The Bab el-Mandeb Strait has always carried an ominous name — the ‘Gate of Tears’. Today, it feels painfully literal. This narrow maritime corridor linking the Red Sea to the Gulf of Aden carries not only more than 10 per cent of global seaborne trade, but also the accumulated tensions of the Middle East, the Horn of Africa, and an increasingly fractured international order. What happens in Gaza no longer stays in Gaza. What is decided in Tel Aviv reverberates in Mogadishu. And what appears, at first glance, to be a diplomatic gesture — Israel’s recognition of Somaliland in December 2025 — risks becoming a strategic accelerant across one of the world’s most fragile regions. Israel became the first country […]

This article was sourced from Middle East Monitor.

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