Half a century ago, the Yom Kippur war between Israel and Arab states put a new cartel of oil producers at the centre of global politics. The Organization of Arab Petroleum Exporting Countries, including Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, halted oil supplies to the western countries that had supported Israel. It was the first global oil shock.
On Wednesday, the Jewish holy day of Yom Kippur, Saudi Arabia and its oil allies — which now include Russia in the Opec+ group — moved to upend the world’s energy order again.
Their decision to slash 2mn barrels a day from production targets, or 2 per cent of global supply, might sound modest. But doing so while Brent crude was trading at a lofty $90 a barrel — almost twice its long-term historical price — is a threat to a global economy stalked by inflation and mounting consumer anxiety about energy prices and shortages. And it marks a new and perhaps dangerous breach between producer and consumer countries, especially between the US and Saudi Arabia.