Houthi Leader Declares Iran Ceasefire a 'Great Victory,' Warns of Further Attacks on Red Sea

Houthi Supreme Leader Abdul-Malik al-Houthi declared the Iran–US ceasefire a 'great victory for the Axis of Resistance' on May 29, while simultaneously warning that the Houthi movement reserves the right to resume attacks 'depending on future developments.' The declaration raised immediate alarm in Riyadh: if the Houthis remain independently hostile to Saudi Red Sea shipping after the US-Iran ceasefire, Saudi Arabia's strategic pivot to the Red Sea corridor — which Chatham House identified in a May 27 analysis as the primary alternative to the Hormuz route — faces a new chokepoint threat at Bab el-Mandeb. Saudi Arabia's MARAD-flagged Red Sea corridor depends on Bab el-Mandeb passage. The Houthi declaration underscored the structural risk in Saudi Arabia's logistics reorientation: escaping Hormuz dependency may mean deeper exposure to Houthi interdiction in the Red Sea — a threat Saudi Arabia cannot easily suppress without a full resumption of the Yemen war it has been trying to end.