Iran-backed Houthi rebels have seized a strategic Yemeni port city and are pushing towards a second major global shipping chokepoint, threatening to tighten the squeeze on world trade and oil supplies.Houthi forces announced on Thursday they had captured Mocha, on Yemen’s Red Sea coast, after launching a major offensive against Saudi-backed government forces.The city sits about 75km north of the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, known as the “Gate of Tears”, a narrow passage linking the Gulf of Aden and the Indian Ocean with the Red Sea and Suez Canal.At its narrowest point, the strait is just 29km wide and is one of the world’s most important trade arteries.The advance comes as shipping through another crucial waterway, the Strait of Hormuz, remains heavily constrained amid the wider conflict with Iran.“Now you have Iran on one side of the Arabian Peninsula controlling Hormuz, and now the Houthis controlling Bab el-Mandeb on the other side of the peninsula,” Hisham Al-Omeisy, senior Yemen adviser at the European Institute of Peace, told Fox News.“Which basically is going to drive prices — oil prices, goods and everything else — up exponentially.”The growing threat to Bab el-Mandeb is particularly significant because oil producers have increasingly turned to the Red Sea route to avoid Hormuz.US Energy Information Administration figures released this week showed crude oil and petroleum liquids moving through Bab el-Mandeb averaged 8.1 million barrels a day in the second quarter of 2026, up from 5.4 million in late 2025.Over the same period, flows through Hormuz plunged from 21.6 million barrels a day to just 4.9 million.Saudi Arabia has rerouted some crude through its East-West pipeline to the Red Sea port of Yanbu, effectively making the Bab el-Mandeb route even more important.Yemeni government sources said the Houthis had captured Mocha and reached the strategically important Hanish Islands, while government forces withdrew south towards Dhubab, directly opposite Perim Island near the strait.Control of the area could give the rebels a far stronger position from which to threaten shipping.“This is a turning point right now in the war,” defence policy analyst Wolfgang Pusztai told Al Jazeera, warning the advance could trigger a broader breakdown of government forces in southern Yemen.The fall of Mocha has also sent civilians fleeing, with hundreds of women and children reportedly heading towards government-controlled Lahij and Aden.More than 20,000 people have been displaced by fighting across the Taiz and al-Hodeidah provinces in the past two weeks.The UN’s special envoy for Yemen, Hans Grundberg, has called on the Houthis to halt attacks in Yemen and Saudi Arabia, as well as threats against commercial shipping.Fighting has meanwhile intensified dramatically across Yemen.Conflict-monitoring group ACLED recorded at least 276 deaths between September 3 and 7, while the Houthis this week launched dozens of drones and ballistic missiles at Saudi territory, injuring 73 people, according to the organisation.Reuters has reported Iranian arms and guidance from the Revolutionary Guards helped fuel the Houthi offensive, although Tehran has publicly denied directing the group’s operations.The Houthis insist international navigation through the Red Sea remains safe, while maintaining Saudi vessels remain subject to their blockade.But as Iran disrupts one side of the Arabian Peninsula and its Houthi allies advance towards another vital waterway on the other, the threat to global trade is rapidly widening.Oil markets have already reacted, with Brent crude jumping more than 5 per cent to AUD $148.96 a barrel.More to come.