Tag: israel

BRICS and Israel’s ongoing energy supplies

mkaradjis1 Comment

by Michael Karadjis

It is well-known that Israel’s Gaza genocide is principally enabled by the constant supply of tens of billions of dollars of killing equipment by the United States, making it the principle accomplice in the genocide, with Germany coming in a close second.

An important secondary question, however, is that of who continues to supply most of the state’s oil and coal (Israel has its own Mediterranean gas supplies) that keep the Israeli economy and war machine running. It may surprise some that the main culprits have been publicly critical of Israel’s actions, including BRICS members Russia, Brazil, Egypt and China, as well as some who have condemned Israel most furiously, such as BRICS member South Africa and, indirectly, Turkey.

According to S&P Global in late October 2023:

“With almost no domestic crude or condensate production, Israel has been importing around 300,000 b/d of crude this year to process at its two refineries in Haifa and Ashdod. Israel’s biggest source of oil is the Kazakh-sourced CPC Blend crude exported via Russia’s Black Sea port of Novorossiisk and Azeri Light which is shipped from Turkey’s Mediterranean port of Ceyhan. Together they accounted for over half of Israel’s crude imports this year” [emphasis added].

Map showing the routes of the BTC pipeline (red), through which Azeri oil reaches Israel via the Turkish port of Ceyhan, and the CPC pipeline (green), through which Kazak and Russian oil reaches Israel via the Russian Black Sea port of Novorossiysk

It is worth breaking this down a little more. First, even with regards to fuel, the US is also a supplier, mainly of refined JP-8 Jet Fuel for Israel’s killer jets, as part of US military aid to Israel; three tankers of jet fuel have arrived since October. Before the war, the only other form of refined fuel Israel imported was from BRICS member and rabid Israel-ally India, which supplied diesel, but this has fallen off, not due to good intentions, but rather due to the Red Sea blockade by AnsarAllah authorities in north Yemen. Regarding India, it is worth adding that an Indian-Israeli joint-venture has been producing Hermes 900 UAV attack drones and providing them to Israel; India has also been providing large numbers of rockets and explosives to Israel. Indian leader Modi is, of course, a close ally of his “dear friend” Vladimir Putin as he described him in his recent trip to Moscow.

Besides refined fuel, “Israel’s military requires significant quantities of diesel and gasoline for tanks and other military vehicles” which “is supplied by Israel’s refineries” in Ashdod and Haifa, which rely on imported crude oil. This is where Azeri, Russian-Kazak, Brazilian and Egyptian crude comes in, alongside growing supplies from Gabon/Nigeria.

This bar chart shows the main suppliers of crude to Israel over 2022-24:

Azerbaijan-Turkey and the BTC pipeline

Azerbaijan has been a major supplier of oil to Israel for many years, as part of a two-way arrangement in which Israel supplies Azerbaijan with guns. The basis of this cozy arrangement is Azerbaijan’s fraught relationship with neighbouring Iran; Azerbaijan’s three-decade autocrat Aliev runs a secular dictatorship, but as Azerbaijanis are largely Shiite, he fears the influence of Iran’s fundamentalist Shiism; while Iran itself includes a very large Azeri minority, and Iran in turn fears Azerbaijan’s potential influence there. Though this has not prevented some growing Iran-Azerbaijan cooperation, particularly on the International North-South Transport Corridor running from Russia, via Azerbaijan into Iran and out into the Indian Ocean to the Indian city Mumbai, nevertheless this arms for oil Israel-Azerbaijan arrangement has stood the test of time.

Israeli arms played a decisive role in facilitating Azerbaijan’s reconquest of the Armenian-populated Ngorno-Karabakh region in 2023, which led to the flight of 90 percent of the population.

The problem is that for landlocked Azerbaijan to get its oil to the Mediterranean Sea, it must go through Turkey via the BTC (Baku-Tsibilisi-Ceyhan) pipeline; while long ago a reliable ally of Israel under the Kemalist military, Erdogan’s Islamist AKP regime turned markedly anti-Israel and pro-Palestine since coming to power in 2003. But this did not prevent long-established, large-scale Turkish-Israeli trade from flourishing, indeed Turkey had been Israel’s fifth largest trading partner; and above all Azerbaijani oil has continued to flow through Turkey to Israel.

Erdogan’s regime finally put its money where its mouth is in May 2024, cutting off all Turkish trade with Israel. However, given the international agreements involved with Azeri oil and the BTC pipeline (BP is the major shareholder along with Equinor, Eni, Total, Exxon and the Azeri oil company, while the Turkish oil company TPAO only holds a 6.5 percent stake), Turkey would find it very difficult to prevent Azeri oil going through to Israel, without forcing a legal showdown and by all accounts this oil continues to flow to Israel.

As such, while Erdogan tells a gigantic state-organised march that Hamas is a “national liberation movement”, calls for a genocide trial for Netanyahu and claims there is “no difference between Netanyahu and Hitler,” while Turkey was the first country to formally join South Africa’s genocide case against Israel in the International Court of Justice (ICJ), and while finally ending trade relations, Azeri oil traversing Turkey still accounts for some 40 percent of Israel’s crude imports.

Kazakhistan, Russia and the CPC pipeline

The other major source of Israel’s crude imports has been from Kazakhistan, which, like Azerbaijan, is landlocked; in this case Russia takes the place of Turkey, with Kazakh oil entering the Black Sea at Russia’s port of Novorossiysk via the Caspian Pipeline Consortium (CPC). Israel also exports drones, precision rockets, radar systems and communications equipment to Kazakhistan, as well as the spyware technology of the NSO Group, with which the autocratic Kazakh regime infects the phones of dissidents. Kazakhistan is a close Russian ally and a member of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO).

Notably, in contrast to Turkey, Russia is not merely a transit territory but the major investor and minor supplier itself.  Some 44 percent of CPC shares are owned by Russian companies, above all the state-controlled, joint-stock company Transneft, the largest oil company in the world which alone owns a quarter of CPC, alongside Lukoil (12.5 percent) and Rosneft (7.5 percent); other shareholders include Chevron, Exxon, Shell, Eni and Kazakh oil companies (20 percent). Likewise, “CPC oil is a blend made up of oil from major fields in and around both the Kazakh and the Russian sections of the Caspian Sea, as well as smaller onshore fields in southern Russia. The majority is Kazakh, and cargoes are given either a Kazakh or a Russian certificate of origin in overall proportion to the amounts of oil that are shipped through the system from each country.”

As we see in the chart above, in July-September 2023, CPC supplied some 40 percent of Israel’s oil imports; while it has fluctuated since, in January 2024 it still accounted for some 40 percent of the total. The data shows that at least 600kt of Kazakh/Russian crude has been shipped to Israel since October via the CPC. This later chart based on data from Oil Change International, shows this has continued through 2024, the CPC supplying some 40 percent of Israel’s oil in March and 100 percent in June:

Despite Russia’s verbal criticism of Israel’s actions, the only unlikely danger to the CPC supply would be not Russian government policy but western sanctions on Russia over Ukraine (sanctions which Israel does not take part in), but “the importance of Caspian Sea oil and gas to US firms ExxonMobil and Chevron — and the lack of viable alternative export routes — has so far saved the CPC system from Western sanctions, and there is no reason to suspect that this will change in the near future.”

In addition, Russia also exports ‘dirty’ petroleum products to Israel, notably VGO fuel oil, which is upgraded into jet fuel (!) and diesel, and “this flow does not seem to have been affected by recent events, with four cargoes having reportedly arrived since 13 October 2023,” carrying 120 kt. Russian VGO has been impacted by EU sanctions, probably making the Israeli market for VGO even more important today.

Russia and the US have also been the main suppliers of processed oil products to Israel over the last year, on some months Russia ahead of the US, though both were surpassed by BRICS member Brazil in April:

Finally, Russia is also an important supplier of coal to Israel, exporting 247,500 mt to Israel in the first half of 2014, second only to Colombia, which in June banned coal exports; more on this below.

Interestingly, both Turkish and Russian trade with Israel was jointly highlighted on June 9 when the Turkish cargo vessel Yaf Horizon caught on fire in Haifa harbour. It was somewhat embarrassing because this was after Turkey’s trade ban, indicating that some Turkish companies have attempted to get around the ban (indeed some circumvent it by re-routing through Greece, which is currently strongly allied to Israel on an anti-Turkey platform). The vessel had first docked at Russia’s Novorossiysk port, where it picked up Russian iron or steel for export to Israel.

Where does Israel-Russia collaboration stand at present?

Of course, there ought to be nothing surprising about Russia supplying, and facilitating the supply of, oil to Israel, given the long-term close relationship between the two countries. During Israel’s ‘Operation Protective Edge’ Gaza blitzkrieg in 2014, which killed 2500 Palestinians, Putin declared “I support the struggle of Israel,” while Israel refused to join its western allies in condemning the 2014 Russian annexation of Crimea, abstaining in the UN and rejecting sanctions.

Following the onset of the Syrian uprising against Assad since 2011, Israel continually stated its preference for Russia’s ally Assad to prevail against his opponents; Israeli leaders expressed appreciation of the Assad dynasty maintaining quiet on the Golan for 40 years; the Syrian opposition (which is also dedicated to recovering the Golan) never asked for Israeli support and Israel never offered it; and in 2018, Israel actively facilitated Assad’s reconquest of the south, alongside Trump and in coordination with Putin. Israel later stepped up attacks on Iranian and Hezbollah forces, which had helped rescue Assad, after Assad had reconquered much of the country, making their aid less essential, but Israel had welcomed the onset of Russian terror bombing to save the regime in 2015, hoping for a Russian-dominated rather than Iranian-dominated regime. Putin and Netanyahu then met more than any other two leaders over the next half-decade, Russian-controlled air defences in Syria allowing these Israeli attacks on Iranian assets. Under Netanyahu, Israel authorized the ‘Cellebrite’ company “to sell its mobile phone hacking device to the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation, which serves President Putin as a key tool of internal repression and political persecution in the country.” Netanyahu even produced a massive billboard showing himself with Putin for the 2019 elections:

Election poster on the Likud party headquarters showing Putin and Netanyahu, 2019

It was hardly surprising that Netanyahu’s equally ultra-rightist successor, and former ally, then prime minister Naftali Bennett, was the first ‘world leader’ to make a high level visit to Moscow to meet Putin after his invasion of Ukraine. Bennett’s first statement following Russia’s invasion merely affirmed Ukraine’s right to sovereignty, but made no mention of Russia. Following US pressure, foreign minister and ‘moderate’ Zionist Yair Lapid issued the official, half-hearted condemnation. Bennett then issued a demand that his ministers say nothing; rejected Ukraine’s calls for arms, blocked any attempt by third parties to send Israeli-made arms to Ukraine, and blocked the US from providing Israeli ‘iron dome’ missile shield technology to Ukraine. Despite two and a half years of pressure from Israel’s main ally, the US, Israel has still not sent a gun to Ukraine. Even in January 2024, Israel rejected US requests for it to supply some very old (supplied to Israel in the 1960s) anti-aircraft weaponry to the US for it to give to Ukraine. Not long before October 7, Russia announced the opening of its consular offices in West Jerusalem, which it had recognised as Israel’s capital several years earlier, despite that city’s illegal incorporation of East Jerusalem.

Following the onset of the Gaza genocide in October 2023 however, these powerful Russian-Israeli relations began to fray. The above demonstrates that this was not because of any problem with Israel as such, but rather was related to Russian-American rivalry. For nearly two years, the US, for its own imperial reasons, had led support for Ukraine’s legitimate struggle for self-determination against Russia’s illegal and barbaric war of aggression. Now it was Russia’s chance to turn the tables, criticising the US for its 100 percent support for Israel’s absolutely apocalyptic actions, showcasing Russia’s more “balanced” view of the Mideast crisis, blaming the US for not having brought about the ‘two-state solution’. While Putin’s target is the US rather than Israel as such, this discourse by definition means criticism of Israel, resulting in damage to Israeli-Russian relations.

While much analysis suggests this is due to the growing relationship between Russia and Iran (eg with Iranian provision of killer-drones for Moscow’s war in Ukraine), in reality Russia (and China) merely place themselves in the exact ‘Arab mainstream’ on these issues alongside their BRICS allies Egypt, Saudi Arabia, the UAE etc – recognition of Israel, calls for ‘two-state solution’, supporting UN ceasefire resolutions, condemnation of the October 7 attack as an “absolutely unacceptable terrorist attack against Israel,” demanding the unconditional release of all Israeli hostages, strong support for the collaborationist Palestinian Authority, refusal to join South Africa’s ICJ case against Israel and so on. Russia’s mild change of stance has not led to even one Israeli warplane being shot down by Russian-controlled air defence while attacking pro-Iran targets in Syria. Meanwhile, in contrast to the active Israel-Lebanon border, the Syria-Israel Golan demarcation line “remains conspicuously calm,” the Syrian regime having instructed its forces in the Golan “not to engage in any hostilities, including firing bullets or shells toward Israel.” To keep it that way, Russia has beefed up its forces along the Golan occupation line to ensure no stray Palestinian or Iran-backed forces cause any trouble.

Of course, the shallowness of Russia’s public criticism of Israel can be gleaned from some of the more serious Russian commentary, such as Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov’s December 28 interview, in which he directly compared Russia’s and Israel’s campaigns in Ukraine and Gaza by using Russia’s Orwellian terms to describe its own invasion: “Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced that Hamas must be destroyed as a whole and as a military force. It sounds like demilitarisation. He also said that extremism must be eliminated in Gaza. It sounds like denazification.” He then went on to commend Netanyahu for not criticising Russia’s war in Ukraine.

In this light, Russia’s provision and facilitation of a major part of Israel’s oil and coal supplies should not be any surprise, but in case anyone were taken in by its newly critical position towards Israel, these material facts are a reminder of reality.

Iraq, Egypt and Brazil

Until April 2023, Iraq’s Kurdistan Regional Government was also an important oil exporter to Israel, again traversing Turkish territory to Ceyhan, but a legal dispute between the KRG and the Iraqi government halted this flow. The main sources making up for this loss have been Gabon and Nigeria, Brazil and Egypt.

BRICS member Brazil is another important supplier of crude to Israel, with two shipments totalling 260 kilotonnes delivered to Israel in December 2023, and February 2024. This crude was supplied from oil fields owned by Shell, TotalEnergies and Brazil’s Petrobras. This is despite the Lula government’s sharp criticism of Israeli actions, leading to the withdrawal of Brazil’s ambassador to Israel in late May and expression of support to South Africa’s genocide case against Israel in the International Court of Justice (ICJ), at one point Lula even calling the Israeli military campaign ‘genocide’.

Lula’s Brazil going completely out of its way to keep up with BRICS partners in supplying Israel with oil.

Finally, Israel imports a small but regular amount of oil from its BRICS neighbour Egypt, via Sidi Kerir, near Alexandria, the terminus of the SUMED pipeline. Oil from BRICS members United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia, as well as Iraq, also feeds into this pipeline. Many might say, this is no surprise, Egypt being the first Arab state to recognise Israel, the irony being that many ‘anti-imperialist’ critics believe BRICS to be the answer to US imperialism – yet BRICS members Russia, China, India, Brazil, South Africa, United Arab Emirates and Ethiopia, like Egypt, all have long-term relations with Israel; only Saudi Arabia and Iran do not. Words are good, but oil profits are another thing.

Of course, it is certainly true that the al-Sisi dictatorship has collaborated with the Israeli blockade of Gaza for years, and now blocks Palestinians fleeing from Gaza not to prevent the new Nakbah, but because the regime hates Palestinians as much as Israel does. But alarmed by the impact Israel’s genocide on its borders was having on its own population, Egypt announced in May it was formally joining South Africa’s genocide case against Israel in the ICJ, alongside Turkey and Colombia. But of course, like the others, Egypt still draws the line at actually taking any concrete action.

Coal: Russia, China, South Africa to the rescue

On June 8, Colombia’s President Gustavo Petro announced that his country would suspend coal exports to Israel – Colombia had on average supplied about 50-60 percent of Israel’s coal. Israel had imported 1.4 million metric tons (mt) of thermal coal in 2024 to date, of which Colombia supplied 855,700 mt, or 60 percent of Israel’s coal imports.

But according to S&P Global Global Commodities at Sea data, Russia was next, exporting 247,500 mt to Israel in that period, fellow BRICS member South Africa next at 169,200 mt, then the US at 86,100 mt and BRICS member China with 53,000 mt. LSEG Data and Analytics shows slightly different but similarly revealing data, showing that Russia had exported nearly double that amount, some 512,000 mt, to Israel since October 7, South Africa 496,000 mt, while not revealing any Chinese coal exports:

This data from LSEG Data and Analytics, showing coal shipments to Israel in 2024, reveals the large role of Russian coal in sustaining Israel’s regime; unfortunately seems to show that Colombia’s boycott has not been put into practice as of July; does not show Chinese shipments as claimed by S&P Global, Source: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1rKdD_nWe5o4YQ3YYXUGkSsXQT4JO0DQ5cAxJ5OYyzeU/edit

As discussed above, there is nothing out of the ordinary in Russia’s case, but an intriguing incident may cast some light on what more may be happening below the surface. On June 12, the Houthis launched a small watercraft, drone and missile attack on the Greek-owned, Liberian-flagged vessel M.V Tutor, sinking it. The Tutor was, or had been, carrying 80,000 mt of Russian coal, loaded at Ust-Luga, near Saint Petersburg; it was on its way to India after traversing the Suez Canal. While the Houthis have not exactly been precise in their choice of attacks – they claim to only attack vessels trading with Israel, yet hits have included ships carrying grain to their ally, Iran, twice, and a Chinese ship carrying Russian oil to India – it is likely that even such hits are based on erroneous assumptions. What may have caused an attack on such a large shipment of Russian coal?

On this, Patrick Bond from the University of Johannesburg speculates that “This may be because MV Tutor had apparently stopped at Jordan’s Aqaba New Port, where it seems that coal can be quickly unloaded and transported, either up the Jordanian highway seven hours distant to cement factories where it serves as a fuel, OR perhaps across the nearby Israeli border at the Rabin Crossing, from where around four hours away by truck, the coal can be sent to storage depots next to the Rutenberg coal-fired power plant, which normally served by ships unloading directly at Ashdod. Next door, Ashkelon’s port has been closed because it’s just 4km from Jabalia in Gaza.”

In the case of China, there should be few surprises there, given China is Israel’s second largest trading partner, and is part-owner of Israel’s port of Haifa (along with India), this making Israel a key link in China’s massive Belt and Road Initiative. Indeed, Israel is the third-largest export market for Chinese cars, and while China’s EV exports to Israel already made up 60 percent of the Israeli market in 2023, in the first 4 months of 2024 this rose to 70.8 percent, despite the Houthi blockade of the Red Sea! China-Israel technology relations have been booming for years (as the official organ of the CCP boasts), and one regular kind of US-Israel dispute has concerned Israeli attempts to sell advanced weaponry to China – where Israel has backed down under intense US pressure.

South Africa, however, was widely commended for its genocide case against Israel at the International Court of Justice, but till now has also had extensive trade relations with Israel, exporting $350.9 million to Israel in 2022, of which 40 percent was coal, and as shown below, nearly 500,000 mt of coal since October:

Source: LSEG Data & Analytics, https://docs.google.com/document/d/1rKdD_nWe5o4YQ3YYXUGkSsXQT4JO0DQ5cAxJ5OYyzeU/edit

To date there are no indications of steps being taken to end these coal supplies to Israel, and with the new governing coalition between the ANC and the pro-Zionist Democratic Alliance, this seems even less likely to change. This urgent appeal to South Africa to halt all coal exports to Israel issued by the Global Energy Embargo Coalition provides a great deal more information on this trading relationship with South Africa and Israel.

Thus despite its ICJ case, for South Africa, along with fellow applicants Egypt and Turkey (led by alleged anti-Israel zealot Erdogan), and more lukewarm critics of Israel’s current actions in Russia, China and Brazil (and of course pro-Israel India), the logic of capitalist commerce and profit-making speaks much louder than words – it is BRICS, after all, that we’re talking about.

US the primary facilitator of genocide, but what of BDS?

Of course, none of the above reduces the absolutely central role of US imperialism in the arming of Israel with billions of dollars worth of weaponry as genocide unfolds, indeed without the continual re-supply of ammunition and a vast array of weaponry the Zionist regime would have had to stop by now. The US supplies $3.8 billion dollars in weaponry to Israel every year, but since the Gaza war began vastly greater quantities of tank and artillery ammunition, bombs, rockets, and small arms have been sent. In February, the Senate approved another $14.5 billion in weaponry to Israel, then in April, Congress approved a further $26 billion in general aid to Israel, and in June Congress approved  another $18 billion arms transfer to Israel to purchase dozens of Boeing Co. F-15 aircraft. Meanwhile, in March it was revealed that the US had sent over 100 “secret” weapons shipments to Israel, consisting of “precision-guided munitions, small diameter bombs, bunker busters, small arms (like firearms), and more,” which it could get away with as they fell just below the dollar value that requires Congressional approval. The head spins as all this US-supplied weaponry is used to slaughter tens of thousands of people and make Gaza unliveable by destroying everything necessary for human life.

The US, in other words, is as much involved in the genocide as Israel itself is; in the same way as it is Russia that is responsible for destroying Ukraine and for the Assad regime’s destruction of Syria, or again the US that was responsible for destroying Iraq, and so on.

That said, the Israeli economy is in crisis as a result of the war, and enormous pressure for it to stop could be exerted if major economies ended their trade relations with Israel, especially the trade that fuels its economy and war machine. Throughout much of the world, supporters of Palestine have pushed the campaign for Boycott, Disinvestment and Sanctions (BDS) on Israel, not just because of the current apocalypse, but against the apartheid regime and the illegal occupation more generally. How ironic that among these western pro-Palestine activists are some who push illusions in rival imperialisms such as Russia and China or who see BRICS more generally as some kind of alternative to US imperialism, yet all these states continue to supply oil and coal, as well as an array of other products, to the regime as it commits genocide, alongside major western oil companies involved in the CPC and BTC like BP, Chevron, ExxonMobil, Shell, Eni and TotalEnergies. If they all ended this trade, it could make a significant difference.

The fact that they have not, and show no signs of it, further accentuates the point that there are no geopolitical ‘camps’, ‘blocs’ or ‘axes’, as mainstream media and popular geopolitics writers, on both the right and left, are so fond of. Rather, all we have is global capitalism, the pigsty of global profit-making, where at times, all may be against all in their rivalry, with no relevance of any imaginary ‘camps’, and at other times, all are in it together. 

The Israel-Iran theater show–a distraction from Gaza genocide 

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The Israel-Iran theater show–a distraction from Gaza genocide 

by Michael Karadjis

Michael Karadjis explains how the recent interchange of missiles between Israel and Iran was an episode of theater distracting from the ongoing genocide in Gaza and leaving Israel more powerful.

Iranian missiles above Israel. Photo: Wikimedia Commons.

How many Palestinians have Israel shot, bombed, and starved in the last week or so? Not a lot of it has been in the news, because we’ve been distractedby “bigger” theatre: a “regional” conflict may be brewing. Let’s observe and analyze this bigger picture, while remembering that the ongoing genocide in Gaza is the real issue here, not Israeli and Iranian fireworks.

At least 43 more Palestinians were killed and 62 others injured on April 13 in four Israeli massacres in Gaza. The next day another five Palestinians were killed “when the Israeli army shelled hundreds of displaced Palestinians trying to return to their homes in the northern Gaza Strip.” Meanwhile, as Al-Jazeera reported, in the West Bank in the same period, while drones flew overhead, mobs of Israeli settlers, backed by troops, spearheaded a large-scale attack on the village of al-Mughayyir, where they killed one Palestinian man and injured 25 others. Since then, settlers have attacked more towns and villages near Ramallah including Bukra, Deir Dubwan, and Kfar Malik.

This is the ongoing reality behind the theatrical scenes we have witnessed over the last week. While the world witnessed the performative deployment of great military hardware on both sides, as both proclaimed self-defense, there was no power to knock out Israeli planes bombing Palestinians; no discussion of Palestine’s right to defend itself.

The U.S. has been pleased that decades of Iranian-regime “anti-Zionist” bluster (aimed at internal and regional homogenization rather than at being taken seriously) amounted to nothing at all as Israel committed genocide in Gaza for six months. Despite Iranian leaders initially promising to back Palestinian resistance “until the liberation of Palestine and Al-Quds,” with one leader claiming an Israeli ground invasion of Gaza would “open that gates of hell,” in reality “the chasm between Iran’s bellicose rhetoric and relatively restrained action is even sharper in the current Gaza war” than in previous wars. Iranian supreme leader Ali Khamenei famously told Hamas chief Ismael Haniyeh in Tehran, that since Hamas “gave us no warning, we will not enter the war on your behalf,” allegedly demanding that Haniyeh silence Palestinian voices calling on Iran or Hezbollah to join the battle. In November, the U.S. allowed Iraq to transfer $10 billion it owed Iran in electricity payments in a sanctions waiver. According to The Economist, this was a reward to Iran for holding back its proxies after October 7.

However, Israeli leaders were less pleased. They were probably pleased in the first month or two, allowing them time to get on with the genocide. Yoav Gallant, Israel’s defense minister, boasted that “no one has come to [Hamas’s] aid – neither the Iranians nor Hizbullah.” But after that, Israeli leaders, or at least Netanyahu’s gang, appeared to want to escalate. For example, while the attacks and counter-attacks between Israel and Hezbollah on the Lebanese border were initially well-calibrated on both sides, restricted to a few kilometers, Israel soon upped the ante: While some twenty troops and civilians have been killed on the Israeli side, about 240 Hezbollah and other fighting cadre and forty Lebanese civilians had been killed by increasingly violent and reckless Israeli bombing by March. By late in 2023, Israel was escalating with targeted killings of leading Hezbollah cadre and Iranian Revolutionary Guards in Lebanon and Syria, which appeared to be aimed at getting a response.

For years, Israel has bombed Iranian and Hezbollah targets in Syria, but mostly they targeted weapons shipments, warehouses, and the like where Iran was transferring missiles to Hezbollah. These Israeli bombings were carried out with the facilitation of Syria’s Russian-controlled air defenses, an arrangement made through countless high-level meetings between then-best-friends Putin and Netanyahu, who over a decade met together more than any other two world leaders. Israel supported the Assad regime remaining in power, but without Iranian backing, and therefore welcomed Russia’s intervention on Assad’s behalf as an alternative. Russia and Iran jointly saved Assad, but then became rivals over domination of the Assadist corpse.

Yet over all these years of attacks, none of them were ever carried out in response to any imaginary Iranian or Hezbollah attacks on “Israel” (i.e., the Israeli-occupied Syrian Golan); the Israeli and Western propaganda that Israel attacks Iranian forces because they pose a “threat” to Israel was very theoretical indeed. In fact, only twice, in my close reading, was there even retaliation (once by Iran, in May 2018, once by Hezbollah, in January 2015), as against hundreds of Israeli attacks.

But only in the last six months has Israel progressed to these targeted killings of significant numbers of important Iranian or Hezbollah figures, but no matter how many were killed, even leading Revolutionary Guards, still there was zero retaliation from Iran. Following a series of suspiciously precise Israeli strikes killing around a dozen leading Iranian Revolutionary Guards in Syria in December and January, Iran’s response was to pull back the Guards from Syria to avoid getting pulled into the conflict.

How is Israel supposed to maintain a 30-year propaganda campaign, that it faces not just the brutally oppressed Palestinians, but behind them a large evil power bent on wiping out Israel and Jews (sometimes referred to as “the Fourth Reich”) allegedly dedicated to Israel’s destruction, when, for years, that power never does anything, not even as a response? And continues the same, no matter how much Israel has turned up the dial in recent months. Israel cultivates this propaganda not because it fears Iran – a laughable proposition for a nuclear-armed military and economic superpower – but because of its utility as a key ideological prop for the Zionist enterprise. In the same way, Iran plays the same propaganda game in relation to Israel. Just as Israel used this propaganda to justify the brutal oppression of Palestine, Iran used the same to mobilize supporters and death squads against opponents – mostly Sunni Muslims – in Iraq and Syria as it built its sub-imperial arc from Iran to the Mediterranean Sea.

While the world witnessed the performative deployment of great military hardware on both sides, as both proclaimed self-defense, there was no power to knock out Israeli planes bombing Palestinians; no discussion of Palestine’s right to defend itself.

But now in the context of its Gaza genocide and the mass global opposition that was confronting it, an Iranian response became especially important for Israel, because if Iran’s response were harsh enough, it may force the U.S. to enter the battle directly against Iran, and under the cover of such a region-wide conflagration, Israel could carry out its genocide in Gaza–and the West Bank–to completion. Israel’s crimes would become a mere sideshow compared to this “bigger picture,” and the world could be convinced that “poor little Israel” faces powerful enemies attacking it. So, it finally made the decision to hit the Iranian consulate in Syria, knowing Iran would now have no choice but to respond at some level or lose face completely.

At first, Iran said it held the U.S. responsible, a hint that the response might simply be that its Iraqi Shiite militia proxies go back to hitting U.S. bases in Iraq or Syria, something they stopped completely months ago (under Iranian regime pressure). Then the U.S. stressed that it was not “involved in any way whatsoever,” that it had received no advance warning from Israel (and was not happy about that), so Iran had better not hit U.S. forces. This was a hint that Iran should instead hit Israeli interests, somewhere. Then Iran hinted that its response would not be of an escalatory nature, and U.S. sources initially agreed that the response would be minor. But then we began to read in the media exactly what its response would be–a drone and missile attack on Israel from Iranian territory–somewhat more significant than initially expected. But the reason we could read about it was that Iran gave the U.S. 72 hours’ notice via various intermediaries–Oman, Iraq, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and Switzerland have all been mentioned–so that the U.S. and Israel would know exactly what was coming, giving them plenty of time to prepare. In real-time theatre, discussions were essentially going on in the media between the U.S. and Iran through these intermediaries over what was deemed to be within reasonable limits to avoid escalation and so on. The U.S. made it clear that if Iran hit Israel, U.S. support for Israel’s defense is “ironclad.”

Of course, this well-choreographed retaliation gave time for Israel, the U.S., the U.K., France, and even Jordan to be well-positioned to shoot down 99 percent of the 350 drones and missiles that Iran sent against Israel. Reportedly, some drones even had their lights on! Iran’s attack was aimed at an Israeli military base, not at civilians, as U.S. leaders confirmed. Iran then declared that the matter was “concluded”. Meanwhile, since the U.S.’s “ironclad” defense of Israel had indeed been successfully put into action, the U.S. therefore, did not need to do any more. Biden commended Israel on the success of its amazing air defense system–even though this may not have been the case if the U.S. and others had not helped–telling Israel, “You got a win. Take the win” and move on; Biden stressed that the U.S. would not support or participate in any offensive Israeli operations against Iran in retaliation.

Two men stand in a pile of rubble.Damage in Gaza, October 2023. Photo: Wikimedia Commons.

The U.K., France, Germany, and other Western countries all likewise called on Israel to avoid retaliating. Russia and China neither supported nor condemned Iran’s attack (just as the U.S., U.K., and France had refused to condemn Israel’s attack on the Iranian consulate in the UN) but expressed alarm about escalation and called for calm.

So, who won, lost, or came out even in this?

Iran and the U.S., for their own reasons, want to avoid escalation. Israel, for reasons explained above, wants to escalate, but not to fight Iran itself, but rather focus on smashing Gaza. For Israel, escalation means that the U.S. gets sucked into a war of non-choice with Iran while Israel gets on with killing the Palestinians, its real, not phantom, enemies. The U.S. has given Israel 100 percent of its support – despite occasional toothless hand-wringing – to Israel’s war of genocide in Gaza but has no interest in getting sucked into Netanyahu’s escalatory games. This reluctance is not out of pacifism; it’s just that it has much bigger issues with Russia in Ukraine and China in the South China Sea, and, as Obama’s Iran nuclear accord showed, the Democrats at least have a more rational understanding that Iranian capitalism merely wants a recognized place in the region and that the bluster, is, well, bluster.

From that perspective, Israel did gain a lot. Above all, the whole episode created a theatrical distraction from Gaza; it allowed Israel to get on with mass murder while the world’s attention was elsewhere; it covered  Israel scuttling the latest negotiations of ceasefire and hostage release; and it demonstrated how efficient its defenses were. The fact that Iran chose a full frontal attack on Israel, rather than an equivalent act such as hitting an Israeli embassy somewhere, allows Israel to again play-act that it is up against a powerful “evil” regime that wants to destroy it. The episode assembled a collection of Western powers and even Jordan as a “defend Israel” coalition. The escalating criticisms of its monstrous war coming from various Western powers, even to some extent from Biden and the U.S. government, have now been blunted. Massive new arms deals with Israel and sanctions on Iran are the word from the U.S. and Western allies.

On the other hand, this is not quite enough for Netanyahu; it is not quite a regional conflagration. The limitations, and above all the choreography, of Iran’s harmless attack do nothing to bring in the U.S. to wage war on Iran; on the contrary, it allows the U.S. to preach restraint.

Iran also gained: It could say, we retaliated for the violation of our consulate, but we also acted responsibly. If Iran had not planned for all its drones and missiles to be shot down, then this would be a severe humiliation. But since that was precisely the plan, Iran simultaneously gained credibility and showed “responsibility.” It also demonstrated that it had had the potential to do damage if it had not given extensive warning, and clear notice to Israel that it no longer accepted the previous rules. It was also a useful exercise for Iran to “test out” Israeli air defense weaponry, though of course, Israel benefits in the same way.

Above all, the whole episode created a theatrical distraction from Gaza; it allowed Israel to get on with mass murder while the world’s attention was elsewhere; it covered Israel scuttling the latest negotiations of ceasefire and hostage release; and it demonstrated how efficient its defenses were.

But again, on the other hand, it can also be argued that Iran fell into Israel’s trap by retaliating, though it had little choice. While the planned results of its attack show restraint, just the fact that it chose a full-frontal attack from its territory as its method of retaliation has allowed the West to denounce “Iranian aggression” and step up support for Israel.

Arguably, the U.S. gained the most by being in a position to jointly choreograph, with Iran, the latter’s response through intermediaries and then play the decisive role in helping Israel shoot down all the Iranian hardware, it placed itself in a strong position. If its aim was to show it could defend Israel while avoiding escalation, it came out on top. While the U.S. tells Israel it should be happy to see how well its defenses performed, Israel knows its dependence on the U.S. has been displayed; this arguably puts the U.S. in a strong position to moderate Israel’s next steps.

Of course, the U.S. has continually criticized some aspects of Israel’s war while at every stage supplying Israel with the weapons to carry out its genocide, so no one should wager too much on the idea that the U.S. will not buckle if Israel were to choose a hard escalatory response. However, it appears that this has been avoided with yet another piece of elaborate theatre, this time by Israel.

Following Iran’s attack, Israel immediately announced that it had to respond and would “decide for itself” in a pointed snub to U.S. advice. As expected, the U.S. began to come around, U.S. leaders now claiming to understand that Israel “had to respond” in some way. So, the U.S. advised Israel to keep it non-escalatory. But if Israel’s response to Iran’s response was not proportionate or bigger, that would not be good for Israel’s credibility. Some Israeli leaders wanted to wage a massive attack on Iran. To prevent that, it appears that the U.S. came up with a deal to save Israel, Iran, and the region from escalation at the expense of the Palestinians.

According to Egyptian officials cited by The Times of Israel on Thursday, “The American administration showed acceptance of the plan previously presented by the occupation government regarding the military operation in Rafah, in exchange for not carrying out a large-scale attack against Iran” [emphasis added]. In other words, no retaliation has been replaced with no “large-scale” retaliation. This is all Israel has to promise in order for the U.S. to give its assent – thus far not clearly given – for Israel to launch its heralded attack on Rafah, where 1.5 million Palestinians have been driven, up against the border of Egypt, into which Israel would like to expel them.

On Friday, April 19, Israel launched its retaliation. Explosions were heard in the Iranian city of Isfahan. Israel did not explicitly report anything; Iran said the explosions were not missiles but the actions of its air defenses knocking out several drones; Iran said the event was so small that it is uncertain where the drones came from and speculated that it may have been an internal attack by “infiltrators” and indicated that it therefore had no plans to retaliate.

Before proclaiming this as a victory for Iran and a climb-down by Israel, by targeting Isfahan, where Iran has major sites of its nuclear program, without hitting them, Israel has shown that it can target them if it chooses to. Therefore, despite the small size of the action, it is an important implicit threat.

Iran wins; Israel wins; escalation is avoided (for now); the U.S. wins. But if the terms of the alleged deal are true, Palestine loses. Following Iran’s retaliatory attack, its UN mission declared it had been conducted “in response to the Zionist regime’s aggression against our diplomatic premises in Damascus” based on Article 51 of the UN Charter “pertaining to legitimate defense,” and therefore the matter can be deemed concluded.” This was not only a message to Israel, but also to Palestine; if, as expected, Israel now goes ahead with a savage attack on Rafah, backed by the U.S., Palestine is on its own.

Ruthlessly repressive capitalist dictatorships like Iran, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Syria, the UAE, and so on have nothing to offer the Palestinian people and never have had – regardless of their rhetoric and whether they use hollow phrases like “resistance” in their titles or not. On one hand, none have ever done anything to aid Palestine; on the other, given their nature as active enemies of human emancipation, even if they did make bumbling attempts to live up to their rhetoric, it would tend to be counterproductive.

The entirely theatrical nature of the past week’s events merely highlights this fact graphically. Only the oppressed peoples of the region, when they next rise against their oppressors, can be real allies of Palestine. In the meantime, all solidarity with the Palestinian resistance in Rafah and throughout Gaza is essential to prevent Israel from using the past week’s events to further its genocidal project.

Featured image credit: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:F-15I_vs_Iranian_strikes_on_Israel_02.jpg; modified by Tempest.

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Dumb things Zionists say: 2. Since the Palestinians rejected the offer of 43% of Palestine as an ‘Arab state’ in the 1947 UN partition, Israel had the right to conquer half of it and increase its allotted 56% to 78% of Palestine.

mkaradjisLeave a comment

by Michael Karadjis

Source: https://www.jewishvoiceforpeace.org/2015/06/28/1947-un-partition-plan-1949-armistice-comparison-map/

Indeed, due to this original sin, the Palestinians have no right to ever demand a return to this original partition or one closer to 50/50 (if the preferable one-state solution continues to evade them).

Logical right? Why don’t we try some other examples?

Russia has conquered and annexed about 20% of Ukraine. Not surprisingly, Ukraine does not agree and fights back, just like the Palestinians in 1948 rejected losing more than half of their country. So therefore, due to Ukraine’s rudeness in not accepting that might equals right, now Russia should annex 50% of Ukraine, and it will be Ukraine’s own fault.

In 1974, Turkey conquered 38% of Cyprus (ethnic Turkish Cypriots were 18% of the population, scattered throughout the island), and later declared this a ‘Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus. Cyprus rejected this partition and continues to, so therefore Turkey has the right to annex about 60% of Cyprus as punishment for this affront.

After centuries of colonialism, Britain partitioned Ireland in 1922, generously allowing the Irish to have a full 5/6ths of their country, only keeping one sixth for the Empire. The Republic of Ireland never accepted this and in the 1960s through 1990s the nationalist population in the north fought to end the partition. Therefore, Britain certainly has the right to now conquer at least one third of Ireland as recompense for this rejection of British goodwill.

And if that is the correct punishment for merely rejecting the violent partition of one’s homeland, surely this principle should apply double or triple when a country outright invades or takes over another country? Iraq invaded Iran in 1980, so therefore Iran is surely entitled to about half of Iraq’s territory as compensation, right? France occupied Algeria, Italy occupied Libya and so on, therefore Algeria is entitled to half of France, and Libya is entitled to half of Italy, and so on and so forth, though we start getting confused about which side is the one that should get the compensation, maybe Algeria should be punished for rejecting the humane offer of French rule by having to pay France for independence; hang on, that’s exactly what happened to the people of Haiti after all.

Of course there is no point continuing with this absurdity; so why is it so commonly accepted that only the first case is not absurd?

The data and timeline are well-known. By 1947, about one third of the population of Palestine consisted of Jews, overwhelmingly those who had immigrated as part of the Zionist program in recent decades (but including a small number of Indigenous Jews), while two-thirds were Palestinian Arabs. What is wrong with a partition being imposed on the Indigenous Palestinians by foreign imperialist and other powers? One can easily think of three objections:

1.It was not the decision of the people who lived there; the principle of self-determination says that massive life-changing ‘solutions’ should not be imposed on people by outside powerful states;

    2. It is normal for people to reject having their own country partitioned, no matter what the percentages, above all because the Palestinian people lived scattered all over Palestine, so a large part of their population would find themselves either ethnically cleansed or living under the rule of the proposed ‘Jewish state’; for the same reasons, partition was an unacceptable solution in countries like Cyprus and Bosnia, where the populations (Greek and Turkish Cypriots; Bosnian Serbs, Croats, Bosniaks [Muslims] and ‘Yugoslavs’ [mixed Bosnians]) lived scattered all over those lands.

    3. Even if they had accepted the (bad) principle of partition, why would the Palestinians accept such an unfair partition, in which the one third Jewish population were awarded 56% of the land and the two thirds Palestinian population only 43% (with one percent the city of Jerusalem)? In which Palestinians would have been a majority of the population even in the ‘Jewish state’, ie a state they would have no rights in (much the same situation likewise existed for Greek Cypriots in the ‘Turkish’ Republic of Northern Cyprus and Bosnian Muslims in the ‘Serb’ Republic in Bosnia).

      What is not widely known is that in 1946 the Arab governments had proposed an alternative plan to partition: a united democratic state where “all citizens would be represented in the guarantee of civil and political rights” where Jews would have a “permanent and secure position in the country with full participation in its political life on a footing of absolute equality with the Arabs.” The Zionist movement and its imperialist and Soviet backers rejected this in favour of a brutal and unequal partition, yet it is the Palestinians that should be punished by losing even more land.

      The Nakbah that Israel launched following (and preceding) the Palestinian rejection of partition of their land involved massive ethnic cleansing, a string of some 70 horrific massacres and and the destruction of 530 towns and villages, killing 15,000 Palestinians; the 750,000 Palestinians ethnically cleansed were never allowed to return, despite UN Resolution 194 of 1948 which demands it; they and their descendants now number nearly 10 times that figure.  

      In response to the Nakbah, a number of semi-feudal Arab states made a weak attempt to protect the ‘Arab state’ by sending in troops; the Zionist assertions that the Nakbah was ‘in response’ to this ‘Arab invasion’ are belied by simply chronology: take the most well-known event in the Nakbah, the Zionist massacre of Deir Yassin in Jerusalem (in which estimates from 107 to 254 Palestinian civilians were slaughtered) as a key example; the date was April 9, 1948; the state of Israel was declared on May 14, 1948, and only after that did the Arab armies enter to the UN-assigned ‘Arab state’. That is when Israel conquered half of that ‘Arab state’ and expanded its rule to 78 percent of Palestine (while of the remaining 22 percent, the West Bank – including East Jerusalem – went under Jordanian control and Gaza under Egyptian control, both conquered by Israel in 1967).

      While the only logical solution is a democratic state for all who live there, Jews, Christians, Muslims, Israelis, Palestinians, one person one vote, together with right of return of Palestinian refugees, the PLO program since 1948, it is the ‘two-state’ solution, whereby Israel keeps its 78% and a state of Palestine is established on the 22% ‘occupied territories’, that has international support (except the US and Israel). Since there are around 7.1 million Israeli Jews and 7.4 million Palestinians now living between the river and  the sea (not including the Palestinian refugees), this ‘two-state solution’ is manifestly unjust, yet despite this it is Israel that has always rejected it, and the Palestinian leadership which has accepted it (if combined with return of refugees to the 78% ‘Israel’ with equal rights there) since the late 1970s (as I have documented here).   

      But in reality, given the roughly equal population numbers, if there were to be a two-state rather than one-state solution (if the latter is impossible to achieve in the short-term), surely a roughly 50/50 split – something closer to the 1947 plan but improved – would be manifestly fairer. Yet the completely just and logical Palestinian rejection of partition in 1947 is today cited as a Palestinian ‘original sin’ that can never be returned to as Israel naturally had the ‘right’ to violate UN Resolution 181 by seizing 78% of Palestine with gruesome violence and terrorism. Think about – where is the logic?

      Dumb things Zionists say: 1. Gaza was no longer occupied; Israel left it to govern itself in 2005 and it responded by firing rockets at Israel

      mkaradjisLeave a comment

      by Michael Karadjis

      Israel “withdrew” from 6% of internationally-recognised Palestine, or 1.2% of historic Palestine; so small it is hard to see on a map, yet are expected to not resist the occupation of the rest of their country?

      There are a number of problems with this. The first is widely noted by pro-Palestine advocates: that Israeli “withdrawal” was accompanied by placing Gaza under a land, sea and air blockade which prevented most goods and people form getting in or out, while Israel regularly bombed the territory, every few years in major near-genocidal operations, bombed its water and power plants, left the people undernourished and with access to only unclean water, shot at Palestinian fishing boats and so on; when a country has no control over its borders because it is blockaded by its “former” occupier, it remains occupied according to international law, not to mention common sense. And of course the devastating impacts of this blockade have been widely reported, with the United Nations reporting that Gaza was “unliveable” – imagine, that is before this current holocaust.

      But there is a more fundamental reason why this is a stupid argument: Gaza is not a nation, or country or state. The nation is Palestine; the state, as recognised by the UN General Assembly and the vast majority of nations on Earth since the 1970s, covers the Palestinian territory occupied by Israel in 1967, namely West Bank and Gaza with its capital in East Jerusalem, one fifth of historic Palestine (for argument’s sake let’s leave aside for now the definition of Palestine as, well, all of Palestine, and the fact that 75 percent of ‘Gazans’ are actually refugees ethnically cleansed from ‘Israel’).  

      Now, the West Bank is 5655 square kilometres; Gaza is 365 square kilometres, meaning the internationally recognised state of Palestine is 6020 square kilometres; Gaza is therefore only around 6 percent of the Palestinian state (even though there are almost 3 million living in the West Bank and 2.3 million squeezed into Gaza). Again, let’s leave aside for now that since Israel itself is 22,770 square kilometres, Gaza is therefore only 1.2 percent of historic Palestine.

      In other words, even if we leave aside the blockade and accept the Zionist premise that Israel withdrew from Gaza in 2005, it therefore “withdrew” from only 6 percent of the occupied state of Palestine (or 1.2 percent of historic Palestine). So, what would we expect a people to do when the colonial occupier leaves only 6 percent of their country? Would they just say, OK, sweet, let’s just get on with it, or would they use this space to continue to resist the ongoing occupation of the rest of their country?

      Let’s imagine – in the 1950s, France had withdrawn from the town of Oran on the north Algerian coastline, and a tiny area around it, but maintained its occupation of 94 percent of Algeria. So, would the Algerians in Oran set up an independent ‘Republic of Oran’ and say stuff the rest of Algeria? Or would it have been a base for the independence struggle of the rest of Algeria? The answer is obvious. The idea that the allegedly ‘free’ Gazans would have just sat pretty while Israel continued to occupy, colonise, steal land and murder in the West Bank and Jerusalem is absurd, and offensive.

      Israel “withdrew” from Gaza, if we ignore the blockade that made life unliveable, it did not withdraw from Palestine.

      Take Ukraine. Russia is currently occupying around 20 percent of Ukraine. That means it is not occupying 80 percent of Ukraine. Putin expects Ukraine to just cop that, to sign a peace treaty allowing Russia to annex 20 percent of its land. Most people see that as self-evidently absurd and unjust. So Ukraine continues to resist. Why is it considered normal for Ukraine, 80 percent of which is unoccupied, to continue to resist Russian occupation of the 20 percent, but it is not considered normal for Palestine, in the 6 percent that was theoretically ‘unoccupied’, to continue to resist Israeli occupation of the 94 percent of Palestine?

      There is actually a third thing wrong with the statement, since it implies that Hamas simply “fired rockets” willy nilly at Israel as if Israel was doing nothing wrong; and for argument’s sake, let’s leave aside both the blockade, and the continuing occupation 94 percent of the Palestinian state, both of which mean Palestinians in Gaza have the internationally recognised right to armed resistance. What it ignores is that after “withdrawal,” Israel continued to bomb Gaza whenever it felt like it. Now, it might be a standard Zionist argument, repeated inevitably in western media, that Israel only launched such bombs “in response” to Hamas rockets, leaving aside the fact that these Israeli bombings always killed far greater numbers of Palestinian civilians than the little home-made Hamas ‘rockets’ did Israelis (they mostly killed no-one). But anyone who believes that is simply a starry-eyed victim of propaganda. Do the research – just as often it was the other way around – Israel launches some targeted assassination and kills a dozen civilian “collateral” victims, Hamas responds with rockets.

      Or, reflecting the unity of all of Palestine as noted above, Israel carries out some atrocity in the West Bank, or for example invades the al-Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem, so Hamas exercises its right to resist by launching some rockets from Gaza. Were these rockets effective, or always a good idea – perhaps not, tactics can be discussed, but when you live in a sealed-off prison you have few other options – but the idea that it was mostly Israel “responding” rather than the other way around is bald fiction.