Last Friday, Saudi Arabia’s energy ministry confirmed that its East-West pipeline had been attacked in the Riyadh and Medina regions. Saudi Aramco shut the pipeline “as a precautionary measure”. The Saudi foreign ministry said that drones coming from Iraq had carried out the attacks, causing injuries and damage that were still being assessed. Oil prices quickly climbed back above $100 a barrel.
On the same day Yemen’s officially recognised government confirmed that territory on its west coast had fallen to a renewed Houthi offensive. After taking the port city of Al-Mokha on Thursday, Houthi forces pushed forward on to islands in the Strait of Bab el-Mandeb. Local officials claim that the group now holds Mayun, Zuqar, and Greater and Lesser Hanish islands.
These two attacks were carried out simultaneously, and not coincidentally. They represent a deliberate escalation of the conflict by Tehran in an effort to raise the cost of continuing the war for both the Arab Gulf States and the global economy.
Until last week, Saudi Arabia’s East-West pipeline was carrying roughly 5 per cent of global oil production from fields in the Eastern Province to the Red Sea port of Yanbu, thus avoiding the Strait of Hormuz.
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