Houthis reported within 80 km of Aden after push into Lahij's Al-Maqatirah district

Yemen's Houthi movement has advanced to within about 80 km of Aden, the seat of the internationally recognised government, according to a Reuters report circulated on social media on Nov 2. A post by @not_now56 summarising the report said the group had seized Al-Maqatirah district in Lahij governorate as fighting reached Tur al-Bahah, and described it as the Houthis' closest approach to the city since 2015 ¹.

Reuters attributed its account to four military sources who spoke on Monday. The agency said the Houthis had begun their assault on government positions in Al-Maqatirah three days earlier. In the portion of the report available for review, Reuters described the start of the offensive but did not clearly state that the district had fallen. The claim that it was captured comes from the social media summaries ¹².

A separate post by @FaytuksNetwork said the group had taken Al-Maqatirah, forcing government troops to pull back and severing the road linking Aden and Taiz ². Neither the Yemeni government nor the Houthis had publicly commented on the reported advance, and no casualty figures have been reported. The description of the move as the closest approach since 2015 could not be independently verified.

According to the military sources cited by Reuters, the advance could allow Houthi forces to outflank government troops along the mountain ranges that overlook the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, a key shipping lane at the southern entrance to the Red Sea. Reuters also said attacks on Aden itself have intensified in recent weeks, including a Houthi strike on the city's airport after an evacuation warning and an attack on the presidential palace in October.

Al-Maqatirah and Tur al-Bahah lie in Lahij governorate, northwest of Aden and close to the boundary with Taiz governorate, on terrain between the Taiz front lines and the southern routes toward Aden and the Bab el-Mandeb ¹. The Houthis were driven out of Aden in 2015, and the government has used the port city as its temporary capital since then.

The reported ground fighting comes amid a wider escalation in the region. Other accounts in recent days described a missile strike on a health centre in Lahij's Al-Mudharaba district, a reported Saudi airstrike on a plastics plant in western Taiz, and reported Houthi missile strikes on sites in the Saudi cities of Riyadh and Dammam. Separately, US strikes were reported on Iran's Qeshm Island near the Strait of Hormuz.

Key details of the Lahij offensive remain unsettled. The reports rest on unnamed military sources relayed through a single news agency and on social media posts, and accounts differ on whether Al-Maqatirah has been captured or remains contested. Whether the Aden–Taiz road has in fact been cut has not been confirmed by officials on either side ¹².