Iran-backed Houthi forces seized Yemen’s strategic port city of Mocha on Thursday, advancing toward positions overlooking the Bab el-Mandeb Strait. The advance opens a potentially dangerous new front for global trade as shipping through the Strait of Hormuz remains severely constrained.
The Seizure of Mocha and Red Sea Strategic Stakes
Houthi forces in Yemen are making a concerted drive to take over the country’s Red Sea coast fully, claiming control of the key port of Mocha in the most serious wave of fighting with the Saudi-backed government in years, bringing the Iran-aligned group closer to full control of a key shipping route. Seizure of the coast and some of the islands in the sea would be a strategic disaster for Saudi Arabia and the US, taking Iran and its proxies closer to full control of two choke points for western shipping on opposite sides of the Arabian peninsula: the Bab al-Mandab at the southern end of the Red Sea and the strait of Hormuz in the Gulf.
Observers have said a reduction in hostilities – the most intense since the UN-sponsored ceasefire of April 2022 put an end to major military exchanges – now seems unlikely in what is seen as an attempt by the Houthis to open a second front in the Iran-US war, alongside the battle for control of Hormuz. Baraa Shiban, the Royal United Services Institute’s (Rusi) Yemen specialist, a London-based security thinktank, said the situation in the country was spiralling out of control.
The advance threatens the southern gateway to the Red Sea just as Saudi Arabia has increasingly relied on that route to bypass Hormuz — putting pressure on critical shipping lanes on both sides of the Arabian Peninsula and raising the risk of further disruptions to oil and commercial traffic through a key global trade choke point.
Now you have Iran on one side of the Arabian Peninsula controlling Hormuz, and now the Houthis controlling Bab el-Mandeb on the other side of the peninsula,
Hisham Al-Omeisy, senior Yemen advisor at the European Institute of Peace, told Fox News Digital. Which basically is going to drive prices — oil prices, goods and everything else — up exponentially.
Military Collateral and the Retreat South
Iran-aligned Houthis have seized control of Yemen’s port city of Mocha and advanced down the Red Sea coast to strategic islands, military sources said, hours after President Donald Trump said he expected the Iran war to end after midterm elections. Yemeni government military sources said the Houthis had gained further leverage over the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, the southern outlet of the Red Sea and one of the world’s most important shipping routes, and had reached the islands of Hanish. Red Sea navigation is safe for all shipping companies except for Saudi vessels, Yemen’s Houthi-run humanitarian operations coordination centre said in a statement. Fighters deployed in Yemen’s Al-Kadha area, west of Taiz province.
The Houthis have conducted missile strikes on the strategic Red Sea islands of Hanish, government sources told Reuters. Government forces and their allies are relocating south to Dhubab, which sits directly on the strait, across from the island of Perim. Control of Dhubab and the island is key to gaining hold of the strait, they said. There has been an escalation in fighting between Saudi Arabia’s Yemeni allies in the internationally backed government and the Houthis in recent days, creating a second theatre of war in the Iran conflict that threatens global energy supplies.
Economic Fallout and Energy Market Pressures
Saudi Arabia, the world’s largest oil exporter, has relied on the Red Sea shipping route since the Iran conflict effectively closed the Strait of Hormuz, through which a fifth of global oil used to flow. Houthi spokesperson Mohammed Abdulsalam said, without elaborating, that operations were defensive and would stop once attacks on Yemen stopped.
By taking control of more of the Red Sea coast south of the port of Hodeidah, the Houthis’ aim is to use a new lever to put pressure on Saudi Arabia and the US to agree a deal that lifts the US blockade on Iranian oil tankers in the Gulf. U.S. President Donald Trump on Wednesday acknowledged he…
International Diplomacy and Iranian Involvement
The Houthi advance down Yemen’s Red Sea coast this week came with direct guidance from Iran’s Revolutionary Guards seeking to open a new front in Iran’s war with the U.S., according to Yemeni government, Iranian and regional sources.
By seizing the southwestern port city of Mocha, the Houthis have strengthened their chokehold on the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, a key waterway whose disruption further constricts global energy supplies after Iran’s blockade of the Strait of Hormuz.
In the wider regional conflict between the Houthis’ Iranian allies and the United States, the group now looks focused on consolidating that grip on the strait even as opposing government forces backed by Saudi Arabia focus on an offensive in the north.
Iran told the Houthis to intensify attacks on Saudi Arabia, a close U.S. ally, and promised more funding, weapons and senior officers to help them do so, two Iranian sources said. While Iran describes the Houthis as an ally, it publicly denies giving them military d…
