Saudi air defences destroyed a Houthi drone near Makkah on Tuesday evening, with the wreckage falling south of the city (Express Tribune).
The interception was at about 6:50pm local time.
This answers yesterday’s open question
This newspaper reported on Tuesday that Saudi Arabia had issued emergency alerts in Mecca, Jeddah and Taif telling residents to shelter indoors, and that authorities “declined to specify the nature of the threat”. We said plainly then that nothing had been claimed against Mecca and that what triggered the alert had not been made public.
It has now. The alert and this drone are the same event.
Only the second attempt
Coalition spokesman Col Turki al-Malki said this was the second attempt to target Mecca, the first being a ballistic missile on 27 July 2017.
He said the security of the Two Holy Mosques and of pilgrims was a “red line”, and that the coalition would deter further attacks.
The OIC
The Organisation of Islamic Cooperation condemned “heinous attacks” on Makkah and Madinah, saying they were intended to “terrorise civilians” and violated the sanctity of holy sites and mosques.
Why “red line” is a phrase to watch rather than applaud
Declaring a red line is a commitment to respond, and it is made by a coalition already conducting a war in Yemen. The value of such a statement is entirely in what follows it: a red line crossed without consequence weakens the party that drew it, and one enforced escalates the conflict that produced the drone.
Al-Malki did not say what deterrence would consist of.
What this does to a treaty named after the city
Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Türkiye signed the Makkah Joint Defence Agreement on 7 August, under which an armed attack on one is treated as an attack on all.
A drone intercepted over the city the pact is named for is the most direct test the agreement could have been given, five weeks after signature.
The week around it
Thirteen civilians were injured on Monday in Khamis Mushait, Abha and Taif; 73 were injured the week before and energy operations were halted. The Houthis have seized the Greater and Lesser Hanish islands in the Red Sea.
What is not established
Nothing has been published about the drone’s type, range, launch point or intended target, and no assessment has been released of how close it came. The Houthis have not commented on Makkah. It has not been stated whether the wreckage caused damage or injuries where it fell.
[Image: Reuters via The Express Tribune]
