US strikes Iran after ship fired on in Strait of Hormuz

Earlier today, the bridge of the M/V Ever Lovely (a Taiwanese-owned Singapore-flagged merchant ship) was struck by a projectile as it attempted to transit the Strait of Hormuz near the coast of Oman. The ship remained operational and no injuries to crew were reported. The Iranian government did not outright say they had struck the ship but this is widely assumed to be the case. A statement subsequently issued by Iranian officials implied that the Ever Lovely may have been traveling outside the corridors approved by the Iranian-Omani Persian Gulf Strait Authority (PGSA).

The US then responded with limited strikes on what Central Command said were military sites on Qeshm Island and the Iranian coast. This is one of the biggest tests yet for the newly-signed Memorandum of Understanding (MOU), meant to cease hostilities between Iran and the US.

Israel continues to test MOU in Lebanon

The peacekeeping power of the MOU also continues to be strained by Israel’s refusal to withdraw from territory it has captured in Lebanon since March. Amid the turmoil in the Strait of Hormuz, the Israeli and Lebanese governments signed on to a peace framework brokered by the US. The full details of the framework are not fully known but reports suggest that it calls for the Lebanese military to take over parts of the territory seized by Israel, while Israel would retain some of the territory as a military “security zone”.

The Lebanon-Israel deal is on shaky ground for numerous reasons. International law does not permit one state to establish military buffer zones within the sovereign territory of another state. Lebanon’s Iran-backed Shia militant organization Hezbollah has also said they will not acknowledge the agreement and continues to demand the full withdrawal of Israeli troops from Lebanese territory, as does Iran. The deal reportedly calls for the Lebanese military to disarm Hezbollah, without having either the military means nor the political support to do so.