Brent oil (BZ=F) prices pushed past $100 per barrel for the first time in months as news of attacks on vessels in the Red Sea threatened to open a new front in the US-Iran war and squeeze an already tight oil market. Pushing up prices Thursday morning were reports that two Saudi Arabian oil tankers had been attacked in the Red Sea, both claimed by the Houthi militant extremist group. The Iran-backed Houthis, based in Yemen, said they are blockading any Saudi Arabian vessels from leaving the Red Sea after what the group said was an assault by Saudi Arabia on the Yemeni capital Sana'a. The Bab el-Mandeb has been responsible for roughly 9 million bpd of crude oil flows over the past month, per Goldman Sachs. If the Bab el-Mandeb is cut off, the only other option to move oil out of the Red Sea is to go north, through the Suez Canal and the adjacent SUMED pipeline.