Special to WorldTribune.com

By John J. Metzler, March 17, 2026

As the Iran War enters its third week of largely aerial and seaborne combat, there’s laser-like focus on the Straits of Hormuz and the wider Persian Gulf.

Iran quite predictably has closed the narrow sea-lane to shipping and thus jolted oil markets from the Middle East to Wall Street and East Asia. It’s all about petroleum; Both the vital shipping routes and the commercial prices per-barrel for up to twenty-percent of seaborne oil shipments.

First off, there’s a misinformation media myth that the Trump Administration was not aware of the consequences of the Hormuz attacks.

Sea lane security and oil shipping form the very grammar of geopolitics. Places like Suez, Strait of Hormuz, Panama Canal, and Straits of Mallaca, and Gibraltar form the geographic choke points through which the world’s oil flows, the very arteries of international commerce.

But meanwhile, what’s the UN’s doing to stop the war?

Amidst the sturm and drang in the Persian Gulf, the seemingly calmer if equally treacherous diplomatic whirlpools at Turtle Bay in New York alongside the United Nations are roiling. Once the war started there reemerged a stark realization of deep divisions in the Council mirroring rising Middle East tensions.

Beyond the predictable diplomatic flurry of activity, usually criticizing Israeli policy in some form or the other, the world organization is focused on Iran.

As the conflict emerged in January, the United States and others condemned Iran’s massacre of 30,000 pro-democracy demonstrators in Teheran and other cities. An emergency Security Council meeting lambasted “Iran’s decades old campaign of repression, subjecting its young and old alike to violence, torture and censorship.”

The U.S./Israeli attacks on the Islamic republic triggered the Teheran regime to respond with widespread drone and missile attacks on Israel, American bases in the Gulf, and Arab Gulf states and oil facilities. In a matter of days, Iran was lashing out at a dozen countries and making new enemies.

The Islamic Republic thus widened the war and its enemies list almost overnight.

Notably on March 11, the UN Security Council, coincidentally under the American presidency for the month of March, called a meeting.

The Gulf state Bahrain, sitting on the Council for a two-year term, and the United States along with an amazing 135 co-sponsors (the most ever) sponsored a draft resolution which resoundingly condemned Iran’s attacks on Arab Gulf states.

The resolution “condemns in the strongest terms the egregious attacks” by Iran against Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Jordan, determining they constitute “a breach of international law and a serious threat to international peace and security.”

It equally demanded the “immediate cessation” of all attacks by Iran against these countries and called on Teheran to comply fully with its obligations under international law, including civilian protection.

In a significant step for diplomacy, Resolution (#2817) passed with 13 votes in favor and only China and Russia abstaining.

Following the vote, U.S. UN Amb. Mike Waltz commented, “Iran’s strategy of sowing chaos, of trying to hold their neighbors hostage, trying to shape the resolve of the region has clearly backfired, and that was shown by this vote today.”

Amb. James Kariuki, UK Chargé d’Affaires stated, “Iran’s unacceptable attacks against ships passing through the Strait of Hormuz threaten maritime security and the safety of seafarers. Iran must cease these attacks.”

Though China offers tepid diplomatic support for Teheran, Russia remains invested.

Hizbullah drones attacked the Mediterranean island of Cyprus hitting the British base at Akrotiri.

But beyond rhetoric, Kier Starmer’s Labour government wallowed in a weak response to what was clearly a dedicated attack on the Sovereign British Bases.

As Cyprus is also a member of the European Union, both France and Greece immediately sent naval vessels to the region. Britain’s air-defense destroyer HMS Dragon will be woefully late when it arrives in Cyprus.

Equally there’s also spillover of the conflict into nearby Lebanon given Hizbullah rocket attacks on neighboring Israel and punishing Israeli counterattacks.

UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres made a surprise trip to the beleaguered country; “I am here on a visit of solidarity with the people of Lebanon…The Lebanese people did not choose this war, they were dragged into it.”

The UN’s relief apparatus is in full support mode. Humanitarian chief Tom Fletcher warned that the closure of the Strait of Hormuz may have “immense consequences” on humanitarian operations as fuel and food are affected impacting on delivery and costs. He added, “Humanitarian cargo must be allowed to pass safely through the Strait of Hormuz.”

Given the Islamic Republic’s aggression both regionally and treatment of its own population, just imagine the Teheran theocracy possessing a nuclear weapon.

John J. Metzler is a United Nations correspondent covering diplomatic and defense issues. He is the author of Divided Dynamism the Diplomacy of Separated Nations: Germany, Korea, China (2014). [See pre-2011 Archives]

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  Meanwhile, the UN condemns ‘in strongest terms’ Iran strikes on Gulf states