Iranian oil continues to flow through the Strait of Hormuz even as Gulf shippers struggle to move their own cargo through a waterway Iran has declared closed, according to a report Sunday from Kikar HaShabbat citing Reuters data, a dynamic that comes as Washington shifts its approach following the latest round of strikes and fresh statements from President Donald Trump.
Six vessels crossed the strait Sunday following renewed hostilities between the United States and Iran, marking the lowest traffic figure recorded since the ceasefire was declared and the memorandum of understanding was signed, Reuters reported according to the Hebrew outlet. That slowdown tracks with figures reported independently by multiple outlets in recent days. Tanker traffic through Hormuz had climbed to an average of roughly 34 to 40 crossings a day in the weeks following the ceasefire framework announced on June 17, according to data from the analytics firms Kpler and Veson Nautical, still only a fraction of the 125 to 140 daily sailings recorded before the war began.
That recovery has since reversed sharply, with Veson Nautical recording just 14 vessels transiting the strait on a recent Thursday, down from 35 the day before, and Bloomberg reporting at one point that only a single sanctioned tanker moved through the waterway on Iran's own controlled route, with no traffic at all detected on the Oman-side corridor meant to fall under American protection.
Among the vessels that did cross Sunday was one particularly large Iranian tanker capable of carrying no less than two million barrels of oil, expected to be sold on the Chinese or Russian market once the United States' renewed sanctions take hold, according to the Kikar HaShabbat report. A separate tanker that crossed Hormuz carried roughly half a million barrels of Kuwaiti oil, though it remains unclear whether it used the Oman-side route or the shipping lane Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps has unilaterally declared under its own control.
American commentators cited in the report have questioned why the Trump administration has not yet announced a restoration of the blockade or moved to shut down the shipping lane Iran uses to move its own oil. Despite an underlying assumption that the administration has no interest in driving up US gas prices, the result has been a lopsided standoff in which Iran has declared the strait closed to others while its own oil continues to move freely through the same waters.
The assessment is that Trump will favor a push to force the strait open to all shipping through targeted strikes in Hormuz and active protection for commercial vessels, rather than reimposing a full blockade, a move that in hindsight risks becoming the kind of decision that drives oil prices sharply higher just ahead of the midterm elections.
