Five cable cuts!!! It definitely has NSA hands all over it. I think that it's either to mess with Iran/OPEC's head, tit for tat over Iran's jeuvenile speed boat provocations, or it's a cover for our planting a combination eavesdropping and misinformation link into the line somewhere distant from the break on each line.
Tapping in is one thing--it can be done nondisruptively. Diverting the feed through a box than can selectively listen, disrupt, or deliver misinformation would require an outage on the line. So we cover it up by staging a break someplace else so they don't see our handiwork.