As the U.S. midterms inch ever closer, American fuel prices remain stratospheric because events in the Middle East remain far from settled. The Iranian regime’s strongest remaining proxy group has now taken the lead in sowing chaos and destruction across the region, with a particular focus on Saudi oil production. Conditions are so concerning that even France is sending troops to defend its interests. President Donald Trump has also said he is considering re-entering the conflict he left more than a year earlier.

On “Washington Watch,” Dr. Michael Rubin, director of Policy Analysis at the Middle East Forum, called the situation “déjà vu all over again.” Upon taking office, President Trump re-designated the Houthis as a foreign terrorist organization and in March 2025 ordered combat operations against them, which ultimately lasted for 51 days.

The catalyst for the conflict was the October 7 terror attack on Israel. As part of the Iranian terror network’s multi-front assault on Israel, the Houthis not only lobbed the occasional missile, but they exploited their strategic position along the Red Sea to once again target passing cargo ships. By June 2024, the U.S. Navy was responding to “near-daily” attacks by the Houthis in what the Associated Press called “the most intense running sea battle the Navy has faced since World War II.”

American operations successfully destroyed most of the Houthis’ military capabilities. But then, in May 2025, the Trump administration negotiated a separate ceasefire with the Houthis, which ignored their attack on Israel and ignored their close ties to Iran. Effectively, after running out of bombing targets, the U.S. left the region with the job half-finished, hoping it could call the ceasefire a victory. In many ways, this partial failure prefigured the 2026 conflict with Iran.

One reason the U.S. strategy suffered was that it lacked any coordination with other players in the region, such as other groups battling the Houthis for control of Yemen. “The southern forces who were resisting the Houthis said they didn’t have warning when Donald Trump began this campaign, and they didn’t have warning 51 days later when he stopped bombing,” Rubin recalled. “If there had been any coordination, maybe … the Anti-Houthi factions [would have] taken the port of Mocha, which is on the strategic choke point, the Bab Al-Mandeb.”

As it happened, the Houthis seized control of the critical port “because the people who used to defend that were people [who] were trained by the United Arab Emirates,” Rubin explained, and Saudi “Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman … put his own personal rivalry with the Emirates above common sense,” ordering airstrikes against the anti-Houthi faction.

Currently, the Houthis have never “had it so good,” Rubin added. “They never expected that they would be able to take the port of Mocha on the Bab Al-Mandeb. … From the Iranian perspective, from the Pakistani-Iranian border to the Bab Al-Mandeb on the Red Sea, that’s about 1,600 miles of coastline they, more or less effectively, control.”

This geographic connection is part of what makes the Houthis Iran’s strongest proxy. Whereas Hamas in Gaza is effectively cut off from Iran, and Hezbollah in Lebanon relies on weapons smuggled over land through Syria and Iraq, the Houthis in Yemen have direct maritime access. In fact, “the Houthis … resupply in three ways,” Rubin explained. “One is by sea, primarily through the port of Hudaydah. The second is by air through Sana’a International Airport, which the Houthis now control, and the third is overland from the Sultanate of Oman.”

This means that, although the U.S. heavily bombed the Houthis just last year, the terror group has already been able to rebuild its capacity significantly.

Another strength of the Houthis is their historic connection to northern Yemen. “They’re not simply an Iranian proxy,” said Rubin. “About 60 or 70 years ago, the Houthis — or their ancestors, I should say — ran Yemen. They had a Shiite imamate in Yemen. So, when you talk to Yemenis, what they say is, ‘We don’t like the Houthis. They’ve been co-opted by the Iranians, but they are Yemenis. They’re going to stay here even if Iran’s regime collapses.’” That deters dissatisfied Yemenis from undermining the Houthi cause, knowing that any resistance could be used against them later.

“Meanwhile, fighting has intensified between Saudi-led forces in Yemen and the Iran-backed Houthis terrorist group,” Perkins noted. The Houthis have attacked King Khalid International Airport in Riyadh 20 times this month, killing 17 people and wounding 333. They have also attacked Saudi oil refineries, pipelines, and facilit[ies] they claimed was a “Saudi military operations HQ.”

Such firepower makes the terrorists bold. The Houthis reacted to the news that America may re-engage combat operations against them by threatening a “swift and painful response.” “I don’t know what to make of that,” Perkins responded; the Houthis must understand that the U.S. military is far stronger and more capable.

Unfortunately, Americans have often lacked the will to treat the Houthis with the firmness they require, Rubin admitted. “Barack Obama made a deal with the Saudis when the Houthis took over Sana’a, that the United States was going to help the Saudis with intelligence and help refuel Saudi planes as they bomb the Houthis. And then, of course, the progressive wing started complaining, and Barack Obama stopped doing that,” he said. “Ditto with Joe Biden. … When there was talk, for example, of cutting off this port of Hudaydah … Joe Biden listened to Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, and others who said, ‘You can’t do this because then people might actually go hungry for three or four days until the fight is over.’”

America’s lack of willpower influenced the decisions of our would-be allies. “If the United States wasn’t serious about defeating the Houthis, and if we were going to cave in to progressive pressure, then what the Saudis were going to do instead of defeating the Houthis was co-opt them,” Rubin described. “Basically, the Saudis and the Houthis struck a bargain for quiet, in exchange for an end [to] Saudi bombing.”

“The problem is, when you co-opt Islamic ideologues, they will always stab you in the back,” Rubin added. “The Saudis are learning this lesson with the Houthis. You got to stop playing footsie with these guys and just defeat them.”

The U.S. government could stand to learn the same lesson. Unfortunately, “because we have a separation of church and state in the United States, too many of our policy makers in the State Department, even in the Central Intelligence Agency, look at religion as a third rail they can’t touch, and they don’t understand how it can be a motivating factor, especially among Islamists,” Rubin lamented.

Indeed, America should keep this principle in mind when dealing with just about every Muslim power in the Middle East, even the ones who currently pose as our friends. Rubin pointed out that the Saudis have their ideological version of Islam, but “the difference is that the Iranians have been exporting it much more.” He pointed to an ominous new defense pact between Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and Pakistan. “Each of those states — Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, and Turkey — want to lead the Islamic world. … Those states that we’ve been counting on as allies for so long don’t have our best interests at heart. … Each of these three states is closer now to China than they are to the United States.”

While considering operations against the Houthis, the president has also said, regarding Iran, “that there will be no major military strikes between now and after the midterm elections,” Perkins observed. “We’ve seen this ‘on again, off again’ before. And it’s only led to Iran kind of regrouping and regaining strength” — just like with the Houthis.

After nearly obliterating the Iranian regime’s armed forces and senior leadership earlier this year, “now I’m trying to be nice. I want to be a nice person,” Trump said. Indeed, he regretted eliminating so many of Iran’s leaders, because that left so few potential parties with whom he can negotiate. “I should have probably left the leaders because I don’t know who we’re negotiating with,” the president reflected.

“There has not been any significant movement on the diplomatic front. Part of the problem is we really still don’t know who exactly is in charge inside Iran,” Rubin affirmed. “The Iranians keep trying to impeach the various cabinet ministers. It’s a big fight among the various factions … each more hardliner than the last.”

However, Rubin would amend Trump’s regretful musings. “There’s always been factions in Iran,” he said. “Part of the problem was our strategy. What President Donald Trump should have done is make an offer that Iranians couldn’t refuse; if they did refuse, then that person is removed from the battlefield, and you go on to the next one.”

“For example, Donald Trump was trying to negotiate with the parliamentary speaker, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf,” he said. “What you need to do is systematically eliminate all the other factions. If you don’t, then ultimately, you’re starting from scratch.”

“Certainly President Donald Trump is right that the sea blockade has been working,” Rubin agreed. “As the United States and international partners have cut off Iran’s ability to export oil and import gasoline, the land borders of Iran —especially in the north, with Turkey, with Azerbaijan, with Turkmenistan — have flooded open. So, in a way, the Iranians have been able to resupply over land. I’m not sure we’ve been doing enough to actually stem that flow.”

The fundamental challenge here is that “Iran is a huge country,” he said. “It’s about six times the size of Great Britain. And, the fact of the matter is, it’s going to take a lot more than simply a maritime blockade to grind them into concession.”

Nor has the United States implemented a blockade of the Houthis effective enough to prevent their rearmament. As Rubin mentioned above, the Houthis can resupply by land, air, and sea. “We’ve taken out the Sana’a airport largely by bombing it,” he said. “What there needs to be real discussion on is for the Omanis to shut down this land transit smuggling weaponry to the Houthis. And, at the same time, there’s got to be a blockade of the Port of Hudaydah through which a lot of Houthi munitions come.”

“Basically, at some point,” Rubin urged, “we’ve got to stop with the half measures and go all in with our strategy, even if that doesn’t involve U.S. boots on the ground.”