Saudi Arabia bombed Yemen's port city of Mukalla, targeting a shipment of weapons from the United Arab Emirates for separatist forces. The UAE later said it would withdraw its forces from Yemen.

At the start of the war, the Iran-backed rebel Houthi movement took control of most of northern Yemen, including the capital Sanaa, from the government. The conflict escalated in 2015, when a coalition of Arab states including Saudi Arabia and the UAE launched a military campaign to restore the government's rule.

The confrontation threatened to open a new front in Yemen’s decadelong war, with forces allied against the Iran-backed Houthis possibly turning their sights on each other in the Arab world’s poorest nation,

Saudi Arabia has publicly accused the United Arab Emirates – a fellow Gulf Arab state and former partner in the Yemen war – of undermining its national security, an unusually blunt charge that exposes a rift long kept behind closed doors.

The bombing followed tensions over the advance of Emirates-backed separatist forces known as the Southern Transitional Council.

Flights at Yemen’s Aden international airport were halted on Thursday, the latest sign of a deepening crisis between Gulf powers Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, whose rivalry is reshaping war-torn Yemen.