Both of Saudi Arabia’s ways around a closed Hormuz came under attack in the same week

Houthi forces advanced down Yemen’s west coast and took Mokha, roughly 80 kilometres north of the Bab al-Mandeb, on 10 September, along with islands in the Hanish chain, according to a special report by the maritime intelligence firm Windward and reporting by the Associated Press carried by NPR. AP attributed the port’s fall to both Houthi and Yemeni government officials, which is the strongest confirmation available; the port had been held by the National Resistance Forces loyal to Tariq Saleh. The claim that has travelled fastest is the weakest. AP attributes the capture of Perim, the island sitting mid-strait at its narrowest point, to a single senior Yemeni government military official, and CNBC hedged it as a reported seizure. Euronews, citing unnamed government military sources, reported Zuqar Island taken after rocket attacks and a ground assault, and more than 2,000 government troops besieged on the Hanish islands with their own command unsure of their status. That is the losing side describing its own losses, anonymously. Saudi Arabia struck Mokha’s airport afterwards, according to a Houthi broadcaster; the coalition has not confirmed it.

The second route was hit the same day. The Jerusalem Post’s live file for 11 September carries the line that a drone launched from Iraq struck Saudi Arabia’s East–West pipeline, alongside a satellite image dated 10 September showing black smoke rising from a section of the line south of Medina, credited to NASA Worldview and distributed by Reuters. Neither Riyadh nor Aramco has been reported confirming damage or throughput loss, no faction has been reported claiming it, and no Iraqi government response has surfaced. The attribution matters more than the smoke. The East–West line carries Eastern Province crude to Yanbu on the Red Sea, which is precisely the infrastructure that exists so that Saudi barrels need not pass Hormuz. Bloomberg reported on 10 September that Riyadh shifted more of its oil exports onto the Red Sea route in July. Eight days before that pipeline strike, Houthi attacks on energy facilities and cities in southern Saudi Arabia wounded at least 73 people at Abha, Khamis Mushait, Jizan and Najran, according to coalition spokesman Turki al-Maliki.

What all this is a detour from is still contested. US Central Command said on Friday that US forces had redirected 99 commercial vessels as of 11 September in enforcing the blockade on Iran, and that the USS Boxer remains flagship of the amphibious ready group carrying it out. The tracker straits.live logged the strait as closed to commercial shipping for a 195th day on 11 September, recording six transits on 6 September against a normal of roughly 85 a day, and noting that Iranian media call it closed while Reuters and gCaptain report IMF PortWatch counting those same six. Kpler data cited by Al Jazeera put the ten-day average at 13 vessels a day; President Trump has said the United States is helping around 30 ships across daily. Brent was $105.82 at 9:15 a.m. ET on Friday on Fortune’s series, against $94.11 on 1 September. In Cairo, CAPMAS data show Suez revenue at $505 million in July, the highest monthly figure since December 2023.

Assessment: The through-line is that redundancy is being priced out. Hormuz, Bab al-Mandeb and the Yanbu pipeline were three separate answers to the same question, and this week all three carried risk simultaneously. That is the structural change, and it does not depend on the shakier claims around it. Distrust those claims individually. Perim rests on one Yemeni official; the 2,000 besieged troops on anonymous sources from the side that lost them; the pipeline’s Iraqi launch point on a partisan outlet’s live-file headline and a satellite image that shows smoke, not provenance. Treat CNBC’s relay of MS NOW reporting that Mohammed bin Salman personally pressed President Trump for intervention as second-hand until Riyadh or the White House says anything on the record — particularly since the Times of Israel reports Trump rejecting a Saudi request for strikes on the Houthis. And read Egypt’s Suez numbers for what they are: a chokepoint premium, not a Red Sea recovery. If Hormuz reopens, the mechanism reverses.