Yemen's Houthis are turning Bab el-Mandeb into a second strategic pressure point as the war disrupts Hormuz. Their advance threatens Saudi Arabia's Red Sea escape route, global oil shipping, and U.S. interests while revealing the growing strategic importance of the Iran-Houthi alliance.

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Yemen: The Houthis' New Front

As Iran squeezes Hormuz, the Houthis are transforming Bab el-Mandeb into a second pressure point-- putting Saudi Arabia, Red Sea shipping and the global oil trade in an increasingly dangerous position.

By A. Sadeghian, Ph.D.

For decades, the strategic nightmare of the Persian Gulf had a name: the Strait of Hormuz. Almost every serious discussion of Middle Eastern energy security began with the possibility that war with Iran could disrupt the narrow passage through which an enormous share of the world's petroleum normally travels. Saudi Arabia consequently spent billions of dollars developing an alternative: move oil across the kingdom through its East-West pipeline to Yanbu on the Red Sea and escape the vulnerability of Hormuz. The war of 2026 has exposed the weakness in that solution. Saudi Arabia may have found a route around Hormuz, but at the other end of the Arabian Peninsula lies another narrow passage: Bab el-Mandeb. And beside it stands one of the most heavily armed nonstate movements in the Middle East.

The Houthis Move South

Yemen's Houthi movement has dramatically changed the military geography of the southern Red Sea. In its September offensive, the movement captured the historic port of Mokha and advanced along Yemen's western coast. Houthi forces subsequently reached Mayun, also known as Perim, the island sitting inside the Bab el-Mandeb Strait itself, and then seized Greater and Lesser Hanish islands farther north in the Red Sea. Saudi-backed Yemeni forces have attempted to recover lost territory, and Saudi and Yemeni aircraft have intensified attacks on Houthi positions. Yet the Houthis have achieved their biggest territorial gains in years along one of the world's most strategically important coastlines.

The offensive has been accompanied by renewed attacks against Saudi Arabia. The Houthis launched missiles and drones against targets including the military airbase at Khamis Mushait. Saudi authorities reported that thirteen civilians were wounded. Emergency alerts have also reached Saudi cities including Yanbu, the kingdom's vital Red Sea oil port. The important point is not that the Houthis can defeat Saudi Arabia conventionally; they cannot. It is that a movement Saudi Arabia went to war to suppress more than eleven years ago can still threaten Saudi territory and energy infrastructure while simultaneously conducting a major territorial offensive in Yemen.

The timing could hardly be worse for Riyadh. Saudi Arabia's roughly 1,200-kilometer East-West pipeline, constructed in the 1980s to allow petroleum to bypass Hormuz, is largely out of operation following a drone attack launched from Iraqi territory. The line had recently been carrying millions of barrels per day toward the Red Sea. Repairs are expected to take weeks. Saudi Arabia therefore confronts pressure at Hormuz, disruption of the pipeline designed to bypass Hormuz, and a resurgent Houthi military presence around the Red Sea route on which the kingdom increasingly depends.

The Gate of Tears

Bab el-Mandeb is not merely another waterway on a map. Its Arabic name is commonly translated as the "Gate of Tears." The strait separates Yemen on the Arabian Peninsula from Djibouti and Eritrea in the Horn of Africa. To the north lies the Red Sea and ultimately the Suez Canal; to the south lie the Gulf of Aden, Arabian Sea and Indian Ocean. Ships traveling between Asia and Europe through Suez normally must pass Bab el-Mandeb. Avoiding it generally means sailing around the Cape of Good Hope, adding thousands of miles, additional fuel consumption, higher freight charges, longer delivery times and increased insurance expenses.

The strategic importance of the strait has increased because of the war around Hormuz. Saudi Arabia increasingly used its Red Sea outlets as an alternative to the Persian Gulf. By early June, Saudi oil exports from the Red Sea end of the East-West pipeline had risen above five million barrels per day, according to International Energy Agency figures reported by the Associated Press. Now the pipeline itself has been severely disrupted while Houthi forces have moved onto strategically important territory around the southern entrance to the Red Sea.

Control of coastline and islands does not mean that the Houthis can simply press a button and close Bab el-Mandeb. The United States and its allies retain overwhelming conventional naval and air power, and the African side of the strait remains outside Houthi control. But modern commercial shipping does not require a formal naval blockade before it changes behavior. Missile attacks, drones, explosive boats, mines or even the credible possibility of attack can raise insurance premiums and convince shipowners to reroute vessels.

The Houthis demonstrated this after late 2023. Their attacks on vessels in and around the Red Sea led major shipping companies to divert traffic around Africa. Shipping through Bab el-Mandeb subsequently fell dramatically. The consequences extended far beyond the ships actually attacked. A relatively small armed movement demonstrated that it could impose economic costs on companies and countries thousands of miles away simply by making a narrow maritime corridor sufficiently dangerous.

Who Are the Houthis?

To understand how the Houthis acquired this power, it is necessary to understand what they are. The Houthis, formally known as Ansar Allah, are not an army invented by Iran and transplanted into Yemen. Their origins are indigenous. They emerged from the Zaydi Shiite community of northern Yemen, particularly around Saada. Zaydism has existed in Yemen for centuries and is doctrinally different from the Twelver Shiism that dominates the Islamic Republic of Iran.

The movement grew from a religious and cultural revival associated with the Houthi family. Hussein Badreddin al-Houthi became its early political and ideological leader. Beginning in 2004, the government of longtime Yemeni president Ali Abdullah Saleh fought a succession of wars against the movement. Hussein al-Houthi was killed, but the movement survived. Leadership eventually passed to his brother Abdul-Malik al-Houthi, who remains its dominant leader.

The upheavals following the Arab Spring created the opening that transformed the Houthis from a northern insurgency into a national power. Saleh left office, but Yemen's political transition under President Abd Rabbu Mansour Hadi faltered. The Houthis capitalized on dissatisfaction with the new order and, in one of the stranger alliances of the conflict, cooperated with their former enemy Saleh and military units loyal to him. In 2014 they seized Sana'a. As they expanded southward and Hadi fled, Saudi Arabia intervened militarily in March 2015 at the head of an Arab coalition.

Saudi Arabia's Eleven-Year Houthi Problem

Riyadh intended to restore the internationally recognized government and prevent an Iran-aligned armed movement from consolidating power along Saudi Arabia's southern border. What followed became one of the great strategic miscalculations of the modern Middle East. Saudi Arabia possessed vastly superior aircraft, weapons and financial resources, but superiority in the air did not translate into political victory on the ground.

Years of bombing inflicted enormous destruction on Yemen and contributed to a humanitarian catastrophe, but they did not destroy the Houthis. Instead, the movement became increasingly capable. It acquired ballistic missiles and increasingly sophisticated drones and demonstrated an ability to attack Saudi airports, cities and energy facilities. A UN-mediated truce in 2022 largely halted major combat, and Saudi Arabia increasingly sought negotiation rather than the military victory it had once expected.

The latest fighting exposes how little the underlying strategic problem was resolved. The Houthis survived, retained Sana'a and much of Yemen's populous northwest, preserved their military organization and continued developing their long-range strike capabilities. Saudi Arabia spent years trying to defeat the movement militarily and then years attempting to find a negotiated way out. Now Riyadh is again facing Houthi missiles, drones and territorial expansion.

Why the Houthis Hate Israel

The Houthis' hostility toward Israel is older than the current war. Their notorious slogan includes "death to America" and "death to Israel," together with an explicitly antisemitic curse against Jews. The language demonstrates that their confrontation with Israel did not suddenly appear after October 7, 2023. Anti-Americanism, hostility toward Israel and identification with the Palestinian cause had become components of Houthi political ideology long before the latest Gaza war.

After Hamas attacked Israel on October 7, 2023, and Israel launched its subsequent military campaign in Gaza, the Houthis converted that ideology into a regional military campaign. They launched missiles and drones toward Israel and attacked ships in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden, presenting their operations as support for Palestinians and pressure against Israel. Their criteria for identifying Israeli-linked vessels were often expansive and unreliable, and the attacks endangered international commercial shipping.

Nevertheless, the campaign achieved something strategically remarkable. A movement born in the mountains of northern Yemen demonstrated that it could affect trade between Asia and Europe and force major powers to devote substantial military resources to protecting international commerce. Supporting Palestine also gave the Houthis political resonance far beyond Yemen and strengthened their place within the Iranian-led regional network commonly called the Axis of Resistance.

Their hostility toward Israel should therefore be taken seriously as ideology, but ideology and strategy are not mutually exclusive. Confronting Israel provides the Houthis with legitimacy among some audiences, reinforces their alliance with Iran and gives a Yemeni movement a role in conflicts stretching far beyond Yemen.

Iran and the Houthis: Ally, Not Puppet

The relationship between the Houthis and Iran requires more precision than is often found in political rhetoric. Calling the Houthis simply an Iranian proxy is inadequate. Claiming that Iran has little to do with their military development is equally inaccurate. The Houthis are an indigenous Yemeni movement with their own leadership, domestic political ambitions, religious traditions and interests. Iran did not create them, and they retain considerably more operational autonomy than the word "proxy" sometimes implies.

But autonomy should not be confused with absence of Iranian assistance. Iran has become the Houthis' principal external military supporter. Iranian assistance has included weapons, missile and drone technology, components, training, intelligence and military advice. The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and particularly its Quds Force have been central to that relationship. Iranian assistance helped transform a Yemeni insurgency into a force capable of striking targets hundreds of miles away and threatening international shipping.

The September 2026 offensive provides unusually important evidence of the depth of that relationship. Reuters reported that Yemeni government, Iranian and regional sources described the Houthi advance down the Red Sea coast as receiving direct guidance and assistance from Iran's Revolutionary Guards. Iranian sources said Tehran had promised additional funding, weapons and senior officers. But another Iranian source emphasized that the decision to move on Mokha was a Houthi decision rather than an Iranian one.

That apparent contradiction actually illustrates the relationship rather well. Iran can provide weapons, advisers, intelligence, technical expertise and strategic encouragement without controlling every Houthi tactical decision. The Houthis are allies whose objectives frequently overlap with Tehran's, not soldiers who necessarily wait for every order from Iran.

Abdolreza Shahlai: The IRGC Connection

One Iranian officer deserves particular attention. Abdolreza Shahlai, whose surname is also transliterated Shahlaei, is a senior commander in the IRGC's Quds Force. His connection with Yemen is not a new allegation arising from the current fighting. In 2019, the U.S. State Department publicly described him as a high-ranking Quds Force commander based in Yemen and offered a reward of up to $15 million for information concerning his financial activities, networks and associates.

Shahlai's name has resurfaced in the September offensive. Yemeni military sources told Reuters that, based on communications intercepts and information from captured Houthi fighters, they believed the Iranian effort supporting the western offensive was being directed by Shahlai. Reuters reported that Iranian sources could not independently confirm that particular allegation.

The distinction matters. Shahlai's senior role in the Quds Force and his association with Yemen are well established; his personal direction of the current offensive remains a serious but not independently confirmed intelligence claim. But his history in Yemen illustrates how the Iran-Houthi relationship extends beyond simply shipping weapons. It includes advisers, technical expertise, training, intelligence and years of institutional relationships.

This combination of Houthi autonomy and Iranian support may make the relationship more useful to Tehran. Iran does not necessarily need to issue tactical orders to every allied organization. It benefits from partners whose interests overlap with its own and who can independently create strategic problems for common adversaries. For Iran, a powerful Houthi movement imposes costs on Saudi Arabia, threatens Israel, diverts American military attention and provides leverage near Bab el-Mandeb. For the Houthis, Iran provides military technology, expertise and political backing that would be extremely difficult to obtain elsewhere.

America's Failed Air Campaigns

The United States has already discovered how difficult it is to solve the Houthi problem from the air. During the Biden administration, American and British forces repeatedly struck Houthi missile systems, drones, radar installations, weapons facilities and other military targets after the movement began attacking Red Sea shipping. The objective was to degrade Houthi capabilities and protect freedom of navigation. The attacks damaged the movement but did not eliminate its ability to threaten ships.

President Donald Trump escalated the campaign after returning to office. His administration redesignated Ansar Allah as a Foreign Terrorist Organization and in March 2025 launched a much larger American offensive against Houthi military capabilities. American forces struck hundreds of targets, including air-defense systems, command infrastructure, radar installations and missile and drone facilities.

Yet the Houthis survived that campaign as well. In May 2025, Oman brokered an arrangement under which the United States halted its attacks and the Houthis agreed to stop attacking American vessels. The agreement did not eliminate the Houthi arsenal, resolve Yemen's civil war or end Houthi hostility toward Israel. Once again, superior American firepower demonstrated that it could destroy targets without necessarily destroying the political and military organization generating them.

Trump's Current Houthi Policy

That history helps explain Washington's caution in the current crisis. Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman has sought greater American military assistance as the Houthi offensive has expanded. But as of September 15, the Trump administration has declined to authorize another direct American bombing campaign against the Houthis. Instead, Washington has agreed to provide Saudi Arabia with intelligence-sharing and targeting assistance.

The commander of U.S. Central Command, Admiral Brad Cooper, met Mohammed bin Salman in Jeddah on September 14 as the crisis intensified. The United States therefore remains deeply interested in the outcome and in maintaining freedom of navigation, but Washington is presently attempting to support Saudi operations without reopening the direct U.S.-Houthi air war.

Saudi Arabia faces precisely the same problem it encountered after 2015. It can bomb Houthi positions. The United States can bomb them more heavily. Neither fact answers the essential question: who takes and holds the territory afterward? Airpower can destroy radar installations, missile launchers and ammunition depots. It cannot permanently occupy Mokha, Mayun, the Hanish islands or hundreds of kilometers of coastline. That requires capable ground forces, and the anti-Houthi coalition inside Yemen remains fragmented among factions with different political objectives.

Yemen Pays the Price

The humanitarian consequences are again becoming severe. Nearly 94,000 people have fled their homes since the latest fighting intensified, according to International Organization for Migration figures reported by the Associated Press. More than 2,000 Yemenis have crossed the sea into Djibouti. Hundreds have reportedly been killed during the renewed fighting. Yemen, already devastated by more than a decade of war, is again moving toward the possibility of full-scale civil conflict.

The humanitarian disaster is not separate from the strategic story. A prolonged struggle for western Yemen would mean fighting through populated towns, ports and transportation corridors in a country whose health system and economy were already devastated by years of conflict. Every escalation that strengthens one side militarily also risks producing another wave of displacement, hunger and civilian deaths.

Saudi Arabia Caught Between Two Straits

The strategic consequences extend far beyond Yemen. Saudi Arabia is the world's largest oil exporter. Its East-West pipeline was specifically constructed to reduce dependence on Hormuz. With that pipeline largely out of service for an estimated three to five weeks and Hormuz operating at a fraction of normal traffic, the security of Yanbu and the Red Sea corridors become enormously more important.

This is the deeper significance of what is happening at Bab el-Mandeb. Iran does not have to conquer the Strait of Hormuz in the conventional military sense, and the Houthis do not have to physically close every channel of Bab el-Mandeb. They need only make passage sufficiently dangerous, unpredictable or expensive to change commercial behavior. Modern economic warfare operates through insurance rates, tanker availability, freight prices, delivery delays and expectations as much as through sunken ships.

The consequences are already visible in energy markets. The conflict has pushed benchmark crude prices sharply upward and created extraordinary differences between oil trapped behind vulnerable chokepoints and oil produced where transportation remains secure. The economic importance of a barrel of oil increasingly depends not only on who owns it, but on whether it can physically reach the buyer.

Saudi Arabia therefore confronts an extraordinarily difficult choice. It can escalate the air war and risk another prolonged conflict with an adversary that survived years of Saudi bombing. It can attempt to strengthen Yemen's divided anti-Houthi forces and launch a ground counteroffensive. It can continue asking Washington for greater military involvement. Or it can negotiate with a movement Riyadh spent years trying unsuccessfully to defeat.

None of those choices is attractive. That is precisely why the Houthis' territorial gains matter. Mokha, Mayun, the Hanish islands and Yemen's western coastline are not merely trophies. They are bargaining instruments. Every position from which the Houthis can credibly threaten shipping or Saudi infrastructure increases their political leverage.

The Two-Strait Strategy

For Iran, the strategic benefit is obvious even without assuming complete Iranian control over Houthi decisions. Tehran's adversaries must now think simultaneously about Hormuz, Bab el-Mandeb, Saudi energy infrastructure, Israel, Iraq, the Red Sea and American military installations throughout the region. Iran's strategy of cultivating armed regional partners has multiplied the number of places its opponents must defend.

This is asymmetric warfare at its most effective. Iran does not need a navy larger than the United States Navy. The Houthis do not need an air force capable of defeating Saudi Arabia's. Their strategic objective can be achieved by creating multiple vulnerabilities that are expensive for their opponents to defend simultaneously.

There is also a larger lesson for Washington. The United States has watched Saudi Arabia bomb the Houthis, bombed the Houthis itself under two presidents, intercepted their missiles and drones, imposed sanctions and terrorist designations, and organized maritime security operations. Yet in September 2026 the Houthis are not disappearing. They are advancing along one of the world's most strategically important coastlines.

That does not make them invincible. Their forces can be attacked, their supply networks disrupted and their territorial gains potentially reversed. Nor should their relationship with Iran be exaggerated into the claim that Tehran exercises complete command over them. But dismissing them as primitive insurgents or mere Iranian puppets is no longer analytically defensible. They have become a significant regional military actor with an indigenous political base, substantial Iranian assistance, increasingly sophisticated weapons and unusually valuable geography.

The War Has Found the Escape Route

For Saudi Arabia, the historical irony is difficult to miss. Riyadh entered the Yemeni war in 2015 largely to prevent an Iran-aligned movement from becoming a permanent strategic threat on its southern border. More than eleven years later, that movement controls Sana'a and most of Yemen's populous northwest, possesses missiles and drones capable of reaching Saudi territory, has survived attacks by Saudi Arabia, the United States, Britain and Israel, and has now established an increasingly powerful position beside the maritime route Saudi Arabia needs when Hormuz becomes unusable.

For the rest of the world, Yemen can no longer be treated as a remote civil war. Geography has promoted it into the center of the international energy crisis. The Houthis have moved from the mountains of Saada to the shores and islands of one of the world's most important waterways.

The Arabian Peninsula has two great maritime doors. One is the Strait of Hormuz. The other is Bab el-Mandeb. Saudi Arabia built its western oil route because it understood the danger of depending on the first. The events of September 2026 have revealed the vulnerability of the second.

The war has found the escape route.

References

1. Reuters. "Houthis Strike Saudi Targets Anew as Talks Over Strait of Hormuz Stall." September 15, 2026.

2. Reuters. "Iranian Arms and Advice Helped Yemen's Houthis Seize Key Red Sea City, Sources Say." September 10, 2026.

3. Reuters. "Saudi Crown Prince, U.S. CENTCOM Chief Discuss Developments After Houthi Escalation." September 14, 2026.

4. Reuters. "Yemen's Displaced Long for Loved Ones, Stability as Houthis Advance." September 14, 2026.

5. Reuters. "After Hormuz, Iran Turns to Red Sea Gateway as New Pressure Point." July 14, 2026.

6. Reuters. "Iran Tells Houthis to Close Red Sea Gateway if U.S. Hits Power Network, Sources Say." July 16, 2026.

7. Associated Press. "Houthis Seize 2 Strategic Red Sea Islands, and Other Mideast Developments." September 15, 2026.

8. Associated Press. "Saudi Arabia Shuts Down a Pipeline as Houthis Seize an Island, Opening a New Front in the Iran War." September 11, 2026.

9. Associated Press. "Iran-Backed Houthi Rebels Take Strategic Port City in Yemen, Raising Threat to Red Sea Shipping." September 10, 2026.

10. U.S. Energy Information Administration. "World Oil Transit Chokepoints." U.S. Department of Energy.

11. Council on Foreign Relations. "Iran's Support of the Houthis: What to Know." Background analysis on Iran, Ansar Allah and the IRGC relationship.

12. U.S. Department of State. "Special Representative Brian Hook Announces Reward for Yemen-Based IRGC Quds Force Commander Abdul Reza Shahlai." December 2019.

Authors Bio:

I was born and raised in Tehran, Iran, and came to the United States in 1976 to study psychology. Over time, America became my home, and I later became a U.S. citizen. My professional career has centered on clinical neuropsychology, particularly the evaluation and rehabilitation of patients with neurological disorders and stroke. I also spent many years teaching and mentoring students in academic settings, including at Northeastern Ohio Medical University. In addition to my clinical work, I have been involved in research on neurological conditions, including hemianopsia, and have written articles and books on a variety of subjects. Growing up in the Middle East during a period of profound political and geopolitical change fostered an early interest in history, regional affairs, and international politics. As an undergraduate, I minored in Iranian history, and for decades I have maintained a strong personal interest in military affairs, strategic studies, and the psychology of political leadership. These interests have complemented my professional work and continue to inform my analysis of international conflicts. My interests have always extended beyond psychology. History, anthropology, politics, and culture have long fascinated me, and they continue to shape both my writing and my understanding of human behavior. Much of my work explores the intersection of psychology, leadership, history, military strategy, and international affairs. Today, I am semi-retired and devote much of my time to writing, reading, painting, producing educational podcasts, and playing the Tar, a traditional Persian instrument. Having lived under very different political and cultural systems, I have developed a deep appreciation for freedom of thought, critical inquiry, and open dialogue. While I do not follow a particular religion, I respect the important role that faith plays in the lives of many people. Above all, I remain curious about the human condition and committed to understanding the forces that shape individuals, societies, and history.