Moses may have parted the Red Sea, but now, thanks to a wave of Houthi missile attacks, shipping companies are departing it in droves.

Moses may have parted the Red Sea, but now, thanks to a wave of Houthi missile attacks, shipping companies are departing it in droves.

So far, the Iran-backed Yemeni group has launched at least 100 missile and drone attacks against a dozen ships in the Red Sea, according to U.S. officials, and threatened to target all vessels heading toward Israel, whether or not they are Israeli-owned or operated. To avoid suffering the same fate, major energy and shipping companies, including BP and Maersk, have halted their operations there—rattling energy markets and driving up global oil prices and soon everything else. The Red Sea is what connects Asia to Europe, in terms of cargo ships, so disruptions are felt around the world.

The Houthi attacks “have created worries for global freight markets, for the flows of energy commodities, other commodities, goods,” said Richard Bronze, the head of geopolitics at Energy Aspects, a research firm. “It’s a really critical shipping route, so any disruption risks adding delays and costs, which have a sort of knock-on effect in many corners of the global economy.”

Washington is reportedly mulling striking the Houthi base in Yemen, just days after announcing a multinational task force to safeguard navigation in the Red Sea. But the pledge did little to deter the Houthis, who instead vowed to ramp up their attacks and target U.S. warships if Washington executed attacks in Yemen.

As the threat of escalation looms over wary shipping companies and energy markets, Foreign Policy broke down the Red Sea crisis—and what it could mean for global trade.

Backed by Iran, the Houthi rebel group controls vast swaths of northern Yemen, following a yearslong effort to gain power that ultimately plunged the country into a devastating civil war in 2014. After years of fighting between the Iran-armed Houthis and a Saudi-led coalition, at least 377,000 people had been killed by the end of 2021, 70 percent of whom were children younger than 5, according to U.N. estimates.

Experts say the Houthis’ Red Sea attacks are part of a bid to shore up domestic support and strengthen........

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