Armed men stand on the beach as the Galaxy Leader commercial ship, seized by Yemen's Houthis, is anchored off the coast of al-Salif in Yemen on December 5, 2023.
On September 12, the Houthis arrived on Mayun -- also known as Perim -- the island that guards the mouth of the Bab el-Mandab Strait, after sweeping southward along Yemen's Red Sea coast. Their strategic foothold menaces a chokepoint through which roughly 12 percent of the world's trade by volume transits.
