Gulf on knife edge as Saudis, Houthis trade blows

Saudi crown prince holds talks on maritime security with President Sisi

RIYADH/DUBAI:

Saudi Arabia issued security alerts across wide areas of the kingdom, including the holy city of Makkah and Jeddah, on Tuesday as attacks by Houthi fighters intensified, while Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman met Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi in Cairo for talks on security and maritime navigation.

The alerts were swiftly lifted, and Saudi authorities did not immediately say whether any incoming projectiles had landed. The warnings were nevertheless the widest-ranging since the latest escalation, while the alert in Makkah was the first of the war in the city.

Crown Prince Mohammed travelled to Egypt to meet al-Sisi at Al-Ittihadiya Palace, where the two leaders held bilateral and expanded talks. A statement from the Egyptian Presidency said they stressed the need to ensure freedom and security of navigation in the Bab el-Mandeb and the Red Sea.

The Iran-aligned Houthis in Yemen have announced several major attacks on Saudi Arabia over the past week, including strikes on an air base on Monday that they said were retaliation for Saudi-led airstrikes on Yemen.

Saudi Arabia has also blamed a separate pro-Iranian movement based in Iraq for a Friday attack that knocked out its East-West Pipeline, one of the kingdom's most important oil transport routes. Saudi officials say the 1,200-kilometre pipeline will be largely shut down for weeks for repairs after the attacks.

As Oil prices have risen since last week to levels not seen since May, with Brent crude futures rising above $108 a barrel on Tuesday, US Energy Secretary Chris Wright said the crude should be flowing through the East-West Pipeline within days.

The Houthis have made major advances along Yemen's western coast, seizing the Red Sea port of Mocha and three strategic islands in and near the Bab el-Mandeb Strait. Officials from the Yemeni government said Saudi and Yemeni air forces had responded by stepping up bombardment of Houthi targets.

The officials acknowledged that the Houthis now had effective control over almost the entire western coast along the Red Sea. "The Houthis are being put under heavy pressure. They in turn are putting more and more pressure on the Saudis, increasing their campaign of missile and drone attacks," one Yemeni official said.

A Saudi-led military coalition said 13 civilians were wounded in Houthi attacks on Saudi Arabia on Monday. In Yemen, Houthi-run health authorities said Saudi airstrikes killed three people, including two children, in Taiz province. The claim could not be independently verified.

The renewed fighting is threatening shipping through the Red Sea, which has become more important because of disruptions in the Strait of Hormuz since the wider war began. The United Nations Security Council was due to discuss the worsening crisis around Bab el-Mandeb on Tuesday.

Earlier, the Saudi crown prince had met US regional military commander Admiral Brad Cooper in Jeddah on Monday and spoke by telephone with President Donald Trump last week seeking military support, which so far has been limited to intelligence assistance.

A fuel shortage in Yemen is meanwhile hampering the movement of people trying to flee the country and cross the Red Sea to Djibouti. More than 2,000 Yemenis are in Djibouti, while more than 100,000 others are internally displaced in Yemen, according to the UN refugee agency.