Houthi threat adds to fears of wider war and economic upheaval
- The San Juan Daily Star
- 13 hours ago
- 4 min read
By GENEVIEVE GLATSKY and TIBISAY ROMERO
The United States and Iran pressed on with their daily strikes amid the first indications that a blockade of Saudi shipping announced by the Houthis, the Iranian-backed militants in Yemen, was affecting global oil supplies already strained by the standoff over the Strait of Hormuz.
The Houthis had yet to enforce their threat by firing on passing ships at the southern passage in and out of the Red Sea, as they have done in the past, but two oil tankers in that sea made U-turns, heading north instead, toward the Suez Canal, according to Kpler, a maritime intelligence firm.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, under questioning during a congressional budget hearing, said the Pentagon’s latest estimate of the cost of the war against Iran was $37.5 billion. That is in line with some independent assessments of direct expenses, but experts say indirect costs such as higher fuel prices caused by standoffs like those in the strait — and now potentially the Red Sea — have made the total much greater.
The Houthis’ announcement Monday added to fears of a wider regional war amid turmoil in global energy markets that have been rocked for months by danger in the Strait of Hormuz, the portal to the Persian Gulf. The price of Brent crude, the international benchmark, surpassed $90 a barrel Tuesday, nearing its highest level in the past month.
President Donald Trump, speaking to reporters at the White House on Tuesday, said that if the Houthis follow through on their threat, the United States would strike them as it did when they had targeted ships during the Israel-Hamas war. “If something like that happens, we take care of it,” Trump said. “You know, we’ve done that with the Houthis before and we haven’t heard from them in a while.”
He also vowed to keep striking Iran, particularly an underground nuclear complex known as Pickaxe Mountain. “We’ll be hitting that area very, probably pretty soon, and there’s not a thing they can do about it,” he said.
Saudi Arabia has been able to shift some of its oil and gas shipments from the Persian Gulf to the Red Sea, evading Iranian threats in the Strait of Hormuz. The Houthis’ move seems primarily geared toward curtailing the kingdom’s alternative route.
U.S. forces have launched 10 straight night of attacks on Iran. U.S. Central Command, which oversees Middle East operations, said Tuesday that the targets included military command centers, as well as missile and drone launch sites.
And Iran said it had launched new strikes on Kuwait, Bahrain and Jordan, countries in the region that host U.S. military bases. The Kuwaiti government accused Iran of again targeting the country’s critical infrastructure by hitting power plants and water desalination plants the previous day.
The latest exchanges of fire have killed at least three U.S. soldiers, as Iran has stepped up its attacks and broadened the range of its targets. On Tuesday, the Pentagon identified the service member who was killed by flying debris Sunday during a controlled detonation of an Iranian drone at Irbil Air Base in Iraq as Sgt. Michael Emmanuel Swinton, 30, of Fayetteville, North Carolina.
The hostilities have escalated over the past week, with only muted signs of the United States and Iran resuming diplomatic efforts to end the war. On Tuesday, Iran’s interior minister met with Pakistan’s prime minister and army chief in Islamabad. Pakistan has been brokering negotiations between the United States and Iran.
Here’s what else we’re covering:
— U.S. injuries: The U.S. military said Monday that the number of American service members wounded in the war in the past two weeks had risen to nearly 100, after not disclosing casualty numbers since the resumption of fighting. The “vast majority” of those injuries, it said, were “mild concussions.”
— Iranian attacks: Suspected Iranian strikes have targeted U.S. military installations and other facilities in at least four countries since July 7, according to satellite imagery and videos verified by The New York Times.
— Lebanon plan: Trump met President Joseph Aoun of Lebanon at the White House on Tuesday. The Lebanese army deployed Tuesday in a village in southern Lebanon after Israeli forces withdrew from it, signifying the first step in a phased U.S.-backed plan to end the conflict. It did not go smoothly: The Lebanese military said Israeli forces had opened fire nearby. The Israeli military said its soldiers had fired warning shots in the air after Lebanese forces entered an area outside the so-called pilot zone.