Yemen’s Houthis attack Saudi tankers in Red Sea
Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi rebels said they attacked two Saudi oil tankers in the Red Sea on Thursday, potentially opening a new front as the US military conducted its 12th night of strikes against Iran.
The Houthis have threatened to shut down another key trade route, with the world economy already reeling from Iran’s closure of the Strait of Hormuz. Iran and the US have meanwhile stepped up their attacks as they vie for control of the strait, through which a fifth of the world’s oil and gas passed in peacetime, setting off a scramble for alternative routes.
US President Donald Trump threatened “major military punishment” against the Houthis if their attacks on ships continue. “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,” Trump wrote on social media.
As the rhetoric escalated, so did the economic fallout. The price of a barrel of Brent crude oil, the international standard, spiked 4.3 per cent Thursday to USD 98.16, its highest level since early June, before the two sides reached a preliminary peace agreement that has since collapsed.
Prime Minister Ali al-Zaidi of Iraq, who has close ties to both the US and Iran, was in Tehran on Thursday to call for peace and dialogue, a spokesperson said. Al-Zaidi met with Trump earlier this month in Washington.
An Arab diplomat said Gulf states are increasingly pessimistic about finding an off-ramp. The diplomat, speaking on condition of anonymity due to the sensitivity of the situation, said regional countries, in addition to Pakistan and Turkiye, continue to push for de-escalation.
The Houthis’ SABA news agency said the rebels had struck two tankers, the Encelia and the Layla, in the Red Sea, leading to fires on both. There were no reports of casualties.
It was their first reported attack on a vessel since they announced a blockade of Saudi-linked shipping through the Bab el-Mandeb Strait earlier this week in retaliation for the kingdom’s blockade on Yemen and a recent attack on the international airport in Yemen’s rebel-held capital, Sanaa.
Bab el-Mandeb, at the southern tip of the Arabian Peninsula, is a vital shipping chokepoint connecting the Red Sea to the Gulf of Aden. Around 12 per cent of the world’s trade, including a fourth of global container traffic, passes through there, moving between Europe and Asia via Egypt’s Suez Canal. The state-run Saudi Press Agency reported an attack set the Encelia ablaze overnight in the Red Sea. It did not mention Layla.
The United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations Centre, UKMTO, said it received a report of a tanker being struck by “an unknown projectile” 130 kilometres (80 miles) southwest of Al Shuqaiq, Saudi Arabia, in the Red Sea.
The Houthi attacks put at risk oil shipments from Saudi Arabia’s Yanbu port on the Red Sea and present a “double whammy” on top of the disruption in the Strait of Hormuz, said maritime data and analysis firm Lloyd’s List Intelligence.
Saudi Arabia has diverted millions of barrels a day of oil exports to Yanbu via an overland pipeline as the war has bottled up the Persian Gulf. The Houthi threats “raise questions on the viability of this route,” Lloyd’s said in slides accompanying an online webinar on Thursday.
US Congress passes resolution seeking to halt military action in Iran again as some Republicans defect
Washington: The House on Thursday narrowly passed a resolution to halt US military action in Iran, sending a warning to President Donald Trump for the second time as the war has escalated and the future of the conflict is increasingly uncertain.
The 214-208 vote requiring congressional approval for the war comes as the Senate is expected to consider a similar resolution later Thursday morning. Though the votes forced by Democrats are largely symbolic, they are meant as a strong signal to the Republican president that his support on Capitol Hill is chipping away as the war drags on and lawmakers in both parties have questioned his administration's endgame. The war has had "no clear mission, no strategy, no end goal," said Washington Rep. Pramila Jayapal, a Democrat who led the resolution on the House floor. The resolution narrowly passed after a handful of Republicans voted with Democrats to end the war. But the vast majority of Republicans voted to back the war and cede congressional war powers to Trump.
