Axios reported Tuesday that Iran's leadership had completed approval of a draft Hormuz arrangement. [1] Two regional officials told the Associated Press on Wednesday that Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei had not signed. [2] Those are not the same sentence.

Tuesday's Oman file already treated a three-month window as a memo, not a reopening. Wednesday adds a split on whether the memo even has a signature. ISW called the delay factional. The IRGC is not at the Muscat table. [3]

Khamenei has not been seen in public since the war's opening strikes. AP sources portrayed a temporary lane, not a finished waterway. [2] A U.S. official and a regional source told Axios the approval process finished Tuesday. [1] Readers who flatten those wires into one deal will miss the only operational fact: the leader's name is still the gap.

Until a joint statement exists, Axios has a source. AP has a wait. The strait has neither.

Trump told reporters a deal could come Wednesday or the next day after Axios previewed an announcement. [2] Oil eased then inched back. A presidential adverb is not Khamenei's signature. The paper files the split, not the hope.

-- YOSEF STERN, Jerusalem