Saudi Arabia’s King Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud on Tuesday, 22 September 2026, branded Yemen’s Houthis a “terrorist militia” and condemned the attempt to target Mecca, describing it as a “heinous crime” and “a provocation to Muslims around the world”, according to Al Jazeera and Dawn, which published the report by the French news agency AFP.

He spoke at a cabinet meeting in Jeddah, recorded by the Saudi Press Agency, the kingdom’s official news agency: a rare intervention by the 90-year-old monarch, who has left day-to-day affairs to his son, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. Saudi Arabia says it intercepted a Houthi drone headed for Mecca on 15 September 2026, which Al Jazeera records as the first time a security alert had been activated in the city in nearly 10 years. Houthi leader Abdel-Malik al-Houthi denied the attack and called the Saudi accusation “a heinous lie”. Since then, Houthi missiles and drones have hit Saudi cities and energy infrastructure: the Saudi-led coalition said it intercepted a ballistic missile fired at Riyadh on 19 September 2026, sending a dark column of smoke from a fuel storage area at King Khalid International Airport.