Iran-backed Houthi militants seized a strategic island in the Bab al-Mandeb strait and a town along its mainland coast on Friday, taking effective control of one of the world’s most important shipping chokepoints after a rapid offensive. The Houthis took control of Perim Island, Saudi and Yemeni officials said.
The volcanic island sits inside the Bab al-Mandeb and divides the narrow waterway into two shipping channels, giving whoever holds it a powerful position to threaten vessels entering or leaving the Red Sea. The militants also reached the Yemeni town of Dhubab, which sits directly on the strait.
The seizures cap a series of swift Houthi gains. The militants captured the strategic port city of Mokha on Thursday and are pushing along other stretches of Yemen’s Red Sea coast.
The Houthi advance further threatens Saudi oil exports just as Iran is constraining shipments through the Strait of Hormuz on the other side of the Arabian Peninsula.
Riyadh has relied on moving crude across the country to Red Sea ports to bypass Hormuz, but escalating Houthi attacks are putting that alternative route under growing pressure. “The progress made by the Houthis raises the risk of greater dis
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