What did Houthis achieve in 18 months of attacks on the Red Sea

Abdul Kareem, a religious preacher in Sanaa, believes that Yemen has been on the right side of history over the past year and a half. 

He praised the decision of the Houthis, who rule large swathes of northwestern Yemen, including the capital, to militarily respond to Israel’s war on Gaza. 

“We didn’t stop the Israeli aggression, but we posed a big threat,” Abdul Kareem told Middle East Eye. “Silence on such Israeli barbarism is shameful.”

In November 2023, a month after Israel began pummelling Gaza, the Houthis started a drone and missile campaign targeting what they claimed were Israeli-linked vessels in the Red Sea. 

The action, launched in solidarity with Palestinians, resulted in the biggest disruption to global trade since the Covid-19 pandemic. 

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Over the course of 18 months, the Houthis carried out attacks on over 250 military and commercial ships. 

Fearing bombardment, vessels travelling from Europe to Asia avoided the traditional Suez Canal route leading to the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden. 

Instead, they opted for the lengthier and more expensive route around the Cape of Good Hope at the southern tip of Africa. As a result, maritime traffic in the Gulf of Aden dropped 70 percent in two years. 

The enormous trade disruption gave the Houthis leverage in the international arena. But it was also used by successive US administrations as a pretext for relentless attacks on Yemen. 

The maritime campaign appears to be over - for now, at least.

This week, in exchange for the US ceasing air strikes on Yemen, the Houthis agreed to stop attacking vessels (though attacks on Israeli ships and territory will continue). 

By opening a maritime front in the war, the Houthis gained domestic popularity and a fearsome international reputation. But for many Yemenis, it came at a brutal cost. 

Military gains

Military action in solidarity with Palestinians, both in international waters and via long-range missile strikes on Israel, has been a key domestic publicity tool for the Houthis. 

That popularity has led to a highly effective military recruitment drive.

“The Houthis capitalised on the attacks against ships and on Israel to increase recruitment in held areas, exploiting the narrative of the fight against Israel and the US,” Eleonora Ardemagni, a senior associate research fellow at the Italian Institute for International Political Studies, told MEE. 

The number of Houthi fighters has grown from 220,000 in 2022 to 350,000 in 2024, according to UN experts. 

Ardemagni, an expert on Yemeni armed groups, found in a recent report that since 7 October 2023, there had been an uptick in children being targeted by Houthis for recruitment. This has occurred through revised school curricula and summer camps, some of which normalised militarism and violence. 

The campaign has also given the group, which has no shortage of foes both domestically and internationally, opportunities to deploy new weaponry and enhance its operational readiness. 

'Fighting against Yemen is not an easy adventure' 

- Ali, Houthi field commander

The Houthis have tested their use of ballistic and cruise missiles over the past year and a half, as well as uncrewed aircraft and boats. 

Ali, a Houthi military field commander in the northern al-Jawf region, believes that US President Donald Trump has been taught a big lesson since launching an offensive on Yemen in March. 

“When Trump began the aerial campaign, he said he would annihilate us,” Ali told MEE. “Now he has ordered the military to stop the air strikes. Fighting against Yemen is not an easy adventure.”

Ali noted that since mid-March, the Houthis had downed seven US MQ-9 Reaper drones and two fighter jets.

“Such a loss was not envisioned in Washington,” he said.

Expanded global networks

With a mixture of Iranian arms and locally produced drones and missiles, the Houthis have put up serious resistance against much more costly American missile systems. 

That has earned the Houthis recognition and influence in Iran's so-called "axis of resistance" and beyond.

“The Red Sea attacks promoted the Houthis as a key regional player,” Mohammed al-Samei, a Taiz-based researcher and journalist, told MEE. 

As well as reputational benefits, the maritime campaign helped the Houthis build tangible military and financial links with neighbouring partners.

'Russia intensified political and military contacts with the Houthis'

- Eleonora Ardemagni, research fellow

“Because of the Red Sea attacks, they also expanded their network of partners in Iraq and, most of all, in the Horn of Africa - thus shaping weapons-driven ties with actors close for geography, respectively, to the Mediterranean Sea and to the Arabian Sea,” said Ardemagni. 

Cooperation was not limited to Iranian-aligned actors, but also included Sunni militant groups such as al-Shabaab in Somalia and al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula.  

“Russia also intensified political and military contacts with the Houthis after late 2023,” Ardemagni added. 

That activity consisted of delegations between the two sides, Russian intelligence presence in the Houthi-held areas of Yemen, as well as the sharing of Russian satellite data in relation to shipping. 

‘Attacks were intangible’

Not all Yemenis have supported the Houthis' decision to put the country on a global war footing. 

The poorest country in the Middle East has already been battered by over a decade of civil war. 

Since the Houthis drove the internationally recognised government out of Sanaa in 2014, the country has remained fractured between rival factions backed by different foreign actors. 

While a tentative ceasefire was agreed last year, wider peace talks remained stalled and threatened to unravel amid the Red Sea escalation. 

“The Houthi attacks on the Red Sea and Israel invited fresh evil to our country again,” Saleh Taher, a university lecturer in Sanaa, told MEE. “Recovering from the consequences will take decades.” 

Samei said the Houthis' campaign failed to alter events in Gaza materially.

“The magnitude of the Israeli brutality committed against Palestinians has not changed,” he said. “Gaza did not benefit from the Houthi intervention.”

Meanwhile, the costs inside Yemen of military escalation have been devastating. Israeli and American strikes have killed and wounded hundreds of civilians. It has also caused widespread infrastructure damage.

An Israeli strike on Sanaa airport this week was estimated to have cost up to $500m in damage, Houthi authorities estimated. 

The re-routing of shipping away from the Red Sea also exacerbated food insecurity in Yemen, a country where more than half of the population relies on humanitarian aid. 

While some Yemenis backed the Red Sea campaign as a bold act of resistance, others were critical of the costs. 

A 2024 survey by the Sanaa Center for Strategic Studies found that 76 percent of respondents believed the Houthi attacks would hurt prospects for peace in the broader civil war.

And while the Houthi reputation may have improved among some regional actors, it remains fraught elsewhere. 

The group has been re-designated as a terrorist organisation by the United States, further isolating them diplomatically and economically.

Still, in Sanaa, Abdul Kareem remains defiant. 

“We knew we would pay the price,” he said. “We understand that countering aggression is a demanding mission.”

middleeasteye.net