SANAA, April 15 (Xinhua) -- Yemen's Houthi militia said they fired seven ballistic missiles toward a Saudi Aramco oil site in Saudi Arabia's southwestern city of Jizan at Thursday dawn, causing a fire.
"The attack was accurate and caused a huge fire in the site," Houthi military spokesman Yehya Sarea said in a statement aired by the group's al-Masirah TV.
"At the same time, our forces launched four drones in the direction of the Patriot anti-missile system in Jizan," he added.
Meanwhile, the Saudi-led coalition forces said they intercepted and destroyed five ballistic missiles and four drones launched by the Houthi militia from Yemen toward Jizan.
"Shrapnel of the intercepted missiles fell on the campus of Jizan University, causing a small fire," the coalition said in a statement reported by the Saudi-owned Alarabiya TV.
This is the second Houthi attack this week against the Saudi oil company. On Monday, the Houthis said they launched two long-range ballistic missiles and explosive-laden drones toward Aramco refineries in the Saudi cities of Jeddah and Jubail, which the coalition forces said they intercepted.
Cross-border missile and drone attacks by the Iran-backed Houthis have escalated since February when the group began a major offensive against the coalition-backed Yemeni government army to capture the oil-rich province of Marib in central Yemen.
Yemen has been mired in a civil war since late 2014 when the Houthi rebel group seized control of several northern Yemeni provinces and forced the internationally recognized government of President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi out of the capital Sanaa.
The Saudi-led Arab coalition intervened in the Yemeni conflict in March 2015 to support Hadi's government.
