Houthi missile and drone attacks wounded 13 people in Saudi Arabia this week, forcing the kingdom to shut a key oil pipeline and pushing crude prices to their highest levels since mid-May. Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman still went ahead with a state visit to Egypt, where he and President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi pledged to protect shipping through the Strait of Hormuz and the Red Sea.
Houthi attacks intensify as pipeline shuts
The Iran-backed Houthi movement has kept up a days-long assault on Saudi Arabia, striking several towns this week and wounding more than a dozen people in the south. An attack by Iranian-aligned militants in Iraq last week forced Saudi Arabia to shut its East-West oil pipeline, a route that has become vital for exporting crude since Iran throttled shipping through the Strait of Hormuz.
The Houthis said they fired dozens of drones and missiles at King Khalid air base in Khamis Mushait on Monday, in response to more than 300 air strikes against the rebels in Yemen over the past five days. Saudi military spokesman Major General Turki al-Malki said the attacks targeted the towns of Abha, Taif and Khamis Mushait, wounding 13 civilians and damaging seven houses. He said the wounded suffered "minor to moderate injuries."
Phone alerts also warned residents of Jeddah, Yanbu, Taif and Al-Ulah of a threat early Tuesday, though there were no reports of attacks on those cities. Similar alerts sounded later that day in Jeddah and Mecca.
Saudi and Egyptian leaders pledge to protect shipping lanes
In a sign Riyadh wants to project normalcy, Crown Prince Mohammed went ahead on Tuesday with a long-planned state visit to Egypt to meet President Sisi. The two leaders committed to ensuring freedom of navigation through the Strait of Hormuz, the Bab al-Mandeb Strait and the Red Sea, Egyptian state media said. Sisi also stressed Egypt's support for Saudi measures to protect its security and stability and to reach a political solution to the Yemen crisis.
Since reigniting their more-than-decade-long war in July, the Houthis have targeted energy facilities in the kingdom and attacked Saudi tankers. Last week they launched an offensive southward along Yemen's Red Sea coast, pushing back Saudi-backed forces and tightening their grip over the Bab al-Mandeb Strait — a waterway Saudi Arabia relies on to avoid the Strait of Hormuz and export oil to Asia.
Crude prices climb as ceasefire collapses
The attacks on the world's top oil exporter, together with the Houthi advance along the Red Sea coast, have pushed crude prices to their highest levels since mid-May.
These attacks have also shattered a four-year ceasefire between Saudi Arabia and the Houthis that had brought relative calm to Yemen's civil war. Riyadh had intervened in the conflict in 2015 to lead an Arab coalition against the Houthis after the rebels seized the capital, Sana'a, and ousted the internationally recognized government. Before the truce took hold in 2022, the Houthis fired regular missile and drone barrages into the kingdom, most of which Saudi air defenses intercepted.
But the latest escalation comes as stocks of interceptor missiles across the region have been depleted because of Iran's retaliatory attacks since the US and Israel launched their war against the Islamic republic.
Source: Financial Times
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