Houthi Attack Slows Red Sea Shipping Amid Ongoing US-Iran Conflict

Ship traffic through the Bab el-Mandeb strait has slowed significantly after Yemen's Houthi militants attacked Saudi oil installations along the Red Sea coast, according to shipping data from Kpler. On Sunday, July 26, only 11 commodity vessels passed through the strait, the lowest level in months. This disruption is part of a larger conflict that has already choked oil supply through the Strait of Hormuz.

Seven of the vessels that passed through Bab el-Mandeb were oil tankers, with three of them entering the Red Sea to load Saudi crude at the port of Yanbu. Two of these tankers are very large crude carriers (VLCCs), while the third is a Russian-linked ship. The four vessels that exited the Red Sea on Sunday included a Hong Kong-flagged VLCC carrying 2 million barrels of Saudi and Emirati crude for eastern China's Ningbo port.

The Houthi military spokesperson, Yahya Saree, said the group struck sites belonging to Saudi state oil company Aramco in the cities of Jizan and Yanbu on Saturday. The attack is an escalation of the US-Iran conflict that has already disrupted shipping through the Strait of Hormuz.