On November 19, Iran-backed Houthi forces began attacking shipping vessels affiliated with Israel passing through the Red Sea.

The attacks, launched in response to Israel’s war on Gaza after the Hamas-led, October 7 attacks on Israel, have disrupted international trade on the shortest shipping route between Europe and Asia.

Since then, at least 40 vessels have been attacked according to data analysed from Ambrey Analytics, a global maritime risk management firm.

Three months on, Al Jazeera examines the impact these attacks have had on international trade, the risks faced by seafarers, and the US and UK strikes on Yemen.

The Suez Canal and Red Sea together make up one of the most important shipping corridors globally. They provide the fastest and shortest way to travel between Europe and Asia.

In 2023, an estimated 21,344 ships, averaging 59 vessels a day, travelled through the 193km (120-mile) long Suez Canal in Egypt, making up 12 percent of global trade.

In recent months, major shipping carriers, which usually sail via the Red Sea and Suez Canal, have responded to attacks in the region by transiting their fleet around the Cape of Good Hope, off the Cape Peninsula in South Africa.

Alternative shipping routes

Rerouting vessels around the Cape of Good Hope can add up to two weeks to a shipment’s journey and between 3,000 and 6,000 extra nautical miles (between 5,556 and 11,112km).

London Stock Exchange Group’s (LSEG) oil and shipping research team calculated that it costs 35 percent more and takes an additional eight days for a large container vessel to travel from Shanghai, China to Rotterdam, Netherlands via the Cape of Good Hope, compared to the Red Sea route.



Spire Global, an analytics company collecting real-time maritime data, mapped the increase in trade voyages between China and Europe via the Cape of Good Hope from October to January as shown in the animation below.



The detour has meant that freight container volumes through the Red Sea region fell by around 78 percent from expected values in January, affecting 10 percent of all globally shipped goods, according to the Kiel Institute for the World Economy.

Freight containers transport most of the world’s goods, from raw materials to consumer goods such as electronics. Julian Hinz, research director of trade policy and head of the Kiel Trade Indicator, says that the “current situation appears more dramatic than it is economically”, with current delays expected to normalise once the longer shipping route is accounted for logistically.


With more companies opting to travel around the Cape of Good Hope, container shipping lines are struggling with congested ports and ship shortages. Inchcape Shipping Services (ISS), a British multinational ports and marine management company, told Al Jazeera that in addition to increased insurance premiums, vessels will now have to plan for “bunkering, husbandry, crew changes, and any customs or port fees at new ports of call”.

The map below shows how long it would take vessels carrying different goods to reach their destination, avoiding their usual route via the Red Sea.

In some cases, travel times can more than quadruple, for example, a bulker carrying a wheat shipment from the Ukrainian port of Odesa in the Black Sea would usually take about eight days to reach the Port of Djibouti via the Red Sea. However, going around the Cape of Good Hope would add an extra 30 days to the journey making it a 38-day journey.

Houthi attacks

On November 19, Iran-backed Houthis in Yemen landed a helicopter on the Bahama-flagged, British-owned Galaxy Leader, which was travelling from Turkey to India via the Red Sea.

After the cargo vessel was seized, it was rerouted to Hodeidah port in Yemen, where crew members are still held captive.

Since then, at least 40 ships have been attacked according to analysis of data from Ambrey Analytics, mostly in the southern Red Sea.

The Bab al-Mandeb Strait also known as the Gate of Tears, is approximately 32km (20-mile) wide at its narrowest point and has proven to be pivotal for Houthi rebels, who have often attacked vessels using missiles and drones as they entered the Strait.


“What's really interesting is that all the events are actually happening in close proximity to Yemen’s land,” Nick Loxton, intelligence delivery and innovation manager at Geollect, a geospatial intelligence company, told Al Jazeera.

“I think what's likely is that [Houthis] are using the Strait as a means of capturing the vessels coming through, probably through a relatively primitive line of sight, like somebody looking with some binoculars and saying: ‘That’s the vessel.’”

Despite the Houthis having missile and drone capabilities with a range of up to 2,500km (1,554 miles), the majority of attacks on vessels have occurred close to Yemen, though not necessarily within their territorial waters.

“It could be they're concerned they don't want to project force too far from the international borders to draw unnecessary attention,” Loxton said. “It's easier to say: ‘We're exercising our rights to protect our people to defend our brothers who are being targeted in Gaza.’”

Ships declaring ‘no relation to Israel’

Houthi rebels have said they would continue to attack vessels as long as Gaza remained under siege, demanding Israel agree to a ceasefire.

At least 29,000 people, including more than 12,300 children, have been killed in Israeli attacks on the Gaza Strip since October 7 according to the Palestinian Ministry of Health.

Yemenis wave a Palestinian flag in a show solidarity with Palestinians [File: Khaled Abdullah/Reuters] A number of vessels have resorted to AIS messages indicating their non-affiliation with Israel. AIS, or Automatic Identification System, is a system used in marine navigation for identifying and tracking the location of vessels.

Spire Global has shown that vessels are using protective AIS destination messages such as “allchinesecrew” or “norelationtoisrael”, a practice that increased significantly after mid-January.
Other vessels have shared communications such as armed guards being onboard to deter any close contact attacks from skiff boats.

Seafarers

Last week, the International Bargaining Forum (IBF), a forum which brings together the International Transport Workers' Federation (ITF) and international maritime employees, agreed to expand the High Risk Area to include the Gulf of Aden and surrounding waters as safety concerns rise among seafarers.

IBF agreements cover over 250,000 seafarers working on over 10,000 vessels.

"Seafarers just want to earn a living – and understandably they want to be safe while doing their jobs. Their voices have been pitifully absent in how this situation is playing out,” Stephen Cotton, general secretary of the ITF, told Al Jazeera.

“ITF have heard from people on board vessels in the Red Sea who can't sleep because they are worried about being attacked or killed."

The crew of the Galaxy Leader are still being held captive three months after their capture.

"All those who care about the lives of seafarers – or a global supply chain that keeps its workers safe – must call for a permanent ceasefire in Gaza. Peace is the best way to end the attacks on ships in the Red Sea,” Cotton told Al Jazeera.

While seafarers can refuse to sail through high risk areas, many companies have already diverted their vessels via the Cape of Good Hope.

Risk of piracy

Geollect also says that rerouting maritime traffic exposes vessels to other security threats, which may simply trade one risk for another.

According to Ambrey Analytics, since the crisis in the Red Sea began, 17 vessels have been hijacked in Somalia-based piracy events with 14 in December and January alone.

“I think the fact that more vessels are rerouting at short notice from the southern tip of the Bab al-Mandeb to go back around the Horn of Africa means there's just more vessels in the area,” Loxton told Al Jazeera. “So it’s just a case that they're [pirates] more likely to be taking opportunities as and when they come.”

US and UK strike Yemen

The Houthis, also known as Ansar Allah, are an Iranian-backed armed group that controls the western coast of Yemen, including the capital, Sanaa.

In response to the Houthi attacks, the United States established Operation Prosperity Guardian (OPG) - a naval initiative comprising warships from several nations.

On January 11, the US and Britain began bombing dozens of Houthi-linked targets in Yemen.

As of February 10, the Houthis say at least 17 of its fighters have been killed in the US and British attacks.

The satellite images below show the damage to an airfield in Hodeidah after US and British strikes on January 12.


However, even with targeted strikes on airfields and missile launch sites, it will be difficult to eradicate all threats from the Houthis, experts say.

“Realistically, they [US/UK forces] won't have the assets or the capability or even the intention to go after each and every missile system and drone system because many of these drone systems in particular are $20,000 worth of drones that the Iranians are supplying Houthis at very cheap cost,” Loxton told Al Jazeera.

“They're very easily transportable, therefore they should be considered a mobile asset. You'd have to track it very carefully…If you try to go after every single drone missile, A: It will be difficult to do. B: It will be very expensive. And C, you're probably going to have some kind of an incident which could lead to civilian casualties or your own people being killed or wounded or captured.”

Frigate 'Hessen' is sent off to the Red Sea from Wilhelmshaven, Germany [File: Carmen Jaspersen/Reuters] In addition to Operation Prosperity Guardian, the European Union has launched its own naval mission on February 19 to protect cargo ships in the Red Sea.

The naval mission will send European warships and airborne early warning systems to the Red Sea, Gulf of Aden and surrounding waters. So far, France, Germany, Italy and Belgium have said they plan to contribute ships.

Regional spillover

The Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project (ACLED), a global crisis mapping group, describes the developments in the Red Sea as entering a fourth escalation phase, in which the Houthis and the Western coalition are engaged in a retaliatory cycle from which neither side seems eager to back down.

In January, the US announced that it would return the Houthis to a list of “terrorist” groups – a decision the UN fears could harm Yemen’s economy, particularly commercial imports of essential items, UN aid operations director Edem Wosornu said.

International tensions have also emerged between states including Russia and China, who have accused the US and Britain of illegally attacking Houthi military sites in Yemen.

Most recently, the Pentagon confirmed on Tuesday that the Houthis had shot down a US MQ-9 Reaper drone off the coast of Yemen using a surface-to-air missile.

An MQ-9 Reaper drone flying over the Nevada Test and Training Range [File: US Air Force/AFP] Pentagon Deputy Press Secretary Sabrina Singh told reporters that Houthi "attacks are getting more sophisticated", but she insisted "our dynamic strikes or coalition strikes absolutely have an impact".