Houthi Attack on Aden Palace Kills Five, Yemen Health Minister Says
Yemen’s health minister reported five killed and 16 wounded in the 15 October attack on the Maashiq palace complex. The government said the prime minister and cabinet were safe.
The casualties included security personnel and civilian workers, Health Minister Qasim Buhaibeh said in the tally carried by AFP. Earlier accounts focused on guards and gave lower numbers. Those reports describe the same attack and should not be added to the minister's figure.
How the casualty accounts changed
An early Associated Press account reported two deaths and six injuries. Other early reporting put the deaths at two guards, while an intermediate AFP account cited four dead and ten wounded. The later named ministerial tally located for this article was five dead and 16 wounded.
The publications' revision times could not all be placed on a common clock, and the time of the minister's original statement was not established. The five and 16 figures are therefore the latest named official account located, not a final independently audited toll. They concern Aden alone.
The government describes missiles and drones
A cabinet statement published by Saba, the news agency of Yemen's internationally recognized government, described missiles and drones striking Maashiq in Aden on 15 October. It reported casualties among the complex's guards and condemned the attack as terrorism. AFP separately cited the information minister's account of five missiles.
Maashiq serves as a government headquarters in Aden, the southern city used as the government's temporary capital. Saudi Arabia backs that government. Saba said institutions would continue operating from the city and that the attack would not halt their work.
Saba also said Presidential Leadership Council chairman Rashad al-Alimi contacted council members and Prime Minister Shaya Mohsen al-Zindani to check their safety and ordered care for the casualties. Those calls and the government's assurance establish its public response, not the prime minister's precise location when the weapons struck.
The Houthis give a different target account
Reuters reported that a Houthi spokesman claimed the attack targeted a Saudi military headquarters in Aden. That is the Iran aligned terrorist group's description of its objective. It should not be substituted for the government's identification of the palace complex or treated as proof that a particular command facility was hit.
The missile count also differs from the number of confirmed impacts: announcing five launches does not establish five successful strikes. Israel News Pulse could not independently find a complete damage assessment or a verified breakdown of missile and drone impacts at the site.
Riyadh's casualties are a separate ledger
The Saudi led coalition, the military alliance supporting the recognized Yemeni government, separately reported 17 deaths and 333 injuries from attacks on King Khalid International Airport in Riyadh this month. Reuters carried the coalition spokesman's figures alongside accounts of attacks on other Saudi facilities and retaliatory operations in Yemen.
Those numbers must not be combined with Aden's casualties. Earlier coverage used 12 dead and 309 injured for the Riyadh airport attacks, but the original bulletins' matching time periods were not reconciled here. The new coalition statement is a separately attributed update, not a basis for calculating five additional deaths or 24 additional injuries from a single later strike.
