Middle East Tensions Spark Oil Price Surge Amid Threats to Global Supplies
Oil prices surged above $100 last week for the first time since July as tensions in the Middle East escalated, threatening global energy supplies. The politically sensitive retail price of diesel fuel in the United States rose on Sunday to another all-time high above $6.20 a gallon.
The recent uptick in violence tied to the war that the United States and Israel launched six months ago follows a quiet August in which flows of Middle East oil had trickled back up. In Saudi Arabia, state media released video of damage to homes and a mosque from the latest purported cross-border attack by Yemen's Iran-aligned Houthi rebels in Jazan province in the south.
Iran, for its part, said one person was killed and four crew wounded aboard an Iranian commercial vessel struck off its coast. The UKMTO reported that a vessel had been struck by a projectile as it moved through the Strait of Hormuz, causing a fire and forcing the crew to be evacuated.