The Wall Street Journal reports:

Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps attacked a Singapore-flagged cargo ship Thursday in the Strait of Hormuz, according to two senior U.S. officials, testing the deal signed last week by the U.S. and Iran to end the fighting and reopen the vital shipping lane.

The attack, which damaged the ship’s bridge but left no casualties, according to U.K. Maritime Trade Operations, took place near the coast of Oman hours after the Iranian paramilitary’s navy warned ships not to use routes through the waterway that the regime hadn’t sanctioned.

On Tuesday, the International Maritime Organization told shippers it was coordinating an evacuation route for the hundreds of ships still stuck in the Persian Gulf in cooperation with Iran, Oman, other coastal states and the U.S.

Hours after the attack, the IMO—a United Nations body—announced that it had paused the evacuation operation. Arsenio Dominguez, IMO secretary-general, said the pause, in light of the attack, was to “reconfirm that the necessary safety guarantees continue to be in place for the ships on our evacuation list and all those in the region.” He added that the vessel that had been attacked didn’t transit under the IMO’s evacuation framework.

The 60-day deal to reopen the strait requires that Iran make its best efforts to ensure the safe passage of commercial vessels, in return for the lifting of the U.S. blockade of its ports. As part of the pact, the U.S. waived sanctions on Iranian oil sales this week and allowed Tehran to sell its crude in dollars for the first time in decades.

The White House didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment on the attack or its bearing on the deal.

Shipping traffic through the global-energy chokepoint had begun to rebound this week, reaching its highest level since the war began, with 70 to 80 vessels on Wednesday making it through the neck of the Persian Gulf, according to ship trackers whose estimates vary.

Ship-tracking firm Kpler said that 70 vessels had crossed the strait, more than double the number the day before, in an indication that shippers were regaining confidence to make the crossing after months when only a trickle of traffic had gone through because of the threat of Iranian attacks and the U.S. blockade. [Continue reading…]