![The Bab el-Mandeb Strait, where the Red Sea meets the Gulf of Aden, seen from the International Space Station on February 23, 2020 (NASA Johnson Space Center, via Wikimedia Commons, public domain) [file photo]](https://i0.wp.com/mereja.com/index/wp-content/uploads/2026/09/bab-el-mandeb-feat.jpg?resize=780%2C439&ssl=1)
The Bab el-Mandeb Strait, where the Red Sea meets the Gulf of Aden, seen from the International Space Station on February 23, 2020. Photo: NASA Johnson Space Center, via Wikimedia Commons [file photo]
An armed small boat fired on the Singapore-flagged container ship CUL Klang about 15 nautical miles southwest of Mokha on Wednesday, the maritime security firm Marisks said, according to Kuehne+Nagel’s myKN news service.
“Multiple shots were reportedly fired towards the vessel’s bridge before the attackers broke off,” myKN reported, and no one on board was hurt. The EU-backed Maritime Security Centre Indian Ocean (MSCIO) received a report that a small craft had fired shots at a passing container ship north of Bab el-Mandeb and then moved away, while the ship continued north through the Red Sea and its crew was unhurt, The Maritime Executive reported. The ship, which has room for 2,433 twenty-foot containers, is operated by the Chinese carrier CU Lines, and its tracking signal displayed the message “China owned&CHN crew.” No group has claimed the attack. myKN said the tactics were “consistent with tactics previously used by Houthi forces,” but that attribution “has not been independently confirmed,” while The Maritime Executive noted that some small boats in the area may be fishermen protecting their nets and that the Houthis have said they target only ships linked to Saudi Arabia. Marisks said the attack and the recent strikes around Aden point to a “material deterioration” in security in the southern Red Sea.
On land, the Nation’s Shield Forces, which fight for Yemen’s internationally recognized government, said on X that their troops, together with the Giants Brigades and the Joint Forces, had taken “full control” of the Kahbub front, a mountainous area in Lahj province that overlooks the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, Anadolu Agency reported. The journalist Mareb al-Ward (@mareb_alward) wrote on X that Kahbub lies less than 30 kilometers from Mayyun (Perim) Island and that holding these heights would help protect the eastern flank of government forces on the Mokha, Dhubab and Bab el-Mandeb front. Wednesday was the third day of the “Dawn of Yemen” offensive, which Presidential Leadership Council chairman Rashad al-Alimi launched on Monday to retake the capital, Sanaa.
The Al-Khattabi Center for Studies (@alkhattabirw), which publishes research and conflict maps, gave a more cautious picture on X on Wednesday, writing that the recapture of Mokha “has not been confirmed,” because the announcement that forces had reached it “turned out to be premature.” It said government forces hold the Dhubab military airport and the al-Omari camp, while the Houthis remain in the center of Dhubab, the Bab el-Mandeb area and Mayyun Island, which government forces have surrounded, and that the advance on Mokha has paused because of mines and fortifications. The Yemeni news site YNP (@yemnews1) wrote on X on Thursday that a Nation’s Shield statement said its forces are “fighting battles in the Kahbub mountains,” and it presented this as a move back into Lahj after the earlier claim of reaching Mokha. DW correspondent Kersten Knipp told DW Amharic on Wednesday that it is still unclear whether government forces will succeed in taking control of Bab el-Mandeb, and that the divided anti-Houthi groups would need to coordinate their forces.
The Houthis stepped up their attacks on Saudi Arabia on Thursday and said they hit Riyadh’s King Khalid International Airport with a ballistic missile, while Saudi forces said they intercepted two missiles fired at the capital, France 24 reported. Witnesses saw smoke rising from a parked plane at the airport that was believed to be empty, and Saudi state media said debris from an intercepted missile damaged a kindergarten and a medical complex in Riyadh, Reuters reported. Several international firms in the King Abdullah Financial District told staff to work from home, diplomats sheltered inside their embassies and at least one international school moved children into a basement, according to Reuters and AFP. The Houthis told workers at Saudi oil facilities to leave their jobs “so as not to endanger their lives,” and Saudi authorities have said three people were killed this week in strikes on the Riyadh and Abha airports. Turkey’s foreign minister on Thursday ruled out sending troops to fight the Houthis, saying that Turkey’s defense pact with Saudi Arabia was “not an offensive agreement,” France 24 reported.
More than 200,000 people have been displaced in Yemen since July, according to UN data cited by AFP. Lloyd’s List Intelligence data cited by myKN show at least 1,214 transits by large cargo ships through Bab el-Mandeb in September, up 17 percent from a year earlier. The port of Djibouti, Ethiopia’s main trade gateway, sits on the Gulf of Aden a short distance from the strait, which lies between Yemen, Djibouti and Eritrea, ABC News (Australia) reported.
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