The deadly Houthi attacks on Saudi Arabia over the last week have put pressure on Riyadh to respond.
Saudi Arabia has carried out airstrikes on the Houthis in support of the Yemeni government forces over the past month. However, Riyadh has appeared reticent to respond in a massive way to the Houthi attacks. Rumors are swirling in the region about what might come next. Analysts tend to portray the Saudis as facing an uphill struggle with the Houthis.
Does Saudi Arabia really have no good options? Various recent reports have discussed different aspects of what Riyadh may be weighing in terms of what comes next.
For instance, there is the question of the US supporting Saudi Arabia. The US and many countries have condemned the attacks. However, US President Donald Trump has left media guessing as to whether the US will do more. The US appears to be supporting Saudi Arabia in terms of intelligence and targeting, according to the BBC.
The Houthis have threatened a "swift and painful" response if the US does intervene. "If the US becomes involved in the aggression against Yemen, we will not deliberate over the decision to respond; rather, there will be a swift and painful response targeting the US and all its interests in the region," Houthi political bureau member Mohammed Al Bukhaiti told the AFP.
All of this must weigh on US-Saudi coordination. There are questions about how a widening war in Yemen could also lead Iran to operationalize militias in Iraq.
Who should Saudi Arabia ally with to minimize spread of war in the Middle East?
Saudi Arabia has seen this before. It intervened in Yemen in 2015 to back the Yemeni government against the Houthis. The Houthis widened the war with ballistic missile and drone attacks on Saudi Arabia. In 2019, Iran directly attacked Saudi Arabia. Militias in Iraq also targeted Saudi Arabia. Therefore, Riyadh knows exactly what is at stake.
Meanwhile, there are questions about whether tensions in Yemen could lead to renewed fighting with Iran. Reports indicate that Israel could be involved in strikes on Iran again, or even on the Houthis.
There is intense interest in this among Saudi Arabia’s allies in Turkey and Pakistan. Those countries joined an alliance with Saudi Arabia over the last few months.
However, Turkey would likely not want to be on the same side as Israel fighting alongside Saudi Arabia. Anadolu media in Ankara noted that Riyadh had so far rejected Israel’s “bid to join fight.” It is not entirely clear if Israel wants to get deeply involved again in Yemen.
Israel already carried out strikes on Yemen in 2024-2025 in response to numerous attacks by the Houthis on Israel. The Houthis also attacked commercial ships they claimed were linked to Israel. They seized the Galaxy Leader, only releasing the crew in 2025. They tried to make the ship into a kind of tourist attraction. The Galaxy Leader finally partially sank in April 2026, the Maritime Executive noted.
How did Saudi Arabia get into tensions with the Houthis?
Let’s review again how Riyadh got here. Saudi Arabia intervened in Yemen in March 2015, leading a coalition against the Iranian-backed Houthis after the group seized Sanaa and advanced toward Aden. The intervention developed into a prolonged conflict involving airstrikes, ground fighting and Houthi missile and drone attacks on Saudi territory. A UN-brokered truce in April 2022 significantly reduced hostilities, and although it formally expired that October, a fragile period of relative calm followed.
That ceasefire has come under increasing pressure in 2026. Saudi strikes on Sanaa in July marked a renewed escalation, while the Houthis subsequently launched an offensive toward Bab el-Mandeb, the strategic strait connecting the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden. It’s worth recalling that Saudi Arabia and the Yemeni government didn’t want Sanaa airport used by Iran to fly in Iranian advisors to the Houthis.
Saudi-backed Yemeni forces launched a counteroffensive in October, supported by coalition airstrikes, to recover territory near Bab el-Mandeb and Mocha. The Houthis also escalated attacks on Saudi airports, including Riyadh’s King Khalid International Airport, where an October 10 strike killed 12 people and wounded 309. Riyadh vowed a firm response.
The conflict has also expanded beyond Yemen. On September 11, Saudi Arabia’s East-West oil pipeline was struck by drones that Saudi and Iraqi authorities said originated in Iraq. Riyadh temporarily shut the pipeline, a crucial alternative to shipping through the Strait of Hormuz. The attack highlighted growing concerns about coordination among Iran-backed terrorist groups across the region and the potential vulnerability of Saudi energy infrastructure.
On October 12, JINSA President and CEO Michael Makovsky spoke to Fox News about the latest Houthi attacks.
“It's very important that the [Saudi] Crown Prince be successful [in combating the Houthis], and it's vital for US national security. But he's alienated or distanced himself from a few key countries that could have been helpful here. I mean, he had a very well-known fight with the Emiratis, who were effective ... against the Houthis. ... He's kept a distance from the Israelis, who have ... [been] very effective at hitting the Houthis, and, at times in this war, he's been rather cool to the United States,” Makovsky said.
“I'd like to see the Saudis work with the Israelis, the Emiratis, and the U.S. to deal with the Houthi threat. It is not only a threat to the Saudis, of course, but affects the whole world because of [the Houthi threat] to international commerce. ... There has to be an international coalition," he added.
Thomas Juneau, a professor at the University of Ottawa, who focuses on Iran and Yemen and is a former Department of National Defence analyst in Canada, noted on October 11 on X that Saudi Arabia faces no good options with the Houthis.
"Military escalation was inevitable and is likely to continue - but it will hurt Saudi Arabia more than the Houthis. Negotiations are inevitable too - though not in the short term. The Houthis hold stronger cards, and they know it; their goal will be to extract maximal concessions from Saudi Arabia, which remains reluctant to pay this very high price.”
Might game theory help us understand the dilemma for Saudi Arabia in confronting the Houthis?
The challenge is modelling how complex this theater is in terms of how it is entangled with Iran, Israel, the United States, Iranian-backed militias in Iraq, Turkey and Pakistan.
The central problem is that Saudi Arabia may be militarily stronger than the Houthis, but military superiority does not necessarily translate into strategic leverage. The Houthis can impose high costs on Saudi Arabia without defeating its armed forces. Riyadh, meanwhile, must consider how its response affects not only Yemen but its economic security, regional alliances, and relations with Iran. This is what is called an “asymmetric” conflict.
This creates several overlapping strategic dilemmas. Saudi Arabia faces three calculations it has to make at the same time. It has to examine how it might deter more attacks, it has to manage its alliances, and it has to look at the regional context and potential escalation.
Game theory does not provide a clear answer, because the outcomes depend on uncertain information, different objectives, and the decisions of several independent actors. Nevertheless, it might be helpful to model this problem more because Saudi Arabia is in a difficult position, but it has many options.
Saudi Arabia can weather the storm. It has done so in the past. It has a naturally cautious leadership, similar to most Gulf countries. The West tends to prefer quick solutions, and Western media appears to think that a lack of an immediate large response, like “shock and awe,” means nothing is happening.
However, this illustrates the differences in calculations. The Iran war, for instance, has proven to be longer and more complex than many thought. This reflects the differences in thinking, perhaps, between Washington, Jerusalem, Riyadh, Ankara, and other places in the region.