At least 66 people were killed in airstrikes and clashes in Yemen on Sunday as pro-government forces pushed to oust rebels from a key stretch of coastline, medical sources reported Sunday.
Air raids by a Saudi-led coalition and fighting near the strategic Bab al-Mandab strait killed at least 52 fighters among Shia Houthi rebels and allied troops loyal to ex-president Ali Abdullah Saleh, the sources said. Fourteen members of pro-government forces were also killed.
Forces loyal to President Abedrabbo Mansour Hadi launched a vast offensive on January 7 to retake the Dhubab district overlooking the Bab Al-Mandab, a key maritime route connecting the Red Sea and the Indian Ocean.
Coalition warplanes and Apache attack helicopters have been pounding rebels in support of pro-Hadi forces advancing toward the Red Sea city of Mokha, military sources said.
By Sunday, loyalist forces were within 10 kilometers of Mokha, they said, but the offensive has been slowed by mines laid by rebels.
The rebels took their dead to a military hospital in Hodeida, a major western port city they control, a medical source told AFP.
The hospital received 14 dead on Saturday and 38 on Sunday, as well as 55 wounded rebels, the source said.
On the pro-government side, 14 soldiers were killed and 22 wounded, according to medics in the southern port city of Aden where Hadi’s government is based.
The Saudi-led coalition intervened in Yemen in March 2015 in support of the beleaguered president.
Meanwhile, Egypt's National Defense Council on Sunday has extended its participation in the Saudi-led Arab coalition carrying out military operations in Yemen, the presidency said in a statement on Sunday.            
Egypt is part of the Saudi-led coalition that began in March 2015 against the Iran-backed Houthi rebels, who have seized large parts of Yemen.
"The National Defence Council agreed during the meeting to extend the participation of the required elements from the Egyptian armed forces in a combat operation outside the nation's border to defend Egyptian and Arab national security in the Gulf, Red Sea, and Bab al-Mandab areas," the statement read.
The insurgent and their allies, whom the coalition accused to be aided by Iran, still control the capital Sanaa and much of the central and northern highlands, as well as the 450-kilometer (280-mile) Red Sea coast.

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