Smoke billows following a Saudi airstrike in the Yemeni capital, Sana’a, on Nov. 27, 2020. (Photo by AFP)

Yemen’s army and Popular Committees have launched drone and missile attacks on several military positions in Saudi Arabia in retaliation for the kingdom’s aggression on their country.

Spokesman for the Yemeni Armed Forces Brigadier General Yahya Saree said in the early hours of Monday that the Yemeni forces have used five ballistic missiles and five drones in a joint operation on sensitive military positions in southwestern Saudi Arabia over the past 24 hours.

The operation targeted a camp of the Saudi National Guard in Najran, and military positions in Abha International airport in the city of Abha as well as King Khalid Air Base in Khamis Mushait.

Saree said in a tweet that the hit was accurate.

He stressed that the operation came in retaliation for the kingdom’s ongoing siege and aggression on Yemen.

Saudi Arabia and some of its regional allies, backed by the US and other Western powers, have been waging a devastating war on Yemen beginning in March 2015 to reinstall Yemen’s former president Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi, a staunch ally of Riyadh, and crush the popular Ansarullah movement.

The Saudi war, which Riyadh had claimed would last only a few weeks but is still ongoing, has failed to achieve its goals, but pushed Yemen to the brink, killed tens of thousands of innocent people, and destroyed the impoverished state’s infrastructure.

The United Nations has described the war on Yemen as the world’s worst humanitarian crisis.

Yemeni forces regularly target positions inside Saudi Arabia in response to the bloody war.

Saudi Arabia relies heavily on US-made Patriots to intercept missiles and drones fired at the kingdom on a near daily basis by Yemeni forces in retaliation for the Saudi airstrikes that have claimed the lives of thousands of civilians.

Earlier this month, the administration of US President Joe Biden said the Pentagon was cutting the number of troops and air defense units deployed to the Middle East, including withdrawing Patriot batteries and an anti-missile system, called THAAD, from Saudi Arabia.

Saudi Arabia has said the US decision to cut the number of Patriot batteries deployed to the kingdom would not affect its capabilities amid intensified Yemeni retaliatory attacks.

This will not affect the Saudi air defenses, Turki al-Maliki, a spokesman for the war coalition against Yemen, told reporters on June 20.