Two explosions rang out near the Strait of Hormuz on Thursday morning. A British maritime security agency reported that a commercial oil tanker passing through the narrow waterway, close to the Omani peninsula of Musandam, heard the blasts — though no casualties or damage have yet been confirmed. The timing could not have been more charged: Iran had said, just hours earlier, that a historic agreement with Oman governing passage through the strait was in its final stages of drafting. US President Donald Trump added to the urgency from Washington, suggesting that a formal deal could be announced within days.

His Vice President, JD Vance, was more cautious, acknowledging that the negotiations can appear to be going nowhere and warning that the process is "messy" and "going to take some time." The mixed signals from the White House reflect how fragile the diplomatic moment remains — a single incident in those waters could upend months of quiet Omani mediation. Elsewhere in the region, the pressure continued to build on multiple fronts. Houthi rebels in Yemen, backed by Tehran, claimed they had launched ballistic missiles at a Saudi oil tanker in the Red Sea near the port of Yanbu, though they offered no evidence and Riyadh made no immediate comment.

Further north, Israel's military issued its first evacuation warning in weeks to residents of the southern Lebanese village of Mansouri, then announced targeted strikes against Hezbollah positions — a sharp escalation of a ceasefire that had, until that point, largely held since June 20. The strait handles roughly a fifth of the world's traded oil.