Benjamin Netanyahu said on Wednesday night that the Iranian regime has to be overthrown, and that the United States and Israel are the ones who should do it. He said President Trump had told him the United States is “ready to finish the job,” according to a Fox News account of the week.

Trump went further in public on Friday than he has before.

At a rally in Florida he said the United States “may do another little epic fury” if Iran does not agree to a deal. Speaking to reporters the same day, he said the United States could “take all of the oil” and “the whole country,” and said the Strait of Hormuz is under American control.

Oil moved with him. Brent crude briefly passed $117 on Friday and settled at $116.72, its highest level since early May. West Texas Intermediate closed at $103.27.

That is the number that reaches a driveway in West Virginia, and it is the reason this story is not only a foreign policy story.

The pressure campaign is working on its own terms. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said Operation Economic Outcast, launched under two months ago, has badly damaged Iran’s oil industry. The analytics firm Kpler projects Iranian crude revenue could reach zero by the middle of December, a projection that rests on the American naval blockade holding.

The war around it has not quieted.

Saudi Aramco ordered its Dhahran headquarters evacuated on Thursday as fighting with the Houthis intensified, Reuters reported. The Houthis claimed responsibility for an attack on King Fahd International Airport that killed two and injured eight, and claimed strikes on a defense ministry site in Riyadh that the Associated Press said came without evidence.

Earlier this month a Houthi missile attack on King Khalid International Airport reportedly killed fourteen.

State Department spokesman Tommy Pigott said the department has taken “concrete action” to cut off Houthi financing. The United Kingdom said Tuesday it is expanding military support for Saudi Arabia.

Reuters also reported that Iran has prepared plans to cut undersea communications cables if the fighting resumes.

On the diplomatic side, Rafael Grossi of the International Atomic Energy Agency said Saturday the agency stands ready to monitor Iran if a deal is reached. No deal has been announced. Iran’s position has not moved publicly: lift the sanctions and end the threats first, and no uranium leaves the country.

Two things are true at once here and both belong in the same report.

The economic campaign has put Tehran in the worst position it has occupied in years, without an invasion. And the language coming out of this week — overthrow the regime, take the whole country, take all of the oil — describes something much larger than a pressure campaign.

Which of those the next nine days produce is not yet known. The election is November 3.