Pepe Escobar, Zulfiqar Ali: China Threatened to Cut Off Rare Earths on Trump; Weapon China Is Bringing to Xi-Trump Summit

by Transition Protocol [9-19-2026] Pepe Escobar(bio).

Iranian sources tell Transition Protocol that when Xi Jinping meets Donald Trump in Washington next week, he is expected to link China's rare-earth exports to the American naval blockade of Iran.

Pepe Escobar, recording from Moscow fifteen minutes after the information reached him, on what that would mean — and on the week Yemen took the Bab al-Mandeb and the House of Saud ran out of friends.

Recorded past midnight in Moscow on Friday 18 September 2026, the first in a new weekly wrap-up series.

In this episode:

• What Iranian sources expect Xi to put to Trump at next week's summit, and why rare earths are the lever. Beijing has not confirmed this and, as Pepe says on camera, it never will.
• The message Sanaa sent to the White House through Oman, and the American base named in it.
• How Ansar Allah took the Yemeni coast, Mayun, and control of the Bab al-Mandeb — and what happens at Taiz and Marib next.
• Riyadh's search for allies: Pakistan, Turkey, Britain, and — as widely reported since 15 September — Israel, through US Central Command.
• Why Islamabad cannot join a war against Yemen without paying for it at home.
• The Saudi East–West pipeline, the repair clock, and what three more drones would do to it.
• The argument in Washington over striking Iran before or after the midterms.
• Why the Bab al-Mandeb is closed to some shipping and not to others — a distinction almost nobody else is making.
• Two chokepoints, record diesel prices, and the stagflation warning.
• And to close: mandala multipolarity against what Alexander Dugin calls the Dark Enlightenment.

Houthis Warned the US via Oman. It Named a Base

Trump said the Houthis phoned. Escobar says a message named Camp Lemonnier. His sources; uncorroborated.

Pepe Escobar says the Houthis never phoned the White House. He says they sent a message through Oman instead.

In his telling, it named one consequence of a US attack: the destruction of Camp Lemonnier, the American base in Djibouti. “So, apparently, the White House understood the message,” he says.

If he is right, the routes carrying your fuel and cargo are now shaped in Sana’a and Tehran, not Washington. It rests on his Yemeni sources, and nothing else in the recording corroborates it.

Next week, he says, Xi Jinping may carry a second lever to Washington: a total halt to rare-earth exports.

INSIDE THE PAID BRIEFING (What You’ll Unlock Below):

• The three-part message Escobar says reached the White House via Oman, ending with Camp Lemonnier.
• Why he says Yemeni forces could hit Djibouti with a few ballistic missiles, and what he says the base watches over.
• The total rare-earth halt he says Beijing can use if the blockade of Iranian ports stays, ahead of Xi’s visit next week.
• How he says Ansar Allah takes Marib through a tribal deal (”you keep your weapons”) within “very few weeks.”
• The 100 American advisers he places in Saudi Arabia, and why he will not rule out a coalition “leading from behind.”

PART 2 — THE DEEP DIVE

How to read the tags in this post. Every major claim carries one.

• CONFIRMED: publicly reported and independently verifiable. This post draws on one recording and no outside source, so it uses no CONFIRMED tags.
• DEVELOPING: several indicators point the same way and the picture is still forming. Escobar presents these as public events; we have not checked them independently.
• SOURCED: comes from a privileged channel and has not been corroborated.
• ANALYSIS: Escobar’s reasoning or forecast, not a report of events.

The message Trump did not describe

Escobar says the Houthis did not call the White House. He says they sent a message through Oman that reached Washington and named an American base in Djibouti.

He is answering two things he attributes to Trump: that the Houthis phoned, and that the United States has “nothing against the Houthis” and is not involved in what is a matter between Saudi Arabia and Yemen. Of the phone call, Escobar says: “The Houthis don’t call the White House… They sent a message via Oman.”

The message, as he renders it, had three parts. Nothing against the United States. A serious problem with Saudi Arabia that Sana’a hopes to settle diplomatically, though so far, in his rendering, Riyadh does not want that. And one consequence if Washington attacks. In his voice for Sana’a:

“If you, United States, attack us, it’s very, very simple. Who will destroy your base in Djibouti? Camp Lemonnier. Completely.”

Those are Escobar’s words for a message he says others sent. They are not his threat. The recording contains neither the text of the message nor a named source for it. He says only that he confirmed the information “with my Yemeni sources and friends.”