Houthi media report funerals for dozens of fighters as Yemen fighting intensifies
Yemen Herald News 
SANAA, Yemen — Houthi-run media reported funerals for dozens of the movement’s fighters this month, including senior officers, as fighting with government forces intensified.
Saba TV, the Houthi-controlled broadcaster in Sanaa, said on Aug. 13 that the movement had buried 57 fighters over the previous 10 days.
The dead included 31 officers, among them three brigadier generals, according to that report.
The broadcaster did not say where the fighters were killed or in what circumstances.
The report was relayed by the Anadolu Agency and by Middle East Monitor.
Both outlets attributed the figures to Houthi state media. Neither published an independent count.
Al-Masirah, another Houthi-run channel, broadcast funeral ceremonies for at least 47 members of the movement.
Fourteen of them were officers, including two brigadier generals and six colonels, according to the broadcast.
The ceremonies were shown in Sanaa, Dhamar, Amran, Hajjah, Saada, al-Mahwit and Ibb.
The channel separately reported funerals for seven fighters, six in Amran province and one in Hajjah.
In other announcements, the movement said four of its members had been killed as fighting escalated.
An earlier statement reported the deaths of three fighters.
The movement does not publish a consolidated casualty figure, and its announcements overlap.
That makes the individual tallies difficult to add together.
Yemen Herald could not independently verify any of the figures.
Government-aligned forces have issued their own counts, which differ.
Those forces said more than 27 Houthi fighters were killed and 19 wounded in strikes in Taiz over three days, Middle East Monitor reported on Aug. 14.
That claim comes from the opposing party to the fighting and has not been confirmed by the Houthis.
Neither side’s figures have been verified by the United Nations or by an independent monitoring mission.
Yemen Monitor, an independent outlet, reported that dozens of dead and wounded Houthi fighters had arrived at hospitals in Sanaa.
It did not give a total.
Independent access to hospitals and front lines in Houthi-held areas is restricted, which limits outside verification of casualty reporting.
Funeral broadcasts have become one of the few public indicators of the movement’s losses.
The reports coincide with a period the United Nations has described as an escalation.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Türk, said on Aug. 17 that he was alarmed by the rising civilian toll.
Türk said at least 17 civilian casualties from Ansar Allah attacks had been reported in government-controlled areas since Aug. 6.
Two casualties were reported in Ansar Allah-controlled areas in late July, according to the same statement.
Ansar Allah is the formal name of the Houthi movement.
Türk urged all parties to exercise restraint.
Houthi sources told Agence France-Presse that the movement was massing forces for an offensive on Yemen’s western coast.
The government has not confirmed that account.
Fighting has spread across several fronts, with clashes reported in Marib, al-Jawf, Hadramout, Hodeidah, Taiz, al-Dhale and Lahj, Al Jazeera reported.
The Houthis launched attacks on government forces in Marib, Hadramawt, Shabwa and Dhale in early August.
The group fired ballistic missiles and drones at positions of the government-aligned Emergency Forces in Hadramawt and Marib on Aug. 6.
Houthi forces fired six ballistic missiles into Marib in mid-August, striking residential neighbourhoods and displacement camps.
Yemen’s information ministry described those strikes as a threat to civilian life.
The Houthis have also attacked Mokha, the government-held port on the southern Red Sea coast.
A strike there on Aug. 14 killed at least eight people, according to a Yemeni government military official.
The Houthis said they struck a Saudi oil installation the same day.
The government said its forces carried out more than 100 operations against the Houthis in a 24-hour period, later putting the figure at 133.
Casualty and operational claims from both sides during the escalation have generally not been independently verified.
The Emergency Forces are a government-aligned formation operating in Hadramawt.
Marib hosts a large displaced population and has been a front line for years.
Mokha lies on Yemen’s Red Sea coast north of the Bab al-Mandab strait.
The United Nations special envoy warned that Yemen faces its highest risk of a return to full-scale war since the 2022 truce.
Hans Grundberg has held the envoy post since 2021 and mediated the 2022 truce.
The International Crisis Group published an assessment in August titled “Yemen’s War is Returning”.
Yemen has been divided since 2014, when the Houthis took Sanaa.
The internationally recognised government operates from Aden.
A Presidential Leadership Council chaired by Rashad al-Alimi has held executive authority since April 2022.
A UN-brokered truce that began in April 2022 lapsed that October and has not been formally renewed.
That truce was the longest sustained pause in the fighting since 2015.
Exchanges of fire have continued along fronts in Marib, al-Jawf, Taiz and the Red Sea coast.
The March 2026 Humanitarian Needs and Response Plan recorded more than 22 million people in Yemen as needing humanitarian assistance.
It listed 18.3 million people as acutely food insecure and 5.2 million as internally displaced.
More than 2.2 million children under five are acutely malnourished, 516,157 of them severely, according to the plan.
The plan seeks $2.16 billion to reach 12 million people.
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