US President Donald Trump has told his advisers he is willing to end the military campaign against Iran even if the Strait of Hormuz remains largely closed and delay the complex operation to reopen it for the time being, US administration sources told the Wall Street Journal.
According to the cited source, Trump's first option remains the opening of the strait by negotiating an end to the war with the Iranian regime, while the second option would be to ask his allies, especially the Gulf states and NATO, to lead operations to reopen the narrow maritime channel located between Iran and Oman, which has become the epicenter of the crisis with effects all over the world, The Jerusalem Post reports.
Trump has decided that the US should achieve its primary goals of crippling Iran's navy and its missile stockpile and reducing current hostilities, while exerting diplomatic pressure on Tehran to resume the free flow of trade.
Other military options are being considered by the US president, according to officials cited by the WSJ, but they are not currently an immediate priority for him.
The US government also estimates that any military campaign focused on reopening the Strait of Hormuz would take between four and six weeks.
Netanyahu's solution
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu suggested on Monday that a long-term solution to the Strait of Hormuz crisis could be found without a military operation, but rather by rerouting the Gulf states' pipelines.
“Long-term solutions include rerouting energy pipelines west through Saudi Arabia to the Red Sea and the Mediterranean Sea, bypassing Iran's geographic choke point,” Netanyahu explained in an interview with the conservative US publication Newsmax.
Gulf states have asked Trump to continue attacks against Iran until the Islamic regime no longer poses a threat to the region.
According to Gulf and Israeli officials cited by the AP, the Gulf states believe that Iran has not yet been weakened enough, almost a month after the start of the Middle East war
Gulf officials have particularly insisted that the current situation offers a key opportunity to eliminate the Iranian regime, even after they hesitated at the start of the war because of the short notice they received before the joint Israeli-American attack.
Toll for transiting the Strait of Hormuz
And Iran plans to put a toll on the Strait of Hormuz. A parliamentary committee approved a bill to impose a transit fee on ships passing through this strategic hub, state media reported on Monday, AFP writes.
According to a member of parliament's security committee quoted by state television, the draft includes “financial provisions and charging systems in the rial,” the Iranian currency, as well as cooperation with Oman, across the strait.
It also includes “the ban on the passage of Americans and the Zionist regime” (Israel), as well as the ban on other countries that have imposed sanctions against Iran.
In peacetime, about a fifth of the world's crude oil and liquefied natural gas transit through the Strait of Hormuz.
Since the start of the war, traffic there has dropped by about 95 percent, according to the Kpler maritime tracking platform. The repercussions are felt across all global energy markets.
Iranian oil exports on the rise
Iran's oil exports continued to grow in the first month of the war, while hydrocarbon shipments of other Gulf states were severely affected by the blockade in the Strait of Hormuz, according to an analysis published by Bloomberg and quoted by the international press, writes News.ro.
Data analyzed by Bloomberg show that Iran exported about 1.8 million barrels of oil per day this month, nearly 8 percent more than the daily average in 2025, meaning hundreds of millions of dollars in additional revenue for Tehran.
While many merchant ships remain stuck in the Gulf due to military risks and attacks on shipping, Iranian exports continue to flow, mostly to China, the main buyer of Iranian oil, according to Reuters.
Maritime data show that most of the ships that have managed to cross the strait are Iranian oil tankers or ships from states considered friendly, while many shipments from other manufacturers have been suspended.
The traffic disruption has severely affected regional exports. Analysts warn that the Hormuz blockade has drastically reduced the flow of oil and gas from the Gulf and created one of the biggest global energy crises in decades.
The situation gave Iran a major strategic leverage over the energy markets. Even though Iran's military infrastructure has been hit by American and Israeli attacks, control of maritime traffic through Hormuz allows Tehran to directly influence global energy flows.
Analysts' warning
Analysts warn that if the war continues and traffic remains limited, energy prices could rise further and the impact will be reflected in fuel costs and commodity prices globally.
Experts emphasize that international maritime law provides for freedom of transit through straits essential for global navigation.
However, neither Iran nor the United States have ratified the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, which complicates the application of these rules in the current conflict.
