Gulf War Reignites as US Strikes Around 90 Iranian Targets
Washington has declared the ceasefire dead and launched a fresh wave of strikes on Iran's coast, while the UN maritime agency rejects Tehran's bid to control Hormuz and oil prices squeeze Serbia's budget.
- US Central Command said its forces struck around 90 Iranian military targets along the coast on Wednesday.
- President Trump declared the ceasefire and the memorandum with Tehran over, calling the deal a waste of time.
- The council of the UN maritime agency adopted a document urging states to reject Iran's attempt at unilateral control over Hormuz.
- Former supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei was buried on Friday, July 10, at the shrine of Imam Reza in Mashhad.
When a fifth of the world’s oil passes through the Strait of Hormuz, the consequences of every new strike in the Persian Gulf reach the pumps in Belgrade and Nis, and the ledgers of a Serbian budget that leans on imported energy. That is why the escalation Washington set in motion this week is not a distant story: US Central Command, better known as CENTCOM, said its forces struck around 90 Iranian military targets on Wednesday, among them air defense systems, coastal surveillance radars, missile and drone depots, and naval assets stationed along the Iranian coast.
According to the American side, the aim of the strikes is to disable Iran’s ability to threaten navigation through the strait, following attacks on three vessels on July 6 and 7 that shattered a brief lull in hostilities. President Donald Trump simultaneously declared the ceasefire and the memorandum with Tehran over, judging the agreement to have been a waste of time as the strikes continue. That formally ended the arrangement that was meant to restore safe passage and open negotiations on Iran’s nuclear program.
Why did the fragile deal fall apart?
The memorandum struck last month rested on a simple logic: Tehran would guarantee free passage through Hormuz, and in return Washington would halt its strikes and sit down to negotiate the nuclear file. That structure collapsed the moment Iranian forces attacked commercial ships, leaving the diplomatic channel hollowed out rather than deepened. Both sides now insist the other is wasting time, the familiar rhetoric that tends to precede a broader military phase.
On a symbolic level, the end of the truce coincided with the funeral of the former supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who was buried on Friday, July 10, at the shrine of Imam Reza in Mashhad, one of the holiest sites in Shia Islam. The passing of the man who defined Iranian state doctrine for decades has sharpened the domestic atmosphere at a moment when Tehran is trying to project strength rather than weakness. Iran’s new leadership thus enters open conflict while carrying the weight of a transition at the top of power.
Who controls the Strait of Hormuz?
The central legal question of these days is who holds authority over traffic through that narrow but economically decisive passage. The council of the International Maritime Organization, a specialized agency of the United Nations, adopted a document calling on member states to reject Iran’s attempt to impose sovereignty and a unilaterally formed body for controlling traffic through Hormuz. The message of the multilateral community is clear: the strait is an international waterway, not waters under any single state’s control.
Alongside the military escalation, Qatari mediators, coordinating with Washington, are in talks with Iranian officials in an effort to de-escalate, for now the only open diplomatic channel. Doha has already shown it can mediate the region’s most sensitive files, and many chancelleries in Europe are looking precisely to Qatari mediation for a possible way out. For Serbia, which carefully balances relations with every actor and relies on imported energy, each additional day of conflict means more pressure on fuel prices and on the trade balance.
Will the Qatari channel manage to halt the slide toward a wider war, or do the coming weeks hold new columns of destroyers in the Gulf and costlier oil at Serbia’s pumps?
