Barracuda: IterativeModel and Veto_If_Null

Q. if I have an iterative model that is not rendering any items (i.e.
iterating over an empty list), would every directives within the
"boundary" of the iterative_start and iterative_end be skipped?
 
for example:
 
<ul>
    <li class="Dir::Iterative_Start.MyModel
Dir::Iterative_Next.MyModel">
        <span class="Dir::Get_Data.MyModel.SomeData">..</span>
    </li>
    <li class="Dir::Veto_If_Null.MyModel.showTotal">Total</li>
    <li class="Dir::Iterative_Next.MyModel Dir::Discrd">...</li>
</ul>
 
would the "Veto_If_Null" directive gets executed even if the iteration
never takes place (because of zero-sized list)?  From what i'm seeing,
it seems like it does.  I just don't know if this is expected or bugs in
my code.
 
 
thanks!
-tn