🇾🇪 | Saudi Arabia loses the Battle of Bab al-Mandab as Ansar Allah establishes its first positions in the Gulf of Aden:

About a week after Saudi Arabia launched a new escalation targeting the key shipping routes off Yemen’s western coast, the results appear to be going in the opposite direction. What are the main developments?

On 5 October, Saudi Arabia launched a large-scale operation south of Yemen’s western coast. According to coalition spokesman Turki al-Maliki, the operation involved nearly 100 fighter jets, hundreds of armored vehicles and military pickups, and thousands of fighters from Saudi-backed factions advancing from southern Yemen. Despite Saudi Arabia providing sustained air cover for the operation, with the participation of other countries, including America, which acknowledged providing support to Saudi Arabia, as well as Turkey and Pakistan, the offensive has so far failed to establish control over any positions, even across an area just a few kilometers south of Bab al-Mandab. The operation is taking place in open coastal terrain.

According to battlefield reports, and by Saudi Arabia’s own admission, Sana’a’s forces continue to maintain their grip on the Bab al-Mandab theater of operations and effectively control the areas of Al-Suwaida and Al-Ardi. These strategic positions lie south of Bab al-Mandab and border Al-Mudharabah and Ras al-Arah District in Lahj Governorate, which are currently being used as staging areas for attacks toward Bab al-Mandab.

Over nearly seven days, the positions held by Saudi-backed factions south of Bab al-Mandab have turned into a war of attrition. Those factions have suffered more than 1,000 casualties, killed and wounded, if the statement by Mahmoud al-Subaihi, a member of the Presidential Leadership Council, is taken into account. He confirmed approximately 900 casualties among members of the al-Subaiha tribe, whose members have joined Saudi-backed factions in large numbers and without a coordinated structure. Other figures published in recent days have also reported hundreds of casualties daily.

Despite these losses and the destruction of hundreds of military vehicles, including armored vehicles and pickups, the front is gradually becoming an even greater quagmire for Saudi Arabia. Saudi-backed factions continue to face dozens of airstrikes daily, while the course of the fighting is shifting against them. This is particularly significant given the latest flanking maneuver by Sana’a’s forces and their advance into Ras al-Arah and Al-Mudharabah districts. These areas include a key maritime stretch along the Gulf of Aden, giving Sana’a a substantial advance toward the gulf and leaving Saudi-backed factions behind Bab al-Mandab encircled, depleted, and unable to maneuver.

On 5 October, Saudi Arabia hoped to secure at least some gains south of Bab al-Mandab, a vast area of open terrain. It appears to have assumed that the coastal areas would be easy to capture. Nearly a week later, however, the balance appears to favor Yemen’s forces, which have decided to shift the battle toward the Gulf of Aden to secure the remaining areas around Bab al-Mandab and the Red Sea and impose a new equation on Saudi Arabia.

🇾🇪@enemywatch