2026-07-30 — Diplomacy fragments; no ceasefire, no new combatant confirmed

• Saudi Arabia is moving to build an international coalition to protect Red Sea shipping from Houthi attacks — its first organized multilateral security response to the blockade, reported consistently across three outlets (Al-Monitor, Jerusalem Post, Al Jazeera), all citing sources, 07-29 evening. ⟨daily 2026-07-30⟩
• Separately, China is holding direct talks with the Houthis to secure safe passage for its own tankers — a unilateral bilateral track outside any coalition, per Reuters (dated 07-28, missed until the 07-30 sweep). ⟨daily 2026-07-30⟩
• No ceasefire or de-escalation confirmed. ⟨daily 2026-07-30⟩
• ⚠️ Not confirmed, flagged rather than added: several aggregator headlines/live-blogs frame this as a “US-Israel-Iran war.” No primary source found confirming Israel is now directly striking Iran in this specific widening — do not add Israel as a combatant without a dedicated primary-source check. ⟨daily 2026-07-30⟩
• Flash rail assessed and left as-is: the current entry (updated in place 07-30 morning, expires 08-02) already covers the full widening through Kuwait/Egypt/Treasury sanctions. Nothing found on 07-30 rises above that — no new country struck, no confirmed ceasefire, no confirmed new combatant. ⟨daily 2026-07-30⟩

2026-07-29/30 — The war widened past the triggering strike

• The US struck targets inside Iran directly — Bandar Abbas, Kish Island, and sites across Khuzestan’s oil belt — killing civilians on Qeshm Island in a residential building hit. (NPR) ⟨daily 2026-07-29⟩
• Saudi Arabia joined US airstrikes against Iran-backed militias in Iraq — its first direct military action of this kind, reported ~20 PMF fighters killed (one source adds 6 Iranian advisers), 32 wounded; stated cause was 30+ drone attacks on US/Saudi positions over the prior 72 hours. (Al Jazeera) ⟨daily 2026-07-29⟩
• Two new countries were hit — Kuwait and Egypt. An Iranian strike killed a worker at a Chinese-run site in northern Kuwait; a drone hit two vessels (Gaslog Salem, Energos Winter) at Egypt’s Damietta port, reported as the first attack on Egyptian soil in this war. (Kuwait Times · Al Jazeera) ⟨daily 2026-07-29⟩

2026-07-28 — The pause breaks

• Iran fired ballistic missiles at a US air base and a CENTCOM facility in Jordan at 5:45pm ET — all intercepted, no casualties. CENTCOM called it “an attempted surprise attack.” The first Iranian ballistic-missile attack on a US base since the 07-24 pause — the event that triggered the flash rail. (Axios · CNN) ⟨daily 2026-07-28⟩
• Earlier the same day, the pause still appeared to hold — Trump cited “good talks” with Tehran and a “good chance” of a resolution, while warning strikes resume if diplomacy fails. Both were true at 16:00 ET and false by 17:45 ET — the pause is a headline, not a state, broken once within four days of being declared. (CNBC) ⟨daily 2026-07-28⟩
• The war’s other front got photographed: satellite imagery corroborated Iranian strikes on two Amazon data centres in Bahrain (Zallaq, Askar) — claimed ~07-21, following earlier drone attacks on AWS sites in the UAE (03-01) and Bahrain (04-01); Iranian state media had named Microsoft, Google, Apple, Meta, Oracle, Intel and Nvidia as targets on 03-31. This war now runs through compute infrastructure directly — full capex/AI-lens read in aws-capex and datacenters-as-targets. (Bloomberg) ⟨daily 2026-07-28⟩

2026-07-26/27 — The shooting war itself quietly pauses

• The US quietly halted strikes on Iran late Friday (07-24) and Iran ceased retaliatory strikes — a broader US-Iran fighting pause, distinct from (and not yet extended to) the ongoing Houthi Red Sea campaign against Saudi shipping and infrastructure. (CNBC) ⟨daily 2026-07-28⟩

2026-07-25 — Direct hit: first Saudi oil-infrastructure strike since 2022

• Houthi drones struck Aramco refineries at Jizan and Yanbu — Yanbu alone handles ~92% of Saudi seaborne crude exports (Kpler/AFP) — the first direct strike on Saudi oil infrastructure since 2022. Market reaction (Brent spiked above $100/bbl same day) tracked on red-sea-oil-shock. (Washington Post) ⟨daily 2026-07-28⟩

2026-07-23 — Tankers struck, blockade declared

• Houthi (Iran-backed) forces struck two Saudi oil tankers (Encelia, Layla) in the Red Sea and declared a naval blockade of Saudi ports — the first direct tanker strikes of the current conflict; Trump threatened to hold Iran responsible and floated bombing Iranian infrastructure. The originating event of this war — market reaction (Brent +7% to ~$100.69, the day’s equity selloff) tracked on red-sea-oil-shock. (CNBC) ⟨daily 2026-07-23⟩

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