The guns fell silent for exactly one month. Then, on Sunday, US forces destroyed what the Pentagon described as Iranian rocket-launcher positions along the Strait of Hormuz — the narrow chokepoint through which roughly a fifth of the world's oil passes every day. The strike was the first US military action in thirty days, and it ended the longest pause in a war that has already dragged on for more than six months. Iran did not wait long to answer.

By Monday, Iranian missiles had hit military bases in both Jordan and the United Arab Emirates, two Gulf-region states that host significant American troop deployments. Tehran framed the attacks as "legitimate self-defence," a phrase that carries precise weight under international law — and that both sides have now used to justify nearly every escalation since the conflict began. The exchange has instantly unsettled global energy markets. The Strait of Hormuz is not simply a strategic waterway; it is an economic pressure point.

A sustained blockade or even credible threat of one can send oil prices lurching within hours, and traders in Tokyo, London and New York were watching the situation closely before Monday's open. Neither Washington nor Tehran had announced any new diplomatic contact as of early Monday morning. What makes this moment different from previous flare-ups is geography. Iranian strikes on Jordanian and Emirati soil drag two governments — each with their own fragile domestic politics — directly into a conflict they had been carefully skirting.