Yesterday's heads-up from al-Jazeera on the state of play in Lebanon was pretty important.
Lifted in toto from Bloomberg via Yahoo Finance, April 17:
Iran announced that the Strait of Hormuz is now “completely open” for commercial traffic, a major step toward ending a war with the US and Israel that’s sent energy prices surging.
“In line with the ceasefire in Lebanon, the passage for all commercial vessels through Strait of Hormuz is declared completely open for the remaining period of ceasefire,” Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said on X. Ships can move on the “coordinated route as already announced” by Iranian authorities.
US President Donald Trump announced a 10-day ceasefire between Lebanon and Israel on Thursday evening, a key move that eased tensions with Iran.
For what it's worth the Strait of Hormuz was never actually closed.
Iran said it was, and then later said the Strait had been mined and just the words were enough for the Protection & Indemnity insurance clubs to cancel war insurance on the ships. A couple Lloyd's syndicates continued to write cover for cargo though the terms pretty much guaranteed there were few takers.
As it turned out Iran;a claim to be laying mines was a lie, or at least none have been reported found.
Finally, the U.S. Navy interdiction force is out in the Gulf of Oman, only a couple minesweepers actually crossed into the Strait.
So let's see if the cease-fire turns into something more substantial this weekend and in the meantime get those ships out of the Persian Gulf.
