Yemen's Houthis just denied bombing Mecca and called for mass protests
18 September 2026 · 18 September 2026Share
The Grand Mosque in Mecca, as seen from above at night. File photo. Wurzelgnohm · CC0
Yemen's Houthi leader just went on TV and denied his group tried to hit Mecca with a drone.
And then he called for mass protests.
Abdul Malik al-Houthi gave the speech a few hours ago on Al-Masirah, the Houthi-run channel.
He called the Mecca claim an "utterly heinous lie."
And he's telling people to fill the streets tomorrow in Sanaa and other Houthi areas.
So that's not a quiet denial. That's a leader accused of threatening Islam's holiest city, asking his own people to march over it.
Here's what led to this.
Two days ago, Saudi Arabia said its air defences shot down a drone before it reached restricted airspace over Mecca. Colonel Turki al-Maliki, the Saudi-led coalition's spokesperson, says it happened just before 7pm local time, south of the city. He called Mecca's security a red line and said the coalition would respond.
Saudi Arabia's Foreign Ministry called it a "cowardly terrorist attack." It says the kingdom has the right to defend the two holy mosques, the pilgrims and its own people.
The Houthis denied it straight away. Yahya Saree, their military spokesperson, called the Saudi account propaganda. He says Houthi operations hit Saudi oil facilities and military bases, nowhere near the holy places.
But this time, al-Houthi went further than a denial.
He's accusing Saudi Arabia of using the claim itself as a weapon, to build support against the Houthis. He said the real threat to Mecca, Medina and Al-Aqsa Mosque comes from Israel. And he accused the United States of directly backing Saudi military operations, saying around 200 American military experts are involved.
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Perim Island and the Bab-el-Mandeb Strait, which separates Yemen from the Horn of Africa and connects the Red Sea to the Gulf of Aden. File photo. NASA · Public domain
Worth flagging: that number comes only from al-Houthi. Nobody independent has confirmed it.
Saudi officials say this is only the second time the Houthis have been accused of going after Mecca. The first was in 2017. The Houthis fired a missile from Yemen that time too, but they said it was aimed at a Saudi air base, not the city.
And this time, someone's dead.
Saudi civil defence says debris from the intercepted drone killed one person and injured two more, in Taif province. The dead man was a Yemeni resident of Saudi Arabia. It's the first civilian death since the Houthis stepped up their attacks on the kingdom. Saudi authorities say the drone was theirs.
Iran is urging caution. Its Foreign Ministry says a drone interception shouldn't be used to escalate tensions, or turned into an accusation against one side without evidence.
The Arab League's Secretary-General called the alleged attack extremely serious. Pakistan's Prime Minister backed Saudi Arabia over it, without naming the Houthis. But officials in Turkey and Pakistan told the Associated Press that Saudi Arabia hasn't actually asked for help under the three countries' defence pact.
And all of this is happening while the Houthis are already winning ground. They now hold effective control of Yemen's entire Red Sea coast, including the port of Mokha and Perim Island, right in the Bab el-Mandeb Strait. An estimated 125,000 people in Yemen have fled as they've advanced.
Here's the twist, though.
At the same time al-Houthi is on TV accusing Saudi Arabia and Israel, the Houthis are quietly telling Washington something else entirely. US officials reportedly met Houthi representatives in Muscat, Oman, around five days ago. There, the Houthis said they have no intention of attacking American ships, and won't hit Israeli or commercial vessels either, only Saudi ones. Donald Trump says the Houthis phoned his administration to say they don't want to fight the US.
So one message for Washington. A very different one for his own people, on camera.
What happens tomorrow, nobody actually knows yet.
Houthi-run media says al-Houthi called for two million people to march. But no independent outlet gives any number at all, and even the Houthi reporting is inconsistent on the figure. Whether Friday's protests happen at that scale, or spread beyond Houthi-controlled Yemen, is still completely open.
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