Iran celebrates US election loss while Houthis target Saudi airports
Tehran leaders claim voters rejected the war, and Yemeni rebels claim missile hits on King Khalid International Airport as UN peacekeepers prepare to leave Lebanon.
By Takeshi Faure ·
Tehran streets filled with cheering crowds on Wednesday.
The celebration followed Tuesday’s US midterm elections, where Democrats gained control of Congress. Iranian officials framed the result as a direct rejection of President Donald Trump’s war strategy against the Islamic Republic. Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf, the country’s chief negotiator and parliament speaker, posted on the social media platform X that Americans said no to war. He warned that if the US government ignored the vote for change, it would learn their no comes with a nightmare.
The political shift comes as the region remains tense over the potential for renewed US military operations. For weeks, diplomats have held talks aimed at preventing new fighting. Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader, dismissed the idea that Washington would alter its approach to the Islamic Republic despite the domestic political change. The mutual hostility was visible in Tehran, where thousands marched through the capital on Wednesday. The government organized the event to mark the anniversary of the 1979 takeover of the US Embassy. Demonstrators burned American and Israeli flags and chanted death to America and death to Israel.
In Yemen, the Iran-backed Houthi rebels claimed they fired strikes on targets in Saudi Arabia. Yahya Saree, a Houthi military spokesperson, said rebels fired a ballistic missile toward King Khalid International Airport in Riyadh. He described the damage to the airport as major. Saree also claimed the group fired a drone at a radar installation and a ballistic missile at a command and control center in Jazan province. The Associated Press could not independently verify these claims. The Saudi information ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The Saudi civil defense issued an alert in Riyadh overnight and warned of potential danger in Jazan and Najran early Wednesday.
Houthi health authorities reported that an airstrike killed at least seven people in Taiz province. The strike hit a house in the district of Maqbanah, killing two children and wounding six others. The Houthi-run health ministry blamed Saudi Arabia for the attack. Footage aired by Houthi media showed a heavily damaged concrete building with large sections of the roof and walls collapsed. The fighting in Yemen has intensified since the civil war resumed more than three months ago, pitting the Houthis against Saudi Arabia and the internationally recognized Yemeni government.
In Lebanon, UN peacekeeping chief Jean-Pierre Lacroix urged the Security Council to act before the UNIFIL mission ends on December 31. Lacroix warned of a security vacuum between Israeli forces and the Lebanese army when the third-party presence withdraws. He questioned who would monitor the Blue Line and prevent unintended clashes in the border region. The Security Council is scheduled to discuss the issue on November 19.
The Israeli military said it struck two suspects in the Lebanese village of Qabrikha, killing one person and wounding another. The ministry reported the strike hit a motorcycle. This was the first such drone strike in nearly a month, following a US-brokered ceasefire in late June that ended the latest Israel-Hezbollah war.
