Donald Trump taunted Iran on Monday with threats to become the “guardian angel” of the Strait of Hormuz and demand payment for safe passage through the waterway as the conflict between the warring nations reignited.
Traffic through the vital shipping route has come to a complete standstill with no commercial vessels openly transiting overnight, although some may have passed with their transponders switched off.
“We’re going to keep the strait, and we’ll probably run it. We’ll become the guardian of the strait,” Trump said in a phone interview on Fox and Friends.
“Maybe we’ll call it the guardian angel of the strait. And we should be reimbursed for that.”
Shortly afterwards, he declared he would charge a 20 per cent fee for US control over the shipping lane, announcing in a post on Truth Social: “The U.S.A. will be, from this point forward, known as ‘THE GUARDIAN OF THE HORMUZ STRAIT,’ but as such, and as a matter of FAIRNESS, will be reimbursed, at the rate of 20% on all cargo shipped.”
Iran swiftly said it would not allow the US to intervene in the management of the waterway, according to the country’s top joint military command, Khatam al-Anbiya Central Headquarters.
“Any attempt by the US army to arrange transit through the strait outside the paths designated by Tehran and without coordination with Iran’s armed forces will be strongly resisted,” it added in a statement on social media.
Trump’s comments came after the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps said they had attacked energy facilities in Bahrain and Kuwait, destroyed radar systems in Oman, and struck fuel tanks and ammunition depots at Prince Hassan Air Base in Jordan.
Hours earlier, the US military had announced strikes on Iran to “hold Iranian forces accountable” as tensions over the strait escalated.
Despite a fragile interim agreement that required all parties to cease hostilities, tit-for-tat strikes were renewed following Iranian attacks on three commercial vessels last week.
Both sides have accused the other of violating a Memorandum of Understanding with Tehran insisting that attempts by vessels to traverse the shipping lane along the Omani coast poses an encroachment of its authority, while the US insists that the agreement required ships to pass through the strait unfettered.
Trump said Iran had an “11-hour meeting” yesterday, adding that “everything was agreed to”.
On Monday, the UK made the decision to proscribe the IRGC as a national security threat over “threats to life and intimidation on UK soil” after years of debate about reported links to international terrorism and human rights abuses in Iran.
Sir Keir Starmer said he made the decision to do so after the group was linked to antisemitic attacks in the UK. Another Iran-linked group named the Islamic Movement of the Companions of the Right (IMCR) was also proscribed for antisemitic attacks along with the GRU, a Russian intelligence agency.
It is now a criminal offence in the UK to invite support for, or express an opinion or belief that is supportive of them.
The aim is to “disrupt individuals who promote the interests and objectives of designated bodies”, according to a report by Jonathan Hall KC, the independent reviewer of state threats legislation in a May 2025 report.
The Foreign Office had previously resisted proscribing the IRGC because it is so intertwined with the political and social structures of Iran that it makes it almost impossible to deal with the government there.
