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Fighting has continued between Iran-backed rebels and Saudi Arabia, adversely impacting the kingdom's economy and security. Still, Saudi officials have stopped warning of Houthi attacks in an effort to calm fears.
Thursday's attacks on Riyadh airport killed three people, Saudi authorities said on Friday, as Yemen's Houthi group stepped up missile strikes on the kingdom and tried to shut down its airspace in an escalating war triggered by the US-Iran conflict. The strikes, which also injured several people, damaged a Saudia Airlines plane and sent smoke billowing over the airport, led many airlines to cancel flights to the Saudi capital days before it is due to host a major meeting of global oil chiefs.
It's unclear how the Saudis can defuse the threat presented by the Houthis in next-door Yemen or who they can turn to for help. The US isn't interested, the Europeans are hedging and nobody wants open conflict with Iran.
François Picard is pleased to welcome Barbara Slavin, Distinguished Fellow at the Stimson Center. She describes the US-Iran conflict as a dangerous combination of military escalation, diplomatic ambiguity and political calculation. Slavin sees an absence of true diplomacy: The recent indirect contacts between Washington and Tehran, mediated by Qatar, has been too limited and too fragile to produce any serious breakthrough. For her, this amounts to “kabuki diplomacy”: they half engage while positioning themselves against any appearance of compromise.
It was the first air raid alert in Riyadh since an escalation in fighting between the Houthis in Yemen and Saudi Arabia.
