Iran-backed Houthi rebels and loyalist forces battled Saturday around Yemen's third city Taiz even after a 48-hour cease-fire was announced by the Saudi-led coalition fighting the insurgents began following U.S. pressure. Inside Taez itself, rebel rocket fire into a residential district killed three civilians and wounded two, military and medical sources said. Four rebels and two loyalists were also killed in or near Taez, military sources added.

The Iran-allied Houthis, who are battling the internationally recognized government of Yemen's President Abd Rabbu Mansour al-Hadi, often fire mortars into southern Saudi regions and test Saudi defenses with guerrilla-style incursions. The attack came hours before the Saudi-led coalition that is supporting Hadi in the war, announced a cease-fire in an effort to end a conflict that has displaced millions of people and caused a humanitarian disaster. The 48-hour truce started at noon on Saturday.

Near the Saudi border further north, two ballistic missiles fired by the rebels hit the coastal area of Midi killing two pro-government soldiers and wounding four, a military commander said. Intermittent fighting was also reported in Nahm near the capital Sanaa, in Shabwa in the south and Sarwah to the east.

The cease-fire comes after U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry this week met rebel representatives in Oman and also urged the government to come on board. Kerry said last Tuesday that the Saudi-led coalition, that backs the government in its fight against the rebels, supported a cease-fire plan that the Houthis have agreed to. But President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi's administration rejected Kerry's move, complaining that it played into the hands of the Houthis and sidelined the government.

The Houthis confirmed the attack in a statement on their Saba news agency. Saudi jets early on Saturday bombed Yemen's capital Sanaa and an area of farmland in Yemen's southern Shabwa province, the statement said.

Yemen's 20-month-old war has left more than 7,000 people dead and nearly 37,000 wounded, the World Health Organization announced in its latest toll update. As of Oct. 25, "more than 7,070 people have been killed and over 36,818 injured, according to health facility-based data," the WHO said in a statement late Sunday. Another 21 million people are in need of urgent health services, said the U.N. health agency.

In addition to the fighting, international organizations have warned in recent weeks of a spread of disease and growing rates of malnutrition in the country, which was already the Arabian Peninsula's poorest even before the war erupted.

The WHO said in its statement released from the rebel-held capital Sanaa that 2.1 million people have been internally displaced by the conflict. More than half of all health facilities across the country have been shut or are partially functioning, it said. "There are critical shortages in medical doctors in more than 40 percent of all districts," it added. Attempts by the United Nations to convince the warring parties to commit to a cease-fire and resume peace talks have so far failed.

Iran-backed Houthi rebels seized the Yemeni capital Sanaa in September 2014, forcing the internationally recognized government to flee the country. A Saudi-led, U.S.-backed coalition has been conducting an extensive air campaign against the Houthis since March 2015 that has pushed the rebels out of southern Yemen. The U.N. says the conflict has left more than 19,000 people dead and displaced at least 3 million. Saudi Arabia leads a coalition of Muslim countries, backed by the U.S., the U.K. and France, in the war in neighboring Yemen. The campaign, which is a campaign to restore the government ousted by the Iran-allied militia, is part of a larger assertive effort to prevent weapons from reaching Shiite Houthi rebels and their allies, who have overrun much of Yemen.