On Oct. 5, a Twitter account affiliated with al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) claimed credit for attacks targeting the Houthi rebels that took place on Oct. 2 and Oct. 3 in Amran and Sana’a provinces, respectively.
AQAP claims to have attacked a Houthi gathering with an improvised explosive device (IED) in northern Amran province on Oct. 2. The statement posted on Twitter states that AQAP fighters detonated the IED in the al Ahnoum region of Amran where a gathering of Houthis was taking place. Although the AQAP media wing, “Ansar al Shariah News,” did not have any details regarding the result of the attack, the AQAP statement noted that local media outlets report that the attack led to the death or injury of 15 Houthis.
The second AQAP attack took place on Oct. 3 in Sana’a and targeted what AQAP referred to as a “Houthi headquarters in the Yemeni capital, Sana’a.” This attack was carried out by AQAP fighters lobbing a grenade on the “Houthi headquarters” in the Habra region of Sana’a. The AQAP statement on the attack claimed vaguely that the guards protecting the headquarters were killed and injured in the attack.
These latest developments come amid an escalation of AQAP attacks against the Yemeni military and the Shiite Houthi rebels. The Houthis staged a lightning sweep of Sana’a on Sept. 22 and quickly consolidated their power in the capital in the following days. Since then, AQAP has declared an open war against the Houthis and called on Sunnis to take up arms against the Shiite rebels.
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