Turkey breaches its own trade embargo on Israel by shipping crude oil: Report

Turkey has breached its own trade embargo by shipping Azeri crude oil from Adana's Ceyhan Port to Ashkelon, Israel, in late October, according to a recent report by the Progressive International and Stop Fuelling Genocide campaign.

28.11.2024 16:01

Duvar English

Turkey violated its own economic blockade on Israel by shipping crude oil, a recent report by the Progressive International and Stop Fuelling Genocide campaign revealed.

In May, Turkey announced cutting all imports and exports with Israel due to the “worsening tragedy” in Gaza. However, Ankara has faced public criticism that trade may be continuing with Israel given a spike in exports to the Palestinian territories since the ban in May.

Researchers from the Stop Fuelling Genocide campaign revealed that Turkey breached its own trade embargo by shipping crude oil directly from Ceyhan Port located in the southern Adana province to Ashkelon, Israel.

According to the report, a large tanker carrying Azeri crude oil from this port turned off its location transponder (AIS) on Oct. 30 in the middle of the East Mediterranean for several days, during which time researchers identified it docking at an oil pipeline in Israel using satellite imagery.

Marine shipping data revealed that the crude oil tanker, “Seavigour”, arrived at the Haydar Aliyev Terminal in Ceyhan on Oct. 28 and was recorded as heavier on departure - indicating that the tanker onboarded oil from the BTC pipeline. The Haydar Aliyev Terminal is the last point on the BTC pipeline and almost exclusively exports crude oil according to MarineTraffic.

MarineTraffic screenshot of Seavigour’s AIS tracked route on Oct. 28

Seaweb S&P screenshot. Highlighted row shows that Seavigour entered Ceyhan Port, was docked for 24 hours and registered an increase in draught (weight), indicating that the tanker has on boarded oil.

The crude oil tanker then travelled south to the East Mediterranean Sea before turning off its tracking signal on Oct. 30. The practice of manipulating a tanker’s maritime signal was previously reported as patterned behaviour for shipments delivering oil and cargo to Israel.

MarineTraffic screenshot of Seavigour heading south. Information in white box shows the time and date that the tanker’s AIS transponder was turned off/last recorded

Marine shipping data excludes any information about the tanker stopping at Ashkelon. The tanker’s signal was next recorded only 7 days later on Nov. 6, the report said.

MarineTraffic screenshot showing Seavigour’s AIS transponder being registered again on Nov. 6, for the first time since Oct. 30.

The tanker is shown to be heading in a direction perpendicular to the Israeli coast, towards Riposto Port in Sicily, Italy where the tanker next stopped.

MarineTraffic screenshot showing extended view of journey made by Seavigour for dates Oct. 28 - Nov. 8. The red line indicates data is missing from the voyage, with the tanker’s AIS radio signal being unable to register on the onshore systems that pick up this data. The straight line is therefore an estimated journey.

Seaweb S&P screenshot. Highlighted rows indicate that Seavigour arrived at Riposto port on both Nov. 5 and Nov. 8.

Port logs reveal that the tanker arrived at Sicily lighter in weight compared to when it left Ceyhan. This suggests that the tanker offloaded the oil it was carrying at some point in between these two recorded stops. "The crude oil must have been offloaded in between this journey," the report said.

The same Seaweb S&P screenshot. Data here indicates that the tanker arrived at Riposto with a draught figure of 9.500.

Researchers matched Seavigour to satellite images which reveal the tanker stopped at the EAPC terminal near Ashkelon, Israel on Nov. 5.

MarineTraffic screenshot of Port call log for Seavigour. It shows the tanker spent 36 hours at Cartagena port from Oct. 21 to Oct. 23

Seaweb S&P screenshot showing the matching Port call log entries. It provides additional information and specifies that Seavigour docked at Berth E-018 at Terminal Inflammable (Escombreras Basin).

Map of Escombreras Basin, Cartagena Port, Spain with Berth E018 highlighted in red box

MarineTraffic details of Seavigour. The tanker is reported to have a length of 274m, a width of 48m. Public photo images of the tanker reveal it to have a white deck colour.

Landviewer screenshot. Satellite image from Nasa’s Landsat 9 T1 showing a tanker with a white deck and an estimated length of 273.99m at Berth E018 on Oct. 22, indicating strong match.

Landviewer screenshot. Satellite image from European Space Agency’s Sentinel-2 L2A shows two ships, a red ship and a white ship. The timestamp on the right shows “05 Nov 2024”.

Landviewer screenshot zoomed in. Satellite image shows a Tanker with a white deck and an estimated length of 274m.

Screenshot from QGIS (another software with a measurement tool) shows the tanker pictured in 6f to have an estimated length of 274m

Screenshot from the website of European Asia Pipeline Company Ltd (EAPC) who operate the Ashkelon Oil Port. Their website details that they have “Two SPM berths, no.3 and no.4, for crude oil”. SPM stands for Single Point Mooring, which are designed as floating buoy anchored offshore for oil to be discharged or loaded.

Second screenshot from EAPC handbook. The diagram on the right page shows the location of the offshore SPM berths. The position of the tanker captured at 6f is in close proximity to berth 4.

MarineTraffic screenshot, dated 5 November 2024, with white lines added to show rough position of EAPC terminal SPM crude oil berth 3 (top) and 4 (middle). The pier picked up by the satellite image used for coal.

With this evidence, researchers from the campaign concluded that the Seavigour tanker shipped Azeri crude oil from Turkey to Israel. The report also indicated that this is not a one-off incident, with early evidence for other tankers suggesting that this route has been repeated on multiple occasions since the Turkish government announced the trade blockade in May.

Energy Embargo for Palestine earlier this year published a report that showed how oil from the BTC pipeline is refined and used by the Israeli military to the fuel fighter jets, tanks and military vehicles carrying out the genocide against Palestinians in Gaza.

This research comes amidst reports of Turkey circumventing its economic embargo by other means, permitting Maersk cargo ships transporting military equipment for Israel to dock and recently, a Turkish-owned ship destined for Israel was targeted by the Houthis in the Red Sea.

On Nov. 10, a day before the “Stop Fuelling Genocide” global protests against Turkey’s involvement in facilitating oil shipments to Israel, the Energy Minister on Nov. 10 argued that “Companies transporting oil through the BTC pipeline for export to global markets from Haydar Aliyev Terminal have respected Türkiye’s recent decision not to engage in trade with Israel. No deliveries with Israel as the delivery destination have taken place.”

The Stop Fuelling Genocide campaign warned that by shipping fuel to Israel, an essential ingredient required by Israel’s military to carry out its attacks on Gaza and Lebanon, the Turkish Government is complicit in Israel’s ongoing genocide. SOMO’s “Fuelling the Flames in Gaza” report also details how this crude oil from Azerbaijan is refined in Israel into jet fuel, used by F-35 fighter jets and drones.