Traffic through the Suez Canal is down about 60 percent since 2023, even after Trump-ordered attacks on the Houthis and now a cease-fire.
The largest commercial shipping companies continue to avoid the Red Sea and Suez Canal, despite a recent cease-fire agreement between the United States and Houthis intended to make the trade lanes safer.
The cease-fire, which began May 6, ended a U.S. campaign that involved over 1,100 strikes against the Houthis in Yemen and became a source of embarrassment for the Trump administration after group chats about the strikes inadvertently became public. The Pentagon had planned on a monthslong bombardment, but President Trump ended it after about 50 days.
“If the intention was to restore freedom of navigation, which is what they stated it was, then the results speak for themselves: The shipping industry has not gone back,” said Richard Meade, editor in chief of Lloyd’s List, a shipping publication.
Ship traffic through the Red Sea is down by around three-fifths since 2023 when the Houthis started targeting ships there in solidarity with Hamas in its war with Israel in Gaza, Mr. Meade said. Fearing that their vessels would be struck, big shipping companies avoided the Red Sea and the Suez Canal, taking a much longer route around the southern tip of Africa to travel between Asia and Europe.
The Houthis have said they are still at war with Israel and will attack vessels bound for the country. And though the Houthis have not attacked a commercial vessel since December, shipping companies say they worry that their vessels may be hit, deliberately or mistakenly, and have no plans to sail the southern part of the Red Sea anytime soon.
“We’re pretty far from the threshold,” said Vincent Clerc, the chief executive of A.P. Moller-Maersk, a large shipping line based in Copenhagen. Speaking soon after the cease-fire in May, he said the Red Sea would have to remain safe for the foreseeable future before the company’s vessels returned.