The latest Yemeni strikes on Saudi Arabia should be seen as an attempt to establish a new deterrence equation. The Saudis bomb Sana’a airport; the Yemenis strike Saudi airports. The Saudis attack energy infrastructure; the Yemenis threaten Saudi energy infrastructure. In an ideal world, all sides would spare civilian infrastructure, and international law would actually mean something. But this is not the world created in the Middle East. Saudi Arabia spent years bombing Yemen’s infrastructure and imposing siege conditions on the country, while Washington largely looked the other way. Ansar Allah has now concluded that the only way to restrain Riyadh is to impose costs directly on the strategic assets upon which the Saudi state depends.

This is why the strikes on King Khalid International Airport had a strategic impact. Saudi Arabia has spent years selling itself as a stable haven for foreign investment, artificial intelligence, tourism, logistics and petrochemicals under Vision 2030. That entire economic model depends on one assumption: stability. If international companies begin calculating that Riyadh, Jeddah or Dammam can be reached by Yemeni missiles and drones, then Ansar Allah does not need to destroy the Saudi economy. It only has to destroy the illusion that Saudi Arabia can wage war against Yemen while remaining completely insulated from the consequences. The recent attacks have already disrupted flights and raised questions about the kingdom’s ability to protect critical infrastructure.

But there is another layer of this war. Saudi Arabia is supposedly one of America’s most important strategic allies in the Middle East, yet Donald Trump has so far resisted Riyadh’s requests for direct American military intervention against Ansar Allah. Washington is providing intelligence and other forms of military support, but it has stopped short of joining the Saudi offensive directly. Why?

I suspect that there is a trap being set for Mohammed bin Salman.

The United States and Israel have wanted Saudi Arabia inside the Abraham Accords for years. Riyadh, however, has continued to insist publicly on conditions before formal normalization, including progress toward Palestinian statehood and, more importantly, a defence pact with the United States. The Saudis can see that Washington is gradually reducing its willingness to carry the entire military burden of the Middle East. If the U.S. eventually diminishes its regional presence, then Riyadh has to ask who fills the vacuum: Iran, Turkey or Israel. This is why the Saudi leadership wants guarantees that America will still defend the Kingdom even if American forces become less physically present in the region.

If I put myself in Washington’s position and I want to force Saudi Arabia toward Israel, I do not necessarily need to abandon MBS completely. I only need to allow him to feel sufficiently vulnerable. Let the Saudis become trapped again in the Yemeni quagmire. Give them intelligence, weapons and limited assistance, but do not provide the overwhelming American intervention they expected. At the same time, demonstrate that Israel possesses intelligence, military capabilities and regional reach that Saudi Arabia desperately needs. Then the argument almost writes itself: Why continue keeping the Saudi-Israeli relationship in the shadows when Israel is already helping you confront your enemies? This is the logic I see behind the pressure, although I want to be clear that I am connecting political dots here rather than claiming possession of a secret American document proving the strategy.

This is why I used the provocative term “Zionization” when discussing the future of Saudi Arabia. By that I mean bringing the kingdom fully under an Israeli-centered regional security architecture similar to what has happened with the UAE: normalization is no longer merely diplomatic recognition but strategic integration, intelligence cooperation and the gradual acceptance of Israel as the security center of the region.

Ansar Allah, meanwhile, is trying to prove exactly the opposite: that Saudi security cannot be guaranteed from Washington or Tel Aviv while Riyadh continues its war against Yemen.

That is the new deterrence equation.

And if Washington is deliberately allowing Saudi Arabia to discover the limits of American protection to make an Israeli alliance look unavoidable, then the war in Yemen is not only about Yemen anymore. It is also about who will inherit the regional security architecture as America gradually steps back.