Hundreds of thousands of Iranians filled the streets of Tehran on Friday for a government-organised, military-style parade called Janfada — Sacrifice for Iran — the largest show of support for the government since the war began on February 28. Participants pledged readiness to take up arms as those who sacrifice their lives for Iran; some trampled American and Israeli flags. The Revolutionary Guard displayed the drones it has used against shipping in the Strait of Hormuz, women affiliated with the Guard marched with rifles, and President Pezeshkian watched from the stand. The Associated Press placed it in context: the government is stressing national unity as the economy worsens under the US naval blockade and new sanctions designed to increase Tehran’s pain. This tracker records the turnout as reported and the rally as state-organised.

[AP]

The timing is not incidental. In the preceding four days the House voted to end the war, Washington said it was open to the concept of a deal and then that Iran was not ready, and the State Department granted Pezeshkian a visa for UN high-level week beginning September 22. A mass mobilisation with the strait weapons on parade, held with the president present, is the image Tehran chose to carry into New York: not a government under pressure seeking terms, but one with a street behind it. Whether that reflects the country is not something a state-organised rally can establish, and this tracker does not infer it.

[AP]

Iran said it struck the Togo-flagged oil tanker Trend on Thursday night for what state television, citing the Guard, called an "illegal attempt" to pass through the strait. The Guard’s navy warned that unauthorised passage would result in the destruction of offending vessels. The Associated Press could not confirm the report. UKMTO separately logged a tanker in the strait hit by an unknown projectile and set on fire, later extinguished; a late-reported strike on another tanker on Wednesday as it transited outbound; and a security incident 16 nautical miles northeast of Khasab, Oman. Crews were safe in every case and no environmental damage was reported. Iranian claim and independent monitor are again running in parallel without a confirmed match between them.

[AP/CP24] [AP/UKMTO]

Container ships and tankers continued to transit the Bab el-Mandeb after the Houthis said they are targeting only Saudi-linked vessels, though monitors reported a dip in traffic over the week since the island advance. Hundreds rallied in northern Yemen in support of the Houthis and against the Saudi accusation over Mecca. Saudi Arabia’s crown prince sought Egypt’s backing as the attacks rattled Red Sea oil routes — the second regional partner approached in as many days after Turkey and Pakistan said they had not been asked.

[AP/CP24] [AP/UKMTO]

South Korea said it is considering expanding its naval operation in the Gulf of Aden to protect its ships and oil routes, but that it will not send troops to intervene in the Iran war. It is the clearest statement yet of the posture most of the countries President Lee described on Day 202 as deploying assets near Hormuz appear to be taking: escort their own, join no coalition. Separately, Anthropic said users in Houthi-held Yemen had attempted to use its AI to develop advanced weapons.

[AP/CP24]

Tracker status holds at WAR RESUMED. Day 203 belongs to Tehran’s presentation of itself. The largest crowd of the war, the drones that closed the strait rolled past the president, and a tanker claimed the same day — assembled in the week Washington granted the visas and the House voted to stop. The strait produced four incidents and no confirmation; the Red Sea produced traffic under a Houthi rule; and the countries with ships to protect are protecting them and nothing else. The next scheduled event is Pezeshkian in New York.