The US military broke its daily announcement of fresh strikes on the Islamic republic on Saturday, following 13 nights in a row hitting military targets there.Trump said he had not yet decided whether to launch major strikes on Iran, hours before the conflict widened across the region with Yemen's Houthi rebels claiming a missile attack on the southern Saudi city of Jizan.The Houthis had accused US ally Riyadh of a "dangerous escalation" after it struck military targets belonging to the group on Friday, following the rebels announcing a maritime blockade of the top oil producer and hitting its ships in the Red Sea.The flare-up marks a new front in a war that has engulfed the region following US-Israeli strikes on Tehran in February, and comes on top of Iran's parallel blockade of the Strait of Hormuz, Riyadh's only other maritime route.Riyadh did not immediately comment on the Houthis' Ansarollah media post on Telegram on Saturday that a "Yemeni missile strike" had sparked fires in Jizan.
The flare-up between Yemen's Houthi rebels and Saudi Arabia marks a new front of the Middle East war that has engulfed the region © Mohammed HUWAIS / AFP
But Riyadh's civil defence agency issued brief warnings to residents in the city, as well as Yanbu, early on Saturday.The warning came after the Saudi-led coalition said Friday it had hit Houthi sites and destroyed targets threatening commercial vessels in response to attacks on Red Sea shipping.A Yemeni security source told AFP a naval base in the port city of Hodeida and a military camp on Kamaran island were among the Saudi targets.The Houthis claimed attacks on two Saudi ships earlier this week, with Saudi Arabia confirming one of the attacks in the Red Sea.'Tipping point'The escalation came after Trump said he would hold off on a major operation as Tehran was now getting "serious" in talks with Washington."No I haven't," Trump told journalists in the Oval Office when asked if he had made a decision on hitting Iran hard, for now dialing back reports that he was increasingly frustrated with the war and mulling a large-scale military operation."Look, we're talking to them right now. I think they're getting more and more serious as the days go by, for maybe the obvious reason."
