With a pause in U.S. attacks stretching into a fourth day on Monday, Iran has shifted its aggression toward Saudi Arabia, and especially at sabotaging Saudi efforts to shift their oil exports from the Strait of Hormuz into the Red Sea.
The Saudi defense ministry said on Monday that it intercepted multiple drones launched by Iran against oil facilities in eastern Saudi Arabia and the national capital of Riyadh.
Defense ministry spokesman Maj. Gen. Turki al-Maliki said the “terrorist” attacks were launched from Iraqi territory by “Iranian-backed terrorist militias” over the course of several hours on Monday morning.
Maliki said Saudi Arabia will exercise its “inherent right to defend itself and its national assets, while reserving the right to respond at the appropriate time and place.”
The Saudi foreign ministry issued a statement on Monday expressing its “strongest condemnation of the reprehensible drone attacks carried out by Iran-backed militias operating in Iraq.”
The statement called upon the government of Iraq to “take all necessary measures to prevent its territories from being used as grounds from which acts of aggression are launched.”
Another Iranian terrorist proxy, the Houthi insurgents of Yemen, announced on Monday they targeted “a number of sensitive targets and points for the supply and transport of crude oil from eastern Saudi Arabia to Yanbu,” a Saudi port city on the Red Sea.
Yanbu is connected to the eastern oil fields of Saudi Arabia by a pipeline network, which is currently moving about 7 million barrels per day (bpd) in an effort to bypass the Strait of Hormuz. Before Iran closed the strait, the majority of Saudi Arabia’s seaborne oil exports were shipped from the Persian Gulf, but over the past few months, Yanbu has become the kingdom’s busiest export hub.
Last week, the Houthis announced a “maritime ban” on Saudi shipping through the Red Sea, ostensibly in retaliation for the Saudis “blockading” Yemen. The Houthis backed up their threat by attacking two Saudi tankers passing through the Red Sea. The Yemeni insurgents are sending warnings by email to shipping companies that any vessel suspected of carrying Saudi oil could come under attack.
The Houthis claim to have attacked Yanbu, and refinery complexes in the city of Jazan, with missiles on Saturday. Eyewitnesses reported a fire burning at the Jazan refinery after the attack. The Saudi military said the first strike against Yanbu was intercepted by a U.S.-made Patriot missile battery, operated by the Greek military under a defense agreement between Greece and Saudi Arabia.
The National reported on Sunday that Saudi Arabia has “loaded no crude for export via the Bab Al Mandeb strait from its west coast since the Houthis declared a maritime embargo on Saudi shipping.”
Instead, the Saudis are shipping crude oil to Asia via a longer, safer route through the Suez Canal into the Mediterranean. The Suez route more than doubles the length of time it takes for Saudi oil to reach ports in China, India, and Japan.
Unlike the deep waters of the Bab el-Mandeb passage, the Suez Canal cannot handle massive Very Large Crude Carriers (VLCCs), so it takes twice as many smaller tankers to handle the load – which could be adding up to $2 million to the cost of each two-million-barrel shipment.
Ship tracking firm Kpler said on Monday that traffic through the Bab el-Mandeb strait has slowed dramatically since the Houthis declared their blockade of the Red Sea. Only 11 ships passed through the strait on Sunday, the lowest level of traffic in months.
Kpler noted that three of the loaded oil tankers passing through the Bab el-Mandeb were bound for China, and another was headed for Pakistan, which might have made the Houthis reluctant to attack them. Meanwhile, only ten ships passed through the Strait of Hormuz, which has been blockaded by Iran.
About eight percent of the world’s oil normally flows through the Bab el-Mandeb route, about two-thirds of it coming from Saudi Arabia, after the Saudis began using their pipeline network to bypass the Strait of Hormuz.
President Donald Trump said on Thursday he would hold Iran responsible for Houthi attacks on Red Sea shipping.
“A year ago the United States of America attacked, very powerfully, the Houthis, for their interference with commerce and trade, by shooting at ships. Since that time, and during our conflict with Iran, they have acted very responsibly,” Trump noted in a post on Truth Social on Thursday.
“Unfortunately, now they are starting up again, shooting at two Saudi Arabian ships last night,” he continued, referring to the Houthi strikes in the Red Sea last Wednesday night.
“Please let this TRUTH serve to represent that if they do this again, the U.S. will hold Iran responsible, in that the Houthis are a Surrogate and/or Proxy of Iran, and major military punishment will be inflicted upon Iran and, of course, the Houthis, themselves, who I am very disappointed with in that they have, until now, acted very professionally and smart,” he wrote.