The naval blockade has become conveniently modish, particularly when it comes to narrow straits of water where heavy international traffic and cargo pass through.  The Iranians were the first to realise an eventuality long suspected: that the Strait of Hormuz might be feasibly shut for lengthy periods of time with minimum use of force, periodically and selectively opened to balance the strategic books when needed.  It has been seen, no less, as a divine gift with ambrosial properties. 

The Iranian-backed Houthis of the Ansar Allah (Partisans of God) movement are now doing much the same thing with their July 20 announcement of a maritime embargo against Saudi Arabia.  The measure is intended to counter the Saudi blockade of ports and airports in the Houthi-controlled area of north-western Yemen.  In the words of Yahya Sarea, a Houthi military spokesman, Saudi Arabia had imposed an “unjust and oppressive siege on our dear people for nearly 12 years, plundering our resources and imposing a comprehensive blockade on our ports and airports by land, sea and air”.  

In an email to shipping operators from the Houthi-operated Humanitarian Operations Coordination Center, the threat was unmistakably clear: “Vessels are banned from loading or discharging cargo at or from any Saudi ports.”  Any vessels carrying Saudi cargo “may be subject to targeting in any location within the operational reach of the Yemeni Armed Forces.”  

This amounts, without even the firing of a shot, to cutting off the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, yet another critical waterway found between Yemen to the northeast and Djibouti and Eritrea to the southwest.  The volume of traffic passing through this small body of water is less impressive than the Strait of Hormuz but still hefty: some 10-12% of global shipments, with somewhere between 6% to 7% of oil shipments moving through.  The Red Sea has become even more critical as a means of bypassing the Strait of Hormuz, helped by an increasing use of Riyadh’s East-West Pipeline. The rerouting of oil tankers with the closure of Bab el-Mandeb could, according to an estimate arrived at by Abdulwahab Al-Qahtani of Al Yamamah University in Saudi Arabia, increase shipping costs in........

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