Episode Details

The clock has run out. Trump's 48-hour ultimatum to Iran expires tonight at 7:44pm Eastern Time — and Iran has not reopened the Strait of Hormuz. Instead, Tehran escalated. Iran's armed forces declared they are ready to close the Strait indefinitely if power plants are struck. Iran threatened to mine the entire Persian Gulf if its coastline is attacked. And the IRGC said on state television: do not doubt that we will do this.

The International Energy Agency called it the greatest global energy security challenge in history. Asian stock markets collapsed on Monday morning — the Nikkei down three and a half percent, the Kospi down nearly five percent. Brent crude hit one hundred and fourteen dollars per barrel. US crude crossed one hundred dollars for the first time since the war began.

Also in this episode: Israel launches a broad wave of strikes on Tehran and multiple Iranian cities as Monday begins. Iran's Red Crescent reports eighty thousand civilian units damaged across Iran in twenty-four days — including four hundred and ninety-eight schools and two hundred and seventy-five health facilities in Tehran province alone. Iran fires its four-hundredth-plus ballistic missile at Israel. The IAEA director-general warns Iran's enriched uranium will still exist after this war ends. Trump's National Security Advisor confirms exactly which power plants would be hit first. Britain's PM Starmer convenes an emergency economic meeting. Ukraine's Zelensky warns a long Iran war benefits Putin. And Iran signals it is monetizing control of the Strait as leverage — not as a military tactic.

The deadline is tonight. What happens next defines the next phase of this war.