From: Andrew Fox from Fox On War <mrandrewfox@substack.com>
Date: Wed, 5 Aug 2026 at 21:23
Subject: The Houthis have found Saudi Arabia’s jugular
To:
If you’d like to see more reporting like this, let me know. The Houthis have found Saudi Arabia’s jugularYemen’s rulers stayed cautious through five months of war. Then Riyadh touched their red line, and they went after the kingdom’s oil escape route.
Whilst all eyes are on Iran, another of the world’s key waterways faces a similar threat. It is worth keeping an eye on Yemen. On Wednesday, Yemen’s Houthis claimed they had launched ballistic missiles at a Saudi tanker off Yanbu. A day earlier, they said they had carried out a drone strike on Najran airport. These followed attacks on Saudi tankers, Aramco facilities and the East-West oil pipeline. Yemen’s four-year truce is unravelling at the worst possible moment for Riyadh: traffic through the Strait of Hormuz remains severely disrupted, Saudi crude has been diverted west to Yanbu, and the Houthis now have the escape hatch under their missiles. Ansar Allah’s origins lie in the Zaydi highlands around Saada, where state neglect and the spread of Saudi-backed Salafism fuelled a religious and political revival in the 1990s. Ali Abdullah Saleh tried to crush it in 2004. Six wars over the following six years killed its founder, Hussein al-Houthi, while teaching his followers to survive bombardment, navigate tribal politics and turn state repression into recruitment. Saleh’s state helped them learn. The movement swept into Sana’a in 2014, aided by an extraordinary tactical alliance with Saleh, its former enemy. Saudi Arabia intervened the following year, expecting to restore the internationally recognised government. Instead, war gave the Houthis time, territory and an outside patron. They became a de facto state with ministries, prisons, taxation, mass mobilisation and a missile force. The weapon system now aimed at Yanbu took two decades to assemble. The Houthis’ roots, leadership and political project are Yemeni. Tehran jumped on their success, and Iranian and Hezbollah support then enhanced the quality of Houthi power through training, smuggling routes, technical expertise and components for ballistic missiles, cruise missiles and drones. Calling them a proxy captures the supply chain but misses the decision-maker. Ansar Allah has its own constituency, coercive economy and ambitions, although its strategic relationship with Tehran is now deep. Last week, some recent attacks on Saudi Arabia were launched from Iraq by Iraqi militias aided by the Houthis under IRGC supervision, according to regional assessments that Iran and the Houthis have not confirmed. This indicates close operational cooperation and speaks to the endurance of the IRGC’s proxy network in the Middle East, even after nearly three years of attrition post-7 October. The Houthis’ recent quiet needs qualification. The Houthis launched a handful of missiles and drones at Israel in late March, yet avoided sustained attacks on Gulf states or Red Sea shipping for nearly five months during the Iran war. Restraint served them well. The informal 2022 truce had left them entrenched across northwestern Yemen, while Saudi Arabia searched for an exit. American and Israeli strikes in 2025 had damaged ports, supply routes and senior personnel, and a renewed maritime campaign risked bringing the bombers back. The campaign against Israel also played well inside Yemen. A war against an Arab neighbour in defence of Iran was likely to draw less popular enthusiasm.
Pete Hegseth claimed that earlier American operations against the Houthis kept them out of the Iran war, but recent developments suggest that Bab el-Mandeb was simply more valuable as a weapon held in reserve. Iran and the Houthis tend to escalate in stages, saving the most economically painful options for when pressure is needed. Once Hormuz was largely closed and Saudi Arabia began pushing millions of barrels a day through Yanbu, the value of the southern Red Sea route soared. The Houthis could wait until the target became richer. The immediate rupture occurred on 13 July. An Iranian aircraft approached Sana’a, carrying what the Houthis said was a delegation returning from the funeral of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Yemen’s Saudi-backed government struck the airport runway to prevent the plane from landing, saying the flight violated Yemeni sovereignty; the plane diverted to Hodeidah. Riyadh regards an Iranian air bridge into Houthi territory as a national security red line. Regular flights could move advisers, senior operatives and high-value components directly into the Houthi capital, converting a tacit truce into rearmament under Saudi Arabia’s nose. The Houthis blamed Riyadh and launched missiles and drones at Abha airport. On 20 July, they declared a naval blockade of Saudi Arabia under the slogan “blockade for blockade”, echoing the Iran-US blockade competition over Hormuz. They subsequently claimed strikes on the tankers Encelia and Layla, on Aramco facilities at Jizan and Yanbu, on the East-West pipeline, on Najran airport, and on another tanker near Yanbu. Several claims remain unconfirmed, although video and satellite imagery indicate damage at Jizan, and the Encelia issued a distress call after being struck. The threat alone prompted tankers to turn around or sail with their tracking systems switched off. Following Iran’s lead in the Strait of Hormuz, the Houthis have weaponised insurance calculations as effectively as missiles. Saudi Arabia has responded with airstrikes on Houthi military facilities in Hodeidah, as well as launch sites and depots elsewhere in Yemen. It has also announced a multinational maritime coalition, supported by fourteen states, to protect the Red Sea. Riyadh’s behaviour still shows conspicuous caution: its defence minister urged Washington to avoid a broader campaign against the Houthis, warning of unknown risks. The kingdom wants to restore deterrence without restarting the war it spent years trying to escape. The strategic danger now runs through two narrow stretches of water. Around twelve per cent of world trade normally passes Bab el-Mandeb, including a quarter of container traffic. More than seven million barrels of petroleum a day were shipped through the strait in June, while Saudi Arabia has recently sent roughly four million barrels a day through Yanbu. Pressure at Bab el-Mandeb, on top of the Hormuz crisis, gives Iran’s network influence over both maritime exits from the Arabian Peninsula. Ships can divert around Africa, adding time and cost. Saudi Arabia cannot easily reroute national vulnerability. The Houthis are using that leverage to reopen Yemen’s frozen settlement on their terms. Their bargaining aims include freer access through ports and airports, prisoner exchanges, civil-service salaries and oil revenues. Iran gains another pressure point against Washington and its Gulf allies, while Ansar Allah gains bargaining power, prestige and proof that years of bombing did not break it. Both agendas fit within the same missile. Riyadh now faces a miserable choice. Absorbing the attacks would concede a Houthi veto over Saudi oil exports. Major escalation reopens a war the kingdom failed to win and drives Ansar Allah deeper into Iran’s military network, thereby handing Iran another win. Maritime escorts and Patriot batteries can reduce the damage; more airstrikes will crater another runway. None settles who rules Yemen or how Saudi Arabia lives beside an entrenched missile state. Iran’s war supplied the opening, but the prize remains Houthi power in Yemen, enforced by a hand around Saudi Arabia’s oil artery. Your support lets me spend less time arguing on X and more time doing research and fieldwork, talking to people on the ground and writing for you. I don’t take that lightly. If you ever feel this isn’t worth what you’re paying, please reply and tell me why before you cancel — I’d rather fix it than lose you. If you want to help even more, the best thing you can do is share the free posts I send out — that’s how new serious readers find their way here. If there’s ever anything you’d like me to cover for members only, reply and let me know.
© 2026 Andrew Fox
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