CCTV footage showed people cowering at the moment of impact of Saturday’s attack.

Footage filmed in the aftermath of showed damage inside one of the terminal buildings at the airport, which is located about 22 miles north of the Saudi Arabian capital.

The attacks by the Houthis, an Iran-backed group, were the biggest escalation yet in their campaign ⁠against Saudi airports, oil facilities and tankers in recent weeks.

Though the violence might appear at first sight to be restricted to the Arabian peninsula, it could have global consequences, pushing up fuel prices and so international inflation.

Why now?
The Houthis’ timing is partly opportunistic but also rooted in the dynamics of the conflicts across the Gulf.

The Houthis initially stayed on the sidelines of the conflict launched by the US and Israel against Iran earlier this year. But last month, the Islamist militia movement seized control of key territory and gained virtual control of the Bab al-Mandab strait, which dominates the Red Sea, a critical shipping route for oil and gas exports from the region.

The Yemeni government forces and local allies began a major counteroffensive last week to drive back the Houthis from the Bab al-Mandab and also hit other Houthi positions.

Saudi Arabia is in the Houthis’ crosshairs because it supports Yemen’s UN-backed government and its forces. Their attacks on high-profile targets in the kingdom such as oil infrastructure and the capital’s airport – key symbols of its international integration and economic future – makes painfully obvious the costs of Riyadh’s strategic choices.

Such attacks also benefit Iran, which has long supported the Houthis as part of its “axis of resistance”, a coalition of Islamist hardline movements that allows Tehran to project power and influence round the region.

The new threat from the Houthis to the Red Sea and to Saudi Arabia highlights again the massive leverage Tehran and its allies can exert on global oil and gas supplies, countering recent US pressure in bold move on the conflict’s chessboard.

How is this new territory for Saudi Arabia?
The recent attacks on Saudi Arabia have been the deadliest to hit the kingdom in a decade.

They also marked one of the most significant disruptions to Saudi civil aviation in years, forcing airlines across Europe and Asia to suspend services. Businesses in Riyadh’s financial hub have told employees to work remotely, authorities in Riyadh have asked schools to switch to online classes this week, and top energy executives were ⁠dropped from the schedule of a high-profile conference this week in the capital.

Though Saudi Arabia has intervened indirectly in conflicts around the Middle East and beyond for decades, violence has rarely struck the kingdom itself. In recent months, the country has found itself on a frontline, something its rulers have long sought to avoid.

Why couldn’t Riyadh stop the missiles?
Saudi Arabia has invested enormous sums in its military – the kingdom is the world’s eighth biggest spender on weapons – but Houthi attacks are very hard to stop.

“Saudi air defences have been able to intercept some Houthi missile and drone attacks, but Saudi Arabia is so large that it’s simply impossible for them to consistently defend themselves,” said Thomas Juneau, a security analyst at Ottawa University.

Other analysts point out that even the vaunted Israeli air defence systems failed to stop a ballistic missile narrowly missing Ben Gurion international airport last year.

Reprisals against the Houthis and efforts to pre-emptively destroy the movement’s offensive capabilities are not easy either. The US bombardment in 2025 showed how hard it is to destroy the militia’s capabilities, which have been much enhanced over recent years, in part through Iranian advice and investment.

What might happen next?
The Houthis say their actions were “guided by reciprocity” – suggesting they are responding to ongoing Saudi strikes on the territory they control in Yemen – but show no sign of stopping their attacks.

“Unless the Saudi enemy stops its aggression and interference in Yemen, worse is yet to come, God willing,” official statements carried by the Houthi-run al-Masirah television channel said.

It seems unlikely Saudi Arabia will halt its counterstrikes, and equally unlikely the kingdom will be able to find a way to block all incoming Houthi missiles, though it may improve its intelligence gathering and early warning to allow better defence of specific high-value targets.

Nor is there any imminent prospect of an end to the hostilities between Iran and the US that are a major factor in the surge of the recent violence in Yemen. And though the Houthis are more a coalition of different factions than a coherent single movement, for the moment they appear unified behind hardline and ideologically committed leaders.

Farea al-Muslimi, a specialist on Yemen and the Gulf at Chatham House in London, said the Houthis had been consistently underestimated over the years.

“They have really upped their game and believe they can get something now which will reposition them within the region. They are very confident at the moment and feeling empowered …. But though they think they can control this [escalation], that may well be an illusion,” he said.

In its twice-yearly World Economic Outlook, the IMF said global growth had withstood the Middle East conflict better than feared over the past six months.

It said the rerouting of oil supplies away from the strait of Hormuz, and the release of strategic energy stocks, had helped to contain the impact on oil prices from the US-Iran war.

However, it warned that emergency stocks are now depleted, and high debt levels and deficits in many countries could leave governments with little capacity to protect consumers from any future jump in prices.

“Without shoring up supply capacity and replenishing policy buffers, the global economy could soon test the limits of resilience,” it said. “Inventories in energy markets are dwindling and additional geopolitical shocks could still transmit rapidly through prices and supply disruptions.”

The International Energy Agency announced the largest-ever emergency releases of oil stocks on to the market in March this year, and promised to accelerate it after a meeting of oil ministers last month.

But in a sign of the system’s vulnerability, the US strategic petroleum reserve was recently reported to have fallen to its lowest level since 1982.

Last week, Donald Trump agreed a deal with Vladimir Putin to temporarily lift sanctions on US imports of Russian diesel in an attempt to bring down prices at the pumps, which analysts said would have little “meaningful” effect.

The World Economic Report was published on Tuesday in Bangkok, where the IMF and World Bank are holding their annual meetings this week, with finance ministers and central bankers scheduled to attend.

Ahead of the gathering, the IMF managing director, Kristalina Georgieva, urged governments to tighten their belts, amid rising global debt levels. “We cannot keep delaying necessary policy action – you have the tools, now have the wisdom to use them,” she said.

In the report, the IMF revised up its forecast for global economic growth this year marginally, to 3.1% – against 3% in its last update in July. Next year’s forecast is unchanged, at 3.4%.

US growth remains unchanged at 2.3% this year and revised up to the same pace, 2.3%, for 2027 – from 2.2% at the last update.

The IMF predicted GDP growth of 1.3% for the UK this year – up 0.3 percentage points from its most recent update in July – in welcome news for the chancellor, John Healey, who is set to arrive in Bangkok later this week.

However, the IMF also warned that prolonged high oil prices and rising interest rates meant growth was likely to “edge down” in 2027, “as higher energy prices and long-term interest rates weigh on consumption and investment”. It cut its UK growth forecast for next year modestly to 1.2%, from 1.3%.

However, the IMF warned that “risks are skewed to the downside” for the global economy. In particular, it pointed to the threat of “a prolonged stalemate or further escalation in the Middle East”, which would lead to higher energy and food prices.

“Further disruptions to energy infrastructure, cyber-attacks, or extreme weather events could amplify these effects,” the IMF added.

Trump has continued to insist that he could launch another wave of attacks on Iran in the coming weeks, with little sign of a peace agreement being negotiated.

The persistence of elevated oil prices means the spike in inflation is now expected to last longer than previously forecast.

Global inflation is expected to be 4.7% this year – the same level as forecast in July – and to decline to 4.1% in 2027 – up from 4% in the last update.

The IMF urged the world’s central banks not to overreact to short-term jumps in inflation, but to be ready to respond quickly if it appears to be becoming entrenched. “With economic conditions in flux, agility is at a premium,” it said.

As well as fresh turmoil in energy markets, the IMF pointed to the continuing risk to the global economy of an AI-driven market crash