According to Riyadh's official media on Thursday, a Saudi ship was assaulted in the Red Sea as Tehran-backed Houthi rebels claimed to hit tankers in the waterway, suggesting a possible new front in the US-Iran battle.
The five-month conflict had already effectively closed the crucial Strait of Hormuz, and the Houthis had threatened to blockade Saudi ports on the Red Sea, a major conduit for oil imports.
Due to the conflict between Washington and Tehran over the vital Hormuz crude delivery route, a preliminary agreement to settle the conflict collapsed, driving up oil prices worldwide.In the most recent round of tit-for-tat warfare, the Houthis' assertion coincided with the United States launching new strikes on Iranian military targets, which prompted retaliatory airstrikes on US ally Kuwait.
The army of Kuwait announced early on Thursday that it was detecting "drone threats" in response to Iranian bombings on the Gulf state for many days.
After threatening to blockade Saudi ports, the Houthis claimed to have launched missile and drone attacks on the Encelia and Layla, two Saudi tankers in the Red Sea.
About 70 nautical miles southwest of Al Shuqaiq, a tanker's master reported being struck by an unidentified projectile, resulting in a fire that the crew was battling, according to the British naval security monitor UKMTO.

Saudi Arabia would not comment on the other tanker, but it did confirm that the Encelia had been hit.
The threat might exacerbate the shock of the Hormuz closure and jeopardize Riyadh's ability to avoid the strait for some oil exports, but it is still unknown how fully the Houthis could impose a blockade.
Iran's Revolutionary Guards announced on Thursday that they prevented three oil tankers from passing through the Strait of Hormuz, as the US and Iran fight for control of the waterway that, prior to the conflict, carried about one-fifth of the world's oil.Iran's formidable Revolutionary Guards declared in a statement, "The Strait of Hormuz is under our control... and any ship that is deceived by the US and intends to pass without coordination with the Islamic Republic of Iran will suffer the same fate."
"Any time the Islamic Republic of Iran shoots at a ship in Strait of Hormuz, whether it be by Missile, Rocket, Drone, or any other device or weapon, the United States will bomb and destroy ONE BRIDGE OR POWER PLANT," Trump wrote on social media on Wednesday, threatening to bomb Iranian civil infrastructure every time Tehran fires at ships in the strategic straight. The warning seemed to defy this threat.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth stated on Tuesday that the fight had cost the United States $37.5 billion, up from almost $29 billion in mid-May. Trump has been under tremendous political pressure to terminate it.
However, as he traveled to an airstrip to retrieve the remains of four US service members, Trump disregarded polls that indicated the war was unpopular.
One person perished in a controlled explosion of an unexploded Iranian drone in Iraq, while three were murdered in an Iranian attack on a military base in Jordan.
Two persons were killed in a US attack near Shalamcheh on the Islamic republic's border with Iraq, according to Iranian state television on Thursday.

"Americans don't want high gasoline prices but they're not against the war," Trump remarked.
For the first time in almost six weeks, the global oil standard, Brent crude, momentarily surpassed $95 per barrel on Wednesday. Later, crude futures lost some of their gains, although they were still up almost 3%.
US strikes
In an effort to "further degrade Iran's ability to threaten civilian mariners and commercial vessels transiting regional waters," US Central Command said that its eleventh consecutive night of attacks on Iranian military targets started at 2130 GMT on Wednesday.
According to Iranian state television, two US missiles struck Bushehr on Thursday. Bushehr is the location of the nation's sole civilian nuclear plant and is frequently targeted by Washington.While air alert sirens went off in Bahrain, where an AFP correspondent in Manama heard an explosion, Jordan claimed to have shot down four missiles and four drones.
Trump declared that if the Houthis carried out their threat to blockade Saudi ports, he would "take care of" them.