Dubai, United Arab Emirates — US President Donald Trump said on Monday that the United States is “re-imposing” a blockade on Iran in the Strait of Hormuz and, in an apparent policy shift, will impose fees on other ships for safe passage. Iran insists on its control of the vital waterway, as another exchange of fire threatens to return to all-out war.
The US has so far said the strait should remain open to everyone without fees, as was the case before the US and Israel attacked Iran on February 28. Any attempt by the United States or Iran to impose tariffs would violate global standards on freedom of navigation, increase tensions, and potentially cause further economic disruption outside the region.
The price of a barrel of Brent crude, the international standard, rose 7.8% to $81.92 a barrel on Monday, still well below the $120 level reached at the height of the war.
Three boys play in the shallow waters of the Strait of Hormuz, while a plume of smoke rises from an explosion in the background, off Bandar Abbas, Iran, Monday, July 13, 2026.
Razia Budat/ISNA via AFP
The exchange of fire in recent days, sparked by Iranian attacks on ships, has cast further doubt on the interim peace agreement reached last month. Washington lifted the blockade it imposed in mid-April as part of that deal, which also called for the full reopening of the strait.
“We are reimposing the Iranian blockade,” Trump said on social media. “All other countries will have fair and open use of the strait.”
The president said the United States would be “reimbursed” 20 percent of the value of the shipment to help cover “any and all costs necessary to carry out the mission of providing safety and security.”
The US military said that it would resume its blockade of Iranian ports on Tuesday at 4 pm EST.
The conflict over the Strait is escalating
Iran asserts that it has the right to manage traffic through the strait and possibly impose duties in accordance with the interim peace agreement. The United States objected to this.
Iran pledged on Monday to respond to any American interference in the Strait. Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi mocked Trump on social media and used his support to impose tariffs to legitimize Iran’s position.
“POTUS is absolutely right. Whoever provides safe and secure passage for commercial ships through the Strait of Hormuz should be compensated for this service. Iran has always been the guardian of the Strait and will remain so forever. 20% is of course too much. We will be fair,” Araqchi wrote on X.
The International Maritime Organization, a UN agency that oversees international shipping, said it was waiting to learn more about Trump’s proposal but remained opposed to tolls through international waterways.
“There is no legal basis on which mandatory fees can be imposed simply for passing through the strait,” she said in a statement.
The United States opposed imposing tariffs in the strait
In his meeting with Gulf leaders late last month, Secretary of State Marco Rubio spoke out forcefully against Iran imposing tariffs on transit through the strait.
“This is an international waterway,” Rubio told reporters in Bahrain on June 25. “There is no country on Earth that supports having to pay money to cross the strait.”
Rubio also said that “there is no support among the Gulf states for any type of fees or fees or anything that imposes fees on the use of international waters. The president has made clear that is not going to happen.”
A fifth of the world’s oil and gas passed through the strait before Iran effectively closed it at the beginning of the war, sending global prices for energy, fertilizers and other commodities soaring. Traffic rebounded after last month’s agreement but remained well below pre-war levels.
The US military has attempted to create a route through the strait along the coast of Oman that would be outside Iranian control. Iran has attacked ships using this route, saying the United States is violating the interim peace agreement. In response, the United States attacked Iran, sparking Iranian attacks on Arab countries allied with the United States.
The US strikes at a time when allied Arab countries reported a wave of attacks
The US military said it struck dozens of sites on Monday in response to an Iranian attack on a container ship the day before, including air defense systems, radar sites, missile equipment, drones and small boats. It said it used unmanned ships for the first time to strike an Iranian ship maintenance facility and a submarine on Sunday.
Missile sirens sounded three times Monday in Bahrain, home of the US Navy’s 5th Fleet. There was no immediate news about damage.
Separately, the Kuwaiti Foreign Ministry said that its consulate in Iraq was attacked. No one was immediately accused of the attack and the damage or casualties were not revealed.
The oil-rich kingdom – which hosts several American military bases – also condemned Iran and its “factions and militias loyal to it in Iraq” for attacking what it described as “several border points” and an offshore oil exploration platform belonging to the Kuwait Petroleum Corporation.
In Jordan, the Kingdom’s army said that it shot down four Iranian missiles in an accident that “resulted in no casualties or material damage.” Jordan also hosts US military forces and aircraft.
In Iran, the authorities reported attacks in Hormozgan, Khuzestan, and Markazi provinces, and said that at least two people were killed, according to the Islamic Republic of Iran News Agency. Semi-official Iranian media also reported strikes in the eastern province of Sistan and Baluchestan, located on the coast of the Gulf of Oman.
Iran holds the United States responsible for the chaos in the region
Attacks on Iran continued hours after the United States ended its strikes, once again raising the possibility of Gulf Arab states retaliating. There were attacks for which no party claimed responsibility on Iran on Thursday.
Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Ismail Baghaei held Washington responsible for the chaos sweeping the region. He said Iran would not agree to IAEA visits to nuclear sites bombed by the United States in 2025. Tehran’s stockpile of highly enriched uranium is believed to be buried there.
Trump indicated last week that the interim agreement in the war was “over” and that the United States had ended waivers allowing Iran to sell crude oil on the open market in US dollars. But the mediators, including Pakistan, Qatar and Egypt, continued their efforts to reach a final agreement to end the war.
Iran and the United States are about halfway through the 60-day period during which they were supposed to negotiate such an agreement, which was also supposed to address Iran’s disputed nuclear program.
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Bock reported from Washington. Associated Press writers May Anderson in New York, Konstantin Torobin in Washington, Karim Chehayeb in Beirut, Munir Ahmed in Islamabad, and Stella Martini in Erbil, Iraq, contributed to this report.
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