Who are the Houthis and what do they want?

Yemen's devastating civil war has flared up in recent months, with fierce fighting between the Iran-backed Houthi movement, which controls much of the country's north-west, and Saudi-backed pro-government forces.

In September, the Houthis seized part of Yemen's Red Sea coast near the Bab al-Mandab Strait, a chokepoint for global shipping at the southern entrance to the Red Sea. Their advance contributed to a further rise in oil prices following six months of war between the US, Israel and Iran.

At the start of October, pro-government forces said they had managed to regain control of territory overlooking Bab al-Mandab after launching a major counter-offensive with the support of intense Saudi air strikes.

The Houthis responded to the strikes by launching missiles and drones at military bases, energy facilities and airports in neighbouring Saudi Arabia. At least 13 people were killed when a missile hit Riyadh's international airport on 10 October - the deadliest attack in the kingdom in more than a decade.

They are an armed political and religious group from northern Yemen which champions the country's Zaidi minority. Zaidism is a branch of Shia Islam.

The Houthis declare themselves to be part of the Iranian-led "axis of resistance" against Israel, the US and the wider West - along with armed groups such as Hamas and Lebanon's Hezbollah movement.

Formally known as Ansar Allah (Partisans of God), the group emerged in the 1990s and takes its name from the movement's late founder, Hussein al-Houthi. His brother, Abdul Malik al-Houthi, has been its de facto leader since 2004.

In the early 2000s, the Houthis fought several rebellions against Yemen's long-time authoritarian president Ali Abdullah Saleh. They wanted greater autonomy for the group's homeland in the north of Yemen.

During the 2011 Arab Spring, a popular uprising forced Saleh to hand over power to his deputy, Abdrabbuh Mansour Hadi.

President Hadi's government was overwhelmed with problems and the Houthis seized control of the northern province of Saada before capturing the capital Sanaa in 2014.

In 2015, they seized large parts of western Yemen and forced Hadi to flee abroad, prompting a Saudi-led coalition to intervene on behalf of the government.

The fighting since then has reportedly left more than 150,000 people dead and triggered one of the world's worst humanitarian crises, with more than 22 million people in need of some form of aid, according to the UN.

The Houthis have continued to grow in strength, with UN experts estimating they had recruited up to 350,000 fighters by 2024. They control between one-quarter and one-third of Yemen's territory, where about three-quarters of the population live.

Saudi Arabia feared the Houthis would take over Yemen and make it a satellite of the kingdom's regional rival, Iran, when they ousted the government from Sanaa.

The Saudis formed a coalition with other Arab states that began an air campaign in 2015 aimed at restoring the government's authority. They received logistical and intelligence support from the US, UK and France.

But years of air strikes and fighting on the ground by the Yemeni military and anti-Houthi militias were unable to dislodge the Houthis from most of the territory they seized.

A temporary ceasefire was brokered in 2022 that largely halted the fighting. That year also saw Hadi transfer his powers to a new Presidential Leadership Council, which oversees the Aden-based government.

Soon after the start of the Gaza war in October 2023, the Houthis began firing drones and missiles towards Israel and at merchant vessels in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden, saying they were acting in support of the Palestinians.

Western countries deployed warships to protect shipping, and the US, UK and Israel carried out air strikes intended to degrade the Houthis' military capabilities. Israeli strikes also killed senior Houthi figures, including the prime minister of the group's self-declared government.

The Houthis paused attacks on Israel after the October 2025 ceasefire in Gaza but resumed them after the US and Israel attacked Iran in February 2026.

The informal ceasefire between the Houthis and the Saudis began to unravel in July.

The Houthis announced a "maritime embargo" against Saudi Arabia and began missile and drone attacks on Saudi airports, oil facilities and tankers in the Red Sea. They said they were retaliating for what they called the Saudi "blockade" of ports and airports in Houthi-controlled areas of Yemen, as well as an air strike on Sanaa airport that month which they blamed on Saudi Arabia.

This was followed by a rapid Houthi advance in September that captured as much as 130km (81 miles) of Yemen's south-western Red Sea coastline, including the port city of Mokha and the island of Perim (Mayyun).

The move gave the Houthis significant control of the strategic Bab al-Mandab Strait, but they insisted that they posed no threat to international shipping, except for Saudi-linked vessels.

In October, the Yemeni government announced the start of a new offensive aimed at retaking all territory held by the Houthis. Since then, pro-government forces have reportedly regained control of areas around Bab al-Mandab with the help of intense Saudi air strikes. But the Houthis have denied losing territory there.

Hundreds of people have reportedly been killed on the ground in Yemen during the escalation. The UN says more than 200,000 people have been newly displaced.

The Houthis' actions have caused renewed concern about disruption of world oil supplies. Bab al-Mandab became an important route for oil exports from Saudi Arabia after shipping through the Strait of Hormuz, on the other side of the Arabian Peninsula, was curtailed due to the US and Israel's war with Iran.

The situation has also been exacerbated by Houthi missile and drone attacks on Saudi airports and oil and gas facilities, as well as an attack in September on the kingdom's East-West Pipeline that was blamed on Iran-backed Iraqi militias.

The escalation has threatened to again draw in Western powers.

Following the deadly attack on Riyadh airport, US President Trump said he was going to "make a decision" about whether the US would join the Saudi strikes on the Houthis.

The UK meanwhile agreed in September to deploy a military aircraft to help refuel Saudi fighter jets in mid-air for "purely defensive missions".

Saudi Arabia and Western powers say Iran smuggled weapons - including drones, and cruise and ballistic missiles - to the Houthis during Yemen's civil war in violation of a UN arms embargo.

A panel of UN experts concluded in 2024 that the Houthis had been transformed into a powerful military organisation due to the transfer of material, assistance and training from Iran's Revolutionary Guards, Lebanon's Hezbollah movement and Iraqi specialists.

And a report in May 2026 by Conflict Armament Research (CAR) - after the start of the Iran war - found that whereas in the past Tehran shipped finished weapons to the Houthis, it was now increasingly sending parts which its proxies were able to assemble and was also sharing increasingly advanced missile technologies.

Iran has denied supplying weapons to the Houthis and says it only supports them politically.