Houthi forces have seized Yemen’s Red Sea town of Dhubab and reached Perim island inside the Bab el-Mandeb Strait after internationally recognised government forces withdrew from the island, according to Yemeni government sources.
Four government sources said Houthi forces reached Perim on Friday, while two said government forces had withdrawn from the island and that Dhubab, on the Yemeni mainland opposite Perim, had also been taken.
Perim, also known as Mayun, lies inside Bab el-Mandeb and divides the narrowest part of the strait into two navigation channels. Dhubab lies directly opposite the island on the Yemeni coast.
The advance follows the capture of the Red Sea port city of Mocha and advances through the Hanish Islands, extending Houthi positions along the southern approach to the Suez Canal.
Yemeni Presidential Leadership Council chairman Rashad al-Alimi said on Thursday that the offensive was increasingly directed towards Bab el-Mandeb and Yemen’s western coast.
Yemen’s National Defence Council later acknowledged a repositioning of government forces in the western coastal area.
Mohammed Abdulsalam, head of the Houthi negotiating delegation, maintained that operations in coastal areas were limited in scope and that navigation and international trade in the Red Sea and Bab el-Mandeb remained safe and regular.
The Houthi-run Humanitarian Operations Coordination Center said on Thursday that Red Sea navigation remained open to shipping companies except Saudi vessels, which remain covered by an earlier ban.
The US Energy Information Administration estimates that 8.1m barrels per day of crude oil and petroleum liquids passed through Bab el-Mandeb in the second quarter of 2026, up from 5.4m bpd in the fourth quarter of 2025.
Maersk’s MECL service resumed transits through Bab el-Mandeb and the Suez Canal on 9 September, cutting transit times by eight days compared with routing around the Cape of Good Hope.
Bab el-Mandeb connects the Red Sea with the Gulf of Aden and Arabian Sea and forms the southern gateway to the Suez Canal route. Disruption can force Asia-Europe shipping around the Cape of Good Hope, adding distance, time and cost to voyages.