Washington lacks a clear strategy, Mikser, a former foreign minister, went on, and the ongoing high fuel prices continue to threaten to decimate the Republican vote at this November's mid-term elections.

While Donald Trump has been saying since last Sunday that good news is imminent, that the Strait of Hormuz will reopen, and everything will return to normal, that has not happened. Why so?

The parties remain very far apart in terms of their conditions. The terms put forward by the U.S. cannot and never could be acceptable to the Iranian regime, while the Iranian regime's conditions are equally unacceptable to the U.S. Iran has grasped that its ability to shut off the Strait of Hormuz is its most important means of exerting pressure on America. It is not only oil that passes through the strait; in fact, a large share of the world's fertilizers does as well. Natural gas is one of the main raw materials used in fertilizer production, as is helium, a critical input in semiconductor manufacturing. The consequences are therefore likely to be long-term and much broader than today's high fuel prices alone.

Will the strait remain closed forever? Certainly not. But for as long as the Iranian regime remains in power, it will retain the ability to close it again, whenever it deems necessary or desirable to do so.

How is it that, on the one hand, a ceasefire is in effect, while on the other, the U.S. has bombed Iranian ports?

In a situation like this, war and peace are always relative concepts. The intensity of combat operations is manifold times lower than it was during the initial weeks of the war. To that extent, the ceasefire is holding up. Neither side has announced that it is completely abandoning the agreement. Although Iran has described the American strike as a serious violation, it has not declared that it will resume military operations at the same level of intensity as before. So some form of negotiations is undoubtedly taking place. Whether an agreement is days away or months away is likely very hard to say. What is clear, however, is that if an agreement comes quickly, it is likely to be only an abstract framework whose details will need to be worked out during future negotiations. If we recall the Obama-era nuclear agreement with Iran's leadership of the time, negotiating and concluding that deal took many long months.

At the same time, Iran certainly does not want the U.S., together with Israel, to launch the kind of extensive bombing campaign seen in the opening days of the war. It wants to avoid that. Yet it still retains the ability to drag out negotiations, to maneuver, and continue doing things that suit its interests. How is that possible?

The ships carrying fertilizer, fuel, and other raw materials through the Strait of Hormuz belong to commercial companies, who make their own decisions about whether it is safe to transit the waterway. The strait is relatively narrow, and Iran needs only a few isolated attacks to undermine confidence in its safety. That is not particularly difficult to do. The Americans are certainly capable of escorting individual vessels through the strait and delivering devastating strikes against selected targets. But they have no miracle cure that would eliminate Iran's ability to shut down the Strait of Hormuz. A handful of speedboats, drones, and naval mines are enough, and Iran is also believed to have retained a fairly substantial arsenal of ballistic missiles.

Is NATO's participation in this operation merely rhetoric—something discussed more seriously at times and less seriously at others—or is it a genuine possibility?

The issue is not that the Americans lack capabilities or military power. The problem is that there is no clear strategy for achieving the desired outcome: reopening the strait. I believe NATO would be willing to help stabilize the situation and reopen the Strait of Hormuz if there were a clear understanding of what exactly needed to be done. Thus far, American requests for assistance from Europe and NATO allies have been rather vague. Just as the reasons for starting this war have not been convincingly explained, neither has it been made clear what is actually expected from us and how assistance from NATO or the EU might help achieve the desired result.

Who benefits from rising fuel, fertilizer and gas prices?

There are very few winners. For Iran, the victory lies simply in the survival of the regime—and that is a relatively low bar. The regime has no future once the political system changes. For that reason, the Revolutionary Guard, its leadership, and the country's senior religious figures, are undoubtedly willing to do whatever is necessary to hang on to their power. As long as that power remains intact, so too does their ability to repress their own population and, when needed, close the Strait of Hormuz.

In fact, analysts within the U.S. administration reportedly warned quite seriously about this possibility. However, after the overthrow of [Venezuelan former president Nicolás ] Maduro, there was likely a certain sense of euphoria and an assumption that the Iranian regime's capitulation would be a matter of days—or, at worst, weeks. In reality, totalitarian regimes can, under certain circumstances, endure for a very long time.

What does this war mean for Trump's popularity, given that the conflict with Iran is not particularly popular in the U.S.?

The war with Iran is deeply unpopular in the U.S., primarily because it has driven up oil and fuel prices domestically. The price of a gallon of gasoline at pump is something American voters take very seriously when making electoral decisions, as history has repeatedly demonstrated. Trump's popularity was not especially high even before the war started. There are many reasons for the decline in his approval ratings, including alleged corruption scandals within the administration, immigration operations that have resulted in casualties, and much more. But this war has indeed become, one might say, the final nail in the coffin of the administration's and the Republican Party's popularity.

At the same time, Trump was heard yesterday making threats against Oman. I do not know under exactly what conditions, but that would represent an escalation. On the one hand, it may have been merely rhetoric—but on the other hand, perhaps not.

Oman has generally been one of the U.S.' allies in the region. The president's odd remark was apparently made in response to claims that Iran and Oman had discussed imposing transit fees on traffic passing through the Strait of Hormuz in the future. It is unlikely that the comment reflected any serious calculation or carefully considered strategy. I believe it was simply a rhetorical gaffe.

At the time of writing a "tentative" truce had been reached between the U.S. and Iran over the issue of the Strait, but Trump had not yet signed off on it.

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