Taiz, considered Yemen’s cultural capital, has suffered huge destruction since becoming a main battleground in the war

SANAA — At least 20 Houthi fighters were killed in heavy clashes in Yemen’s third-largest city Taiz on Thursday, a day after they pounded it with rockets, forces loyal to the government said.

Taiz, considered Yemen’s cultural capital, has suffered huge destruction since becoming a main battleground in a war between government supporters and the Iran-allied Houthis, who are backed by forces loyal to former president Ali Abdullah Saleh. It is currently divided between the two sides.

A Saudi-led coalition trying to restore the government of Yemen’s current president, Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi, has gained ground in the south, but Houthi forces remain in control of much of the country despite the almost daily air strikes.

Forces loyal to Hadi killed at least 20 Houthis and Saleh loyalists in Taiz, their commanders said. Nobody from the Houthis was available to confirm the death toll.

Air strikes and indiscriminate shelling of civilian areas in Taiz on Wednesday killed 22 people and wounded 140 others, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said in a statement, citing local hospitals as their sources.

“The situation in Taiz is particularly dire, even by the standards of the appalling conditions all over Yemen, with the nearly half of the hospitals closed and streams of wounded people desperate for treatment,” the head of the ICRC delegation in Yemen, Antoine Grand, was quoted as saying.