Saudi Arabia moved to put the brakes on the U.S. blockade of the Strait of Hormuz, out of concern that a strategy meant to pressure Iran is backfiring and could shake the entire key maritime shipping lane of the Middle East.
The Wall Street Journal (WSJ), citing Arab officials, reported that Saudi Arabia recently asked the United States to lift the blockade and urged a return to the negotiating table. The United States is currently taking hard-line steps, including counter-blockading ports, to reopen the Strait of Hormuz, where Iran wields influence. The Strait of Hormuz is a strategic chokepoint through which about 20% to 30% of the world's crude oil shipments pass. Early in the war, Iran attacked ships in the Strait of Hormuz, disrupting oil flows and pushing international oil prices above $100 a barrel.
In response, Saudi Arabia has been rerouting Persian Gulf crude through an inland pipeline across the desert to the Red Sea port of Yanbu. That allowed Saudi Arabia to barely restore exports to about 7 million barrels a day, roughly the pre-war level, softening the blow. The problem is that as the United States raised pressure by fully blockading Iranian ports, Iran, cornered with no way out, began targeting this Saudi bypass. Iran is said to be considering the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, the southern outlet of the Red Sea, as a retaliatory card in addition to the Strait of Hormuz.
Meaning "Gate of Tears," the Bab el-Mandeb Strait is the gateway to the Suez Canal and a critical corridor for global logistics linking Asia and Europe. Narrow and thus relatively easy to blockade, the strait is an area where Yemen's Houthi rebels, backed by Iran, exert influence. The Houthis have a record of paralyzing Red Sea logistics by attacking merchant ships with drones and missiles during the Gaza war.
Saudi officials fear that if Iran, via the Houthis, blockades Bab el-Mandeb as well, the country's crude exports could be effectively paralyzed. The WSJ said, "Although the Houthi rebels are taking a relatively watchful stance in the current Iran war, they remain a core proxy of Iran," adding, "A blockade of Bab el-Mandeb has also been mentioned as one of the options." Ali Akbar Velayati, a foreign policy adviser to Iran's supreme leader, recently warned on social media (SNS), "We regard Bab el-Mandeb the same as Hormuz," and "with a single signal, we can cut off the global energy flow." Erik Meyerson, an emerging-markets strategist at Sweden's SEB bank, also noted, "If the United States restricts Iran's oil exports, Iran will try to disrupt exports through Saudi Arabia's Yanbu terminal."
Some say the situation shows that the entire Middle Eastern energy transport network faces the risk of cascading blockades that go beyond a simple strait confrontation. The structure in which one strait is blocked and another emerges as a countermove could shake the entire global supply chain simultaneously. Analysts say Saudi Arabia, the world's largest oil producer, is walking a tightrope between rival Iran and ally the United States to avert the worst-case scenario of energy isolation.