COMMENTARY: By Lim Tean
“If we can’t sell oil, we will make sure you can’t too.”
That is the message Iran’s parliamentary Speaker has just sent to the entire Gulf — and to US President Donald Trump.
The Speaker, Mohammad Baqer Ghalibaf, has delivered the starkest ultimatum of this war.
Responding to Trump’s threat to destroy one Iranian bridge or power plant for every ship attacked in the Strait of Hormuz, Ghalibaf didn’t blink. He went further.
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“The equation of this war is clear: either all or none. In a region where we do not sell oil, no one will sell oil. If our security is not ensured, no infrastructure will be safe,” he said.
“The security of the Strait lies in the absence of American forces. The situation of the Strait will not return to pre-war conditions.”
Read that carefully. This is not a threat to close Hormuz. It is something more sophisticated — and more dangerous. Iran is saying it will hold the entire Gulf’s oil exports hostage to its own.
Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Kuwait, Qatar — all of them — become collateral in a dispute that is not theirs.
The Strait of Hormuz carries 20 to 21 million barrels a day — a fifth of global oil consumption. Bab el-Mandeb carries another 6 to 9 million. Between them, roughly a third of the world’s seaborne oil now sits under the shadow of a single Iranian sentence.
“They wanted to punish Iran. Punished themselves with triple-digit oil instead. 10/10 strategy,” Iran’s chief negotiator and parliament speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf said in a post on X.
Live updates: https://t.co/kGUykdVSBy pic.twitter.com/73aiqzxNcu
— Al Jazeera English (@AJEnglish) July 23, 2026
Surged past $100 a barrel
Brent has already responded — surging past $100 a barrel, a six-week high.
This is the Legitimacy Principle playing out in real time. When the dominant naval power — the United States — can no longer guarantee safe passage, the question of who actually controls the Strait stops being theoretical.
Iran is answering it by force of statement, before it even needs to answer it by force of arms.
Will Trump escalate further, or is this the moment Washington starts looking for an off-ramp? Either way, the Gulf states now have every incentive to start talking to Tehran directly — because Washington just showed it cannot protect them from the consequences of its own war.
Lim Tean is a Singaporean lawyer, politician and commentator. He is the founder of the political party People’s Voice and a co-founder of the political alliance People’s Alliance for Reform. He also hosts Lim’s Substack.
This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.
APR editor | Radio Free (2026-07-24T04:12:36+00:00) Lim Tean: Iran’s Ghalibaf warns US war equation is clear – ‘either all or none’. Retrieved from https://www.radiofree.org/2026/07/24/lim-tean-irans-ghalibaf-warns-us-war-equation-is-clear-either-all-or-none/
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