Much has been made about how Israel’s ongoing rampage in West Asia is hurting its economy —damage that is sure to multiply with its launch of an illegal war against Iran.
While that might be true, if we view Israel less as a traditional state and more as an “unsinkable US aircraft carrier”, it is performing its mission. The reality is of course multi-layered and complicated. Israel and its religious fanatics do have agency. But the US was clearly involved in the attack on Iran, just like it has been in Syria, Lebanon, and Gaza. And the effort to topple the government in Tehran is an attempt to further both’s interests, which may very well backfire spectacularly.
Let’s have a look at those converging interests. And for that we can turn to the case of the India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor (IMEC). On paper, IMEC is a network of railroads, ship-to-rail, road transport routes, energy pipelines and high-speed data cables connecting South Asia, the Gulf and Europe—and one that doesn’t make a whole lot of sense:
Proposed India-Middle East-Europe trade corridor explained in this video. pic.twitter.com/ndshkZOji0
— Vice Admiral Arun Kumar Singh (@subnut) September 11, 2023
Unsurprisingly, there has been little progress in the way of infrastructure. The UAE and India, have deepened their cooperation on IMEC by launching a digital trade corridor and working together on port modernization (in 2022, the UAE signed major bilateral trade deals with both Israel and India). Beyond that it’s unclear where the money will come from for IMEC’s vision with gulf investors and calls for the European Investment Bank to issue “green bonds” to help grease the wheels.
Israel and its port at Haifa are central to the entire project, but how much longer will that port be in existence? Israel’s genocide in Gaza and other conflicts were already calling the entire project into doubt. But viewing all the bloodshed as a roadblock misses the two true points of IMEC. It is less an infrastructure project than an ideological alliance devoted to what Netanyahu endearingly calls authoritarian capitalism. Israel, a long time practitioner of that ideology, is naturally at the center of this IMEC embrace of the dark side.
That’s long what the shiny towers built with fossil fuel riches and on the backs of slave laborers in the Gulf have represented. Under the Modi government, India has successfully leveraged its growing commercial and security ties with the Gulf states to push aside the Pakistan issue at the same time that New Delhi sees a mutual affinity between India and Israel as religious-nationalist states:
An emerging alliance? 🇮🇱🇮🇳🇬🇷
“We’re all ancient civilizations all facing the same problem — radicalism.” @Ypoultsidis1 speaks with @indianaftali pic.twitter.com/Zh0c0zjJoi
— i24NEWS English (@i24NEWS_EN) May 21, 2025
New Delhi also embraces Netanyahu’s description of an authoritarian-capitalist future, as of course does the US. And European nations are quickly moving in this direction as well as the logical destination in their decades-long neoliberal journeys.
The key second goal to the IMEC alliance is the aim to compete with and bypass Chinese trade routes and thereby sideline Beijing politically, economically, and logistically. Now, how exactly do the US, India, Europe, Israel and the Gulf states plan to out-China China on infrastructure, manufacturing, and the like? They can’t.
What they can do —or at least try to—is embrace destruction. They can attack states friendly to Beijing even if, like in the case of war with Iran, it means destruction for Israel as well. While some analysts point to the fact that the Resistance is still resisting as a win because it means IMEC has yet to come to fruition, I think this is a misreading of the landscape. Certainly Washington is less interested in building massive infrastructure projects than preventing China from doing so. In that case, the Al Qaeda takeover in Syria and the weakening of Lebanon are wins for Washington. And the ultimate prize would be the toppling of the government in Tehran.
While Israel cannot defeat Iran militarily (and even US-friendly analysts admit that US involvement can’t either), the real concern is if Mossad and the CIA have other destabilization tools up their sleeve. More targeting of civilians and attempts at Libya- and Syria-style dirty wars are a good bet. I recall Vanessa Beeley saying recently that her sources tell her there are up to 12 million takfiris in Türkiye, which along with Azerbaijan that also shares a border with Iran, might be interested in seeing the government in Tehran fall. We’ll see.
Neocons have long dreamed of using the Azeris and Kurds to destabilize the country. Eldar Mamedov has written at Responsible Statecraft about what a stupid and reckless idea this is, but one must remember that death and destruction are what the US and Israel are after here. Oddly enough, Iran’s current president Masoud Pezeshkian, who came to power after his predecessor died in a helicopter crash on a return flight from Azerbaijan, is part ethnic Azeri, as is Supreme Leader Ali Hosseini Khamenei.
Out of a population of more than 80 million people, Persians comprise the largest ethnic group in Iran at approximately 61 per cent. Other ethnic minority groups include Azeris (16 per cent), Kurds (10 per cent), Lur (6 per cent), Baluch and Arabs (both 2 per cent), Turkmen and other Turkic tribes (2 per cent), and other nomadic peoples comprising about 1 per cent of the total population. Iran’s constitution states that “All people of Iran, whatever the ethnic group or tribe to which they belong, enjoy equal rights; color, race, language, and the like, do not bestow any privilege.” Perhaps that isn’t applied perfectly, but surely it’s no worse than in Israel or post-Assad Syria.
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Israeli and American officials point dubiously to the nuclear weapon clock as the reason for the illegal attacks on Iran:
On Thursday the IDF spokesperson claimed Iran was days away from getting nuclear weapons.
Except in March the US head of national intelligence told a senate committee hearing that Iran wasn’t developing nuclear weapons.
As always, Israel lies.pic.twitter.com/4XIInMye1p
— Saul Staniforth (@SaulStaniforth) June 15, 2025
Netanyahu, for his part, has been warning for three decades that Iran is about to get the bomb. It could simply be that the Trump administration is bought and paid for by Zionists. It’s also worth pointing out that Iranian economic integration with China and Central Asia just took a major step forward.
Mark Sleboda also pointed out that the new strategic partnership between Russia and Iran was likely going to lead to an integrated multi-layer air defense and electronic warfare system for Iran, which would be too much of a “defensive threat” to the US and Israel.
China gets almost half of its fossil fuels from West Asia with Iran making up a good chunk of it at discount prices. Here’s more detail from SpecialEurasia:
In an increasingly polarised global context, Western sanctions appear not only partially ineffective but also act as a catalyst for strategic alignment among historically rival actors such as Moscow, Beijing, and Tehran.
Iran’s geographically strategic location has long positioned it as a bridge between East and West, as well as a key crossroads along the ancient Silk Road. Since 2013, when Chinese President Xi Jinping launched the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), Tehran has publicly expressed its support for the project.
Under President Raisi’s administration, Tehran has actively leveraged its position by pursuing a foreign policy aimed at integrating the country into major regional transport corridors, joining key regional organisations, and strengthening bilateral relations with leading Eurasian actors. Iran’s growing economic and logistical integration into the Eurasian network may undermine Western efforts to isolate the country and could discourage partner states from withdrawing from economic engagement with Tehran.
Viewed through this lens the US-Israel violence in West Asia can be considered a front line in the war against China.
Necessary Pain for Gain?
While IMEC infrastructure might be struggling to gain any traction, Israel (and the US) have made enormous strides spreading their tentacles through the region over the past few years, as the Iranians have noted. Here’s Mondoweiss:
In a recent public address on October 4, Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei highlighted for the first time what he described as U.S. and Israeli plans to control the region’s natural resources. He stated that Israel’s current war campaign aims to position Israel as a hub for exporting energy to Europe and importing technology to ensure its survival. Khamenei called for resistance against the so-called India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor (IMEC), a proposed land bridge connecting India, Saudi, the UAE, Jordan, Israel, and Europe.
Days after his call, the Iranian parliament discussed introducing a bill for a defensive alliance with the countries belonging to the “Axis of Resistance.” Khamenei further elaborated on this vision on October 27, calling for the establishment of “a global political and economic alliance, and if necessary a military one” to confront Israel and stop its ongoing crimes against the peoples of the region. This signals a clash of markets might be the next phase of the war. At the heart of this clash is the conflict over dominance in regional and global supply chains.
Ahmed Alqarout, the Lead Middle East and North Africa Analyst at Sibylline risk consultancy, writes about how with US assistance Israel is already inserted into much of the energy, cybersecurity, and defense supply chain running from Morocco and Europe to Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and India—a scary thought when one considers the state’s penchant for inserting exploding devices into certain products.
It was also revealed last week that multiple Israeli defense companies have signed contracts with Qatar for supply of weapons, ammunition, cyber technology, and other sophisticated weaponry.
Israel and the US of course view this larger supply chain war a zero-sum game, and there is no act considered out of bounds. The states standing in the way must be destroyed:
And they and their clients must have full control over Syria, Lebanon, Iran, and Yemen. Until recently, Israel focused on “cutting the arms” and now as Netanyahu says, they have now “struck the head.” While many have tried and failed to subdue the Houthis in Yemen, US-Israel is likely to redouble their efforts if Iran is successfully destabilized. An extended Gaza-style siege and starvation campaign of Yemen would be likely as we’ve already seen them go after civilian infrastructure like ports, hospitals, and energy infrastructure.
Success there would mean US-Israeli control over the strategic chokepoint of Bab al-Mandab, which would be a major card to be used against China.
Visions of Gold
Here’s a snippet from Trump’s widely lauded speech in Saudi Arabia:
In the United States, we’ve launched the Golden Age of America. It’s the Golden Age. We see it. We see it with all that money, trillions and trillions of dollars pouring in, hundreds of thousands of jobs coming in with it. And with the help of the people of the Middle East and the people in this room, partners throughout the region, the golden age of the Middle East can proceed right alongside of us.”
What is it really? We’ve covered Gaza 2035 in the past but it’s worth another look in light of events as it represents a wider vision. Despite Israel’s shiny renderings and Trump’s talk of making Gaza the “Riviera of the Middle East,” it’s nothing more than modern colonialism.
The Zionist idea is that ‘Gaza can become a significant industrial production centre for the shores of the Mediterranean with excellent access to… energy and raw materials from the Gulf while leveraging Israeli technology’. No doubt, the Zionists will produce grand plans for Iran as well if it comes to that point.
The US just bought off (or tried to, we’ll see how it goes) the Gulf monarchies with massive technological giveaways. Here’s Zvi Mowshowitz:
There is a 5GW AUE-US AI campus planned, and is taking similar action in Saudi Arabia. The deals were negotiated by a team led by David Sacks and Sriram Krishnan.
Lennart Heim: To put the new 5GW AI campus in Abu Dhabi (UAE) into perspective. It would support up to 2.5 million NVIDIA B200s.
That’s bigger than all other major AI infrastructure announcements we’ve seen so far.
In exchange for access to our chips, we get what are claimed to be strong protections against chip diversion, and promises of what I understand to be a total of $200 billion in investments by the UAE. That dollar figure is counting things like aluminum, petroleum, airplanes, Qualcomm and so on. It is unclear how much of that is new.
The part of the deal that matters is that a majority of the UAE investment in data centers has to happen here in America.
So we’ll get slave laborers building AI centers for a technology that is helping to prolong an increase in fossil fuel usage that is cooking the planet.
And it will take place in a West Asia dominated by US and Israel oligarchs, and Gulf monarchs with a sizable population of captive labour that is meant to produce more Dubais and Dohas built on the remains of genocide and war. As Sarah Jilani writes at ArtReview:
Displacing a population and destroying their existing social, architectural and economic fabric under the guise of modernisation harks back to colonial ideas about certain races and societies being apparently unfit or incapable of extracting the maximum profit from land – an argument favoured by nineteenth-century colonisers from South Africa to North America. Three hundred years of this thinking has landed us in our grotesquely unequal present, yet former colonial powers in Europe and settler colonies like the US continue to finance the militarisation of Israel.
There is nothing visionary about the Gaza 2035 ‘vision’. Devoid of social, ecological and historical accountability, and without even the veneer of interest in Palestinian agency, it is a futuristic facade meant to distract us from the same ambition that drove every colonial power since the nineteenth century: unfettered access to cheap labour and natural resources. To see atrocious images of Gaza being razed, while presented with shiny, state-of-the-art renders of a fictitious replacement – sanitised of everything that made Gaza a home, especially its Palestinian inhabitants – produces a harrowing cognitive dissonance that visual acrobatics cannot undo. These aesthetics seek to seduce viewers with what Israel thinks ‘the true spirit of ordered civilisation’ looks like: an open-air prison where captive labour builds Israeli products at the barrel of a gun.
And one where genocide and wars of agression are normalized. For that vision to become reality, the Iranian government must be toppled for the crime of trying to achieve economic and political sovereignty.
Yet even should the IMEC crew be successful, there’s at least one major flaw in the plan. How long before all these authoritarian capitalist, ethno-supremacist states start fighting among themselves?
