Iran touts Hormuz attacks as oil flows increase despite tensions

Mediators are trying to facilitate more talks, but Washington signals faith in its pressure tactics.

Vessels near the Strait of Hormuz, as seen from Musandam in Oman, August 31, 2026 [Stringer/Reuters]

Tehran, Iran – Iran is claiming success in attacking ships – including US Navy vessels – near the Strait of Hormuz, saying that the strikes have forced Washington to move its warships further from the Iranian coast.

It comes as US media reported on Sunday that eight US Marines had suffered from smoke inhalation and potential traumatic brain injuries on September 14 after being targeted by an Iranian antiship cruise missile in the Strait of Hormuz.

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Al Jazeera reached out to US Central Command (CENTCOM) for comment on the reports, but did not receive a response. CENTCOM previously said that US vessels had successfully evaded Iranian ballistic missile attacks earlier this month. The US officials quoted in the reports on the injuries to the US Marines said that the vessel they were on when attacked was not a US Navy ship.

The Pentagon had earlier quietly added 29 US sailors and eight Marines to its list of war-wounded, increasing the total since the start of the war on February 28 to 861 service members. At least 19 deaths have been recorded.

In recent days, Iranian state-linked media claimed that US warships pulled back earlier this month from their previous line of blockade positions. Previously positioned closer to the Iranian port of Chabahar and the entrance to the Gulf of Oman, the media reports said they had now moved further into the central Arabian Sea, reportedly to avoid Iranian missiles.

Iran’s Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei appeared to make a reference to US naval movements in the latest message attributed to him published by state media on Monday.

US forces are now refraining from advancing further “because of the painful blows they have suffered at the hands of the valiant fighters and the guardians of the Strait of Hormuz”, he said.

“Whenever they have taken that risk, they have brought harm upon themselves,” Khamenei’s message said. “And soon the Arabian Sea, too, will empty itself of them”.

For its part, the US continues to maintain a naval blockade of Iran’s southern ports in some form, while rejecting the Islamic Republic’s latest proposal for reopening the Strait of Hormuz .

But with Tehran saying it is ready for both defensive and offensive military action if necessary, analysts believe controlled escalation is expected, even if renewed all-out war is unlikely to be on the immediate horizon.

Iran’s authorities are likely to continue targeting ships because the strategy has served Tehran’s aims during the war, said maritime law and security expert Ian Ralby, pointing to the similar success of the Iran-aligned Houthis in Yemen for nearly three years.

Ralby, who is also the president of the good governance nonprofit Auxilium Worldwide, told Al Jazeera that missile and drone strikes have become a means by which a weaker military power can gain a significant strategic advantage and impact global markets.

“It is fairly certain, therefore, that whether US personnel are on board or not, attacking ships will continue to be part of Iran’s approach to fighting, not only for its continued existence, but for its strategic regional hegemony,” Ralby said.

The escalating rhetoric from Iranian authorities comes as the US military has been able to move considerably more energy shipments through the Strait of Hormuz in recent weeks – although the waterway is still far away from its pre-war unimpeded state.

Despite the IRGC’s insistence that the strait remains closed to vessels that do not coordinate passage with Iranian authorities, US Energy Secretary Chris Wright said on Sunday that nearly 13 million barrels of crude were passing through it each day. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent gave a higher estimate of 15-22 million barrels per day (bpd), compared with roughly 20 million bpd before the war.

Bessent also claimed on Sunday that Iran was unable to export its own oil through the blockade, leaving it with only about 15 million barrels already stored at sea that could be shipped to China within two weeks.

Crude exports through the Strait of Hormuz were expected to average 7.4 million bpd in September, according to preliminary data released by Kpler on Monday. The data and analytics company said on Friday that 19 tankers transited the strait in the week ending September 27, including 17 very large crude carriers (VLCCs), each capable of carrying two million barrels of oil.

Regional exports, including shipments from Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Iraq, Oman, Qatar, Kuwait, and Iran rebounded to 12.8 million bpd in September, the highest since the start of the war.

Analysts appearing on Sunday on Be Vaght-e Iran, a war-focused Iranian state television programme that adopts a hardline position, acknowledged that available evidence indicated at least seven million barrels of crude were passing through the Strait of Hormuz daily.

The analysts said Arab Gulf governments were using shuttle systems to move oil out of the region, with US forces providing protection. Because the operations involved state-backed arrangements, the analysts said, they could avoid relying on international insurance companies charging high premiums.

The system includes using older or less valuable VLCCs and other smaller vessels, which would at times turn off their transponders and travel close to the coast of Oman until they exit the strait. They would then engage in ship-to-ship transfers before re-entering the waterway to reload.

Mediators work to contain tensions

After US President Donald Trump said he had rejected conditions put forward by Iran for reopening the Strait of Hormuz, reports indicated that mediators were expected to facilitate further diplomatic exchanges between the two sides on Monday and throughout the week.

Iran has said there will be no direct negotiations, and that it wants to use the June memorandum of understanding with Washington and the bilateral Hormuz deal finalised with Oman as baselines for a future agreement with the US that lifts the blockade and also deals with Iran’s nuclear programme.

Hamidreza Azizi, a senior Iran analyst at the Crisis Group, said he believes Iranian authorities are increasingly prepared to rely more heavily on attacks in and around the Strait of Hormuz if the current diplomatic track fails and the US blockade remains.

“This does not necessarily mean that Tehran has already decided to launch a sustained campaign against US warships, but the threshold for doing so appears to have come down considerably,” he told Al Jazeera.

The expert said the Islamic Republic wants to prevent an assessment taking hold in Washington that Iranian leverage over Hormuz is declining and the US can normalise maritime traffic while keeping Iran economically isolated through sanctions and blockade.

“That could mean increasing the number and intensity of attacks on commercial vessels, using more projectiles in each attack, targeting escorting naval assets, or even trying to inflict casualties on US personnel,” Azizi said.

But he cautioned that a successful Iranian attack causing significant US casualties could lead to a level of escalation that Tehran wants to deter. More aggressive attacks could also push Saudi Arabia and others towards the US, so the Iranian approach is “likely to remain calibrated, but increasingly aggressive”, he said.

Auxilium’s Ralby said no amount of violent action has so far succeeded in bringing either party to the point of being willing to abandon their efforts and pursue a lasting peace, although Iran’s continued ability to push back against the US has undermined some narratives by Washington.

“While that may serve Iranian interests, it likely does not accelerate the path towards a negotiated settlement,” he said.

调解人正努力促成更多会谈，但华盛顿方面表示对其施压策略充满信心。

2026年8月31日，从阿曼穆桑达姆拍摄的霍尔木兹海峡附近的船只 [Stringer/Reuters]

伊朗德黑兰——伊朗声称在霍尔木兹海峡附近袭击了包括美国海军舰艇在内的船只，并表示袭击迫使华盛顿将其军舰从伊朗海岸进一步撤离。

此前，美国媒体周日报道称，9月14日，8名美国海军陆战队员在霍尔木兹海峡遭到伊朗反舰巡航导弹袭击后，吸入浓烟并可能遭受创伤性脑损伤。

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英国释放三名嫌疑人中的第二名，伊朗否认参与据称发生在美军基地的阴谋

伊拉克寻求霍尔木兹海峡以外的石油出口替代方案（共3条，此为第3条）

半岛电视台就相关报道联系了美国中央司令部（CENTCOM）寻求置评，但未收到回复。中央司令部此前曾表示，美国舰艇在本月初成功躲过了伊朗的弹道导弹袭击。报道中引述的美国官员表示，美国海军陆战队员受伤时所乘坐的船只并非美国海军舰艇。

五角大楼此前悄悄地将29名美国海军士兵和8名海军陆战队员列入战争伤亡名单，使自2月28日战争开始以来受伤的军人总数达到861人。至少有19人死亡。

近日，伊朗官方媒体声称，美国军舰本月初已从之前的封锁阵地撤离。媒体报道称，这些军舰此前部署在靠近伊朗恰巴哈尔港和阿曼湾入口处，现在已进一步向阿拉伯海中部移动，据称是为了躲避伊朗导弹。

伊朗最高领袖穆杰塔巴·哈梅内伊周一通过国家媒体发表的最新声明中，似乎提到了美国海军的行动。

他说，由于“英勇的战士和霍尔木兹海峡的守护者们给了美军沉重打击”，美军现在已停止进一步推进。

哈梅内伊在电报中说：“他们每次冒险，都给自己招致了伤害。不久之后，阿拉伯海也将彻底清除他们。”

美国方面继续以某种形式对伊朗南部港口实施海上封锁，同时拒绝了伊朗伊斯兰共和国提出的重新开放霍尔木兹海峡的最新提议。

但德黑兰方面表示，如有必要，它已准备好采取防御性和进攻性军事行动，分析人士认为，尽管不太可能在短期内再次爆发全面战争，但局势仍将受到控制地升级。

海事法律和安全专家伊恩·拉尔比表示，伊朗当局可能会继续以船只为目标，因为这一策略在战争期间服务于德黑兰的目标，他还指出，伊朗支持的胡塞武装在也门近三年来也取得了类似的成功。

拉尔比同时也是倡导良好治理的非营利组织 Auxilium Worldwide 的总裁，他告诉半岛电视台，导弹和无人机袭击已经成为军事实力较弱的国家获得重大战略优势并影响全球市场的手段。

拉尔比说：“因此，可以相当肯定的是，无论美国人员是否在船上，攻击船只仍将是伊朗为生存而战，也是为了维护其战略区域霸权而战的方式之一。”

伊朗当局的言辞不断升级，与此同时，美国军方最近几周得以通过霍尔木兹海峡运送更多的能源物资——尽管这条水道距离战前畅通无阻的状态还相差甚远。

尽管伊朗伊斯兰革命卫队坚称，未经伊朗当局协调通行的船只仍不得通过霍尔木兹海峡，但美国能源部长克里斯·赖特周日表示，每天有近1300万桶原油通过该海峡。财政部长斯科特·贝森特给出的估计更高，为每天1500万至2200万桶，而战前这一数字约为每天2000万桶。

贝森特周日还声称，由于封锁，伊朗无法出口自己的石油，目前只有大约 1500 万桶石油储存在海上，可以在两周内运往中国。

根据Kpler周一发布的初步数据，预计9月份经霍尔木兹海峡的原油出口量平均为每日740万桶。这家数据分析公司上周五表示，截至9月27日的一周内，共有19艘油轮通过该海峡，其中包括17艘超大型原油运输船（VLCC），每艘VLCC的载油量可达200​​万桶。

包括沙特阿拉伯、阿拉伯联合酋长国、伊拉克、阿曼、卡塔尔、科威特和伊朗在内的地区出口在9月份反弹至1280万桶/日，为战争开始以来的最高水平。

周日，在伊朗国家电视台以战争为重点、采取强硬立场的节目“Be Vaght-e Iran”上，一些分析人士承认，现有证据表明，每天至少有700万桶原油通过霍尔木兹海峡。

分析人士指出，海湾阿拉伯国家政府利用穿梭运输系统将石油运出该地区，并由美军提供保护。分析人士还表示，由于这些行动涉及国家支持的安排，因此可以避免依赖收取高额保费的国际保险公司。

该系统包括使用老旧或价值较低的超大型油轮和其他小型船舶，这些船舶有时会关闭应答器，并沿阿曼海岸附近航行，直至驶出海峡。之后，它们会进行船对船的货物转运，然后再重新进入航道进行装载。

调解员致力于缓解紧张局势。

在美国总统唐纳德·特朗普表示他已拒绝伊朗提出的重新开放霍尔木兹海峡的条件后，有报道称，预计调解员将于周一及本周内促进双方进一步的外交交流。

伊朗表示不会进行直接谈判，并希望以6月份与华盛顿签署的谅解备忘录以及与阿曼最终敲定的霍尔木兹海峡双边协议为基准，与美国达成未来协议，解除封锁并解决伊朗的核计划问题。

危机组织高级伊朗分析师哈米德雷扎·阿齐兹表示，他认为如果目前的外交途径失败，美国的封锁继续下去，伊朗当局越来越倾向于在霍尔木兹海峡及其周边地区发动袭击。

“这并不一定意味着德黑兰已经决定对美国军舰发动持续的军事行动，但这样做的门槛似乎已经大大降低了，”他告诉半岛电视台。

这位专家表示，伊朗伊斯兰共和国希望阻止华盛顿方面形成这样一种评估：伊朗对霍尔木兹海峡的影响力正在下降，美国可以在通过制裁和封锁使伊朗经济孤立的同时，实现海上交通正常化。

阿齐兹说：“这可能意味着增加对商船的袭击次数和强度，每次袭击使用更多弹药，以护航海军资产​​为目标，甚至试图造成美国人员伤亡。”

但他警告说，伊朗若发动袭击并造成美军重大伤亡，可能会导致局势升级，而德黑兰希望阻止这种情况发生。更具侵略性的袭击也可能促使沙特阿拉伯和其他国家倒向美国，因此，他表示，伊朗的策略“可能会保持谨慎，但会越来越强硬”。

援助组织（Auxilium）的拉尔比表示，迄今为止，任何暴力行动都未能使任何一方愿意放弃努力并寻求持久和平，尽管伊朗持续反击美国的能力削弱了华盛顿的一些说法。

“虽然这可能符合伊朗的利益，但不太可能加快通过谈判达成解决方案的进程，”他说。