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Iran Conflict 2026
19JUN

Houthi blockade cuts Saudi loadings 36%

2 min read
12:07UTC

Saudi crude loadings through Bab el-Mandeb fell 36% before the Houthis struck the tankers Encelia and Layla on 23 July, turning a blockade threat into realised losses.

← Back to Trump lifted the blockade, not the straitJump to analysis ↓
ConflictDeveloping
Key takeaway

Rerouting round the Cape keeps Saudi barrels flowing but ties up ships and lifts freight.

Saudi crude loadings through Bab el-Mandeb, the strait between Yemen and the Horn of Africa that funnels Suez-bound shipping, fell 36% in two weeks, from 9.5 million barrels a day at the 29 June peak to 6.1 million in the week of 13 July, before a shot was fired 1. The Houthis, the Yemeni armed movement that controls the country's Red Sea coast, declared a naval blockade of Saudi-linked shipping through the strait on 20 July. On 23 July they struck two Saudi tankers, the Encelia and the Layla, with missiles and drones in the Red Sea; both caught fire, the Encelia broadcast 'not under command', and no crew casualties were reported 2.

More than 2,000 ships have already rerouted around the Cape of Good Hope, adding up to three weeks to a Europe-bound voyage, and Saudi exporters have pushed over 70% of their barrels to the west-coast terminal at Yanbu to skip the strait entirely. The military dimension belongs to the Gulf war that took Brent past $90 on Iran's strike against Kuwait . Every barrel that rounds the Cape instead of transiting Suez ties up a ship for longer, and a fleet that turns slower charges more.

Analysts cited by Bloomberg warn that a full Bab el-Mandeb closure stacked on the Hormuz constraint could put roughly a quarter of world oil and gas at risk 3. That figure describes a ceiling rather than a base case: the strait is being avoided, not sealed, and rerouting round the Cape keeps the barrels flowing at a higher freight cost rather than removing them from the market.

Deep Analysis

In plain English

The Houthis are an armed group that controls much of Yemen and has fought a civil war there since 2014. In 2023 they began attacking ships in the Red Sea they linked to Israel; they have now declared a blockade specifically targeting vessels connected to Saudi Arabia. Bab el-Mandeb is a narrow strait between Yemen and the Horn of Africa that ships must pass through to reach the Suez Canal from the Red Sea. Two Saudi tankers, the Encelia and the Layla, were hit by missiles and drones there, and Saudi crude loadings through the strait fell more than a third in two weeks as shippers diverted cargo. That matters because Saudi Arabia can reroute some crude to its Red Sea port at Yanbu, but the slower, longer voyage round the Cape of Good Hope adds cost and time that ultimately reaches fuel buyers in Europe and Asia.

Deep Analysis
Root Causes

Houthi anti-ship missile and drone capability traces to transfers routed through Yemen's Hodeidah corridor, a supply chain UN Panel of Experts reporting has documented since 2015. That dependency gives external suppliers indirect leverage over Red Sea shipping without direct naval engagement of their own.

Saudi Arabia's Bab el-Mandeb exposure is structural: crude loaded at Red Sea terminals for European and North African buyers has no chokepoint-free alternative besides the slower, costlier Yanbu-to-Cape route, which is now absorbing the diverted cargoes, part of the same Gulf war Iran's Kuwait strike opened .

What could happen next?
  • Risk

    A sustained Bab el-Mandeb blockade would compound Suez-dependent Mediterranean freight costs already rising on aframax pricing, layering a second Red Sea risk premium onto European-bound cargoes.

Sources:The National·Bloomberg
Mentions:Houthis →Saudi Arabia →Bab al-Mandeb →Cape of Good Hope →Yanbu →Yemen →Iran →Fujairah →Gulf Research Centre →Red Sea →Kuwait →Bloomberg →Israel →Encelia →Layla →RUSI →Suez Crisis →Dated Brent →
First Reported In

Update #19 · Second chokepoint doubles Med freight

The National· 23 Jul 2026
Read original →
Causes and effects
Caused by
Brent takes $90 on the ninth night
The Iran-Kuwait strike that broke Brent through $90 (ID:5121) is the wider Gulf war the Houthi Bab el-Mandeb blockade and tanker strikes now extend into the Red Sea.
Occurred 19 Jul 2026
Read story →
This Event
Houthi blockade cuts Saudi loadings 36%
A second strait now faces kinetic blockade, forcing Saudi crude around the Cape and lengthening every Europe-bound voyage before any barrel is lost.
Led to
Saudi crude abandons its Red Sea route
The 23 July Houthi Bab el-Mandeb blockade forced Saudi crude off that route and into the Suez Canal.
Occurred 24 Jul 2026
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June's calm was borrowed, not banked
The 23 July blockade reversed within a week the March-to-June bypass decline Wood Mackenzie's 24 July data documented.
Occurred 24 Jul 2026
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Bab el-Mandeb thins to 7.5 tankers a day
The 23 July Houthi blockade declaration and tanker strikes triggered the war-risk withdrawal behind the transit collapse Windward quantified on 30 July.
Occurred 29 Jul 2026
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Different Perspectives
Lloyd's Market Association
Lloyd's Market Association
War-risk underwriters price the Houthis' Red Sea attacks because the group announces its targets in advance, but the unclaimed Damietta drone gives insurers a hit with no author to price against. An attack nobody claims costs shipping more than one that is claimed, since premiums are set against a known pattern, not raw damage.
US Central Command
US Central Command
CENTCOM has announced no strike on Iran since resuming bombing on 30 July within hours of an IRGC salvo on Jordan, and centcom.mil did not respond to requests to confirm any pause. The command has gone quiet before while a larger operation was being weighed, so silence alone proves nothing about what it has or has not done.
Hengaw
Hengaw
Hengaw recorded at least 67 executions in Iran during July, of which the state acknowledged only eight, and reported the 1 August execution of protest detainee Arvin Kheirkhahan at Shahrud with no advance notice to his family. A family's first notice of a death sentence is now usually the instruction to collect a body.
Egypt
Egypt
Egypt's government asked media on 2 August to report the Damietta attack accurately, named no author, and said no findings will be published before its own investigation concludes. Cairo holds the debris and jurisdiction over an attack on its own soil, and naming a culprit now would pull it into a dispute it has avoided for five months.
Iran's Foreign Ministry
Iran's Foreign Ministry
Araghchi called the Hormuz talks with Oman final-stage on 2 August, four days after his own deputy rejected Oman's lane proposal, and denied the Damietta drone strike as an Israeli false flag while two Iranian officials privately claimed it for Tehran. Iran's public position now contradicts itself on both files at once.
Bahrain and Kuwait
Bahrain and Kuwait
Bahraini and Kuwaiti aircraft flew their own strikes on Iranian depots in July with Emirati air cover behind them, and Ynetnews reports some Gulf capitals wanted the 2 August strike to proceed rather than stop. States that have already taken fire see a closing window on Iranian weakness, not a reason to pause.