Houthis Seize Mokha, Closing on the Bab el-Mandeb Strait

Houthi forces have taken the Red Sea port city of Mokha, bringing the group to within roughly 80 kilometres of the Bab el-Mandeb Strait. Houthi and Yemeni officials confirmed the capture, with forces loyal to the internationally recognised government withdrawing south towards Dhubab.

The advance ran down the Tihama coastal plain over a matter of days. Houthi units pushed south past Al Khawkhah and seized high ground in the area of Al Hays before moving on Mokha itself, and they also took the area around the airfield at Dhubab, which was built by the United Arab Emirates. Positions have been established on the Hanish Islands, including Zuqar and the Greater and Lesser Hanish, and on Perim Island in the narrowest part of the southern approach to the Red Sea.

Mokha's fall gives the group markedly greater control over Yemen's western coastline. The port sits on the eastern shore of the southern Red Sea, north of the strait, and the coastline running south from it towards the Murad Peninsula is the last stretch of Yemeni Red Sea frontage that was not already under Houthi control. Ras Menhali, the port on that peninsula, has also been reported taken.

The commercial significance lies in geography rather than in any single port. The Bab el-Mandeb is the southern gate of the Red Sea and the Suez route, and its shipping lanes pass between Perim Island and the Djiboutian shore. A force holding the Yemeni side of that gap is within range of traffic using it, which is the condition that drove the diversions around the Cape of Good Hope from late 2023 onwards and that still keeps a large share of Asia to Europe container capacity off the Suez routing.

The Houthis have said the operation is directed at ending what they describe as a blockade of their territory. Government forces have not collapsed elsewhere in the country and have been counter-attacking around Marib.

This story is part of the Maritime Briefing of 12 September 2026.