Saudi capital's airport reopens to limited traffic, and other Mideast news
Riyadh’s King Khalid International Airport was open for domestic flights on Wednesday following multiple Houthi strikes on the Saudi capital this month.
Later Wednesday, an attack on King Fahd International Airport in eastern Saudi Arabia left one Saudi resident dead, the Saudi Civil Aviation Authority said. Global flight-tracking service Flightradar24 said flights have been diverted away from the airport in Damman.
The United States ordered some diplomats to leave Saudi Arabia as fears of escalating Houthi attacks rise.
Here is the latest news from the Middle East on Wednesday. Read our full coverage here.
One Saudi resident was killed in an attack on King Fahd International Airport in eastern Saudi Arabia on the Persian Gulf near Bahrain and Qatar, the Saudi Civil Aviation Authority announced early Thursday.
The aviation authority also said eight people were injured in the late Wednesday attack and the airport in Dammam suffered some material damages. Global flight-tracking service Flightradar24 said on X that flights have been diverted away from the airport.
Authorities did not say who carried out the attack or provide further details. The Iranian-backed Houthis h ave not commented on the attack.
King Fahd airport has been attacked previously amid a wider wave of Houthi missile and projectile strikes targeting major airports in Saudi Arabia.
The State Department is ordering some diplomats and the families of U.S. government employees to leave Saudi Arabia following a series of deadly attacks in the country by Iran-backed Houthi rebels and rising fears of an escalation in hostilities.
The department said Wednesday it had ordered the departure of nonessential staff at the U.S. Embassy in Riyadh and its satellite consulates. The embassy had been badly damaged at the start of the Iran war and had been operating with only a skeleton staff for months, although some diplomats had returned in recent months.
In a new travel alert, the department said, “Iranian-supported Houthis have engaged in hostilities against Saudi Arabia, including attacks on civilian airports and other critical infrastructure resulting in civilian casualties and severe travel disruptions. The hostilities have the potential to escalate rapidly beyond that immediate area.”
A limited number of Saudi airlines took off and landed at the country’s main airport on Wednesday, two days after authorities notified airlines that they could resume operations with prior permission.
Saudia and FlyNas were operating flights Wednesday, according to flight-tracking data published by FlightAware. Major carriers, including Lufthansa and Air France, have canceled flights through mid-November.
Riyadh’s King Khalid International Airport has been hit multiple times this month by Yemen’s Houthi rebels and shut down on Oct. 10.
The Houthis have acknowledged attacking the airport, claiming without evidence that Saudi Arabia provided military equipment to government forces through the facility.
A billboard-like art installation that went on display north of Iran's capital features a live actor portraying U.S. President Donald Trump behind bars. A mockup of a prison cell protrudes from the billboard where the actor walks and occasionally sits. It went on display late Tuesday in Tajrish Square.
“Not seeing this scene is a crime,” is written on the billboard, while other messages include a reference to an early September U.S. strike on a wedding ceremony in the southern Iranian town port of Sirkik that Iranian state media said killed two women and two children and wounded more than 60 other people.
Tehran resident Farzaneh Arabzadeh, 30, said she hopes the scene becomes reality because Trump started the war by attacking Iran and "did something that put our people in a worse situation.”
Houthi military spokesman Brig. Gen. Yahya Saree said a ballistic missile struck a military camp adjacent to Yemen's Aden airport in Khor Maksar district.
The Houthis claim the military camp houses a command center for the Saudi-led forces fighting the rebels.
A transportation ministry official in Aden said airport operations were temporarily suspended and the tarmac wasn't damaged. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to brief the media.
This is the second time the Houthis claim to have targeted the military camp inside the airport complex in five days and the third this month.
— By Sara El Deeb in Beirut and Samy Magdy in Cairo
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said Wednesday on X that Iran remains open to diplomacy if the U.S. demonstrates a willingness to build trust and reach a resolution.
But if the U.S. "chooses war over diplomacy, it’ll certainly result in an even greater strategic failure,” he added.
That echoed remarks he wrote in the Financial Times but gave no details of talks with Washington through mediators on Iran’s recent seven-day proposal to end the war and fully reopen the Strait of Hormuz.
Meanwhile, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio told reporters on Wednesday that mediation efforts are welcomed, though the final decision on terms rests with Trump.
Brad Lander, a Democrat running for a New York seat in the U.S. House of Representatives, was briefly detained by Israeli police on Wednesday as he joined rabbis and other volunteers accompanying Palestinian farmers during the annual olive harvest in the occupied West Bank.
Dozens of other volunteers also were detained, according to a spokesperson for Protect the Harvest, the group that organized the visit.
Israeli police said four foreign activists will be referred for a deportation hearing, while 32 people were questioned and released and will be prohibited from returning to the area. Another 40 were released because there were no grounds for further detention, police said.
The Israeli foreign ministry said in a post on X that Lander was “harvesting headlines” in “a calculated political provocation.”
This year’s Palestinian olive harvest has been the most violent in recent history, according to Israeli rights group Yesh Din and the Palestinian Farmers’ Union.
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This report will be updated throughout the day as new developments emerge.
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