Iran’s foreign minister said Sunday that every vessel wanting to cross the Strait of Hormuz must first clear it with the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. The strait carried 20% of the world’s oil before the fighting started. On Saturday, 10 ships made it through.
Abbas Araghchi made the declaration from Iraq, announcing a 30-day period of Iranian “sole management” over the waterway. He warned that any workaround, including the U.S. practice of using military escorts through the Oman-controlled half of the strait, would only extend the shutdown.
“Any attempt to adopt new or separate arrangements compared to what is underway by the Islamic Republic of Iran will only lead to more complicated situations and delays in the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz,” Araghchi said.
The standoff escalated sharply over the weekend. Thursday, the IRGC fired a drone at the Singapore-flagged container ship Ever Lovely, claiming the vessel had taken a route that skirted Iranian-controlled waters. Iran then attacked the Panama-flagged tanker M/T Kiku as it sailed out of Qatar.
U.S. Central Command struck back, hitting 10 Iranian military targets in and around the strait. Iran answered by launching drones and missiles at Bahrain and Kuwait.
Normal traffic through Hormuz had been running 130 ships a day before the war began, according to maritime intelligence firm Kpler. By Saturday that was down to 10. Earlier this week it sat at 40 to 50.
President Trump, posting on Truth Social, accused Iran of blowing up the cease-fire.
“It is very possible that they will never learn! There may come a point when we are no longer able to be reasonable, and will be forced to militarily complete the job that we very successfully started,” Trump wrote. “If that happens, the Islamic Republic of Iran will no longer exist!”
Vice President JD Vance, who flew to Switzerland last week for talks with Tehran, put it shorter: “Violence will be met with violence.”
Sen. Roger Marshall (R-KS) went on NBC’s “Meet the Press” Sunday morning and called the current U.S. strikes a cleanup phase, not a new war. “The major war is over and think of this as almost just a mop-up operation,” he said. “We have to press them if they strike us. We have to strike them back by 10.”
Marshall asked for patience, acknowledging Iran broke the cease-fire but saying the end goal is still reachable. “I’m asking America to hang in there. This is a detente. This is a ceasefire and yeah they broke the ceasefire. We have to answer that as well,” Marshall said. He pointed to Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s Israel-Lebanon peace framework, signed last week, as evidence the Trump team is producing results. His summary of those goals: “No nukes for Iran, no forever wars, bring the cost of gas and groceries down.”
Iran has floated plans to charge tolls, or what it calls “insurance,” for ships to cross the strait once the 30-day period ends. Washington has rejected any such scheme outright.
