The Saudi‑led coalition in Yemen struck Houthi targets on Saturday in response to missile attacks launched by the Iranian‑backed group.
The Joint Forces Command of the Coalition, the military structure supporting Yemen’s internationally recognized government, said its forces hit “legitimate military targets” used by the Houthis to threaten commercial vessels in the Red Sea. The Yemeni government air force also carried out strikes on Houthi missile and drone launch sites, Al Jazeera English reported.
Saudi authorities announced warnings for Jazan, along the country’s border with Yemen, and for Yanbu early Saturday morning, asking people to seek shelter. Authorities have lifted the warnings, stating that the danger has passed.
The attacks underscored how quickly the conflict is widening as the Houthis in Yemen have opened a second front in the US-Iran war. The Houthis announced a blockade of shipping routes through the Red Sea in response to recent strikes by the kingdom on the Yemeni capital, Sana’a.
That escalation has fed directly into global energy anxiety, with Red Sea tension compounding existing disruptions. Maritime traffic through the Strait of Hormuz is largely paralyzed by hostilities between the US and Iran. Brent crude closed on Friday at $96.78 a barrel. It has soared about 27% in the past two weeks, with US‑Iran skirmishes worsening and instability extending to the Red Sea.
“Crude prices continue to spiral upward, temporarily breaking back above $100/bbl as the Iran War escalated and the Houthis more directly joined the conflict with a maritime blockade on Saudi Arabia,” Rory Johnston, an oil market researcher, posted on X.
Houthis Deepen Involvement in War
Any disruption to Saudi Arabia’s Red Sea export routes would likely push up oil prices even more. The US Energy Information Administration (EIA) stated that 12% of world oil shipments used to transit through the Bab El-Mandeb Strait, a critical 100-kilometer (62-mile) waterway that separates Yemen on the Arabian Peninsula from Djibouti and Eritrea on the Horn of Africa.
The Houthis claimed to have struck Saudi Arabia with missiles on Saturday morning, deepening their involvement in the Middle East war. Military spokesman Yahya Saree said the Houthis launched two “sensitive operations” against Saudi Arabia and the principle of a “blockade for a blockade” will continue.
The choice of targets highlights the group’s focus on infrastructure central to Saudi export resilience. The militia targeted Jazan, home to an oil refinery with a capacity of 400,000 barrels a day.
Yanbu is a strategic port on the country’s Red Sea coast that has allowed Saudi Arabia to reroute the majority of its barrels around the Strait of Hormuz. Saudi exports via the Red Sea port of Yanbu approximately tripled to a record high of around 4 million barrels a day in the spring, according to analysts, before falling back slightly.
Against that backdrop, the blockade has begun to affect shipping through the region’s chokepoints.
Vessels Turn Back
A Greece-flagged VLCC signaling “Suez for orders” stopped short of the Gulf of Aden on Wednesday, Windward, a maritime intelligence company, said. After a 12-hour pause, it now appears to be diverting away.
That is one of six tanker diversions Windward has tracked in two days. A Hong Kong-flagged supertanker bound for Saudi Arabia’s Red Sea port of Yanbu made a U-turn, Bloomberg News reported on Saturday, citing shipping data.
Bab el-Mandeb recorded 49 confirmed crossings, including five sanctioned vessels, 11 shadow-fleet vessels and four dark transits, Maritime Traffic, a global ship-tracking provider, said on Friday. Several ships that had previously reversed course in the Gulf of Aden and Red Sea later completed their passages.
The mixed traffic patterns reflect both heightened caution and attempts to maintain supply flows. The security posture shifted following the confirmed Houthi attack on a Saudi-flagged tanker on Wednesday, the Joint Maritime Information Center (JMIC) reported on Thursday.
“The incident demonstrates a renewed willingness and capability by Houthi forces to target specified merchant shipping,” the JMIC said.
Saudi-Led Coalition Condemns Houthis
On Thursday, US President Donald Trump said he would hold Iran responsible for further attacks by the Houthis, after the militant group said it had struck the Saudi tankers.
“If they do this again, the US will hold Iran responsible, in that the Houthis are a Surrogate and/or Proxy of Iran, and major military punishment will be inflicted upon Iran and, of course, the Houthis themselves,” he said in a Truth Social post.
The Saudi-led coalition denied reports that it had targeted Hodeidah Port in its latest strikes. All Yemeni ports remain open to maritime navigation and are operational in receiving commercial vessels that carry all sorts of foodstuffs, commodities, oil, and construction materials, it said.
Iran is the main funder and sponsor of the Houthis, though the group is more autonomous than other proxies of Tehran, such as Hezbollah in Lebanon. Its role adds another layer of geopolitical risk to a conflict already reshaping regional energy security.
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