While the Yiddish writer and World War II partisan Avraham Sutzkever (1913-2010) is known primarily as poet, he also wrote numerous stories in prose. One such work—translated into English by Zackary Sholem Berger under the title “A Black Angel with a Pin in His Hand”—describes a fellow poet Sutzkever knew in Vilnius before the Holocaust. It begins thus:

His whole life he had been called Moyshe-Itzke, a familiar name, like you’d call a boy. The only people in whose memory he’s still barely alive remember him by that name.

Moyshe-Itzke was born because he wanted to be born. That’s what he told me. He then added confidentially that an entire collection of dark forces didn’t want to let him shine, but his will was stronger. The anointed writer Moyshe-Itzke was born in order to live eternally.

“I’m going to stay the way I am,” he said, assessing me superciliously, with the sort of face that would well up out of a shattered mirror. “Death isn’t relevant to me; we belong to two different worlds. It’s a pity that you won’t be walking these streets in a thousand years. You’d recognize me in throngs of people. I won’t change. Like a rock doesn’t change.”

He burst into hysterics, laughter like a dispersed mold, and kept going on like one possessed. “You say a rock can be overgrown with moss? Yes, my great soul will be overgrown with a beard. And you say that sparks sleep in the rock? They sing in my veins! The storm that can extinguish my sparks has not yet been born.”

For more than a year, the Iran-backed Houthis have been launching drones and missiles at ships traversing the Red Sea, as well as at Israeli territory, in support of Hamas. This development has drastically curtailed shipping through the Suez Canal and the Bab al-Mandeb Strait, driving up trade prices. This week, the Trump administration began an extensive bombing campaign against the Houthis in an effort to reopen that crucial waterway. Burcu Ozcelik highlights another benefit of this action:

The administration has a broader geopolitical agenda—one that includes countering China’s economic leverage, particularly Beijing’s reliance on Iranian oil. By targeting the Houthis, the United States is not only safeguarding vital shipping lanes but also exerting pressure on the Iran-China energy nexus, a key component of Beijing’s strategic posture in the region.

China was the primary destination for up to 90 percent of Iran’s oil exports in 2024, underscoring the deepening economic ties between Beijing and Tehran despite U.S. sanctions. By helping fill Iranian coffers, China aids Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps in financing proxies like the Houthis. Since October of last year, notable U.S. Treasury announcements have revealed covert links between China and the Houthis.

Striking the Houthis could trigger broader repercussions—not least by disrupting the flow of Iranian oil to China. While difficult to confirm, it is conceivable and has been reported, that the Houthis may have received financial or other forms of compensation from China (such as Chinese-made military components) in exchange for allowing freedom of passage for China-affiliated vessels in the Red Sea.