but let s begin in saudi arabia where the president is set to land. nic robertson is joining us there from jeddah. so they are waiting obviously highly an takes pay thing this arrival. what is the sense there ahead of this meeting, one that clearly the saudis wanted not only to have but to have images for the world to see, really legitimizing the regime? reporter: yeah, there is a real sense here that this is a moment for the saudis to have to get through because they know the focus and international attention that will be on president biden casting them as a pariah for the murder of jamal khashoggi. they recognize that. but they really feel that this is a moment to sort of punch through that situation. they are very keen to have face-to-face with president biden. they believe the very fact that president biden is coming here kind of resets the relationship so that they can get to the things that they want to get to which are all the sort of economic development investmen
you also have ships and submarine platforms used. one of the submarines was the uss florida, a guided missile submarine. they are able to fire tomahawk missiles against those targets on i ca ye yemenese soil. the carrier strike group has been in the region to try to deter any regional actors including houthis and iran from expanding the conflict we re seeing currently between easy really and hamas. the nhouthis warning that they would retaliate against any international strikes and the u.s. saying that they and their partners are prepared for that. in the wake of their strikes saying that this may not be the last word in terms of military action against the houthis. alex marquardt, cnn, washington. reporter: president biden saying thursday night that the u.s. is sending a clear message to the houthis that their
reporter: it is very concerned about their development of nuclear weapons by iran, it is very concerned about iran s proxies. the nhouthis who fired a cruise missile all the way to jeddah and hit an electrical substation just before the formula 1 race got under way here. they are very concerned about the threat that iran brings to the region. but i think what you would find here is a concern in saudi arabia going back to 2019 when iran was behind those very precision, multiple strikes on two different oil facilities here in saudi arabia. and the saudis knew it was arabians but they didn t demand a military response and i think they are in the same position now. they know if that if there is a war here, if there are strikes against iran, that war would have a backlash on them, take out their infrastructure that they are building, they have a