Expert warns of 'general escalation' of fighting if Houthis resume Red Sea campaign
The U.S. has hit back against threats to now block another Middle East waterway by Iranian terror proxy, the Houthis.
Earlier this week, the group declared a complete ban on Israeli-owned ships using the Red Sea, declaring them to be "legitimate targets."
The Red Sea and the waterway through its narrow Bab-el Mandeb Strait has become the main route for oil to ship out of the Middle East to Asia since the Strait of Hormuz has effectively stopped functioning as the main route of navigation for shipping.
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Houthi spokesperson Yahya Saree posted on Monday, "We declare a complete and total ban on Israeli maritime navigation in the Red Sea, and we consider all enemy movements to be legitimate targets."
In a statement to Fox News Digital, a State Department spokesperson struck back: "The escalatory actions of Iran and their Houthi proxies are unacceptable. These dangerous actions only serve to further enflame tensions and further disrupt global supply chains. We will continue to work with our partners to ensure freedom of navigation in the Red Sea and the Strait of Hormuz."
Edmund Fitton-Brown, a senior fellow at The Foundation for Defense of Democracies, told Fox News Digital, "The Houthis have indeed risen to the challenge, at least verbally. In common with much ‘Axis of Resistance’ rhetoric at present, the intention appears to be to leverage U.S. political nervousness and market volatility, and to drive a wedge between the Americans and the Israelis."
Fitton-Brown, a former U.K. ambassador to Yemen, added, "Provided the allies keep talking to each other, the Israelis respond proportionately, as they have done, and the Iranians continue to provoke President Trump with actions like the downing of the helicopter, these tactics are unlikely to achieve significant success."
"It will be interesting if the Houthis do go all in, and resume their campaign against Red Sea shipping with full intensity," Fitton-Brown said, adding, "This will draw international anger and likely result in Israeli and U.S. strikes on Sana'a and Hodeida. There is potential for a general escalation if this happens, albeit one in which the allies have a clear military advantage."
Such actions come as reports emerge that Ethiopia, the Red Sea region’s most populous country, is stepping up as a major U.S. ally against Islamic terrorism.
While landlocked, Ethiopia has a population of some 130 million, making it the largest nation in the Horn of Africa. Located near parts of the Red Sea corridor, the country is roughly 60% Christian, according to a recent report by the Association of Religion Data Archives.
And despite it being landlocked, Ethiopian researcher Blen M. Diriba told Fox News Digital that the country acts as a strategic roadblock or "a keystone state" on the Islamist expansionist "highway" that has formed all the way from Iran to Sudan.
Diriba, executive director of the Horn Review — an Addis Ababa-based research and publication think tank — told Fox News Digital that "Ethiopia, long a frontline U.S. security partner, now sits at the center of an expanding pressure zone where maritime disruption, insurgent violence, terrorist threats, and proxy competition converge."
Diriba added. "Iran’s Bab el-Mandeb threat transforms the Horn of Africa into a militarized frontline, placing Ethiopia at the center of a choke point crisis. With Iranian influence radiating through conflict ecosystems in Sudan, Eritrea and Somalia, the region is beginning to resemble a continuous arc of instability stretching from the Arabian Peninsula into East Africa."
"Ethiopia sits at the center of one of the world's most combustible security corridors," Diriba continued. "And in strategic terms, its relevance to the United States is amplified, not diminished, by that reality: From the Red Sea disruptions driven by the Houthis to the persistent insurgency threat of al-Shabab in Somalia, Ethiopia functions as a massive inland security buffer whose stability directly shapes whether these threats expand or are contained."
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But in addition to being pro-U.S., Ethiopia also has relations with Iran.
Fitton-Brown believes to some extent Ethiopia can be accused of playing both sides, as he said Tehran "has helped Ethiopia with its internal conflicts, giving drone support and military aid to the Ethiopian government during the recent Tigray War."
He added, "There is a new memorandum of understanding built upon that basis, with Iran gaining influence in Ethiopia, while Ethiopia receives military, police and intelligence support to counter its domestic ethnic insurgencies."
However, Diriba said, "Ethiopia’s engagement with Iran is neither affinity nor alignment, it’s strategic awareness: keeping channels open to engage where necessary, cooperate selectively, and strategically manage its relations with a complex regional actor, while firmly anchoring its core partnerships with its emerging and long-standing partners — the United States being on the top of that list."
"Ethiopia has pursued a flexible multi-alignment strategy, Diriba said, "prioritizing its entrenched security partnership with Washington while keeping open channels with Tehran to preserve diplomatic room to maneuver in an increasingly fragmented Horn of Africa–Red Sea order."
Fitton-Brown said relations between the U.S. and Ethiopia "are good, especially in the field of counterterrorism. Both countries use Somaliland to their advantage without having gone so far as to recognize it as an independent state."
Fox News Digital reached out to both the Department of War and the Ethiopian government for comment, but received no response by the time of publication.