemeni military and security forces even after he was forced from power in 2012. Those forces have now fractured, and major factions have sided with Mr. Saleh and the Houthis against Mr. Hadi and his Saudi backers.
Residents of Aden said Friday that fighting had broken out in pockets around the city. Houthi-allied forces were advancing. Military forces nominally working for Mr. Hadi had switched sides or deserted, and looters were pillaging military bases. Local militias with no affiliation with Mr. Hadi’s government were arming themselves to defend their neighborhoods or fight the Houthis.
Commercial flights to Yemen have been cut off, and the Saudi-led coalition has blockaded the ports.
The United States is providing intelligence and logistical support for the Saudi-led campaign, including conducting surveillance flights and providing refueling tankers, The Associated Press reported Saturday. State Department officials had said previously that the United States military was also helping the Saudis with targeting information.
Defense Department officials said the helicopter that rescued the two Saudi pilots had flown from a base in Djibouti, a small African nation that lies across a narrow strait from Yemen, The Associated Press reported. A destroyer, the Sterett, and an amphibious transport dock, the New York, were also involved, the report said.
The Houthi-controlled Interior Ministry in Sana said Saturday that at least 24 civilians were killed in Friday’s strikes, raising the two-day toll to 45 civilians as well as scores of fighters. Those numbers could not be confirmed.
Human Rights Watch said in a statement on Saturday that the Saudi-led air campaign had killed at least 11 and possibly as many as 34 civilians in Sana in the first two days of strikes. The group said that the 11 confirmed civilian deaths included two children.
Amnesty International reported that at least 14 civilian homes in a predominantly Houthi neighborhood of Sana had been destroyed.
Other strikes have hit the northern city of Saada, a center of the Houthi movement. The coalition’s forces have also struck the northern city of Hudaydah and the southern city of Taiz, as well as Aden, all places where the Houthis have made recent gains.
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