Yemen’s Houthi rebels have launched a new and yet more violent campaign of attacks targeting cargo ships in the Red Sea, sinking two vessels, killing some of their crew and allegedly taking others hostage. The terror attacks represent the latest chapter of the rebels’ explosive campaign over the Israel-Hamas war that threatens to plunge international shipping into chaos by deterring cargo vessels from transiting the Suez Canal. Between November 2023 and December 2024, the Houthi rebel group officially known as Ansar Allah targeted more than 100 vessels with missiles and drones, sinking two and killing four sailors, in what they said was retaliation for Israel ‘s offensive in Gaza .

Their campaign has greatly reduced the flow of trade through the Red Sea corridor, which typically sees $1 trillion of goods move through it annually, and the latest attacks have seen insurance costs skyrocket. In May, Donald Trump announced he had struck a deal with the rebel group in which the White House agreed to stop bombing Houthi targets in return for an end to shipping attacks. The Trump administration had presented its 52-day bombing campaign on Yemen as being successful in restoring freedom of navigation in the Red Sea. But Yemeni Houthi militia leader Abdul Malik al-Houthi on Thursday embarrassed the US President, declaring that no company could be permitted to transport goods related to Israel as his group launched another round of murderous assaults.

Now, two more ships – the Magic Seas and Eternity C – lie at the bottom of the Red Sea, days after they were hit with drone attacks and with rocket-propelled grenades. The crew of the Magic Seas were rescued, but at least four crewmembers of the Eternity C are believed dead, according to maritime sources who spoke to Reuters. Ten more narrowly escaped the same fate after they were plucked from the Red Sea by rescue boats having abandoned ship and spent more than 24 hours floating adrift in the water. But 10 others remain unaccounted for and are feared to have been taken hostage after the Houthis claimed they had seized some members of the fleeing crew.

Many shipping companies have suspended voyages in the Red Sea due to the fear of attack, dramatically reducing the number of commercial vessels using the transit the Suez Canal – a vital maritime passageway splitting Africa and the Middle East that used to carry roughly 30 per cent of world container traffic. Instead, ships heading to Western Europe from Asia have been forced to circumnavigate the entire African continent, adding up to two weeks to their time at sea. The insurance cost of shipping goods there has more than doubled in the past week since the attack on Magic Seas. Rates for a typical seven-day voyage period, which are set by individual underwriters, have been quoted this week at up to 1%, matching the peak level in 2024 when there were daily attacks.

Such a small percentage may not sound like much, but this adds hundreds of thousands of dollars in further costs for every single shipment. Some underwriters have pausing cover altogether for some voyages. ‘What we have seen in the last week appears to be a return to mid-2024 targeting criteria, which essentially involves any vessel with even a remote Israeli connection,’ said Munro Anderson, head of operations at marine war risk insurance specialist Vessel Protect. The attacks represent a new level of violence being employed by the Houthis. Experts have referred to the assaults as being complex in nature, involving armed rebels first racing out to the vessels in the Red Sea, firing small arms and rocket-propelled grenades.

They then have used anti-ship missiles and both aerial and sea drones loaded with explosives to attack the ships. Analysts also pointed out the fresh aggression symbolises a failure on the part of Israel and America, whose bombing raids have clearly not stripped the rebels of their ability to launch attacks. The US said it dropped more than 2,000 munitions on more than 1,000 targets in the course of its months-long campaign against Houthi stronghold in Yemen as Trump vowed the group would be ‘completely annihilated’ unless it stopped targeting Red Sea shipping . His bluster has seemingly failed to deter the Houthis, who have apparently been able to reconstitute their forces to pull off complex maritime military operations.

For the Houthis, attacking commercial ships remains far easier than targeting warships as those vessels don’t have air defence systems. Instead, some carry a few armed guards able to shoot at attackers or approaching drones. Downing a drone remains difficult and shooting down a missile is impossible with their weaponry. Armed guards also typically are more trained for dealing with piracy and will spray fire hoses at approaching small boats or ring a bridge with cyclone wire to stop attackers from climbing aboard. The Houthis, however, have experience doing helicopter-borne assaults and likely could overwhelm a private security detail, which often is just a three-member team aboard a commercial vessel.

The new attack campaign ‘represents a qualitative shift in the course of the open battle in support of Gaza’, the Houthis’ SABA news agency said this week. It added that Israel commits ‘daily massacres against civilians in Gaza and relies on sea lanes to finance its aggression and maintain its siege’. ‘This stance, which is not content with condemnation or statements, is also advancing with direct military action, in a clear effort to support the Palestinians on various fronts,’ the rebels said. The Houthis are members of Islam’s minority Shiite Zaydi sect, which ruled Yemen for 1,000 years until 1962 . They battled Yemen’s central government for years before sweeping down from their northern stronghold in Yemen and seizing the capital, Sanaa, in 2014. That launched a grinding war still technically being waged in the country today.

A Saudi-led coalition intervened in 2015 to try to restore Yemen’s exiled, internationally recognised government to power. But years of bloody, inconclusive fighting against the Saudi-led coalition settled into a stalemated proxy war between Saudi Arabia and Iran , causing widespread hunger and misery in Yemen, the Arab world’s poorest country. The war has killed more than 150,000 people, including fighters and civilians, and created one of the world’s worst humanitarian disasters, killing tens of thousands more. A ceasefire that technically ended in October 2022 is still largely being honoured. Saudi Arabia and the rebels have done some prisoner swaps, and a Houthi delegation was invited to high-level peace talks in Riyadh in September 2023 as part of a wider détente the kingdom has reached with Iran.

But there is still no permanent peace. The Houthis are counted among Iran’s so-called ‘Axis of Resistance’ in the Middle East that the Islamic Republic uses to project power and political will. Tehran routinely denies arming the rebels, despite physical evidence, numerous seizures and experts tying the weapons back to Iran. Until recently, the Houthis were considered far less capable than their partners Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in Gaza. But these once-feared militant groups have been decimated by Israel after the October 7, 2023, attacks by Hamas that sparked Israel’s war in the Gaza Strip.

Hamas has been systematically broken down by Israel’s brutal campaign of bombings and ground operations that has razed much of the embattled Palestinian enclave to the ground . Hezbollah meanwhile has been gutted by the Israeli Mossad intelligence agency’s cunning pager attacks and bombing campaigns which eliminated its leadership and destroyed much of its military capabilities . Iran too has been left reeling after Israel launched a 12-day war against the country in June, which culminated in US airstrikes on key nuclear sites.