The fragile U.S.–Iran ceasefire came apart this week at its economic seam. On July 7, the U.S. Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control revoked (with a ten-day grace period) “General License X"—the waiver, barely two weeks old, that had lifted U.S. sanctions on Iranian oil exports and the banking, insurance, and shipping services around them. That license was a central plank of the Memorandum of Understanding worked out in Islamabad in June, which had halted the fighting for 60 days in exchange for Iran guaranteeing safe passage for commercial ships through the Strait of Hormuz.
Washington pulled it after the IRGC struck three tankers in the Strait—including a reported Qatari LNG carrier—declaring, in the words of a U.S. official, that the MoU is “entirely performance-based” and that “Iran will only reap benefits if they exhibit good behavior.” Within hours President Trump pronounced the ceasefire “over,” CENTCOM resumed bombing, and Iran answered with the missile barrage on the U.S. Fifth Fleet headquarters in Bahrain. Oil jumped—Brent up more than five percent, toward $80 a barrel.
