SANAA (Dispatches) -- The Yemeni army carried out a retaliatory operation inside Saudi Arabia, hitting King Khaled airbase and Aramco refineries, it said in a statement on Saturday.
In a statement carried by Yemen’s Al-Masirah television, Armed Forces spokesman Brigadier General Yahya Saree announced the “Eighth Deterrence Balance Operation”, in which 14 domestically-developed combat drones targeted a number of military and vital targets inside Saudi Arabia.
He said four Sammad-3 (Invincible) drones bombed King Khaled airbase near capital Riyadh. Four Sammad-2 drones also bombed military targets at King Abdullah airport in Jeddah and Aramco refineries in Jeddah.
Separately, military targets at Abha airport in the southwestern province of Asir were hit by Sammad-3 drones, while Qasef-2K (Striker) drones struck various military targets in Abha, Jizan and Najran provinces.
Yemen’s “armed forces affirm their ability to carry out more offensive operations against Saudi and Emirati enemies within the framework of the legitimate defense of Yemeni nation and homeland,” General Saree said.
He said Yemeni “armed forces, with the help of God Almighty, will face escalation with escalation until the aggression stops and the siege is lifted”.
The retaliation came after Saree said Friday Saudi Arabia had significantly intensified its aggression and carried
 out more than 65 aerial raids across Yemen in the past 24 hours.
“This escalation will have serious consequences for the forces of aggression. They must bear the consequences,” he tweeted.
Hundreds of Yemenis rallied in the western coastal city of Hudaydah Friday afternoon to condemn Saudi attacks and aggression, Al-Masira reported.
Demonstrators took to the streets after the execution of 10 Yemeni soldiers and fighters from Popular Committees by Saudi mercenaries.
They demanded retaliation and pledged to continue their fight against the Saudi aggression and siege and support Yemeni armed forces until final victory. They also called on the Yemeni people to mobilize and liberate their country from occupation.
On Saturday, Yemen’s official Saba news agency said Saudi military forces and their mercenaries had violated a ceasefire in Hudaydah for 182 times in the past 24 hours.
A source in Yemen’s Liaison and Coordination Officers Operations Room said the violations included reconnaissance flights over various regions, including Al-Faza, Al-Jabaliya and Al-Tuhaita districts, in addition to 28 counts of artillery shelling and 45 shooting incidents.
Saudi Arabia, backed by the U.S. and regional allies, launched the war on Yemen in March 2015, with the goal of bringing the government of former president Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi back to power and crushing the Ansarullah movement.
The war has left hundreds of thousands of Yemenis dead, and displaced millions more. It has also destroyed Yemen’s infrastructure and spread famine and infectious diseases there.
Despite heavily-armed Saudi Arabia’s continuous bombardment of the impoverished country, Yemeni armed forces and the Popular Committees have grown steadily in strength against the Saudi-led invaders and left Riyadh and its allies bogged down in the country.