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New pressure, next week
U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said the Trump administration will unveil new measures against Iran next week as it seeks to increase economic pressure on the regime to come back to the negotiating table and fully reopen the Strait of Hormuz.
“Watch this space for more announcements coming next week”
Bessent told Newsmax’s “Rob Schmitt Tonight” that the measures will apply “measures like have never been seen in the history of the economic isolation of a country,” while he said the approach will combine economic isolation with “the continued blockade in the Strait of Hormuz that will keep anything from going in or out of the Iranian ports.”
U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth told reporters the U.S. military could maintain its blockade “indefinitely,” saying the Navy would rotate ships in and out of the region as necessary.
Reuters reported that oil prices rose on Friday and were on track for weekly gains after the United States threatened an indefinite naval blockade of Iran, with Brent futures up $1.43 to $88.50 a barrel and U.S. West Texas Intermediate up $1.56 to $82.81 a barrel at 0810 GMT.
The threats came as the U.S. warned it could maintain a naval blockade of Iran indefinitely and ramp up economic pressure on Tehran after ceasefire talks stalled, according to Reuters.
Strait claims and ship attacks
Iranian and U.S. claims about the Strait of Hormuz continued to clash as Iran said the waterway was under its control and management after President Trump said the U.S. has “total control.”
The CBS News report said Tehran told the U.S. it would “keep it” and that the Strait of Hormuz is “under Iran's control and management,” while it also noted Bessent’s warning that the “continued blockade in the Strait of Hormuz ... will keep anything from going in or out of the Iranian ports.”
In the same reporting cycle, the United Arab Emirates said Thursday evening that Iran attacked two vessels from the state-owned Abu Dhabi National Oil Company while transiting the strait, and the incident was condemned by the UAE’s foreign ministry as “acts of piracy” by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.
Reuters added that two vessels from the state-owned Abu Dhabi National Oil Company were attacked transiting the strait on Thursday, and it described the incident as an Iranian attack as condemned by the UAE government.
Al Jazeera reported that despite Trump’s claims that the Strait of Hormuz is no longer blocked, Iran’s Persian Gulf Strait Authority posted on X that “The Strait of Hormuz remains blocked and will not be reopened until Iran’s conditions are accepted.”
Economic isolation and fallout
U.S. officials framed the pressure campaign as a two-pronged effort combining financial pressure with a physical blockade of Iranian ports, with Bessent saying it would be “a combination of economic isolation” and “the continued blockade in the Strait of Hormuz.”
“cost Tehran roughly$4.8 billionin oil revenue”
The Hill reported that Bessent said the U.S. has already imposed a naval blockade that has cost Tehran roughly $4.8 billion in oil revenue, and it said the administration has targeted Iran’s “bank accounts, crypto wallets, [and] assets around the world.”
Al Jazeera reported that lawmakers in the U.S. raised alarm over dire conditions on board the flagship USS Abraham Lincoln, including accounts of sailors trying to jump overboard, and it cited a letter from Democratic Senator Richard Blumenthal to Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth.
In that same Al Jazeera account, the USS Abraham Lincoln deployment was described as “continuously at sea for a record length of nearly seven months,” and it quoted Blumenthal’s warning that the reports “raise a broader question: whether the Navy can sustain the operational tempo.”
Reuters said the latest U.S. threats came as Iran curbs flows through the Strait of Hormuz, which handled about one-fifth of global daily oil and liquefied natural gas supplies before the conflict began in late February, and it reported that shipping traffic in the strait fell below the month’s average toward the end of the week.
