Yemeni government forces said Friday that they had recaptured a strategic mountain range in the country’s southwest, as fierce fighting with Houthi forces continued over high ground overlooking the coast and the Bab al-Mandab Strait. The area commands key supply routes toward Lahj and Aden, giving the battle significance far beyond the immediate front lines.
The Saudi-backed National Shield Forces said they had retaken Mount Numan and the Dar al-Kafir area, saying the Iran-backed Houthis were using the heights to monitor the surrounding area and shell nearby villages.
Houthi-affiliated media, however, denied that the mountains had been lost, saying the group’s fighters had repelled government forces attempting to advance toward Numan and neighboring areas. Independent verification of developments on the ground is difficult.
For Washington, the stakes extend far beyond Yemen. The fighting is unfolding near one of the world’s most important maritime passages and involves a group the United States designates as a terrorist organization.
At the same time, tensions are rising across the region, from the war between the United States and Iran to disruptions to shipping through the Strait of Hormuz to the rapidly escalating conflict between Saudi Arabia and the Houthis.
Controlling the Numan mountains would give the Houthis the ability to monitor parts of the Mokha coast, the Bab al-Mandab Strait and Mayyun Island. The mountains also form a defensive line protecting areas of Lahj and Aden and provide positions that could be used to attack coastal positions.
Since the Houthis seized large parts of Yemen in 2015, the group has retained control of parts of Al Wazi’iyah district and sections of the Numan mountain range.
After government forces and their allies withdrew from Mokha and parts of the western coast earlier this month, the mountain ranges east of the coast became a key component of their defensive lines.
The Houthis have intensified attacks in recent days on the Kahboub mountain range, which is linked to Numan to the south.
Kahboub is particularly important because it lies along routes used by government forces for supply and defense.
Yemeni military officials say control of Numan and Kahboub could give the Houthis greater ability to threaten the routes linking the coast with Lahj and Taiz. For government forces, however, holding the mountains would provide good defensive positions for Lahj and Aden while allowing them to launch attacks toward the coast.
Brig. Gen. Yasser Saleh, head of the Defense, Security and Risk Unit at the Yemen Future Center for Strategic Studies, told MBN that the government’s shortage of air-defense capabilities was placing its forces under significant pressure as the Houthis made extensive use of ballistic missiles and drones.
He said a Houthi takeover of Numan could allow the group to outflank government positions in Kahboub and advance toward Lahj, while also threatening the supply routes linking Lahj with Taiz.
Among the most strategically sensitive of those routes is the Heijat al-Abd Road, which connects Taiz to Lahj and onward to Aden. Saleh said a Houthi advance in Numan and Kahboub could threaten the road and increase pressure on government supply lines.
Adapted and translated from the original Arabic.
