Iran War Updates: Battle for control of Red Sea, attacks on energy infrastructure temper news of rising oil flow

Updated on: October 5, 2026 / 7:39 AM EDT / CBS News

Global oil stockpiles are "scarily thin" owing to the U.S.-Iran war, Saudi Aramco chief executive Amin Nasser said Monday, days after G7 nations agreed to release more of their inventories to ease supply concerns.

"The system is already straining," Nasser told the Energy Intelligence Forum in London. "And with precious little else the world can turn to, the supply resilience cushion is scarily thin."

His remarks came hours after the news that oil flows from the Middle East surpassed pre-war levels last week. That welcome news for markets has been tempered, however, by furious fighting between Saudi-backed forces and Iran's Houthi rebel allies in Yemen over control of the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, another key energy chokepoint and the southern gateway to the Red Sea.

Saudi Arabia's East-West Crude Oil Pipeline was struck again Sunday, a source working in the kingdom's energy sector told French news agency AFP on Monday, adding that the flow of oil through the pipeline had stopped.

"The East-West pipeline was attacked again yesterday," the source told AFP. "A pumping station east of Riyadh in Khurais. It wasn't targeted before. There was big damage and…

Original source: https://www.cbsnews.com/entertainment/