Yemen’s Houthis Claim They Shot Down Saudi F-15 Jet Over Marib
Yemen’s Houthi movement said it shot down a Saudi Arabian F-15 fighter jet over the central Marib province, an escalation Saudi Arabia had not confirmed as of Wednesday, amid a widening campaign of Houthi strikes on the kingdom and a broader regional war.
Houthi military spokesman Yahya Saree said late Tuesday that the aircraft was struck by a locally manufactured missile while flying in support of Saudi-backed government forces near Marib. The group released video and photographs, aired on the Houthi-affiliated al-Masirah television network, that it said showed a targeting system locking onto an aircraft, burning wreckage and armed men standing near debris bearing a Saudi flag.
Saree said Houthi air defenses also fired on two additional formations of Saudi F-15 and Eurofighter Typhoon jets that entered the area afterward, apparently searching for the downed aircraft, and forced them to withdraw. That portion of the claim, like the shootdown itself, has not been independently verified.
Saree’s description of the weapon used was inconsistent: he was reported in some accounts as saying an air-to-air missile brought down the jet, and in others as citing a surface-to-air system. He did not identify the weapon by name.
No independent confirmation from either side
News organizations including Reuters and CNN said they could not verify or geolocate the footage, and Saudi Arabia had made no official statement on the claim by the time this report was filed. The kingdom’s silence stood in contrast to its response to some past Houthi claims. In 2018, a Saudi-led coalition spokesman rejected a similar Houthi assertion as recycled footage from an earlier failed attempt. In January 2024, the U.S. Central Command said no American aircraft had been lost over Yemen after Houthi forces claimed to have downed a jet.
Military analysts noted that a confirmed loss would mark only the second time an F-15 has been shot down by hostile fire during the broader conflict now underway across the Middle East; Houthi officials have separately claimed additional F-15 losses this year that Riyadh has not acknowledged. The aircraft involved in Tuesday’s incident appeared to be an F-15SA, the newest variant flown by the Royal Saudi Air Force and a mainstay of the kingdom’s strike and air-defense fleet.
Fighting resumes after 2022 truce collapsed
The reported shootdown came amid the sharpest escalation in the Saudi-Houthi conflict since a United Nations-brokered truce took hold in April 2022. Fighting resumed after a Houthi attempt to fly a plane from Tehran to the Houthi-held capital, Sanaa, in defiance of a Saudi-led air and naval blockade; a coalition airstrike hit the Sanaa airport runway to stop the plane from landing. The Houthis responded with missile and drone attacks on Saudi Arabia and declared a blockade on shipping bound for Saudi ports in the Red Sea.
Government forces backed by Saudi Arabia and Houthi fighters have since clashed on multiple fronts, including Taiz, the western Red Sea coast, al-Jawf, Marib and Dhalea provinces. Aid agencies said at least 194 people were killed and 880 wounded over a recent two-week span of fighting. The Houthis have also pressed an offensive along Yemen’s western coast, taking a Red Sea port city and, according to a local official and witnesses cited by AFP, the island of Mayyun in the Bab al-Mandeb strait, a chokepoint Saudi Arabia has relied on increasingly for crude exports.
The Houthis have carried out missile and drone strikes on Saudi cities including Khamis Mushait, Abha, Jizan, Najran and Taif, and on energy infrastructure at the Red Sea port of Yanbu, Saudi and Houthi accounts say. Saudi Arabia has said it intercepted many of the projectiles and has carried out air raids on Houthi-held provinces in response.
Drone intercepted near Mecca adds to tensions
The reported jet loss followed a separate incident Tuesday in which Saudi Arabia said its air defenses intercepted and destroyed a Houthi drone before it could reach airspace over Mecca, Islam’s holiest city. Saudi coalition spokesman Turki al-Malki called the security of the holy sites a “red line” and said the kingdom would take deterrent measures against the Houthis. The Houthis rejected the accusation, saying their targets were Saudi oil facilities and military bases far from religious sites.
The Organisation of Islamic Cooperation condemned the alleged attack, and Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, whose country recently signed a defense agreement with Saudi Arabia, denounced it without directly naming the Houthis. Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman has since sought the backing of Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sissi, whose office said Egypt supported Saudi Arabia’s position; Egyptian officials gave no indication of military assistance. U.S. President Donald Trump said over the weekend that Houthi representatives had told his administration they did not want to fight the United States, and that he expected the situation to be resolved.
Background
Saudi Arabia has led a military coalition against the Houthis, an Iran-aligned group that follows the Zaidi branch of Shiite Islam, since 2015, after the Houthis seized Sanaa and ousted Yemen’s internationally recognized government. The war has killed tens of thousands of people and displaced millions in what the United Nations has called one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises. A 2022 truce sharply reduced cross-border fighting for roughly four years before this month’s collapse.
The current escalation is unfolding against the backdrop of a wider Middle East war between the United States and Israel on one side and Iran on the other, which began at the end of February, according to regional reporting. Saudi Arabia has in the past month entered a defense arrangement with Turkey and Pakistan, a pact now being tested by the renewed Yemen fighting.
What follows
Neither the reported downing of the Saudi F-15 nor the Houthis’ account of a follow-on clash with additional jets has been confirmed by Saudi authorities or independent observers, and the fate of any crew aboard the aircraft, if the incident occurred, remains unknown. Saudi Arabia has not said whether it will respond directly to the claim. Fighting in Marib, Taiz and along Yemen’s Red Sea coast was continuing as of Wednesday, with both sides reporting new strikes.
Sources
Attribution below distinguishes claims verified by multiple outlets from those resting on the Houthi account alone.
Wire services and international press
- CNN, “Houthis release video claiming to show downed Saudi F-15 fighter as Iran-backed rebels press their lightning advance.” https://www.cnn.com/2026/09/17/middleeast/houthi-saudi-f15-shootdown-intl-hnk-ml
- Al Jazeera, “Saudi-Houthi fighting in Yemen escalates: What happened, and what’s next?” https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2026/9/8/saudi-houthi-fighting-in-yemen-escalates-what-happened-and-whats-next
- Al Jazeera, “Saudi-led coalition intercepts Houthi drone headed for Mecca.” https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2026/9/16/saudi-led-coalition-intercepts-drone-headed-for-mecca
- NPR, “Houthi attacks on Saudi Arabia ignite fires at oil facilities and wound 73 people.” https://www.npr.org/2026/09/08/g-s1-142296/houthi-attacks-saudi-arabia
- NBC News, “Saudi Arabia accuses Houthis of attacking Mecca, warns holy city is a ‘red line’.” https://www.nbcnews.com/world/middle-east/saudi-arabia-mecca-houthis-drone-iran-war-trump-oil-gas-prices-rcna598075
- ABC News (Australia), “Houthi drone attack shot down near Mecca religious site, Saudi-led coalition says.” https://www.abc.net.au/news/2026-09-16/houthi-drone-attack-intercepted-near-mecca-saudi-arabia-says/107158928
Local and regional press (Houthi and Saudi-aligned accounts)
- Israel Hayom, “Houthis claim downing of Saudi F-15 jet.” https://www.israelhayom.com/2026/09/16/houthis-claim-shot-down-saudi-f15-fighter-jet
- News.az (citing Al Jazeera), “Yemen’s Houthis claim to have shot down Saudi F-15 jet over Marib.” https://news.az/news/yemens-houthis-claim-to-have-shot-down-saudi-f-15-jet-over-marib
- Ajel News, “Arab Coalition Refutes Houthi Militia Claims about Interception of F-15 warplane” (2018 precedent). https://english.ajel.sa/news/arab-coalition-refutes-houthi-militia-claims-about-interception-of-f-15-warplane
Analysis and background
- The War Zone (TWZ), “Houthis Claim Saudi F-15 Kill Over Yemen.” https://www.twz.com/air/houthis-claim-saudi-f-15-kill-over-yemen
- Defence Security Asia, “Houthis Claim Saudi F-15 Kill — Has Yemen’s Air War Changed?” https://defencesecurityasia.com/en/houthi-missile-saudi-f15-shot-down-marib-yemen-air-war/
- Al Jazeera, “Houthis, Yemeni forces engaged in fierce battles: Why each front matters.” https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2026/9/10/houthis-yemeni-forces-engaged-in-fierce-battles-why-each-front-matters
- CNN, “Saudi Arabia accuses Houthis of ‘red line’ attack on Mecca as rebels face outrage from Muslim world.” https://www.cnn.com/2026/09/16/middleeast/saudi-arabia-houthis-mecca-attack-intl-hnk
Editor’s note on sourcing The claim that a Saudi F-15 was shot down, and the follow-on claim that Houthi forces engaged additional Saudi and Eurofighter jets searching for wreckage, rest solely on statements and footage released by the Houthi movement and its affiliated media; neither has been authenticated by Saudi Arabia or independent parties, so both are reported here as claims, not established fact. A figure describing this as a possible “fifth” F-15 loss this year comes from a single defense-focused outlet citing Houthi claims and is not corroborated elsewhere; it has been omitted from the main text for that reason. The precise description of the missile used (air-to-air versus surface-to-air) differs between accounts of Saree’s statement and could not be resolved from available sourcing.
