Commando paratroopers were dropped at dawn Friday on sites in Al-Sabkhaya close to Jabal Dokhan after a night-long bombardment by the Saudi Air Force targeted areas where infiltrators were believed to be hiding. Military sources told Okaz that the operation, which started at midnight Thursday, involved the use of thermal detection equipment and satellite surveillance, and commandos were sent in under aerial cover and flares. The sources added that 20 infiltrators hiding among civilians had earlier been detained by the military and found to have in their possession quantities of money from between SR10,000 and SR20,000. Military patrols at the border area around Al-Mahallah village killed one armed man and arrested 12 others as they attempted to cross the border into the Kingdom, and army personnel scouring the northern Jizan mountains of Malhama, Al-Rumaih, Shada, Al-Mashnaq and Al-Mathlath were said by the sources to have killed “dozens”. Continued combing of the Jizan region has also led to the discovery of weapons hidden outside some villages and in abandoned houses and, according to the sources, weapons have been seized from infiltrators leading animals and claiming to be shepherds fleeing from fighting. Military supplies were reported as being sent in to ever-more advanced positions as following the order for troops to level old and abandoned houses used by small groups of infiltrators for rest or concealment. The UN Children's Fund UNICEF said Friday that 240 villages have reportedly been evacuated and more than 50 schools closed in Saudi Arabia since the conflict erupted. Thousands of Saudis are huddling in tent cities after being evacuated from scores of villages earlier this month and relocated to camps far from the border. While some Saudi families found shelter in tent camps, others were taken in by friends and relatives and some, like Ahmed Salh Al-Mussawi, said they prefer to rent an apartment. Ahad-Almasarha camp was set up on a field in a small town of the same name, some 50 km from the border. The authorities have pitched 420 tents to accomodate them, Jizan civil defence chief Hammud Al-Hassani said.
