Oil exportsu.s: Iran and Oil

oil exportsu.s: The strait has become a symbolic flashpoint in the region-wide confrontation and indirect conflict between Iran on one side and the United States and Saudi Arabia on the other, according to The Independent. Two oil tankers were attacked and left adrift on Thursday in the Gulf of Oman, just south of the entrance to the strait, stoking fears of a new confrontation between Iran and the United States. Iran has periodically threatened to close the strait to enemy shipping, while the United States and its allies have pledged to keep it open and maintain freedom of navigation, by force if necessary. Oil prices spike as attack on tankers near crucial Gulf passage fan fears of conflict Oil prices are soaring today after U.S. moves to choke off Iran's oil exportsU.S. sanctions on Iran will leave oil markets with thinner safety margins than in the great shocks of 1970 and 2008 The Strait of Hormuz is the world's most important chokepoint for oil, according to the Energy Information Administration EIA the independent statistical and analysis arm of the U.S. Department of Energy. During the Iran-Iraq war 1980-1988 both countries targeted tankers with Iraq attacking vessels loading around Iran's Kharg island in the northern Gulf, and Iran targeting ships further south and in the strait itself. Roughly 30 per cent of all the world's seaborne flow of crude and products passes through the strait each year, so closure could result in a major disruption of global oil supplies. (news.financializer.com). As reported in the news.