Crooked Bough News Round-up

— Who Is Behind The Genocidal “General’s Plan” To Annex Northern Gaza?

 

at 10/18/24 12:19pm

Following its re-invasion and siege of northern Gaza, Israel is moving to designate the area as a closed military zone, a move that critics argue amounts to an effective annexation of the territory. While Israel has used similar strategies in the past, opponents claim the current plan would essentially see a mass extermination of northern Gaza’s population. After nearly a year of Israeli deliberations over what the next phase strategy in its conflict with the Gaza Strip should be, Israeli media reports began indicating that the plan would likely involve annexation and settlement expansion. While Israel officially denies that any specific plan is being implemented, the invasion and siege of northern Gaza align with discussions Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reportedly held in secret meetings in the months leading up to the operation. What is now referred to as the “General’s Plan” is likely the strategy Tel Aviv aims to implement in northern Gaza. This approach would involve seizing all territory north of the Netzarim Corridor and designating it as a closed military zone. The plan would block all aid from entering the area and impose a “surrender or starve” scenario on the remaining Palestinian fighters. Approximately 300,000 Palestinians still reside in northern Gaza despite being ordered to evacuate. Some cannot leave, fearing for their safety during the journey, while others refuse, as there is nowhere else to seek shelter. Under the General’s Plan, these civilians would be given a week to flee the north, after which all remaining individuals would be considered enemy combatants. Critics say that this approach could lead to the mass killing of civilians.   The General The proposal for northern Gaza is credited to retired Major General Giora Eiland. Once considered a figure of Israels political left, Eiland previously worked with former Israeli President Shimon Peres during the peace process in the early 2000s. Eilands increasingly extreme stances since the start of the war in Gaza have made him an Israeli media darling. He’s used that spotlight to call for starving Gaza and advocate for exterminationist policies. Following the Hamas-led attack on October 7, Eiland recommended the Israeli military avoid a costly ground invasion of the Gaza Strip. In November 2023, Eiland penned an op-ed where he argued that no Palestinian civilian should be considered innocent, even mocking the idea. Who are the poor women of Gaza? They are all the mothers, sisters or wives of Hamas murderers, he wrote. The retired Major General went even further, suggesting that Israel should create conditions for starvation and epidemics. Israel must not provide the other side with any capability that prolongs its life, he wrote. The international community warns us of a humanitarian disaster in Gaza and severe epidemics. We must not shy away from this, as difficult as that may be. After all, severe epidemics in the south of the Gaza Strip will bring victory closer and reduce casualties among IDF soldiers. Israel’s leading human rights organization, B’Tselem, cited Eiland’s statements as evidence that the humanitarian crisis in Gaza was not an unintended consequence but rather a deliberately manufactured “intended result” of the ongoing war.   Genocidal Intent The General’s Plan does not solely reflect Giora Eilands views; it aligns with what Israels most senior leaders have advocated since October 2023. It embodies the sentiments expressed by Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant in his speech, where he stated, We are fighting human animals and will act accordingly, and declared that there will be no electricity, no food, no fuel, everything is closed. “It is an entire nation out there that is responsible for the actions of Hamas,” said Israeli President Isaac Herzog, adding, “It is not true, this rhetoric about civilians not being aware, not involved. It’s absolutely not true. They could have risen up.” When South Africa cited Herzog’s remarks at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) to argue that Israel intended to commit genocide, the Israeli president attempted to walk back his statements, claiming that his words had been misinterpreted and twisted. Despite Herzogs attempt to walk back his comments, the Israeli government continued to escalate its rhetoric. Government accounts posted a video online stating, There are no innocent civilians in Gaza. Meanwhile, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu repeatedly referred to Palestinians in Gaza as Amalek, a term from biblical tradition often associated with the call for the destruction of an entire people, indirectly advocating for the killing of women, children, the elderly, and even livestock. While Israel attempted to deny that the reference to Amalek was genocidal in nature, South Africa’s legal team demonstrated at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) that this was precisely how Israeli soldiers interpreted the message. This rhetoric, whether from the architect of the General’s Plan or other senior Israeli leaders, clearly aligns with the intended outcomes of the strategies proposed for northern Gaza. And any doubt remained, since January, Israeli settler groups—endorsed by ministers in Netanyahu’s government—have already begun organizing conferences laying the groundwork for illegal settlements in northern Gaza. Feature photo | Reired Israeli Gen. Giora Eiland speaks to army officers before holding a press briefing at Israels Defense Ministry in Tel Aviv, Israel, July 12, 2010. Ariel Schalit | AP Robert Inlakesh is a political analyst, journalist and documentary filmmaker currently based in London, UK. He has reported from and lived in the occupied Palestinian territories and hosts the show ‘Palestine Files’. Director of ‘Steal of the Century: Trump’s Palestine-Israel Catastrophe’. Follow him on Twitter @falasteen47 The post Who Is Behind The Genocidal “General’s Plan” To Annex Northern Gaza? appeared first on MintPress News.

[Category: Foreign Affairs]

— A Letter From Jailed Palestine Action Activist Fatema Rajwani

 

at 10/18/24 6:41am

Fatema Zainab Rajwani, a Palestinian rights activist and member of Palestine Action, is languishing in a British jail for her involvement in direct action against Elbit Systems, an Israeli arms manufacturer with facilities in the United Kingdom. Rajwani and other activists sought to disrupt the companys operations through physical means, hoping to stem the tide of weapons directly used by the Israeli military in Gaza and contributing to the deaths of tens of thousands of civilians. Palestine Action has long campaigned against the arms trade to Israel, calling for accountability for the violence against Palestinians. MintPress News is publishing Rajwani’s letter to give voice to a perspective often lost in a climate where criticism of Israel in the West can result in severe social and legal repercussions. As discussions of Israel’s actions continue to test the very limits of Western concepts of freedom, activists like Rajwani face imprisonment, the loss of personal relationships, and even professional livelihoods for voicing their support for the victims of Israeli violence.   To the people of Gaza I write to you in my state of love and grief At night I dream of a love so wide and so deep it frees us all It stretches across continents to fill the space between my brown body and yours I wish the love I dream of, was enough I wish the love I dream of would hold your grief the same way that our silence holds violence. When there’s nothing else to write about, I write about love. Because there’s no life worth living, no strength worth perception if not for love The kind of love that forces you to witness The kind of love that does not stay silent Love that is not patient or kind but relentless and harsh I dream of a love so encompassing it hurts. A love that does not make us less afraid But a love that makes us less compromising. At night I dream of a love so wide and so deep it frees us all When dawn breaks I dream of waking up to a love that is not new but old and ancient and unforgiving. The type of love that stands to action There is no greater act of love than standing uncompromising between all which you know and (that destroys) and all which could be (rebuilt anew). Fatema Zainab Rajwani The post A Letter From Jailed Palestine Action Activist Fatema Rajwani appeared first on MintPress News.

[Category: Foreign Affairs, activist letter Gaza, Elbit Systems protest, Fatema Zainab Rajwani, Gaza conflict, Gaza open letter, love and resistance, love in activism, Palestine Action, Palestine solidarity, standing against oppression]

— “Text Me You Haven’t Died” – My Sister was the 166th Doctor to Be Murdered in Gaza

 

at 10/17/24 8:37am

Your lives will continue. With new events and new faces. They are the faces of your children, who will fill your homes with noise and laughter. These were the last words written by my sister in a text message to one of her daughters. Dr. Soma Baroud was murdered on October 9 when Israeli warplanes bombed a taxi that carried her and other tired Gazans somewhere near the Bani Suhaila roundabout near Khan Yunis, in the southern Gaza Strip. I am still unable to understand whether she was on her way to the hospital, where she worked, or leaving the hospital to go home. Does it even matter? The news of her murder or, more accurately, assassination, as Israel has deliberately targeted and killed 986 medical workers, including 165 doctors arrived through a screenshot copied from a Facebook page. Update: these are the names of the martyrs of the latest Israeli bombing of two taxis in the Khan Yunis area .., the post read. It was followed by a list of names. Soma Mohammed Mohammed Baroud was the fifth name on the list and the 42,010th on Gazas ever-growing list of martyrs. I refused to believe the news, even when more posts began popping up everywhere on social media, listing her as number five and sometimes six in the list of martyrs of the Khan Yunis strike. I kept calling her, over and over again, hoping that the line would crackle a bit, followed by a brief silence, and then her kind, motherly voice would say, Marhaba Abu Sammy. How are you, brother? But she never picked up. I repeatedly told her that she does not need to bother with elaborate text or audio messages due to the unreliable internet connection and electricity. Every morning, I said, just type: We are fine. That’s all I asked of her. But she would skip several days without writing, often due to the lack of an internet connection. Then, a message would arrive, though never brief. She wrote with a torrent of thoughts, linking up her daily struggle to survive and her fears for her children to poetry, a Quranic verse, one of her favorite novels, and so on. Dr. Soma Baroud and her niece visit the grave of a loved one. Photo | X | @ZarefahBaroud You know, what you said last time reminds me of Gabriel García Márquezs One Hundred Years of Solitude, she said on more than one occasion before she would take the conversation into the most complex philosophical spins. I would listen and just repeat, Yes .. totally I agree .. one hundred percent. For us, Soma was a larger-than-life figure. This is precisely why her sudden absence has shocked us to disbelief. Her children, though grown up, felt orphaned. But her brothers, me included, felt the same way. I wrote about Soma as a central character in my book My Father Was a Freedom Fighter because she was indeed central to our lives and to our survival in a Gaza refugee camp. As the firstborn and only daughter, she had to carry a much greater share of work and expectations than the rest of us. She was just a child when my eldest brother Anwar, still a toddler, died in a UNRWA clinic at the Nuseirat refugee camp due to the lack of medicine. Then, she was introduced to pain, the kind of pain that, with time, turned into a permanent state of grief that would never abandon her until her murder by a US-supplied Israeli bomb in Khan Yunis. Two years after the death of the first Anwar, another boy was born. They also called him Anwar so that the legacy of the first boy could be carried on. Soma cherished the newcomer, maintaining a special friendship with him for decades. My father began his life as a child laborer, then a fighter in the Palestine Liberation Army, then a police officer during the Egyptian administration of Gaza, then, once again, a laborer; thats because he refused to join the Israeli-funded Gaza police force after the war of 1967, known as the Naksa. A clever, principled man and a self-taught intellectual, my Dad did everything he could to provide dignity for his small family. Soma, a child, often barefoot, stood by him every step of the way. When he decided to become a merchant, buying discarded and odd items in Israel and repackaging them to sell in the refugee camp, Soma was his main helper. Though her skin healed, cuts on her fingers, caused by individually wrapping thousands of razors, remained a testament to the difficult life she lived. Somas little finger is worth more than a thousand men, my father would often repeat to remind us, ultimately five boys, that our sister will always be the main heroine in the familys story. Now that she is a martyr, that legacy has been secured for eternity. Years later, my parents would send her to Aleppo to obtain a medical degree. She returned to Gaza, where she spent over three decades healing the pain of others, though never her own. She worked at Al-Shifa Hospital and Nasser Hospital, among other medical centers. Later, she obtained another certificate in family medicine and opened a clinic of her own. She did not charge the poor and did all she could to heal those victimized by war. Soma was a member of a generation of female doctors in Gaza who truly changed the face of medicine. Collectively, they put great emphasis on womens rights to medical care and expanded the understanding of family medicine to include psychological trauma, with particular emphasis on the centrality but also vulnerability of women in a war-torn society. When my daughter Zarefah managed to visit her in Gaza shortly before the war, she told me that when Aunt Soma walked into the hospital, an entourage of women doctors, nurses, and other medical staff would surround her in total adoration. At one point, it felt that all of Somas suffering was finally paying off: a nice family home in Khan Yunis with a small olive orchard and a few palm trees; a loving husband, himself a professor of law, and eventually the dean of law school at a reputable Gaza university; three daughters and two sons, whose educational specialties ranged from dentistry to pharmacy, to law to engineering. Life, even under siege, at least for Soma and her family, seemed manageable. True, she was not allowed to leave the Strip for many years due to the blockade, and thus, we were denied the chance to see her for years on end. True, she was tormented by loneliness and seclusion, thus her love affair and constant citation from García Márquezs seminal novel. But at least her husband was not killed or went missing. Her beautiful house and clinic were still standing. And she was living and breathing, communicating her philosophical nuggets about life, death, memories and hope. If I could only find the remains of Hamdi so that we can give him a proper burial, she wrote to me last January when the news circulated that her husband was executed by an Israeli quadcopter in Khan Yunis. But since the body remained missing, she held on to some faint hope that he was still alive. Her boys, on the other hand, kept digging in the wreckage and debris of the area where Hamdi was shot, hoping to find him and give him a proper burial. Israeli drones would often attack them in the process of trying to unearth their fathers body. They would run away and return with their shovels to continue the grim task. To maximize their chances of survival, my sisters family decided to split up between displacement camps and other family homes in southern Gaza. This meant that Soma had to be in a constant state of moving, traveling, often long distances on foot, between towns, villages and refugee camps, just to check on her children, following every incursion and every massacre. I am exhausted, she kept telling me. All I want from life is for this war to end, for new cozy pajamas, my favorite book, and a comfortable bed. These simple and reasonable expectations looked like a mirage, especially when her home in the Qarara area, in Khan Yunis, was demolished by the Israeli army last month. My heart aches. Everything is gone. Three decades of life, of memories, of achievement, all turned into rubble, she wrote. This is not a story about stones and concrete. It is much bigger. No matter how long I write or speak, it is a story that cannot be fully told. Seven souls had lived here. We ate, drank, laughed, quarreled, and despite all the challenges of living in Gaza, we managed to carve out a happy life for our family, she continued. A few days before she was killed, she told me that she had been sleeping in a half-destroyed building belonging to her neighbors in Qarara. She sent me a photo her son took as she sat on a makeshift chair, on which she also slept amidst the ruins. She looked tired, so very tired. There was nothing I could say or do to convince her to leave. She insisted that she wanted to keep an eye on the rubble of her home, which made no sense to me. I pleaded with her to leave, but she ignored me and instead kept sending me photos of what she had salvaged from the rubble: an old photo, a small olive tree, and a birth certificate. Soma’s son found this childhood photo of Ramzy on Soma’s shoulders amid the rubble of thier family home My last message to her, hours before she was killed, was a promise that when the war was over, I would do everything in my power to compensate her for all of this. That the whole family would meet in Egypt or Türkiye and that we would shower her with gifts and boundless family love. I finished with, Lets start planning now. Whatever you want. You just say it. Awaiting your instructions She never saw the message. Even when her name, as yet another casualty of the Israeli genocide in Gaza, was mentioned in local Palestinian news, I refused to believe it. I continued to call. Please pick up, Soma, please pick up, I pleaded with her. Only when a video emerged of white body bags arriving at Nasser Hospital in the back of an ambulance I thought maybe my sister was indeed gone. Some of the bags had the names of the others mentioned in the social media posts. Each bag was pulled out separately and placed on the ground. A group of mourners, bereaved men, women and children would rush to hug the body, screaming the same shouts of agony and despair that accompanied this ongoing genocide from the first day. Then, another bag, with the name ‘Soma Mohammed Mohammed Baroud’ written across the thick white plastic. Her colleagues carried her body and gently laid it on the ground. They were about to zip the bag open to verify her identity. I looked the other way. I refuse to see her, but in the way she wanted to be seen: a strong person, a manifestation of love, kindness and wisdom, whose little finger is worth more than a thousand men. But why do I continue to check my messages, hoping she will text me to tell me that the whole thing was a major, cruel misunderstanding and that she is okay? My sister Soma was buried under a small mound of dirt somewhere in Khan Yunis. No more messages from her. Feature photo | Dr. Soma Baroud | Source | X Dr. Ramzy Baroud is a journalist, author and the Editor of The Palestine Chronicle. He is the author of six books. His latest book, co-edited with Ilan Pappé, is ‘Our Vision for Liberation: Engaged Palestinian Leaders and Intellectuals Speak Out’. His other books include ‘My Father was a Freedom Fighter’ and ‘The Last Earth’. Baroud is a Non-resident Senior Research Fellow at the Center for Islam and Global Affairs (CIGA). His website is www.ramzybaroud.net The post Text Me You Haven’t Died My Sister was the 166th Doctor to Be Murdered in Gaza appeared first on MintPress News.

[Category: Foreign Affairs, Opinion & Analysis]

— Israel’s War on the UN: Over 230 UN Workers Killed as Tensions Soar

 

at 10/16/24 1:21pm

Days after Israeli forces repeatedly fired on the headquarters of the United Nations peacekeeping force in Lebanon, Tel Aviv’s unprecedented rhetoric toward the UN has sparked a diplomatic row between France and Israel. Since the war on Gaza began last October, the Israeli government has consistently undermined various UN bodies, banning officials and killing staff members. Former British Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn has labeled this campaign a war on the UN. The situation has become so severe that even French President Emmanuel Macron has publicly condemned it. Israel has spent the past year desecrating international law on live TV. Now it is waging war on the UN itself, including 10,000 peacekeepers from 50 countries stationed in Lebanon. What will it take for the UK to end its military, economic & diplomatic support for Israel? — Jeremy Corbyn (@jeremycorbyn) October 13, 2024 On October 11, Israeli artillery fire struck the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) headquarters in the town of Naqoura for the second time in 48 hours. The attacks injured two UN officers. While UNIFIL and 40 nations strongly condemned the strikes, Israel defended its actions, claiming they targeted Hezbollah fighters in the area, though it provided no evidence to support this assertion. On October 13, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu issued a statement directed at the UN Secretary-General, saying, Your refusal to evacuate UNIFIL soldiers has turned them into hostages of Hezbollah. In response, UNIFIL reminded Israel of its obligations under international law and firmly refused to withdraw from southern Lebanon. PM Netanyahu: I appeal to the UN Secretary General; Your refusal to evacuate UNIFIL soldiers has turned them into hostages of Hezbollah. Full remarks >>https://t.co/YOUp2Yvw20 pic.twitter.com/tfSGX83bwr — Prime Minister of Israel (@IsraeliPM) October 13, 2024 In early October, Israeli authorities declared UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres persona non grata, banning him from entering the country—an unprecedented move. However, barring UN officials from Israel is not new. In December of last year, United Nations Special Humanitarian Advisor Lynn Hastings was expelled from Israel, followed by the denial of visas to other UN staff members. UNIFIL’s mandate provides for its freedom of movement in its area of operations, and any restriction on this is a violation of resolution 1701. We have requested an explanation from the IDF from these shocking violations. — UNIFIL (@UNIFIL_) October 13, 2024 In January, Israeli authorities prohibited doctors from speaking to UN investigators who were gathering information on the Hamas-led October 7 attack. Then, in February, Israel banned UN Special Rapporteur for the Occupied Territories, Francesca Albanese, from entering the country. Israel also leveled a series of allegations against the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), accusing its staff of participating in the October 7 attacks. These claims resulted in the withdrawal of support from various Western nations, which had been the primary financial backers of UNRWA, the most crucial aid agency in Gaza, amid an impending famine. When Israels six-page dossier was eventually released to the media, the UKs Channel 4 News exposed the claims as baseless. Despite the spurious nature of the allegations against UNRWA, the Biden administration has suspended funding to the agency until March 2025. The allegation have also led some Western media outlets to question the accuracy of the UN’s reported Gaza death toll, which is compiled with assistance from the territory’s Health Ministry, often reffered to by the BBC as the “Hamas-run Health Ministry.” Since October of last year, Israel has killed more than 230 UN workers, making the war in Gaza the deadliest conflict for UN staff in the organization’s history. In September, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu addressed the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA), referring to it as a UN house of darkness. He criticized the body, calling it a swamp of antisemitic bile and describing the General Assembly as an anti-Israel flat-earth society. When the President of France, Emmanuel Macron, recently warned Netanyahu not to forget that “his country was created by a UN decision”, referring to UNGA resolution 181, the Israeli PM fired back and claimed that Israel was born out of the war of 1948 instead. While Israel argues that it can disregard the numerous UN General Assembly resolutions condemning its actions, calling for a ceasefire, and demanding an end to its occupation—citing their non-binding nature—it does not have the same flexibility with other UN bodies. The International Court of Justice (ICJ), the UNs top judicial body, issued provisional measures against Israel after accepting South Africas case, which argues that genocide is being carried out in the Gaza Strip. Additional provisional measures were later issued to prevent further violations of international law by Israel. In response, Israel labeled the ICJ as anti-Semitic and has worked to delegitimize the extensive body of UN-sourced evidence presented to the World Court by South Africa. In March, the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) adopted Resolution 2728, calling for a ceasefire until the end of Ramadan. Israel violated the resolution and, once again, responded by accusing the council of anti-Semitism. Unlike UN General Assembly resolutions, UNSC resolutions are binding. However, with support from the Biden administration, Israel attempted to argue that the resolution was not binding and subsequently ignored it. Whether by undermining the credibility of the UNs experts and bodies, discouraging funding for its aid efforts, banning officials, or harming its workers, the Israeli government has extended its war efforts to target the United Nations. These actions have now drawn the ire of European nations. Feature photo | A UN Italian peacekeeping soldier monitors the situation across the Lebanese-Israeli border from his post in the southern Lebanese border village of Aalma El Chaeb, Lebanon, September 2024. Marwan Naamani | AP Robert Inlakesh is a political analyst, journalist and documentary filmmaker currently based in London, UK. He has reported from and lived in the occupied Palestinian territories and hosts the show ‘Palestine Files’. Director of ‘Steal of the Century: Trump’s Palestine-Israel Catastrophe’. Follow him on Twitter @falasteen47 The post Israels War on the UN: Over 230 UN Workers Killed as Tensions Soar appeared first on MintPress News.

[Category: Foreign Affairs, Gaza death toll, Gaza War, ICJ provisional measures, International Law, Israel defies UN resolutions, Israel European relations, Israel-UN conflict, Netanyahu UN speech, UN peacekeepers attacked, UN workers killed, UNRWA allegations, UNSC resolution]

— Revealed: The Israeli Spies Writing America’s News

 

at 10/16/24 9:01am

One year after Oct. 7 attacks, Netanyahu is on a winning streak. So reads the title of a recent Axios article describing the Israeli prime minister riding on an unbeatable wave of triumphs. These stunning military successes, its author Barak Ravid notes, include the bombing of Yemen, the assassinations of Hamas chief Ismail Haniyeh and Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, and the pager attack against Lebanon. The same author recently went viral for an article that claimed that Israeli attacks against Hezbollah are not intended to lead to war but are an attempt to reach de-escalation through escalation.' Users on social media mocked Ravid for this bizarre, Orwellian reasoning. But what almost everybody missed is that Barak Ravid is an Israeli spy – or at least he was until recently. Ravid is a former analyst with Israeli spying agency Unit 8200, and as recently as last year, was still a reservist with the Israeli Defense Forces group. Unit 8200 is Israels largest and perhaps most controversial spying organization. It has been responsible for many high-profile espionage and terror operations, including the recent pager attack that injured thousands of Lebanese civilians. As this investigation will reveal, Ravid is far from the only Israeli ex-spook working at top U.S. media outlets, working hard to manufacture Western support for his countrys actions.   White House Insider Ravid has quickly become one of the most influential individuals in the Capitol Hill press corps. In April, he won the prestigious White House Press Correspondents Award for overall excellence in White House coverage—one of the highest awards in American journalism. Judges were impressed by what they described as his deep, almost intimate levels of sourcing in the U.S. and abroad and picked out six articles as exemplary pieces of journalism. Most of these stories consisted of simply printing anonymous White House or Israeli government sources, making them look good, and distancing President Biden from the horrors of the Israeli attack on Palestine. As such, there was functionally no difference between these and White House press releases. For example, one story the judges picked out was titled Scoop: Biden tells Bibi 3-day fighting pause could help secure release of some hostages, and presented the 46th President of the United States as a dedicated humanitarian hellbent on reducing suffering. Another described how frustrated Biden was becoming with Netanyahu and the Israeli government. Protestors had called on reporters to snub the event in solidarity with their fallen counterparts in Gaza (which, at the time of writing, comes to at least 128 journalists). Not only was there no boycott of the event, but organizers gave their highest award to an Israeli intelligence official-turned-reporter who has earned a reputation as perhaps the most dutiful stenographer of power in Washington. Ravid was personally presented with the award by President Biden, who embraced him like a brother. That a known (former) Israeli spy could hug Biden in such a manner speaks volumes about not only the intimate relationship between the United States and Israel but about the extent to which establishment media holds power to account. It was a moving and special night that I never imagined even in my wildest dreams. It wouldnt have been possible without my editors at @axios who made my stories better, my sources who trusted me, my family that came with me to Washington, and you, the readers. Thank you pic.twitter.com/aMQd2prsam — Barak Ravid (@BarakRavid) April 28, 2024 Ravid has made a name for himself by uncritically printing flattering information given to him by either the U.S. or Israeli government and passing it off as a scoop. In April, he wrote that President Biden laid out an ultimatum to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in their call on Thursday: If Israel doesnt change course in Gaza, we wont be able to support you,' and that he was making his strongest push for an end to the fighting in Gaza in six months of war, and warning for the first time that U.S. policy on the war will depend on Israels adherence to his demands, which included an immediate ceasefire. In July, he repeated anonymous sources that told him that Netanyahu and Israel are striving for a diplomatic solution – another highly dubious claim. Other articles by Ravid following the same pattern include: Scoop: Biden tells Bibi hes not in it for a year of war in Gaza Scoop: White House cancels meeting, scolds Netanyahu in protest over video Biden running out of patience with Bibi as Gaza war hits 100 days Biden-Bibi clash escalates as U.S. accused of undermining Israeli government Biden and Bibi red lines for Rafah put them on a collision course Biden on hot mic: Told Bibi we needed come to Jesus meeting on Gaza Scoop: White House loses trust in Israeli government as Middle East spirals Israeli minister lambasted at White House about Gaza and war strategy Scoop: Biden told Bibi U.S. wont support an Israeli counterattack on Iran This relentless whitewashing of the Biden administration has drawn widespread mockery online. AXIOS EXCLUSIVE: After selling Netanyahu millions of dollars worth of weapons, Biden played —loudly — Taylor Swifts Bad Blood. Everyone could hear it, a source close to Biden says, tweeted X user David Grossman. Continuing to hand over big piles of cash and weapons, but shaking my head so everyone knows i sort of disagree with it, quipped comedian Hussein Kesvani, in response to Ravids latest article suggesting that Biden has become increasingly distrustful of the Israeli government. Throughout this supposed split between the U.S. and Israel, the Biden administration has continued to voice enthusiastic support for Israeli offensives, block ceasefire resolutions and Palestinian statehood at the U.N., and has sent $18 billion worth of weapons to Israel in the past 12 months. Thus, no matter how questionable these Axios reports are, they serve a vital role for Washington, allowing the Biden administration to distance itself from what international bodies have labeled a genocide. Ravids function has been to manufacture consent for the government among elite liberal audiences who read Axios, allowing them to continue to believe that the U.S. is an honest broker for peace in West Asia rather than a key enabler of Israel. Ravid does not hide his open disdain for Palestinians. In September, he retweeted a post that stated: That’s the PaliNazi way…they pocket concessions without giving anything in return and then use those concessions as the baseline for the next round of negotiations. PaliNazis don’t know how to tell the truth.” Less than one week later, he promoted Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallants highly dubious claim that Israeli Defense Forces had found a picture of the children al-Qassam Brigades leader Mohammed Sinwar celebrating in front of a huge picture of planes hitting the World Trade Center. Gallant stated that they had found this picture – clearly trying to falsely associate Palestinians with 9/11 – in a tunnel where the Sinwar brothers were hiding like rats. this is amazing. Barak Ravid, who is considered by the Western media class to be the greatest most objective neutral "journalist" on the ongoing Gaza genocide even though he served in Israeli military intelligence and constantly launders Israeli propaganda, is now openly… pic.twitter.com/lYldfmVqaC — (@zei_squirrel) September 6, 2024   An Infamous Spy Agency Founded in 1952, Unit 8200 is the Israeli militarys largest and most controversial division. Responsible for covert operations, spying, surveillance and cyberwarfare, since October 7, 2023, the group has been at the forefront of the worlds attention. It is widely identified as the organization behind the infamous pager attack on Lebanon, which left at least nine dead and around 3,000 people injured. While many in Israel (and Ravid himself) hailed the operation as a success, it was condemned worldwide as an egregious act of terrorism, including by ex-CIA director Leon Panetta. Unit 8200 has also constructed an artificial intelligence-powered kill list for Gaza, suggesting tens of thousands of individuals (including women and children) for assassination. This software was the primary targeting mechanism the IDF used in the early months of its attack on the densely populated strip. Described as Israels Harvard, Unit 8200 is one of the most prestigious institutions in the country. The selection process is highly competitive; parents spend fortunes on science and math classes for their children, hoping they will be picked for service there, unlocking a lucrative career in Israels burgeoning hi-tech sector. It also serves as the centerpiece of Israels futuristic repressive state apparatus. Using gigantic amounts of data compiled on Palestinians by tracking their every move through face recognition cameras monitoring their calls, messages, emails and personal data, Unit 8200 has created a dystopian dragnet that it uses to surveil, harass and suppress Palestinians. Unit 8200 compiles dossiers on every Palestinian, including their medical history, sex lives and search histories, so that this information can be used for extortion or blackmail later. If, for example, an individual is cheating on their spouse, desperately needs a medical operation, or is secretly homosexual, this can be used as leverage to turn civilians into informants and spies for Israel. One former Unit 8200 operative said that as part of his training, he was assigned to memorize different Arabic words for gay so that he could listen out for them in conversations. Unit 8200 operatives have gone on to create some of the worlds most downloaded apps and many of the most infamous spying programs, including Pegasus. Pegasus was used to surveil dozens of political leaders around the world, including Frances Emmanuel Macron, South Africas Cyril Ramaphosa, and Pakistans Imran Khan. The Israeli government authorized the sale of Pegasus to the Central Intelligence Agency, as well as some of the most authoritarian governments on the planet. This included Saudi Arabia, who used the software to surveil Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi before he was assassinated by Saudi agents in Türkiye. A recent MintPress News investigation found that a large proportion of the worldwide VPN market is owned and operated by an Israeli company headed and co-founded by a Unit 8200 alumnus. In 2014, 43 Unit 8200 reservists penned a joint statement declaring that they were no longer willing to serve in the unit on account of its unethical practices, which included making no distinction between ordinary Palestinian citizens and terrorists. The letter also noted that their intelligence was passed on to powerful local politicians, who used it as they saw fit. This public statement left Ravid bristling with anger at his co-workers. In the wake of the scandal, Ravid went on Israeli Army radio to attack the whistleblowers. Ravid said that to oppose the occupation of Palestine was to oppose Israel itself, as the occupation is a fundamental part of Israel. If the problem is really the occupation, he said, then your taxes are also a problem — they fund the soldier at the checkpoint, the education system… and 8200 is a great spin. Leaving aside Ravids comments, the question arises: is it really acceptable that members from a group designed to infiltrate, surveil and target foreign populations, that has produced many of the planets most dangerous and invasive spying technology, and is widely to be behind sophisticated international terror attacks, are writing Americans news about Israel and Palestine? What would the reaction be if senior figures in U.S. media were outed as intelligence officers for Hezbollah, Hamas, or Russias F.S.B.?   News About Israel, Brought to You by Israel Ravid is far from the only influential journalist in America with deep ties to the Israeli state, however. Shachar Peled spent three years as an officer in Unit 8200, leading a team of analysts in surveillance, intelligence and cyberwarfare. She also served as a technology analyst for the Israeli intelligence service, Shin Bet. In 2017, she was hired as a producer and writer by CNN and spent three years putting together segments for Fareed Zakaria and Christiane Amanpours shows. Google later hired her to become their Senior Media Specialist. Former Israeli spy, Shachar Peled, worked at Israels i24 News before landing a job at CNN, and later Google Another Unit 8200 agent who went on to work for CNN is Tal Heinrich. Heinrich spent three years as a Unit 8200 agent. Between 2014 and 2017, she was the field and news desk producer for CNNs notoriously pro-Israel Jerusalem Bureau, where she was one of the principal journalists shaping Americas understanding of Operation Protective Edge, Israels bombardment of Gaza that killed more than 2,000 people and left hundreds of thousands displaced. Heinrich later left CNN and is now the official spokesperson of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. CNNs penchant for hiring Israeli state figures continues to this day. Tamar Michaelis, for example, currently works for the network, producing much of its Israel/Palestine content. This is despite having previously served as an official IDF spokesperson in the Israeli Defense Forces. The New York Times, meanwhile, hired Anat Schwartz, an ex-Israeli Air Force Intelligence officer with zero journalistic experience. Schwartz co-wrote the infamous and now discredited Screams Without Words expose, which claimed that Hamas fighters systematically sexually violated Israelis on October 7. Times staff themselves revolted over the lack of evidence and fact-checking in the piece. Multiple New York Times employees, including star columnist David Brooks, have had children serving in the IDF; even as they report or offer opinions on the region, the Times never disclosed these glaring conflicts of interest to its readers. Nor has it disclosed that it purchased a Jerusalem house for its bureau chief that was stolen from the family of Palestinian intellectual Ghada Karmi in 1948. MintPress News interviewed Karmi last year about her latest book and Israeli attempts to silence her. Former New York Times Magazine writer and current editor-in-chief of The Atlantic Jeffrey Goldberg (an American) dropped out of the University of Pennsylvania to volunteer as an IDF prison guard during the first Palestinian Intifada (uprising). In his memoirs, Goldberg revealed that, while serving in the IDF., he helped cover up the abuse of Palestinian prisoners. Social media companies, too, are filled with former Unit 8200 agents. A 2022 MintPress study found no fewer than 99 former Unit 8200 operatives working for Google. Facebook also employs dozens of ex-spooks from the controversial unit. This includes Emi Palmor, who sits on Metas oversight board. This 21-person panel ultimately decides the direction of Facebook, Instagram and Metas other offerings, adjudicating on what content to allow, promote, and what to suppress. Meta has been formally condemned for its systematic suppression of Palestinian voices across its platforms by Human Rights Watch, which documented over 1,000 instances of overt anti-Palestinian censorship in October and November 2023 alone. A measure of this bias is highlighted by the fact that, at one point, Instagram automatically inserted the word terrorist into the profiles of users who called themselves Palestinian. Despite the widespread claims by U.S. politicians that it is a hotbed of anti-Israel and anti-Semitic racism, TikTok also employs many former Unit 8200 agents in key positions in its organization. For example, in 2021, it hired Asaf Hochman as its global head of product strategy and operations. Before joining TikTok, Hochman spent over five years as an Israeli spook. He now works for Meta.   Top Down Pro-Israel Censorship When it comes to the Israeli attack on its neighbors, corporate media has consistently displayed a pro-Israel bias. The New York Times, for example, regularly refrains from identifying the perpetrator of violence when that perpetrator is the Israeli military and described the 1948 genocide of around 750,000 Palestinians as a mere migration. A study of the papers coverage found that words like slaughter, massacre, and horrific appear 22 times more frequently when discussing Israeli deaths than Palestinian ones, despite the gigantic disparity in the number of people killed on both sides. Meanwhile, in a story about how Israeli soldiers shot 335 bullets at a car containing a Palestinian child and then shot the rescue workers who came to save her, CNN printed the headline Five-year-old Palestinian girl found dead after being trapped in car with dead relatives – a title that could be interpreted that her death was a tragic accident. This sort of reporting does not happen by accident. In fact, it comes straight from the top. A leaked New York Times memo from November revealed that company management explicitly instructed its reporters not to use words such as genocide, slaughter, and ethnic cleansing when discussing Israels actions. Times staff must refrain from using words like refugee camp, occupied territory, or even Palestine in their reporting, making it almost impossible to convey some of the most basic facts to their audience. CNN staff are under similar pressure. Last October, new C.E.O. Mark Thompson sent out a memo to all staff instructing them to make sure that Hamas (and not Israel) is presented as responsible for the violence, that they must always use the moniker Hamas-controlled when discussing the Gaza Health Ministry and their civilian death figures, and barring them from any reporting of Hamas viewpoint, which its senior director of news standards and practices told staff was not newsworthy and amounted to inflammatory rhetoric and propaganda. Both the Times and CNN have fired multiple journalists over their opposition to Israeli actions or support for Palestinian liberation. In November, the Times Jazmine Hughes was forced out after she signed an open letter opposing genocide in Palestine. The newspaper terminated Hosam Salems contract the previous year after a pressure campaign from pro-Israel group Honest Reporting. And CNN anchor Marc Lamont Hill was abruptly fired in 2018 for calling for Palestinian liberation in a speech at the United Nations. Large organizations like Axios, CNN and the New York Times obviously know who they are hiring. These are some of the most sought-after jobs in journalism, and hundreds of applicants are likely applying for each position. The fact that these organizations choose to select Israeli spies above everybody else raises serious questions about their journalistic credibility and their purpose. Hiring agents from Unit 8200 to produce American news should be as unthinkable as employing Hamas or Hezbollah fighters as reporters. Yet former Israeli spooks are entrusted with informing the American public about their countrys ongoing offensives against Palestine, Lebanon, Yemen, Iran and Syria. What does this say about the credibility and biases of our media? Since Israel could not continue to prosecute this war without American aid, the battle for the American mind is as important as actions on the ground. And as the propaganda war wages, the lines between journalist and fighter blur. The fact that many of the top journalists supplying us with news about Israel/Palestine are literally former Israeli intelligence agents only underlines this. Feature photo | Illustration by MintPress News Alan MacLeod is Senior Staff Writer for MintPress News. After completing his PhD in 2017 he published two books: Bad News From Venezuela: Twenty Years of Fake News and Misreporting and Propaganda in the Information Age: Still Manufacturing Consent, as well as a number of academic articles. He has also contributed to FAIR.org, The Guardian, Salon, The Grayzone, Jacobin Magazine, and Common Dreams. The post Revealed: The Israeli Spies Writing Americas News appeared first on MintPress News.

[Category: Foreign Affairs, Investigations, Top Story, Barak Ravid, Barak Ravid spy, Biden administration, Israel-Palestine conflict, Israeli intelligence, Israeli media influence, Media Manipulation, media whitewashing, pro-Israel bias, U.S. media bias, U.S.-Israel relations, UNIT 8200, White House press corps]

— Natural Disasters vs War Crimes – American Media Has Chosen

 

at 10/14/24 3:05pm

As the 24-hour media cycle churns on, the humanitarian crisis along the East Coast of the United States persists. Two consecutive hurricanes have displaced tens of thousands, with nearly half a million residents still without power five days after Hurricane Milton made landfall. Yet the media has shifted its focus, fixating on the pre-election tours of presidential hopefuls Kamala Harris and Donald Trump, as well as the recent Hezbollah attack on an IDF dining facility. The attack, which occurred over the weekend, killed four soldiers and wounded 60 others. Sky News initially ran the story with the headline, “Israel names teenage soldiers killed in Hezbollah drone attack as ‘23 die’ in Gaza school strike.” However, the outlet has since revised the headline, removing the word teenage. The infantilization of armed combatants in war, coupled with the blatant disregard for the identity—and therefore the protected status—of 23 children killed in an IAF strike on a school, exemplifies the legacy media’s coverage of this conflict. This pattern reflects an ongoing effort to protect Israel, shield Western audiences from its actions, and neglect the suffering of the Palestinian people. Now, the same media dismisses the daily struggles of U.S. citizens enduring the aftermath of a natural disaster. The U.S. legislature approved another $8.7 billion in military assistance to Israel on the eve of two large-scale hurricanes. Although domestic and foreign appropriations operate on separate tracks, many Americans are questioning the rationale behind consistently sending foreign aid while infrastructure crumbles at home. In the wake of Hurricane Helene, it is noteworthy that Florida Governor Ron DeSantis has rejected $11 billion in federal funding over the past few years. The Florida Policy Institute states: By continuing to opt out of federal funding for essential programs for Florida families, like health coverage, disability services, mental health funding, climate resiliency programs, and more, the state not only continually sends billions of our tax dollars to other states but also prevents improvements in quality of life for thousands of Floridians.” It is notable that Governor Ron DeSantis sent weapons assistance to Israel last year, an action that is not illegal for a U.S. governor. While the media’s disregard for the plight of Palestinians in Gaza is expected, the lack of reporting on domestic hardship—especially in a conservative stronghold like Florida—marks a shift. Will residents begin to connect Congress’s unwavering support for Israel, including the recent authorization of a billion-dollar THAAD battery to protect its airspace, to their own governments neglect? DeSantis continually advocates for funding the war in Gaza, holds state cabinet meetings in Israel to promote investment, and now refuses federal funds for infrastructure and disaster relief. It seems unlikely that this mismanaged disaster will serve as a wake-up call for many Americans, but that shouldn’t stop us from trying. Tonight on *State of Play*, we are joined by Hassan Shibly, the founder and lead attorney of Muslim Legal in Florida and a prominent civil rights activist. Greg Stoker is a former US Army Ranger with a human intelligence collection and analysis background. After serving four combat deployments in Afghanistan, he studied anthropology and International Relations at Columbia University. He is currently a military and geopolitical analyst and a social media “influencer,” though he hates the term. MintPress News is a fiercely independent media company. You can support us by becoming a member on Patreon, bookmarking and whitelisting us, and subscribing to our social media channels, including Twitch, YouTube, Twitter, and Instagram. Subscribe to MintCast on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and SoundCloud. Also, check out rapper Lowkey’s video interview and podcast series, The Watchdog. The post Natural Disasters vs War Crimes – American Media Has Chosen appeared first on MintPress News.

[Category: Behind The Headlines, Foreign Affairs, Top Story, Donald Trump, Florida disaster relief, Gaza children killed, Greg Stoker, Hassan Shibly, Hezbollah, Hurricane Helene, Hurricane Militon, Israel military aid, Kamala Harris, Media Bias, MintPress News, Palestinian conflict, Ron DeSantis, State of Play, THAAD battery, U.S. foreign aid, U.S. hurricanes]

— Exclusive: Yemen Uncovers Massive CIA and Mossad Spy Ring Embedded in Pro-Democracy NGOs

 

at 10/14/24 8:18am

While Yemen usually conjures images of conflicts with Israel and the Saudi-led coalition, a new dimension to the complex country and its people has emerged: Yemens secret war of spies. MintPress News delves into the largest CIA spy cell ever uncovered in Yemen, revealing a major security operation that apprehended its members and exposed American espionage activities, dramatically altering our understanding of Yemens complex battlefield. In June, MintPress revealed how the Ansar Allah-led government of Sanaa had dismantled an espionage cell Force 400 allegedly working for the United States and Israel, detailing the cells members and their activities. Washington responded by calling for the release of individuals it claimed were employees of the United Nations, diplomatic bodies, and NGOs, labeling them as hostages held by the Houthis, a pejorative term often used by Western officials to describe the political and military movement known as Ansar Allah. MintPress News correspondent Ahmed AbdulKareem was granted exclusive access to several detainees captured by Yemeni security services, allowing him to conduct a series of interviews with the alleged spies. Additionally, a trove of top-secret documents was provided to MintPress, corroborating the testimony of many of the detainees given during these interviews. MintPress also reviewed hours of footage showing interrogations conducted by Yemeni security personnel, which confirmed the details of the allegations against the detainees that were provided to MintPress during interviews with high-level security officials from Ansar Allah. While arrests related to the vast espionage cell began in earnest in 2021, officials in both the United States and Yemen remained tight-lipped about the discovery. However, Ansar Allah officials told MintPress that Washington was aware of the arrests and initiated a series of secret negotiations for the detainees release shortly thereafter. Those negotiations ultimately failed, and details began to leak in the Arab press. This led Yemeni officials to publicly disclose the discovery of the espionage ring and eventually revived negotiations between the two parties in Muscat, Oman. In a groundbreaking investigation, MintPress News uncovers the inner workings of one of the largest spy networks ever exposed in Yemen, shedding light on how American and Israeli intelligence agencies covertly infiltrated Yemeni society. Through clandestine operations, they manipulated local dynamics, exploiting religious divisions and sowing seeds of normalization with Israel. The ultimate aim: gathering intelligence for Saudi airstrikes on military targets. Exclusive access to top-secret documents, detainee testimonies, and interrogation footage reveals a harrowing narrative of espionage. Spies were recruited through psychological manipulation, sexual blackmail, and torture, highlighting the extent to which U.S. and Israeli operatives bent moral boundaries to secure cooperation. This investigation offers a disturbing glimpse into the shadow war being waged in Yemen—one fueled by exploitation and coercion. It marks the beginning of an ongoing series that will unveil further layers of this covert operation in future reports.   The Double Life of Abdul Azzan Abdul Mohsen Hussein Ali Azzan, a high-level spy arrested last June, worked for both the CIA and the Israeli Mossad for 15 years. Recruited by U.S. intelligence in 2010, his handler was Joanne Cummings, the director of the political and economic department at the U.S. embassy in Sanaa, who managed his activities until 2013. According to his account, Azzan converted from Islam to Christianity while working for an American company in Atlanta that engaged in proselytizing under the guise of selling printer ink. Azzan did not just infiltrate and recruit Yemeni parliamentarians; he also gathered critical intelligence on shoulder-fired air defenses, unmanned aerial vehicles, and ballistic missiles. This high-value information was shared with American intelligence, as evidenced by documents reviewed by MintPress and by Azzan himself during an exclusive jailhouse interview with MintPress correspondent Ahmed AbdulKareem. Thanks to the Atlanta company and my new religion, I was able to form a good relationship with the Americans, Azzan, a graduate of Sanaa University, told MintPress. I wrote a letter to the CIA through Murad Dhafer, a friend who worked for them. I wasnt accepted immediately, but I was enrolled in a special intelligence course. Later, I connected with Carlo Penda, the Canadian director of the Parliament Program at the [National] Democratic Institute, and eventually became a director. Ansar Allah accuses the National Democratic Institute (NDI) in Sanaa of conducting intelligence missions under the guise of spreading democracy and promoting human rights. They claim that through this institute, the CIA recruited spies, some of whom were later arrested, while also collecting information and preparing research and studies for U.S. intelligence agencies. At the end of 2009, I started working at the American Embassy, where Joanne Cummins, the Director of the Political and Economic Program, recruited me for the CIA, Azzan recounted. He underwent a series of tests, including a lie detector test, and took courses under two American intelligence officers. Subsequently, he was connected with Richard Kaufman, the representative of Israeli interests at the embassy. In 2014, the embassy sent me to America, where I met a senior American intelligence official, he added. Before the war against Yemen began in March 2015, the U.S. embassy left Sanaa. However, it managed to attach its operatives to American companies still operating at the time and international organizations such as the High Commissioner for Human Rights, and Azzan was among them. He moved to work with Cambridge Analytica’s UK-based parent company, SCL group, exposed in 2018 by Max Blumenthal to be conducting espionage activities on behalf of Archimedes,” a U.S.-based military contractor. Azzan identified the company as a subsidiary of Moby Media Group, owned by Afghan businessman Saad Mohseni, who has been linked to the CIA. In 2013, the company opened its headquarters in Sanaa, managed by British national Sarah Cunningham, according to Azzan. In addition to his intelligence work, Azzan provided services to the intelligence company where he served as general manager. According to Azzan, the company operated on two tracks: collecting information, preparing field surveys and conducting media campaigns to shift public opinion toward Israel. One of our intelligence activities was the Landscape program, where we studied all local media outlets, Azzan explained to MintPress. The goal was not just to run media campaigns for American companies, but also to identify and recruit media leaders to promote Israeli normalization under the guise of acceptance and peaceful coexistence.  In 2014, the embassy sent Azzan to Washington for a two-week training session, where he met a senior CIA official. After 2018, I worked for the U.S. Department of Defense under the guise of the director of the Labs office in Yemen. My handler was Fahim Ahmed, the regional director of Labs, and through the company, I was connected to a Jewish [Israeli] intelligence organization in America. This organization was interested in studying Yemeni sects, understanding their references, and exploiting them for normalization and fueling sectarian differences. As security suspicions about the company grew, SCL decided to leave Sanaa. Azzan was then transferred to the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) in Sanaa. Leveraging the organizations extensive reach in the Yemeni governorates, Azzan was able to provide his American intelligence contacts with high-value information about camps, launch sites, and naval forces, which were later targeted by Saudi airstrikes. He noted that he worked openly and cooperatively with OHCHR officials to gather this intelligence. Yemeni police inspect a site of Saudi-led airstrikes targeting two family homes in Sanaa, Yemen, March, 2022. Hani Mohammed | AP Under the supervision of the resident representative, Mohamed Al-Shami and I were gathering information with a network of analyst observers in each governorate, Azzan explained. My work continued until my arrest at the end of 2021. When we couldnt access a target area, we would ask the resident supervisor to contact local authorities under the guise of a humanitarian proposal. He would facilitate this, ensuring we took no actions that would reveal our true intentions, Azzan added. The most significant damage was yet to come. In 2016, Azzan began working for the Israeli Mossad through Michael Boven, the former Economic Attaché at the U.S. Embassy in Sanaa. After the embassys closure, Boven moved to the U.S. embassy in Israel. He had previously supervised Azzan at the Middle East Initiative in Sanaa, forging a close relationship based on shared religion, financial incentives, and what Azzan described as true friendship. I would meet Michael in Jordan as the director of Labs (SCL). During one of these meetings, he introduced me to Saul Gad, an Israeli officer in the Mossad. I met Gad in the Dead Sea area of Jordan and began working for him, Azzan revealed. Azzan provided Mossad with highly sensitive information, including details about Sanaa International Airport, transportation movements, changes in Ansar Allahs leadership, military activities, and destroyed weaponry. He also leaked data from the High Commissioner for Human Rights regarding the locations of government officials and Ansar Allah leaders. My baptism influenced my willingness to work for Israel as a Christian at the Atlanta company, which was led by Protestants who support Israel and believe that Christ’s return depends on Israels dominance in the Middle East. This connection continued with my association with the IDEA organization, which is linked to the ‘Saturdays Church.’ Azzan also contributed significantly to the success of the Dar Al Salam Organization. This local group collaborated with Jewish organizations in the U.S. and Europe, aiming to disarm individuals of personal weapons like Kalashnikovs and persuade clerics to promote coexistence and normalization with Israel.   USAID Consultant Turned CIA Operative The Yemeni collaborators, which Ansar Allah officials say numbered over 20 individuals, were well aware of their roles with American intelligence, though they told MintPress that the CIA did not offer them any guarantees post-recruitment. Shaif Hafazallah Al-Hamdani, a senior consultant for development management programs at the U.S. Agency for Development, served the CIA for 27 years. He was recruited by Adam Earli, then the Cultural Attaché at the U.S. Embassy in Sanaa. I joined the CIA in 1997 through the American Cultural Attaché. They told me I would be cooperating with American Intelligence, a high position, and I accepted, he confessed. MintPress News was able to view Al-Hamdani’s documents, photographs with intelligence officers, and embassy evaluation forms. Al-Hamdani carried out his espionage duties as an employee of the United States Agency for Development (USAID). He designed intelligence follow-up and evaluation mechanisms, coordinating USAIDs work with the intelligence contractor, MSI. One of his primary tasks was to verify the implementation of these mechanisms to meet the requirements of American intelligence and other agencies such as IBTCI and MSI. According to a security source, monitoring and evaluation are crucial methods for gathering military information and pinpointing military and manufacturing facilities. Al-Hamdani stated that USAIDs cooperation with MSI aimed to access project areas to locate ballistic missile launch sites and unmanned aerial vehicles. They also monitored and determined military installation locations, provided coordinates to the CIA, and assessed combat situations on the fronts and the position of goods, food, fuel, and essential services. The measures taken by Washington and its allies to punish Yemen have varied. Yet the crown on the jewel has always been to move the Central Bank from Ansar Allah-controlled Sanaa to Aden, where U.S.-backed groups maintain control. Al-Hamdani explains: In 2016, Mr. Brad Hance, the U.S. Deputy Ambassador and intelligence official, assigned me to receive the Central Bank’s code and transport it to Aden. I delivered it to another American agent working in the Aden bank. Unidentified men ride through the streets of Taiz, Yemen, 2018, then the scene of fierce clashes between Ansar Allah and the Western-backed government of Aden. Photo | AP Al-Hamdani emphasizes that the cultural attaché at the American embassy was a critical hub for American intelligence operations. Spy recruitment often occurred under the guise of cultural exchanges, skill enhancement programs, and scholarships like the Fulbright program. This program offers scholarships to outstanding university graduates for a year and a half of masters degree preparation in the United States. During this period, potential spies are assessed, their abilities studied, and select individuals are recruited. Potential spies are also identified and selected through EducationUSA at AMIDEAST, based in Aden, and the Humphrey Fellowship Program, aimed at “outstanding civil employees.” Additionally, the U.S. Speaker and International Visitor Programs play a role. Al-Hamdani notes that American intelligence successfully recruited numerous local spies through these initiatives. “Agents were also selected through events at the embassy and educational scholarships for outstanding students to institutes like YALI, Oxide, and AMIDEAST, which was run by American intelligence officer Sabrina Weber, targeting influential youth.” One document reviewed by MintPress mentions a man named Chris Eckel, who allegedly attended a cultural seminar in Sanaa. When Eckel’s name was mentioned to Al-Hamdani, he identified him as an intelligence officer who worked with him on missions. Al-Hamdani’s contributions were highly valued, as evidenced by an American Embassy evaluation documents viewed by MintPress, which stated: During this period, Shaif did much more than what was asked of him. The mission’s programs would have taken longer. His historical knowledge proved valuable. In addition to his tasks transferring the Central Bank code and recruitment, Al-Hamdani planted eavesdropping devices in the homes of senior officials, including Washington allies like former South Yemen Prime Minister Abu Bakr al-Attas. Al-Hamdani told Ansar Allah security officials that part of his training courses were in cybersecurity.   Cultural Subversion: Targeting Yemeni Values Socially, one of the roles assigned to clients was to promote homosexuality and make society more accepting, according to Al-Hamdani. “The embassy was supporting homosexuals through the Cultural Attaché, promoting it at the American NGO, YALI, by distributing brochures to those inclined or desiring to be homosexual, promoting it as personal freedom. They were also issuing visas under the pretext of persecution.” Al-Hamdani isnt the only one who spoke about the American embassys role in promoting homosexuality in Yemen, a practice that blatantly violates Yemeni social, tribal, and religious norms. Other spies, including Muhammad Ali Ahmed Al-Waziza, who worked with the CIA for 14 years, also mentioned this role. Al-Waziza stated, Visas were given to gay people, and homosexuality was promoted through educational stories taught in the institutes. We had gay teachers at the institute, and the language was taught through gay and lesbian films.” Al-Waziza worked as an administrative assistant at YALI. He joined the U.S. Embassy in 2007 as a translator and then worked as an investigator. After the embassy closed, he continued his espionage work as an employee at Resonate Yemen, which is affiliated with Ahmed Awad bin Mubarak, who currently serves as Prime Minister in Yemen’s Aden-based Riyadh-backed government. The local organization was founded and regulated by USAID. His mission was to maintain continuous communication with recruits contracted by the American Embassy from government agencies, especially the Passport Service, the Ministry of Interior, and other service ministries. Al-Waziza successfully stole the Yemeni Immigration and Passports Authority database from its servers and handed it over to American intelligence. A document reviewed by MintPress includes a letter signed by former NSA staffer Harry T. Sweeney, who was working as a specialist in polygraph testing. The letter, lauding Al-Waziza’s efforts, reads, “I particularly appreciate your contributions to Yemeni culture and your suggestions on how to approach specific people based on your extensive experience in the consular section.” When Asnar Allah security officials asked the spies about him, they all agreed that the reserved and secretive Al-Waziza was the closest to the CIA. He was the only one allowed to access the top floor of the embassy building, which was designated for the CIA. The first floor was for employees, especially analysts, while the second floor was reserved for the ambassador. Al-Waziza, according to information obtained from interrogations by Ansar Allah, was heavily relied upon for conducting investigations and gathering intelligence. He underwent various training courses, including one on people management skills in Florida. Al-Waziza conducted investigations within the embassy for American intelligence and was involved in recruitment, often using methods such as sexual blackmail, according to another spy, Bassam Ahmed Al-Mardahi. Al-Mardahi described how he was coerced into working for the CIA after being filmed during a sexual encounter in Germany and subsequently blackmailed. I was recruited by being sexually assaulted during a course held by the American embassy in Germany. There, I was secretly filmed having sex in a hotel in Frankfurt. After my return to Sanaa, the clips were sent to me, and I was threatened with working with intelligence or having them published online.” Al-Mardahi recruited local members from various Yemeni institutions for American intelligence and conducted a study on the number of weapons held by the population in Sanaa, earning between $300 and $500 a month for his services. The arrest of dozens of spies might offer hope for the release of thousands of prisoners and detainees held by Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and their allies in southern Yemen. The United States is reportedly pushing for negotiations regarding prisoner exchanges between its allies and the Ansar Allah delegation in Muscat, Oman. According to a source in Ansar Allah, there is a possibility of a proposal to release the spies in exchange for Israel stopping its aggression against Gaza. Feature photo | Illustration by MintPress News Ahmed AbdulKareem is a Yemeni journalist based in Sanaa. He covers the war in Yemen for MintPress News as well as local Yemeni media. The post Exclusive: Yemen Uncovers Massive CIA and Mossad Spy Ring Embedded in Pro-Democracy NGOs appeared first on MintPress News.

[Category: Daily Digest, Foreign Affairs, Investigations, Top Story, What's Hot, Abdul Mohsen Hussein Ali Azzan, American espionage operations Yemen, Ansar Allah dismantles spy cell, Ansar Allah exposes CIA spies, CIA and Mossad spy activities Yemen, CIA espionage in Yemen, CIA Mossad covert operations Yemen, Espionage cell arrests Yemen 2021, Force 400 spy ring, Israeli covert operations Yemen, Israeli Mossad spies in Yemen, Joanne Cummings, MintPress News spy investigation Yemen, Sanaa government dismantles spy network, Sexual blackmail in espionage, U.S. and Israel intelligence war in Yemen, U.S. intelligence Yemen infiltration, Yemen CIA spy cell exposed, Yemen intelligence network investigation, Yemen spy network uncovered, Yemen spy ring Saudi airstrikes, Yemeni detainee espionage testimonies]

— Exclusive: CIA Spy Ring Promoted LGBTQ Causes and Israel Normalization in Yemen

 

at 10/14/24 8:18am

While Yemen usually conjures images of conflicts with Israel and the Saudi-led coalition, a new dimension to the complex country and its people has emerged: Yemens secret war of spies. MintPress News delves into the largest CIA spy cell ever uncovered in Yemen, revealing a major security operation that apprehended its members and exposed American espionage activities, dramatically altering our understanding of Yemens complex battlefield. In June, MintPress revealed how the Ansar Allah-led government of Sanaa had dismantled an espionage cell Force 400 allegedly working for the United States and Israel, detailing the cells members and their activities. Washington responded by calling for the release of individuals it claimed were employees of the United Nations, diplomatic bodies, and NGOs, labeling them as hostages held by the Houthis, a pejorative term often used by Western officials to describe the political and military movement known as Ansar Allah. MintPress News correspondent Ahmed AbdulKareem was granted exclusive access to several detainees captured by Yemeni security services, allowing him to conduct a series of interviews with the alleged spies. Additionally, a trove of top-secret documents was provided to MintPress, corroborating the testimony of many of the detainees given during these interviews. MintPress also reviewed hours of footage showing interrogations conducted by Yemeni security personnel, which confirmed the details of the allegations against the detainees that were provided to MintPress during interviews with high-level security officials from Ansar Allah. While arrests related to the vast espionage cell began in earnest in 2021, officials in both the United States and Yemen remained tight-lipped about the discovery. However, Ansar Allah officials told MintPress that Washington was aware of the arrests and initiated a series of secret negotiations for the detainees release shortly thereafter. Those negotiations ultimately failed, and details began to leak in the Arab press. This led Yemeni officials to publicly disclose the discovery of the espionage ring and eventually revived negotiations between the two parties in Muscat, Oman. In a groundbreaking investigation, MintPress News uncovers the inner workings of one of the largest spy networks ever exposed in Yemen, shedding light on how American and Israeli intelligence agencies covertly infiltrated Yemeni society. Through clandestine operations, they manipulated local dynamics, exploiting religious divisions and sowing seeds of normalization with Israel. The ultimate aim: gathering intelligence for Saudi airstrikes on military targets. Exclusive access to top-secret documents, detainee testimonies, and interrogation footage reveals a harrowing narrative of espionage. Spies were recruited through psychological manipulation, sexual blackmail, and torture, highlighting the extent to which U.S. and Israeli operatives bent moral boundaries to secure cooperation. This investigation offers a disturbing glimpse into the shadow war being waged in Yemen—one fueled by exploitation and coercion. It marks the beginning of an ongoing series that will unveil further layers of this covert operation in future reports.   The Double Life of Abdul Azzan Abdul Mohsen Hussein Ali Azzan, a high-level spy arrested last June, worked for both the CIA and the Israeli Mossad for 15 years. Recruited by U.S. intelligence in 2010, his handler was Joanne Cummings, the director of the political and economic department at the U.S. embassy in Sanaa, who managed his activities until 2013. According to his account, Azzan converted from Islam to Christianity while working for an American company in Atlanta that engaged in proselytizing under the guise of selling printer ink. Azzan did not just infiltrate and recruit Yemeni parliamentarians; he also gathered critical intelligence on shoulder-fired air defenses, unmanned aerial vehicles, and ballistic missiles. This high-value information was shared with American intelligence, as evidenced by documents reviewed by MintPress and by Azzan himself during an exclusive jailhouse interview with MintPress correspondent Ahmed AbdulKareem. Thanks to the Atlanta company and my new religion, I was able to form a good relationship with the Americans, Azzan, a graduate of Sanaa University, told MintPress. I wrote a letter to the CIA through Murad Dhafer, a friend who worked for them. I wasnt accepted immediately, but I was enrolled in a special intelligence course. Later, I connected with Carlo Penda, the Canadian director of the Parliament Program at the [National] Democratic Institute, and eventually became a director. Ansar Allah accuses the National Democratic Institute (NDI) in Sanaa of conducting intelligence missions under the guise of spreading democracy and promoting human rights. They claim that through this institute, the CIA recruited spies, some of whom were later arrested, while also collecting information and preparing research and studies for U.S. intelligence agencies. At the end of 2009, I started working at the American Embassy, where Joanne Cummins, the Director of the Political and Economic Program, recruited me for the CIA, Azzan recounted. He underwent a series of tests, including a lie detector test, and took courses under two American intelligence officers. Subsequently, he was connected with Richard Kaufman, the representative of Israeli interests at the embassy. In 2014, the embassy sent me to America, where I met a senior American intelligence official, he added. Before the war against Yemen began in March 2015, the U.S. embassy left Sanaa. However, it managed to attach its operatives to American companies still operating at the time and international organizations such as the High Commissioner for Human Rights, and Azzan was among them. He moved to work with Cambridge Analytica’s UK-based parent company, SCL group, exposed in 2018 by Max Blumenthal to be conducting espionage activities on behalf of Archimedes,” a U.S.-based military contractor. Azzan identified the company as a subsidiary of Moby Media Group, owned by Afghan businessman Saad Mohseni, who has been linked to the CIA. In 2013, the company opened its headquarters in Sanaa, managed by British national Sarah Cunningham, according to Azzan. In addition to his intelligence work, Azzan provided services to the intelligence company where he served as general manager. According to Azzan, the company operated on two tracks: collecting information, preparing field surveys and conducting media campaigns to shift public opinion toward Israel. One of our intelligence activities was the Landscape program, where we studied all local media outlets, Azzan explained to MintPress. The goal was not just to run media campaigns for American companies, but also to identify and recruit media leaders to promote Israeli normalization under the guise of acceptance and peaceful coexistence.  In 2014, the embassy sent Azzan to Washington for a two-week training session, where he met a senior CIA official. After 2018, I worked for the U.S. Department of Defense under the guise of the director of the Labs office in Yemen. My handler was Fahim Ahmed, the regional director of Labs, and through the company, I was connected to a Jewish [Israeli] intelligence organization in America. This organization was interested in studying Yemeni sects, understanding their references, and exploiting them for normalization and fueling sectarian differences. As security suspicions about the company grew, SCL decided to leave Sanaa. Azzan was then transferred to the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) in Sanaa. Leveraging the organizations extensive reach in the Yemeni governorates, Azzan was able to provide his American intelligence contacts with high-value information about camps, launch sites, and naval forces, which were later targeted by Saudi airstrikes. He noted that he worked openly and cooperatively with OHCHR officials to gather this intelligence. Yemeni police inspect a site of Saudi-led airstrikes targeting two family homes in Sanaa, Yemen, March, 2022. Hani Mohammed | AP Under the supervision of the resident representative, Mohamed Al-Shami and I were gathering information with a network of analyst observers in each governorate, Azzan explained. My work continued until my arrest at the end of 2021. When we couldnt access a target area, we would ask the resident supervisor to contact local authorities under the guise of a humanitarian proposal. He would facilitate this, ensuring we took no actions that would reveal our true intentions, Azzan added. The most significant damage was yet to come. In 2016, Azzan began working for the Israeli Mossad through Michael Boven, the former Economic Attaché at the U.S. Embassy in Sanaa. After the embassys closure, Boven moved to the U.S. embassy in Israel. He had previously supervised Azzan at the Middle East Initiative in Sanaa, forging a close relationship based on shared religion, financial incentives, and what Azzan described as true friendship. I would meet Michael in Jordan as the director of Labs (SCL). During one of these meetings, he introduced me to Saul Gad, an Israeli officer in the Mossad. I met Gad in the Dead Sea area of Jordan and began working for him, Azzan revealed. Azzan provided Mossad with highly sensitive information, including details about Sanaa International Airport, transportation movements, changes in Ansar Allahs leadership, military activities, and destroyed weaponry. He also leaked data from the High Commissioner for Human Rights regarding the locations of government officials and Ansar Allah leaders. My baptism influenced my willingness to work for Israel as a Christian at the Atlanta company, which was led by Protestants who support Israel and believe that Christ’s return depends on Israels dominance in the Middle East. This connection continued with my association with the IDEA organization, which is linked to the ‘Saturdays Church.’ Azzan also contributed significantly to the success of the Dar Al Salam Organization. This local group collaborated with Jewish organizations in the U.S. and Europe, aiming to disarm individuals of personal weapons like Kalashnikovs and persuade clerics to promote coexistence and normalization with Israel.   USAID Consultant Turned CIA Operative The Yemeni collaborators, which Ansar Allah officials say numbered over 20 individuals, were well aware of their roles with American intelligence, though they told MintPress that the CIA did not offer them any guarantees post-recruitment. Shaif Hafazallah Al-Hamdani, a senior consultant for development management programs at the U.S. Agency for Development, served the CIA for 27 years. He was recruited by Adam Earli, then the Cultural Attaché at the U.S. Embassy in Sanaa. I joined the CIA in 1997 through the American Cultural Attaché. They told me I would be cooperating with American Intelligence, a high position, and I accepted, he confessed. MintPress News was able to view Al-Hamdani’s documents, photographs with intelligence officers, and embassy evaluation forms. Al-Hamdani carried out his espionage duties as an employee of the United States Agency for Development (USAID). He designed intelligence follow-up and evaluation mechanisms, coordinating USAIDs work with the intelligence contractor, MSI. One of his primary tasks was to verify the implementation of these mechanisms to meet the requirements of American intelligence and other agencies such as IBTCI and MSI. According to a security source, monitoring and evaluation are crucial methods for gathering military information and pinpointing military and manufacturing facilities. Al-Hamdani stated that USAIDs cooperation with MSI aimed to access project areas to locate ballistic missile launch sites and unmanned aerial vehicles. They also monitored and determined military installation locations, provided coordinates to the CIA, and assessed combat situations on the fronts and the position of goods, food, fuel, and essential services. The measures taken by Washington and its allies to punish Yemen have varied. Yet the crown on the jewel has always been to move the Central Bank from Ansar Allah-controlled Sanaa to Aden, where U.S.-backed groups maintain control. Al-Hamdani explains: In 2016, Mr. Brad Hance, the U.S. Deputy Ambassador and intelligence official, assigned me to receive the Central Bank’s code and transport it to Aden. I delivered it to another American agent working in the Aden bank. Unidentified men ride through the streets of Taiz, Yemen, 2018, then the scene of fierce clashes between Ansar Allah and the Western-backed government of Aden. Photo | AP Al-Hamdani emphasizes that the cultural attaché at the American embassy was a critical hub for American intelligence operations. Spy recruitment often occurred under the guise of cultural exchanges, skill enhancement programs, and scholarships like the Fulbright program. This program offers scholarships to outstanding university graduates for a year and a half of masters degree preparation in the United States. During this period, potential spies are assessed, their abilities studied, and select individuals are recruited. Potential spies are also identified and selected through EducationUSA at AMIDEAST, based in Aden, and the Humphrey Fellowship Program, aimed at “outstanding civil employees.” Additionally, the U.S. Speaker and International Visitor Programs play a role. Al-Hamdani notes that American intelligence successfully recruited numerous local spies through these initiatives. “Agents were also selected through events at the embassy and educational scholarships for outstanding students to institutes like YALI, Oxide, and AMIDEAST, which was run by American intelligence officer Sabrina Weber, targeting influential youth.” One document reviewed by MintPress mentions a man named Chris Eckel, who allegedly attended a cultural seminar in Sanaa. When Eckel’s name was mentioned to Al-Hamdani, he identified him as an intelligence officer who worked with him on missions. Al-Hamdani’s contributions were highly valued, as evidenced by an American Embassy evaluation documents viewed by MintPress, which stated: During this period, Shaif did much more than what was asked of him. The mission’s programs would have taken longer. His historical knowledge proved valuable. In addition to his tasks transferring the Central Bank code and recruitment, Al-Hamdani planted eavesdropping devices in the homes of senior officials, including Washington allies like former South Yemen Prime Minister Abu Bakr al-Attas. Al-Hamdani told Ansar Allah security officials that part of his training courses were in cybersecurity.   Cultural Subversion: Targeting Yemeni Values Socially, one of the roles assigned to clients was to promote homosexuality and make society more accepting, according to Al-Hamdani. “The embassy was supporting homosexuals through the Cultural Attaché, promoting it at the American NGO, YALI, by distributing brochures to those inclined or desiring to be homosexual, promoting it as personal freedom. They were also issuing visas under the pretext of persecution.” Al-Hamdani isnt the only one who spoke about the American embassys role in promoting homosexuality in Yemen, a practice that blatantly violates Yemeni social, tribal, and religious norms. Other spies, including Muhammad Ali Ahmed Al-Waziza, who worked with the CIA for 14 years, also mentioned this role. Al-Waziza stated, Visas were given to gay people, and homosexuality was promoted through educational stories taught in the institutes. We had gay teachers at the institute, and the language was taught through gay and lesbian films.” Al-Waziza worked as an administrative assistant at YALI. He joined the U.S. Embassy in 2007 as a translator and then worked as an investigator. After the embassy closed, he continued his espionage work as an employee at Resonate Yemen, which is affiliated with Ahmed Awad bin Mubarak, who currently serves as Prime Minister in Yemen’s Aden-based Riyadh-backed government. The local organization was founded and regulated by USAID. His mission was to maintain continuous communication with recruits contracted by the American Embassy from government agencies, especially the Passport Service, the Ministry of Interior, and other service ministries. Al-Waziza successfully stole the Yemeni Immigration and Passports Authority database from its servers and handed it over to American intelligence. A document reviewed by MintPress includes a letter signed by former NSA staffer Harry T. Sweeney, who was working as a specialist in polygraph testing. The letter, lauding Al-Waziza’s efforts, reads, “I particularly appreciate your contributions to Yemeni culture and your suggestions on how to approach specific people based on your extensive experience in the consular section.” When Asnar Allah security officials asked the spies about him, they all agreed that the reserved and secretive Al-Waziza was the closest to the CIA. He was the only one allowed to access the top floor of the embassy building, which was designated for the CIA. The first floor was for employees, especially analysts, while the second floor was reserved for the ambassador. Al-Waziza, according to information obtained from interrogations by Ansar Allah, was heavily relied upon for conducting investigations and gathering intelligence. He underwent various training courses, including one on people management skills in Florida. Al-Waziza conducted investigations within the embassy for American intelligence and was involved in recruitment, often using methods such as sexual blackmail, according to another spy, Bassam Ahmed Al-Mardahi. Al-Mardahi described how he was coerced into working for the CIA after being filmed during a sexual encounter in Germany and subsequently blackmailed. I was recruited by being sexually assaulted during a course held by the American embassy in Germany. There, I was secretly filmed having sex in a hotel in Frankfurt. After my return to Sanaa, the clips were sent to me, and I was threatened with working with intelligence or having them published online.” Al-Mardahi recruited local members from various Yemeni institutions for American intelligence and conducted a study on the number of weapons held by the population in Sanaa, earning between $300 and $500 a month for his services. The arrest of dozens of spies might offer hope for the release of thousands of prisoners and detainees held by Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and their allies in southern Yemen. The United States is reportedly pushing for negotiations regarding prisoner exchanges between its allies and the Ansar Allah delegation in Muscat, Oman. According to a source in Ansar Allah, there is a possibility of a proposal to release the spies in exchange for Israel stopping its aggression against Gaza. Feature photo | Illustration by MintPress News Ahmed AbdulKareem is a Yemeni journalist based in Sanaa. He covers the war in Yemen for MintPress News as well as local Yemeni media. The post Exclusive: CIA Spy Ring Promoted LGBTQ Causes and Israel Normalization in Yemen appeared first on MintPress News.

[Category: Foreign Affairs, Investigations, Top Story, Abdul Mohsen Hussein Ali Azzan, American espionage operations Yemen, Ansar Allah dismantles spy cell, Ansar Allah exposes CIA spies, CIA and Mossad spy activities Yemen, CIA espionage in Yemen, CIA Mossad covert operations Yemen, Espionage cell arrests Yemen 2021, Force 400 spy ring, Israeli covert operations Yemen, Israeli Mossad spies in Yemen, Joanne Cummings, MintPress News spy investigation Yemen, Sanaa government dismantles spy network, Sexual blackmail in espionage, U.S. and Israel intelligence war in Yemen, U.S. intelligence Yemen infiltration, Yemen CIA spy cell exposed, Yemen intelligence network investigation, Yemen spy network uncovered, Yemen spy ring Saudi airstrikes, Yemeni detainee espionage testimonies]

— Exclusive: CIA Spy Network in Yemen Pushed Homosexuality, Normalization with Israel

 

at 10/14/24 8:18am

While Yemen usually conjures images of conflicts with Israel and the Saudi-led coalition, a new dimension to the complex country and its people has emerged: Yemens secret war of spies. MintPress News delves into the largest CIA spy cell ever uncovered in Yemen, revealing a major security operation that apprehended its members and exposed American espionage activities, dramatically altering our understanding of Yemens complex battlefield. In June, MintPress revealed how the Ansar Allah-led government of Sanaa had dismantled an espionage cell Force 400 allegedly working for the United States and Israel, detailing the cells members and their activities. Washington responded by calling for the release of individuals it claimed were employees of the United Nations, diplomatic bodies, and NGOs, labeling them as hostages held by the Houthis, a pejorative term often used by Western officials to describe the political and military movement known as Ansar Allah. MintPress News correspondent Ahmed AbdulKareem was granted exclusive access to several detainees captured by Yemeni security services, allowing him to conduct a series of interviews with the alleged spies. Additionally, a trove of top-secret documents was provided to MintPress, corroborating the testimony of many of the detainees given during these interviews. MintPress also reviewed hours of footage showing interrogations conducted by Yemeni security personnel, which confirmed the details of the allegations against the detainees that were provided to MintPress during interviews with high-level security officials from Ansar Allah. While arrests related to the vast espionage cell began in earnest in 2021, officials in both the United States and Yemen remained tight-lipped about the discovery. However, Ansar Allah officials told MintPress that Washington was aware of the arrests and initiated a series of secret negotiations for the detainees release shortly thereafter. Those negotiations ultimately failed, and details began to leak in the Arab press. This led Yemeni officials to publicly disclose the discovery of the espionage ring and eventually revived negotiations between the two parties in Muscat, Oman. In a groundbreaking investigation, MintPress News uncovers the inner workings of one of the largest spy networks ever exposed in Yemen, shedding light on how American and Israeli intelligence agencies covertly infiltrated Yemeni society. Through clandestine operations, they manipulated local dynamics, exploiting religious divisions and sowing seeds of normalization with Israel. The ultimate aim: gathering intelligence for Saudi airstrikes on military targets. Exclusive access to top-secret documents, detainee testimonies, and interrogation footage reveals a harrowing narrative of espionage. Spies were recruited through psychological manipulation, sexual blackmail, and torture, highlighting the extent to which U.S. and Israeli operatives bent moral boundaries to secure cooperation. This investigation offers a disturbing glimpse into the shadow war being waged in Yemen—one fueled by exploitation and coercion. It marks the beginning of an ongoing series that will unveil further layers of this covert operation in future reports.   The Double Life of Abdul Azzan Abdul Mohsen Hussein Ali Azzan, a high-level spy arrested last June, worked for both the CIA and the Israeli Mossad for 15 years. Recruited by U.S. intelligence in 2010, his handler was Joanne Cummings, the director of the political and economic department at the U.S. embassy in Sanaa, who managed his activities until 2013. According to his account, Azzan converted from Islam to Christianity while working for an American company in Atlanta that engaged in proselytizing under the guise of selling printer ink. Azzan did not just infiltrate and recruit Yemeni parliamentarians; he also gathered critical intelligence on shoulder-fired air defenses, unmanned aerial vehicles, and ballistic missiles. This high-value information was shared with American intelligence, as evidenced by documents reviewed by MintPress and by Azzan himself during an exclusive jailhouse interview with MintPress correspondent Ahmed AbdulKareem. Thanks to the Atlanta company and my new religion, I was able to form a good relationship with the Americans, Azzan, a graduate of Sanaa University, told MintPress. I wrote a letter to the CIA through Murad Dhafer, a friend who worked for them. I wasnt accepted immediately, but I was enrolled in a special intelligence course. Later, I connected with Carlo Penda, the Canadian director of the Parliament Program at the [National] Democratic Institute, and eventually became a director. Ansar Allah accuses the National Democratic Institute (NDI) in Sanaa of conducting intelligence missions under the guise of spreading democracy and promoting human rights. They claim that through this institute, the CIA recruited spies, some of whom were later arrested, while also collecting information and preparing research and studies for U.S. intelligence agencies. At the end of 2009, I started working at the American Embassy, where Joanne Cummins, the Director of the Political and Economic Program, recruited me for the CIA, Azzan recounted. He underwent a series of tests, including a lie detector test, and took courses under two American intelligence officers. Subsequently, he was connected with Richard Kaufman, the representative of Israeli interests at the embassy. In 2014, the embassy sent me to America, where I met a senior American intelligence official, he added. Before the war against Yemen began in March 2015, the U.S. embassy left Sanaa. However, it managed to attach its operatives to American companies still operating at the time and international organizations such as the High Commissioner for Human Rights, and Azzan was among them. He moved to work with Cambridge Analytica’s UK-based parent company, SCL group, exposed in 2018 by Max Blumenthal to be conducting espionage activities on behalf of Archimedes,” a U.S.-based military contractor. Azzan identified the company as a subsidiary of Moby Media Group, owned by Afghan businessman Saad Mohseni, who has been linked to the CIA. In 2013, the company opened its headquarters in Sanaa, managed by British national Sarah Cunningham, according to Azzan. In addition to his intelligence work, Azzan provided services to the intelligence company where he served as general manager. According to Azzan, the company operated on two tracks: collecting information, preparing field surveys and conducting media campaigns to shift public opinion toward Israel. One of our intelligence activities was the Landscape program, where we studied all local media outlets, Azzan explained to MintPress. The goal was not just to run media campaigns for American companies, but also to identify and recruit media leaders to promote Israeli normalization under the guise of acceptance and peaceful coexistence.  In 2014, the embassy sent Azzan to Washington for a two-week training session, where he met a senior CIA official. After 2018, I worked for the U.S. Department of Defense under the guise of the director of the Labs office in Yemen. My handler was Fahim Ahmed, the regional director of Labs, and through the company, I was connected to a Jewish [Israeli] intelligence organization in America. This organization was interested in studying Yemeni sects, understanding their references, and exploiting them for normalization and fueling sectarian differences. As security suspicions about the company grew, SCL decided to leave Sanaa. Azzan was then transferred to the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) in Sanaa. Leveraging the organizations extensive reach in the Yemeni governorates, Azzan was able to provide his American intelligence contacts with high-value information about camps, launch sites, and naval forces, which were later targeted by Saudi airstrikes. He noted that he worked openly and cooperatively with OHCHR officials to gather this intelligence. Yemeni police inspect a site of Saudi-led airstrikes targeting two family homes in Sanaa, Yemen, March, 2022. Hani Mohammed | AP Under the supervision of the resident representative, Mohamed Al-Shami and I were gathering information with a network of analyst observers in each governorate, Azzan explained. My work continued until my arrest at the end of 2021. When we couldnt access a target area, we would ask the resident supervisor to contact local authorities under the guise of a humanitarian proposal. He would facilitate this, ensuring we took no actions that would reveal our true intentions, Azzan added. The most significant damage was yet to come. In 2016, Azzan began working for the Israeli Mossad through Michael Boven, the former Economic Attaché at the U.S. Embassy in Sanaa. After the embassys closure, Boven moved to the U.S. embassy in Israel. He had previously supervised Azzan at the Middle East Initiative in Sanaa, forging a close relationship based on shared religion, financial incentives, and what Azzan described as true friendship. I would meet Michael in Jordan as the director of Labs (SCL). During one of these meetings, he introduced me to Saul Gad, an Israeli officer in the Mossad. I met Gad in the Dead Sea area of Jordan and began working for him, Azzan revealed. Azzan provided Mossad with highly sensitive information, including details about Sanaa International Airport, transportation movements, changes in Ansar Allahs leadership, military activities, and destroyed weaponry. He also leaked data from the High Commissioner for Human Rights regarding the locations of government officials and Ansar Allah leaders. My baptism influenced my willingness to work for Israel as a Christian at the Atlanta company, which was led by Protestants who support Israel and believe that Christ’s return depends on Israels dominance in the Middle East. This connection continued with my association with the IDEA organization, which is linked to the ‘Saturdays Church.’ Azzan also contributed significantly to the success of the Dar Al Salam Organization. This local group collaborated with Jewish organizations in the U.S. and Europe, aiming to disarm individuals of personal weapons like Kalashnikovs and persuade clerics to promote coexistence and normalization with Israel.   USAID Consultant Turned CIA Operative The Yemeni collaborators, which Ansar Allah officials say numbered over 20 individuals, were well aware of their roles with American intelligence, though they told MintPress that the CIA did not offer them any guarantees post-recruitment. Shaif Hafazallah Al-Hamdani, a senior consultant for development management programs at the U.S. Agency for Development, served the CIA for 27 years. He was recruited by Adam Earli, then the Cultural Attaché at the U.S. Embassy in Sanaa. I joined the CIA in 1997 through the American Cultural Attaché. They told me I would be cooperating with American Intelligence, a high position, and I accepted, he confessed. MintPress News was able to view Al-Hamdani’s documents, photographs with intelligence officers, and embassy evaluation forms. Al-Hamdani carried out his espionage duties as an employee of the United States Agency for Development (USAID). He designed intelligence follow-up and evaluation mechanisms, coordinating USAIDs work with the intelligence contractor, MSI. One of his primary tasks was to verify the implementation of these mechanisms to meet the requirements of American intelligence and other agencies such as IBTCI and MSI. According to a security source, monitoring and evaluation are crucial methods for gathering military information and pinpointing military and manufacturing facilities. Al-Hamdani stated that USAIDs cooperation with MSI aimed to access project areas to locate ballistic missile launch sites and unmanned aerial vehicles. They also monitored and determined military installation locations, provided coordinates to the CIA, and assessed combat situations on the fronts and the position of goods, food, fuel, and essential services. The measures taken by Washington and its allies to punish Yemen have varied. Yet the crown on the jewel has always been to move the Central Bank from Ansar Allah-controlled Sanaa to Aden, where U.S.-backed groups maintain control. Al-Hamdani explains: In 2016, Mr. Brad Hance, the U.S. Deputy Ambassador and intelligence official, assigned me to receive the Central Bank’s code and transport it to Aden. I delivered it to another American agent working in the Aden bank. Unidentified men ride through the streets of Taiz, Yemen, 2018, then the scene of fierce clashes between Ansar Allah and the Western-backed government of Aden. Photo | AP Al-Hamdani emphasizes that the cultural attaché at the American embassy was a critical hub for American intelligence operations. Spy recruitment often occurred under the guise of cultural exchanges, skill enhancement programs, and scholarships like the Fulbright program. This program offers scholarships to outstanding university graduates for a year and a half of masters degree preparation in the United States. During this period, potential spies are assessed, their abilities studied, and select individuals are recruited. Potential spies are also identified and selected through EducationUSA at AMIDEAST, based in Aden, and the Humphrey Fellowship Program, aimed at “outstanding civil employees.” Additionally, the U.S. Speaker and International Visitor Programs play a role. Al-Hamdani notes that American intelligence successfully recruited numerous local spies through these initiatives. “Agents were also selected through events at the embassy and educational scholarships for outstanding students to institutes like YALI, Oxide, and AMIDEAST, which was run by American intelligence officer Sabrina Weber, targeting influential youth.” One document reviewed by MintPress mentions a man named Chris Eckel, who allegedly attended a cultural seminar in Sanaa. When Eckel’s name was mentioned to Al-Hamdani, he identified him as an intelligence officer who worked with him on missions. Al-Hamdani’s contributions were highly valued, as evidenced by an American Embassy evaluation documents viewed by MintPress, which stated: During this period, Shaif did much more than what was asked of him. The mission’s programs would have taken longer. His historical knowledge proved valuable. In addition to his tasks transferring the Central Bank code and recruitment, Al-Hamdani planted eavesdropping devices in the homes of senior officials, including Washington allies like former South Yemen Prime Minister Abu Bakr al-Attas. Al-Hamdani told Ansar Allah security officials that part of his training courses were in cybersecurity.   Cultural Subversion: Targeting Yemeni Values Socially, one of the roles assigned to clients was to promote homosexuality and make society more accepting, according to Al-Hamdani. “The embassy was supporting homosexuals through the Cultural Attaché, promoting it at the American NGO, YALI, by distributing brochures to those inclined or desiring to be homosexual, promoting it as personal freedom. They were also issuing visas under the pretext of persecution.” Al-Hamdani isnt the only one who spoke about the American embassys role in promoting homosexuality in Yemen, a practice that blatantly violates Yemeni social, tribal, and religious norms. Other spies, including Muhammad Ali Ahmed Al-Waziza, who worked with the CIA for 14 years, also mentioned this role. Al-Waziza stated, Visas were given to gay people, and homosexuality was promoted through educational stories taught in the institutes. We had gay teachers at the institute, and the language was taught through gay and lesbian films.” Al-Waziza worked as an administrative assistant at YALI. He joined the U.S. Embassy in 2007 as a translator and then worked as an investigator. After the embassy closed, he continued his espionage work as an employee at Resonate Yemen, which is affiliated with Ahmed Awad bin Mubarak, who currently serves as Prime Minister in Yemen’s Aden-based Riyadh-backed government. The local organization was founded and regulated by USAID. His mission was to maintain continuous communication with recruits contracted by the American Embassy from government agencies, especially the Passport Service, the Ministry of Interior, and other service ministries. Al-Waziza successfully stole the Yemeni Immigration and Passports Authority database from its servers and handed it over to American intelligence. A document reviewed by MintPress includes a letter signed by former NSA staffer Harry T. Sweeney, who was working as a specialist in polygraph testing. The letter, lauding Al-Waziza’s efforts, reads, “I particularly appreciate your contributions to Yemeni culture and your suggestions on how to approach specific people based on your extensive experience in the consular section.” When Asnar Allah security officials asked the spies about him, they all agreed that the reserved and secretive Al-Waziza was the closest to the CIA. He was the only one allowed to access the top floor of the embassy building, which was designated for the CIA. The first floor was for employees, especially analysts, while the second floor was reserved for the ambassador. Al-Waziza, according to information obtained from interrogations by Ansar Allah, was heavily relied upon for conducting investigations and gathering intelligence. He underwent various training courses, including one on people management skills in Florida. Al-Waziza conducted investigations within the embassy for American intelligence and was involved in recruitment, often using methods such as sexual blackmail, according to another spy, Bassam Ahmed Al-Mardahi. Al-Mardahi described how he was coerced into working for the CIA after being filmed during a sexual encounter in Germany and subsequently blackmailed. I was recruited by being sexually assaulted during a course held by the American embassy in Germany. There, I was secretly filmed having sex in a hotel in Frankfurt. After my return to Sanaa, the clips were sent to me, and I was threatened with working with intelligence or having them published online.” Al-Mardahi recruited local members from various Yemeni institutions for American intelligence and conducted a study on the number of weapons held by the population in Sanaa, earning between $300 and $500 a month for his services. The arrest of dozens of spies might offer hope for the release of thousands of prisoners and detainees held by Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and their allies in southern Yemen. The United States is reportedly pushing for negotiations regarding prisoner exchanges between its allies and the Ansar Allah delegation in Muscat, Oman. According to a source in Ansar Allah, there is a possibility of a proposal to release the spies in exchange for Israel stopping its aggression against Gaza. Feature photo | Illustration by MintPress News Ahmed AbdulKareem is a Yemeni journalist based in Sanaa. He covers the war in Yemen for MintPress News as well as local Yemeni media. The post Exclusive: CIA Spy Network in Yemen Pushed Homosexuality, Normalization with Israel appeared first on MintPress News.

[Category: Foreign Affairs, Investigations, Top Story, Abdul Mohsen Hussein Ali Azzan, American espionage operations Yemen, Ansar Allah dismantles spy cell, Ansar Allah exposes CIA spies, CIA and Mossad spy activities Yemen, CIA espionage in Yemen, CIA Mossad covert operations Yemen, Espionage cell arrests Yemen 2021, Force 400 spy ring, Israeli covert operations Yemen, Israeli Mossad spies in Yemen, Joanne Cummings, MintPress News spy investigation Yemen, Sanaa government dismantles spy network, Sexual blackmail in espionage, U.S. and Israel intelligence war in Yemen, U.S. intelligence Yemen infiltration, Yemen CIA spy cell exposed, Yemen intelligence network investigation, Yemen spy network uncovered, Yemen spy ring Saudi airstrikes, Yemeni detainee espionage testimonies]

— A US-Iran War: What the Battlefield Could Actually Look Like

 

at 10/11/24 1:46pm

While U.S. Congress showed strong support for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahus statements on Iran in July, the media has largely shied away from coverage of what potential American involvement in an Israeli-Iranian conflict could look like. As a result, the public remains largely unaware of the potential consequences and the specific role the U.S. might play in such a scenario. In 2002, the U.S. military conducted the “Millennium Challenge” simulations, costing approximately $250 million. These exercises revealed that the American military would likely face failure in an all-out war with the Islamic Republic of Iran. Since then, Iran has significantly advanced its missile technology, drones, air defense systems, and even naval capabilities, further complicating any potential conflict scenario. Washington has repeatedly stated that it does not seek war with Iran, with President Joe Biden publicly making it clear to Israel that he will not order direct U.S. participation in any Israeli attack on Iranian territory. While Israel is often touted as having the most powerful military in West Asia, with 169,500 active-duty personnel across its army, navy, and air force, along with 465,000 reservists, its forces are stretched thin. They are heavily deployed across the northern front with Lebanon, as well as in the West Bank and Gaza. Moreover, Israel’s military size is significantly outmatched by that of its adversaries in the Islamic Republic of Iran. Iran’s standing army is reported to include approximately 610,000 active-duty members, with an additional 350,000 in reserve. Additionally, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), a key component of Irans military structure, is estimated to have 150,000 to 190,000 members, although these figures remain unverified. Beyond these forces, Irans potential manpower extends further. It includes a national police force and the Basij, a volunteer social and paramilitary group said to have millions of members, which provides significant mobilization capacity in times of conflict. #Iran’s Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) long-range and ballistic missiles in the Great Prophet (PBUH) military exercise. pic.twitter.com/6XNtmJcVmc — IRNA News Agency (@IrnaEnglish) February 23, 2024 Irans military capabilities have advanced significantly, particularly in its missile program. Starting in 2015, Iran began conducting major tests on precision-guided, long-range ballistic missiles. Since then, it has developed increasingly sophisticated missile technology. As a result, Iran now possesses the largest and most advanced missile arsenal in the Middle East, a program that began in response to the challenges faced during the Iran-Iraq War. In addition to its missile force, Iran has made significant strides in drone and cruise missile technology. Its advancements in drone technology, in particular, have garnered international attention, including from Russia during its conflict in Ukraine. In an interview with MintPress News, Beirut-based journalist and columnist for The Cradle, Sharmine Narwani, asserted that Iran could defeat Israel in a direct conflict. “Israel is 90 times smaller than Iran—a tiny geography with very vulnerable key infrastructure targets, Narwani explained. The argument can be made that with just a few hundred targeted missiles, Iran could destroy Israels six power plants, two oil fields, two refineries, one oil terminal, three gas fields, five desalination plants, and its remaining ports. The state of Israel would essentially be besieged and lose any self-sufficiencies overnight. Narwani also noted Israels military vulnerability. All Israeli airbases and airstrips are identified and potential targets too. One key for Iran would be to stop the daily arrival of U.S. weapons by air, which is Tel Avivs only lifeline for its continuous bombing of Gaza, Lebanon, and Syria, she added. 25th Karbala Division of IRGC forces training from Mazandaran province, located at North of Iran7 years ago, 200 volunteer soldiers from this Division fought to protect the city of Aleppo in Syria against massive attacks of dozens of western-backed Wahhabi factions. pic.twitter.com/cOXVKnnKlS — Irans military magazine (@iranmilitary_en) May 31, 2024 If the United States were to become involved in direct attacks on Iranian soil as a result of Israeli aggression, threats have already been issued against U.S. bases across the region. As of mid-August, an estimated 40,000 U.S. soldiers were stationed throughout the Middle East, deployed at military bases in Jordan, Iraq, Syria, and the Arab Gulf states. Irans missile capabilities, recently demonstrated during its retaliatory strikes on Israel in an operation known as Operation True Promise 2, have shown their precision in targeting some of the most heavily guarded military bases in the world. These missiles are capable of striking at much longer distances than the U.S. bases located near Tehrans immediate vicinity. Watch Iran’s missiles literally rain on Tel Aviv. pic.twitter.com/1oBOrq9pLd — red. (@redstreamnet) October 1, 2024 Beyond Iran’s military capabilities, the Islamic Republic also has allies throughout the region, operating in Yemen, Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, and Palestine. According to Sharmine Narwani, the Islamic Resistance in Iraq may still have a significant role to play. The Iraqi resistance has shown that it can participate in a multi-front war against Israel and its U.S. partner, especially now that Lebanon is a full warfront, Narwani said. It has done so by successfully launching drones and missiles of higher sophistication and, with more frequency, hitting Israeli targets. Should the regional war escalate and direct U.S. military engagement in support of Israel occur, the Iraqi resistance will likely turn its focus to more accessible targets within Iraqs neighboring borders. In Yemen, the Ansarallah-led government in Sana’a has demonstrated its capability over the past ten months to overcome the efforts of a U.S.-led multinational naval coalition aimed at breaking the blockade imposed on Israel in the Red Sea. In December 2023, the U.S. launched Operation Prosperity Guardian, designed to ensure the safe passage of ships to the Israeli-controlled Port of Eilat. Despite these costly efforts, the U.S. and its allies have failed to break the blockade. As a result, the Port of Eilat was eventually forced to file for bankruptcy. Yemen’s ability to reach Tel Aviv with both drones and missiles, along with its continued resistance, signals that Ansarallah could pose a legitimate threat to U.S. forces in the Arabian Peninsula. Moreover, if Iran were to close the Strait of Hormuz, it would likely succeed, triggering a global oil crisis. In Iraq, the Hashd al-Shaabi, or Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF), are another key Iranian ally, with an estimated force of around 238,000 men. Hezbollah in Lebanon also commands over 100,000 active-duty fighters. Additionally, the presence of Palestinian, Syrian, Iraqi, Afghan, Pakistani, and other militia forces operating inside Syria adds yet another unpredictable factor to the regional landscape. The capabilities of the various militia groups, political parties, and standing armies at Iran’s disposal across the region remain largely unknown. However, what is known is that many of these groups are battle-hardened from years of grueling ground battles with everyone from ISIS to the IDF and that they possess diverse arsenals of rockets, missiles, and drones. Speaking to MintPress News, Sharmine Narwani explained, Based on what we know about Irans advanced missile arsenal, Tehran can easily target all U.S. bases and naval assets in the Persian Gulf, as well as those in Iraq and Syria, as we witnessed in 2020. Narwani further highlighted that the U.S. has never been able to beat Iran in simulated irregular warfare gaming exercises unless the Americans cheated or rigged these games. This is one reason the Pentagon consistently avoids direct military conflict with Iran—the U.S. risks losing billions in forward military assets. Narwani also pointed out that potential U.S. strikes on Iran could be costly. If the targets are Irans key operational infrastructure, this would be a significant loss for Iran, but also a difficult task for the Americans due to Irans immense geographical size and varied terrain. On the other hand, she noted, The targeting of U.S. military bases, facilities, and naval ships is much easier for the Iranians, as these are mostly stationary or easily spotted targets, which could eradicate U.S. military presence in the region. Should the U.S. decide to engage in direct war with Iran, the threats to its forces throughout the region would be formidable. While such a war would undoubtedly be costly for all sides, it is clear that it would not be a simple endeavor. Some neoconservatives in the U.S. have framed a war on Tehran as similar to the 2003 Iraq War. However, Iran is a largely mountainous country, approximately three times the size of Iraq in both population and land mass, making a potential conflict there far more complex. Feature photo | Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian stands at attention while armed military personnel from the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps parade during a military parade commemorating the anniversary of the Iran-Iraq War (1980-88) outside the Khomeini Shrine in the south of Tehran, Iran, September 21, 2024. Morteza Nikoubazl | AP Robert Inlakesh is a political analyst, journalist and documentary filmmaker currently based in London, UK. He has reported from and lived in the occupied Palestinian territories and hosts the show ‘Palestine Files’. Director of ‘Steal of the Century: Trump’s Palestine-Israel Catastrophe’. Follow him on Twitter @falasteen47 The post A US-Iran War: What the Battlefield Could Actually Look Like appeared first on MintPress News.

[Category: Foreign Affairs, News, Ansarallah, Hezbollah, Iran missile arsenal, Iran-Israel war, Iranian missile strikes, Iranian Revolutionary Guard, Israel military power, Israeli blockade, israeli military, Middle East military tensions, Netanyahu Iran stance, Operation True Promise 2, Popular Mobilization Forces, Sharmine Narwani, Strait of Hormuz, U.S. bases in the Middle East, U.S. Congress on Iran, U.S. intervention in Iran, U.S. military in Middle East, U.S.-Iran conflict]

— Israel to Strike: Iran Not an Existential Threat to the West with Dr. Assal Rad

 

at 10/9/24 3:03pm

Iran is overwhelmingly portrayed by the collective West as an existential threat to the survival of Israel and, to a lesser extent, to U.S. national security interests. The issue with this narrative lies in how the Iranian government is depicted. On one hand, its presented as weak and constantly on the brink of collapse. On the other, its seen as powerful enough to control an axis of terror capable of destroying Israel and U.S. military and economic interests in the region. This inherent contradiction has persisted since the 1979 revolution and the establishment of the Islamic Republic. This faulty logic of imminent collapse has been employed by U.S. policymakers for decades. The belief is that one more sanction or one more protest within the country will make the whole project unravel. Yet, at the same time, Iran is presented as an all-powerful force, acting as a puppet master within the Middle East. Why is this paradox maintained? Simply put, it serves to justify U.S. policy positions. In reality, Iran is a heavily sanctioned state with limited economic power to retaliate against Western economic warfare. It is also not a force-on-force military peer to the United States. Since the 2020 assassination of General Qasem Soleimani, Iran has largely practiced restraint, focusing on building defensive alliances with ideologically aligned groups within the region and pursuing de-escalation with an increasingly belligerent U.S. The main narrative promoted by mainstream media and politicians from both sides of the political spectrum isnt intended to inform the public about Iran or how its government poses a national security threat to the United States. Instead, it aims to justify policies that align with Western imperialist interests in the region. Whether through sanctions designed to provoke an uprising against Irans tyrannical government or direct military intervention against its regional proxies, the goal is often the same. These actions pave the way for the establishment of U.S. military bases throughout West Asia. Vice President Harris recently declared Iran as the U.S.s greatest adversary, a statement that many find puzzling. Traditional geopolitical analysis suggests China is the greatest threat to U.S. economic dominance, while Russia, with its vast nuclear arsenal, is considered Americas primary military rival. Iran, by contrast, is a regional power, not a global one. So, what explains this clear logical fallacy? Join us tonight on State of Play as we explore U.S. foreign policy in relation to Iran with Dr. Assal Rad, an Iranian historian, analyst, and author of “The State of Resistance: Politics, Culture, and Identity in Modern Iran.” Greg Stoker is a former US Army Ranger with a human intelligence collection and analysis background. After serving four combat deployments in Afghanistan, he studied anthropology and International Relations at Columbia University. He is currently a military and geopolitical analyst and a social media “influencer,” though he hates the term. MintPress News is a fiercely independent media company. You can support us by becoming a member on Patreon, bookmarking and whitelisting us, and subscribing to our social media channels, including Twitch, YouTube, Twitter, and Instagram. Subscribe to MintCast on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and SoundCloud. Also, check out rapper Lowkey’s video interview and podcast series, The Watchdog. The post Israel to Strike: Iran Not an Existential Threat to the West with Dr. Assal Rad appeared first on MintPress News.

[Category: Behind The Headlines, Foreign Affairs, Top Story, Dr. Assal Rad, existential threat, Greg Stoker, Iran, Iran military power, Iran nuclear threat, Iran regional power, Iran-U.S. relations, Israel, military intervention, sanctions on Iran, State of Play, U.S. military bases, U.S. sanctions, West Asia, Western imperialism]

— Peter Thiel: From Gaza AI War Criminal To White House Puppet Master

 

at 10/9/24 11:53am

The screams of babies as buildings collapse in Gaza. Terrified parents carrying the remains of their children away in plastic carrier bags. These scenes – altogether too familiar today – come enabled by German-American tech billionaire Peter Thiel and his company, Palantir, whose software uses AI and big data to help the Israeli military surveil, target and slaughter hundreds of thousands of Palestinians. It is also used by ICE, the FBI and U.S. law enforcement to destroy privacy, to attack whistleblowers, and to turn the Orwellian concept of pre-crime (identifying and tracking potential subversives before they commit any offense) into a reality. The Silicon Valley oligarch has deep ties to the CIA and the military-industrial complex and is one of the Republican Partys most powerful backers. Already one of the worlds most influential individuals, if Donald Trump wins in November, Thiel has set himself up to become a shadow president, wielding gigantic power over us all. This is his story.   Shadow President Donald Trump is surging. A recent New York Times poll found the former president is ahead in several key battleground states, making the coming election too close to call. One man undoubtedly heartened by this news is Peter Thiel, the German-born tech entrepreneur and co-founder of such companies as PayPal and Palantir. Thiel, whose net worth stands at $10 billion, bankrolled Trumps successful 2016 campaign when few others would. He served on his transition team and as an advisor, leading commentators to label him a shadow president. This time, however, Thiel will enjoy even more influence in the White House, as Trump has selected Ohio Senator and Thiel protégé J.D. Vance as his vice president. Thiel – who has previously stated that freedom and democracy are incompatible- bemoaned the extension of the vote to women and denounced the public as an unthinking demos – took Vance under his wing when the latter was still at college. From there, Thiel secured Vance his first job in 2013. Two years later, Vance joined his venture capital firm, and in 2020, he provided the seed money for Vance to start his own investment group. Vance is a political neophyte, first running for Senate only in 2021. He was able to do so thanks to an enormous $15 million donation from Thiel – the largest ever amount to a Senate candidate. That Thiel had plucked someone from his own firm and bankrolled his political career raised many eyebrows at the time, with many feeling the billionaire had essentially bought a senate seat and put a pawn in his place. However, the stakes have been raised considerably now that Trump has selected Vance as his running mate. J.D. Vance owes both his political career and his previous venture capital career to Peter Thiel, Whitney Webb, an investigative journalist who has closely tracked Thiels exploits, told MintPress News. It has not always been plain sailing between Trump and Vance. The latter began his political career as a vocal Never Trump Republican, describing the 45th president as an idiot and Americas Hitler. It was Thiel himself who personally escorted Vance to Trumps Mar-a-Lago resort to smooth over the relationship. The tech moguls pitch was successful, and in July, Trump shocked many by picking the inexperienced senator as his VP – a decision that gave Thiel unprecedented power and influence over the countrys direction.   AI War Criminal The United States government has unequivocally backed Israeli aggression in Gaza, Lebanon, and Syria. And central to that support has been the role that Thiel has played. Thiels company, Palantir, is using AI to surveil the Palestinian population and help generate massive kill lists for the Israeli military based on that data. According to an investigation by an Israeli outlet, +972 Magazine, Israel is using a piece of software called Lavender, which develops profiles on every person in Gaza, assigning them a score of 1-100 based on individuals perceived connections to Hamas. A wide range of characteristics, including sharing similar work schedules to or being in a WhatsApp group with a known Hamas member, would raise ones score. If an individuals number reached a certain level, they would automatically be put on a kill list. In the first months of the war alone, Lavender identified over 37,000 Palestinians to be executed. Although not mentioned explicitly by name in the +972 Magazine report, Palantir is widely assumed to be part of the Lavender project. The group has long provided the Israeli military with vast amounts of AI hardware and software. Moreover, at the height of the Gaza onslaught, it announced it had entered into a new strategic partnership with the Israeli Defense Ministry to supply technology to help the countrys war effort. Both parties have mutually agreed to harness Palantirs advanced technology in support of war-related missions, the companys executive vice-president, Josh Harris, said, adding: This strategic partnership aims to significantly aid the Israeli Ministry of Defense in addressing the current situation in Israel. Lavender is known to be distinctly hit-or-miss. Many professions with similar communication patterns to Hamas or Palestinian Islamic Jihad operatives, including police and firefighters, or even people with the same name as a resistance fighter, were flagged for execution. Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) sources suggest a 10% false positive rate. Nevertheless, IDF analysts were told to treat Lavender suggestions as orders, turning the program into an automated kill list. One individual said that they devoted only 20 seconds to each target, only to check if the individual Thiels software marked for execution was male. Other than that, humans were there only to rubber stamp Lavenders decisions. Today, Israel also uses AI-powered Smart Shooter guns at checkpoints, capable of mowing down dozens of Palestinians without any human input whatsoever. An AI smart shooter sits atop this checkpoint. Mnar Adley visits the Palestinian city of Al Khalil to witness Israels automated apartheid in full effect. pic.twitter.com/3s5spk6DkQ — MintPress News (@MintPressNews) May 9, 2024 The Israeli military systematically targeted Gazans at night while entire families were in their own homes, sleeping. We were not interested in killing [Hamas] operatives only when they were in a military building or engaged in a military activity, one intelligence officer said, adding: On the contrary, the IDF bombed them in [their] homes without hesitation, as a first option. Its much easier to bomb a familys home. The system is built to look for them in these situations. Israelis called this system Wheres Daddy? presumably a reference to the cries of newly orphaned Gazan children. For most of these assassinations, the Israeli military preferred to use cheaper, unguided missiles, commonly referred to as dumb bombs. Unlike guided missiles, these munitions lacked precision targeting, and so needed to be larger and pack more explosives, causing massive collateral damage. Israel would use these bombs to destroy entire apartment buildings if Lavender identified even a suspected junior Hamas member living there. For the IDF, it was simply a question of resources. You dont want to waste expensive bombs on unimportant people — its very expensive for the country and theres a shortage [of precision guided bombs], explained one intelligence officer. The massive collateral damage barely factored into the equation. Palestinian lives were considered so unimportant that Israeli commanders accepted up to 100 civilian deaths per Hamas target. It was this deliberate destruction of entire apartment complexes that led to the unprecedented wiping out of entire extended families. Palestinian families often lived together in the same building. And when those buildings were felled every night, bloodlines would be extinguished with one keystroke or mouse click. MintPress News recently spoke to Ahmed al-Naouq, a Gazan who lost 21 members of his family to Israeli bombing. Perhaps most controversially, Lavender also gave children a score of 1-100 and recommended many for execution. Israel was delighted with Lavenders performance, with one commander explaining that human targeting produced bottlenecks that limited the IDFs capacity for violence. We [humans] cannot process so much information. It doesnt matter how many people you have tasked to produce targets during the war — you still cannot produce enough targets per day, they said. The IDFs insatiable thirst for destruction could only be quenched through AI Lavender only became less useful after Israel had leveled the strip, displacing nearly the entire population and causing complete chaos. This made the system less able to track individuals movements. Palantirs Alex Karp, center, poses with high-level Israeli military officials and Palantir co-founder Peter Thiel, second right. Source | Palantir   Israels Biggest Supporters The level of destruction in such a short period of time is nearly unprecedented in the modern era. Serious estimates suggest that up to 335,000 people have been killed in less than one year. The situation today in Gaza cannot be analyzed or qualified otherwise than as a genocide. I have not seen a genocide where the intent was so ostentatious and vindicated over and over, Francesca Albanese, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Human Rights Situation in the Palestinian Territories, said. This is one of the most critical cases of genocide, a tragedy foretold, because of the intent to eliminate the Palestinians with all means available – be it transferring them or neutralizing them or segregating them, she added. Israel is currently being investigated for genocide by the International Court of Justice. And Thiel is one of its key enablers. When asked a question about Lavender at the Cambridge University Union, Thiel was flustered, stating: My bias is to defer to Israel. Its not for us to second-guess everything. And I believe that, broadly, the IDF gets to decide what it wants to do, and that theyre broadly in the right and thats the sort of the perspective I come back to. And if I fall into the trap of arguing you on every detailed point, I would actually be conceding the broader issue that the Middle East should be micromanaged from Cambridge. And I think thats just simply absurd. And so Im not going to concede that point.” Thiel has done more than just defer to Israel, however. In January, he flew Palantir executives out to Tel Aviv to host a board meeting in solidarity with Israel. It was there that Palantir announced its new strategic partnership with the Israeli military. In October 2023, Palantir also took out a full-page advertisement in The New York Times, expressing its total commitment to the Israeli war effort. Certain kinds of evil can only be fought with force. Palantir stands with Israel, the company posted on Twitter. These actions precipitated an exodus of employees from the organization, as numerous staff members refused to be complicit in the violence. Since October 7, Palantir has been the target of numerous protests, with groups condemning the companys complicity in the slaughter. Palantirs actions are so unethical that they have even caused significant cognitive dissonance for company executives. I have asked myself, If I were younger at college, would I be protesting me?' Palantir CEO Alex Karp once admitted. Nevertheless, Karp has denounced the student protests against Israel as antisemitic and warned that they pose a threat to the military-industrial complex, saying: If we lose the intellectual debate, you will not be able to deploy any army in the West again. One group pushing for an end to the partnership between Silicon Valley and the Israeli military is Tech for Palestine, a community of tech workers who support Palestinian liberation. I would like to see the tech industry fully divest from Israel. That would be a major step forward, Paul Biggar, founder of Tech For Palestine, told MintPress, adding that Silicon Valley is directly contributing to Palestinian suffering: The goals should be that Palestinian people are afforded full equality and freedom from the Apartheid and oppression of Israel. Any acts that are committed by tech companies that support the Israeli state are de facto apartheid actions. And any involvement in Israel’s war economy is supporting the violation of international humanitarian law and involvement in crimes against humanity.”   The Brains of Ukraine Thanks to its use in Gaza, Palantir markets its products as battle-tested. But the company is deeply involved in the war in Ukraine as well, providing surveillance, intelligence and targeting solutions for the Ukrainian government. Palantir was one of the first Western corporations on the ground after the Russian invasion and has deeply embedded itself into the Zelensky administration. More than half a dozen ministries, including the Ministry of Defense, depend on its software. Palantir uses satellite imagery and artificial intelligence to assess battlefield situations and provide the military with digital kill lists, similar to what they do in Israel. The company is responsible for most of the Ukrainian militarys targeting capability. Its like a superpower, one Ukrainian minister said of Palantir. The organization presents its actions in Ukraine as a moral crusade for righteousness: We believe that when we can make a difference in the service of a just cause, such as in the defense of Ukraine, we carry a moral responsibility to do so. And so, we are proud to provide our technical experience and technology to Ukrainian forces defending their homeland, national sovereignty, and personal freedoms.” Yet, given its other actions around the world, it seems to act less as a champion for human rights and more as an extension of the Central Intelligence Agency and the U.S. national security state.   CIA Front Today, Palantir is a digital juggernaut valued at over $79 billion. But it was not always like that. In its early days in the 2000s, the business floundered and could find neither clients nor investors. A cash injection from In-Q-Tel, the CIAs investments arm, rescued it from oblivion. In-Q-Tel was founded in 1999 and seeks to nurture and sponsor new companies that can supply the intelligence community with cutting-edge technologies to keep them one step ahead of their competitors. The Q in its name is a reference to Q from the James Bond franchise – a creative inventor who supplies the spy with the latest in futuristic tech. Many top tech firms today, including Google and Elon Musks SpaceX, enjoyed intimate relationships with the CIA and owe their prominence to the agency. Palantir is no different, growing up alongside the burgeoning post-9/11 national security state. Its first customers were primarily intelligence agencies. Indeed, until 2008, the CIA was its only client. The government remains its most important customer; it currently possesses more than $1.5 billion in government contracts, including with the CIA, FBI, NSA, U.S. Army, Navy, and Space Force. Many of these were secured during the Trump presidency when Thiel had unparalleled access to the presidency. In 2020, it moved its headquarters away from the Bay Area to Denver, cementing its attempt to position itself less as a tech group and more alongside military contractors such as Raytheon, Lockheed Martin and Booz Allen Hamilton. Palantir is arguably a CIA front company, Webb told MintPress.   Real-Life Minority Report The 2002 movie Minority Report is set in a dystopian future where corrupt police arrest citizens before they commit any crimes. But thanks to Palantir, the concept of pre-crime has become less science fiction and more a reality. The group works with law enforcement across the country, using big data to track Americans movements, interactions with other people, social media posts and more. It builds up a complex web of information predicting which individuals are more likely to be gang members or perpetrators of violent crime. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) also uses Palantir software to surveil, arrest and deport undocumented immigrants, causing fear, alarm, and panic in immigrant communities across the country. Palantir renewed its contract with ICE, even over objections from its own employees, many of whom resigned in protest. Tech companies such as Palantir provide the digital backbone that allows for ICE to carry out raids, arrests and mass deportations, Jesse Franzblau, Senior Policy Analyst with the National Immigrant Justice Center, told MintPress. In the past, ICE has relied on Palantir to target the parents and caregivers of unaccompanied children and to coordinate workplace raids. The government should not be allowed to contract with companies that help ICE put a target on the back of immigrant communities. Thus, today, the same group that helps Israel carry out its onslaught against Palestinians also tears families apart inside the United States – an illustration of how Americas imperial projects abroad are fundamentally intertwined with the war on black and brown people at home. Perhaps even more dystopian is that it also works with government agencies to build profiles on employees that identify which are most likely to become whistleblowers. These subversives can then be isolated, investigated or punished. Moreover, it has developed complex software to ensure leakers of classified information can always be caught. This war on whistleblowers reached new levels in 2010 when Palantir published a plan to undermine, attack and destroy WikiLeaks and its supporters. The document, entitled The WikiLeaks Threat, recommended that the U.S. government carry out cyberattacks and spread disinformation about the organization by creating a media campaign to push the radical and reckless nature of WikiLeaks activities. It suggested cutting off funding sources for WikiLeaks by spreading fear among its supporters that they would be arrested for donating and carrying out targeted attacks against prominent WikiLeaks supporters, such as journalist Glenn Greenwald. The document was hacked and circulated online, causing a huge scandal for Palantir. Although the company offered a full apology to both WikiLeaks and Greenwald, Webbs investigation noted that most of Palantirs anti-WikiLeaks lines of attack were indeed carried out. Palantir also likely has access to your most sensitive health data. The company works with health providers in the United States and Great Britain. This has triggered a reaction in the U.K., where the group No Palantir in Our NHS was formed. A statement on their website explains their objections: Palantir is a U.S. tech and security corporation with a terrible track record. They help governments, intelligence agencies, and border forces to spy on innocent citizens and target minorities and the poor. We don’t trust them with our health data, and we don’t trust them to respect the values of our National Health Service… Palantir operates so far under the radar, it is special ops.”   PayPal Mafioso By the time he started Palantir in 2003, Thiel was already extremely wealthy. He had previously co-founded online payment service PayPal, which was sold to eBay for $1.5 billion the previous year. There, he made connections with another early PayPal investor, Elon Musk. Early PayPal employees went on to develop an extraordinary amount of the modern tech economy, so much so that they are widely referred to as the PayPal Mafia. Members of this mafia went on to found the video platform YouTube, the review site Yelp, and the business social network LinkedIn. Others sit on the boards of Microsoft and Reddit. Thiel is universally described as the don of the PayPal Mafia. The billionaire was Facebooks first outside investor, buying over 10% of the company for a paltry $500,000. He also served on its board of directors from 2005 until 2022. This savvy investment netted him a gigantic return on his investment. Thiel also had ulterior motives in founding PayPal, seeing the project as an attempt to use the power of money to overturn democracy as we know it and allow him to implement his deeply conservative agenda. The initial founding vision was that we were going to use technology to change the whole world and basically overturn the monetary system of the world, he said. However, he knew his ideology could never stand up to public scrutiny and would never be accepted by society. As he noted: We could never win an election on getting certain things because we were in such a small minority, but maybe you could unilateral change the world without having to constantly convince people and beg people and plead with people who are never going to agree with you through technological means, and this is where I think technology is this incredible alternative to politics.” Peter Thiel, left and Elon Musk hold up their credit cards they use for PayPal at company headquarters in Palo Alto, Calif., Oct. 20, 2000. Paul Sakuma | AP   Vampire Capitalist Like many individuals working in Silicon Valley, Thiel holds many controversial beliefs about society that should be better understood, given that he may become the shadow president in November. While still a student, he founded The Stanford Review, a deeply conservative newspaper that attacked attempts to diversify the student body and anyone who challenged American exceptionalism or the superiority of Western culture. In 1995, alongside fellow future PayPal mafioso David Sacks, he wrote and published the book, The Diversity Myth: Multiculturalism and Political Intolerance on Campus: Multiculturalism and the Political Intolerance on Campus. The book warned against multiculturalism, argued that racism and sexism were greatly exaggerated and that U.S. universities displayed a profound anti-Americanism and intolerance of all things Western. These arguments would later become standard conservative talking points. Thiel has also personally bemoaned the extension of the franchise to women and stated that freedom and democracy are incompatible because of the stupidity of the American population, whom he calls the unthinking demos. And while Thiel claimed that racism was largely a thing of the past, in 2016, the U.S. Department of Labor sued Palantir for egregiously racist hiring practices. The governments case noted that 85% of Palantir software engineer applicants were Asian, but despite this, Palantir still hired significantly more non-Asians than Asians. This meant that Asians were four times less likely to be hired. Palantir eventually agreed to pay nearly $1.7 million to settle the lawsuit. Thiel often identifies a supposed woke agenda as one of Americas more pressing problems. In a recent interview with podcaster Joe Rogan, he compared wokeism to Saudi Arabian Wahhabism. Unlike many Trump supporters, however, he blamed the Christian Church for its ubiquity, stating: [Christianity] always takes the side of the victim and there’s something where it is like some kind of deformation or intensification… And maybe you should think of wokeness as ultra-Christianity or hyper-Christianity.” If even the American Christian Church is too liberal for Thiel, then where does he see a future? In cyberspace, outer space, and in building floating towns in the ocean where people can finally be free from government interference and the woke agenda. The 56-year-old entrepreneur sees the Internet, human colonization of other planets, and building autonomous cities on the water as potential libertarian utopias. These are far from Thiels only quixotic schemes. Like many Silicon Valley executives, he also has many alternative beliefs about health. His, however, go further than many others. On a quest to live indefinitely, he follows a strict anti-aging routine, including taking human growth hormone pills and reportedly harvesting the blood of poor but healthy teenagers and injecting it into his body to boost his immune system. Peter Thiel Is Very, Very Interested in Young Peoples Blood, reads one headline from American Business magazine, Inc. Thiel funds several biology and anti-aging start-ups, including those that use stem cells to treat medical ailments. He believes society has been hoodwinked by the ideology of the inevitability of the death of every individual and has suggested immortality could be achievable, a notion that has deeply concerned academics and commentators alike. As a last resort, he plans to have his body cryogenically frozen if his endeavors do not succeed. From left to right, Jack Stephenson of JPMorgan Chase; Peter Thiel and StartOut Founder Darren Spedale at an LGBT Entrepreneurship Awards ceremony in San Francisco. Business Wire via AP   Free Speech Champion? In addition to funding big online media like Facebook and Reddit, Thiel (alongside Vance) invested heavily in video platform Rumble. Launched in 2013, Rumble saw little success for years. But after Thiel and Vance sunk their money into it, it has become a conservative media stalwart, marketing itself as a free speech app that will not censor its users. Yet Thiels commitment to the free flow of information has not always been consistent. Famously, he funded multiple lawsuits, to the tune of around $10 million, against Gawker, which eventually caused the news website to close its doors. In a 2009 interview, he argued that Gawker journalists should be described as terrorists, not as writers or reporters and claimed that they were Silicon Valleys al-Qaeda. Considering how Palantir was aiding the U.S. government with its occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan and how the U.S. was treating its enemies in its War on Terror, Thiels words could be seen as quite the threat. The lawsuits were roundly condemned as having a chilling effect on the free press. For instance, the editor-in-chief of the politics magazine Mother Jones described it as part of a campaign of press intimidation. Gawker had drawn Thiels ire for previously outing him as gay. Thus, instead of promoting a new era of free speech online, Thiels Rumble venture appears more likely to be an attempt to construct a conservative media in his image, just as he is rebuilding the modern Republican Party. Ultimately, Thiel is a walking contradiction: a libertarian who got rich from fat military contracts, an immigrant working with ICE and a free speech advocate who attacks media outlets. He presents himself as an outsider. Yet he is a mainstay at many of the worlds most elite institutions and conferences, including the Bilderberg Group, the Munich Security Conference, and the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. In many ways, his persona is almost out of a comic book, a real-life Lex Luthor. From aiding an Israeli genocide in Gaza to using AI to surveil immigrants at home to spearheading a war against whistleblowers, Thiels story perfectly encapsulates how Silicon Valley has been folded into the national security state and works to maintain the American empire well into the 21st century. Yet his latest venture into politics could arguably be his most consequential project. He has always had a close relationship with the U.S. government. However, a Trump/Vance White House could bring the billionaire a level of influence he previously could only have dreamed of. Thiel does not particularly seek out the limelight. However, with Trump surging in the polls, there is an increasing chance that he will soon have an even more profound influence over our lives, whether we like it or not. Therefore, it is crucial that we understand the man who could be calling the shots come November. Feature photo | Illustration by MintPress News Alan MacLeod is Senior Staff Writer for MintPress News. After completing his PhD in 2017, he published two books, Bad News From Venezuela: Twenty Years of Fake News and Misreporting and Propaganda in the Information Age: Still Manufacturing Consent, as well as a number of academic articles. He has also contributed to FAIR.org, The Guardian, Salon, The Grayzone, Jacobin Magazine, and Common Dreams. The post Peter Thiel: From Gaza AI War Criminal To White House Puppet Master appeared first on MintPress News.

[Category: Investigations, National, News, Top Story, AI genocide Gaza, AI targeting systems Gaza, AI war Gaza, Alan MacLeod, Gaza conflict AI technology, Israeli military Palantir, Lavender AI, Lavender AI Palantir, Palantir Israel, Peter Thiel, Peter Thiel Palantir war crimes, Peter Thiel Trump, Silicon Valley Gaza war]

— Israel Stalls Iran Reprisal Due To Geopolitical Fears

 

at 10/9/24 8:17am

It has been one year since the escalation of hostilities on October 7, followed by Israels relentless bombing campaign and ground offensive. This conflict has displaced nearly 2 million people and potentially resulted in the deaths of around 200,000. In the early months of the Gaza Strip offensive, there was hope for a ceasefire by New Year’s, then by Ramadan, and later by July. However, after a year of this nebulous war of attrition, that hope has faded. Israel has expanded the conflict into southern Lebanon, with no clear timetable or definable objectives. Negotiations with Hamas have stalled. Hezbollah has stated it will only stop firing rockets into Israel if a permanent ceasefire is established in Gaza. There was some discussion of a separate 21-day ceasefire with Hezbollah to ease tensions and contain the conflict. However, the recent assassination of Nasrallah has derailed that initiative. Now, Iran has retaliated with a 200-missile strike on largely military targets in Israel, leaving the region waiting for Israel’s response. Despite bombastic statements from Israeli officials about striking Iranian nuclear sites following Iran’s reprisal, I do not believe a wider regional war is imminent. Such an operation would be infeasible, highly provocative, and unlikely to succeed, as Irans nuclear sites are fortified against aerial attacks—not from Israel, but from the far more powerful U.S. Air Force. Israel appears to be delaying its response, likely at the urging of U.S. military leadership, which seeks to avoid being drawn into another conflict in West Asia. The potential blowback from such an operation could be unpredictable and volatile. Meanwhile, Israel is already grappling with separate division-sized operations in Gaza, the West Bank, and southern Lebanon. A distant conflict with Iran and its allied militias across Iraq and Syria would stretch Israel’s air defense systems beyond capacity. Despite the war hawkish stance of Netanyahu’s government, they are not entirely irrational. While they may naively hope to permanently alter the security dynamics in the Middle East, it is unlikely they will rush headlong into a wider war. The damage Israel would sustain in such a conflict could be irreparable, and current policy suggests they are not pursuing mutual annihilation. As we enter the second year of what many view as a campaign of genocide and ethnic cleansing, two things seem certain: The U.S. will continue to support Israel unconditionally with economic and political backing while ineffectively pressing for de-escalation. And, for the time being, the conflict will continue, but in a contained manner. Join us on State of Play for a year in retrospect and a look at what the future holds. In short, expect more war, violence, and a doubling down on imperial foreign policy. Greg Stoker is a former US Army Ranger with a human intelligence collection and analysis background. After serving four combat deployments in Afghanistan, he studied anthropology and International Relations at Columbia University. He is currently a military and geopolitical analyst and a social media “influencer,” though he hates the term. MintPress News is a fiercely independent media company. You can support us by becoming a member on Patreon, bookmarking and whitelisting us, and subscribing to our social media channels, including Twitch, YouTube, Twitter, and Instagram. Subscribe to MintCast on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and SoundCloud. Also, check out rapper Lowkey’s video interview and podcast series, The Watchdog. The post Israel Stalls Iran Reprisal Due To Geopolitical Fears appeared first on MintPress News.

[Category: Behind The Headlines, Foreign Affairs, Gaza conflict, Greg Stoker, Hezbollah, imperial foreign policy, Iran missile strike, Iran-Israel tension, Israel, Israeli air defense, Israeli ground offensive, israeli military, Middle East security, Middle East war, MintPress News, Nasrallah assassination, Netanyahu government, Qasem Soleimani, Southern Lebanon conflict, State of Play, U.S. military support, U.S. sanctions, West Asia conflict, West Bank operations]

— Israel to Establish Jewish-Only Settlements in Northern Gaza as Annexation Moves Forward

 

at 10/9/24 8:16am

Israel has set its sights on a potential annexation of northern Gaza, framing it as a closed military zone. This comes one year after the same area endured an all-out ground assault. Coupled with Israels newly established buffer zone and the occupation of two corridors in central and southern Gaza, the territory is being gradually eroded. In late October 2023, Israel launched its ground invasion of the Gaza Strip, concentrating primarily on the northern portion of the besieged enclave. At the same time, Israel issued demands for medical staff at all major hospitals to abandon their facilities. It then released CGI imagery depicting a “Hamas headquarters” under al-Shifa Hospital, which was later debunked after the medical facility was bombed and invaded. It had also ordered some 1.1 million civilians to flee towards the South, where “safe zones” were said to be located. Today, Israel has again shifted its focus onto northern Gaza, ordering the civilian population to flee and signaling to the remaining staff of the Kamal Adwan, Indonesian and Al-Awda Hospitals that they should immediately evacuate or be subjected to consequences of another military assault. Israel has now coupled its invasion of the Jabalia Refugee Camp with speculation that the government is moving forward with a plan reportedly considered by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in secret meetings back in September. This plan, publicly supported by certain Israeli members of the Knesset and former military officials, involves seizing northern Gaza and declaring it a “closed military zone.” According to Haaretz, Netanyahus administration is now preparing to enter the “next phase” of its war on Gaza, which could result in the de facto annexation of the area north of the Netzarim Corridor. This corridor, which has been occupied by the Israeli military, effectively splits the Gaza Strip in half. It played a crucial role in the breakdown of previous ceasefire talks, as Israel refused to agree to a permanent withdrawal from the area. The possibility of allowing Jewish settlers to establish colonies in northern Gaza is also being discussed. Since January, the settler movement has held conferences promoting this topic, signaling growing support for the idea. Additionally, on May 6, after Hamas agreed to a ceasefire proposal, the Israeli military immediately invaded the Rafah Crossing in southern Gaza. The invasion continued until Israels forces occupied the entire Palestine-Egypt border area, known as the Philadelphia Corridor. This, along with the destruction of infrastructure and agricultural land on Gazas outskirts over the past year to create a new “buffer zone,” has effectively reduced Gaza into an even smaller enclave. Over 1.5 million people are now crammed into overcrowded, unsanitary tent cities. A map of Gaza highlights destroyed structures and areas with a major decline in health and crop density near the Gaza border between October 2023 and May 2024. Source | Amnesty International Amnesty International published a report on Israel’s “buffer zone,” concluding that the area covered roughly 16% of Gazas total land mass. The group called for an investigation into what they described as war crimes. In July, reports emerged that Israel had attempted to create “Hamas-free bubble zones” in northern Gaza, aiming to use Palestinian collaborators to control specific areas independently and undermine Hamas’s influence. When this strategy failed, a new approach emerged in September: ethnically cleansing hundreds of thousands of civilians, declaring the north a closed military zone, and besieging the remaining resistance fighters. Despite Israels extensive assault on Gaza—actions the International Court of Justice (ICJ) has acknowledged as a plausible genocide—Hamas demonstrated its ongoing capability to launch M90 rockets at Tel Aviv as recently as October 7, 2024. There is no clear indication that Israel can achieve its stated goal of defeating Hamas, as Israeli military spokesperson Daniel Hagari has acknowledged. Yet, the U.S. and Israel continue to reject ceasefire negotiations, choosing to prolong the conflict instead. Feature photo | An Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) soldier stands in the ruins of a destroyed building in Gaza. September 13, 2024. Ilia Yefimovich | AP Robert Inlakesh is a political analyst, journalist and documentary filmmaker currently based in London, UK. He has reported from and lived in the occupied Palestinian territories and hosts the show ‘Palestine Files’. Director of ‘Steal of the Century: Trump’s Palestine-Israel Catastrophe’. Follow him on Twitter @falasteen47 The post Israel to Establish Jewish-Only Settlements in Northern Gaza as Annexation Moves Forward appeared first on MintPress News.

[Category: Foreign Affairs, Gaza invasion news, Gaza settler colonies, ICJ Gaza investigation, Israel buffer zone, Israel Gaza annexation, Israel Rafah Crossing, Israel war crimes Gaza, Jewish settlements Gaza, Netanyahu Gaza plan, northern Gaza military zone]

— Censorship and Damage Control: Israel’s Response to Iran’s Retaliatory Strikes

 

at 10/4/24 2:02pm

Iran’s retaliatory ballistic missile attack against Israel has sparked widespread condemnation from Western nations. These reactions have been accompanied by both denials of the strike’s effectiveness and suggestions that civilians were among the targets. However, video evidence and statements from Tehran’s military leadership present a different narrative. The Iranian attack, dubbed Operation True Promise 2, involved the launch of approximately 180 ballistic missiles against three Israeli military air bases, according to official statements from the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). The October 1 strike was met with widespread celebration across the Middle East as videos emerged showing dozens of missiles directly hitting targets near Tel Aviv and other locations. Iran’s Defense Minister, Brigadier General Aziz Nasirzadeh, stated that the attack was carried out with more than 90% success and was fully compliant with international laws. However, Israel and the U.S. countered by claiming that the strike had targeted civilians and ultimately failed. The most spectacular video yet of Iranian missiles impacting in Israel. pic.twitter.com/p72prcaKKO — red. (@redstreamnet) October 1, 2024 U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris issued a statement condemning Iran, claiming, Israel, with our assistance, was able to defeat this attack. She further stated that the alleged successful cooperation saved many innocent lives. Meanwhile, UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer echoed this sentiment, condemning the strike and asserting that the Iranian regime has launched over 200 ballistic missiles at civilian targets in Israel. He is saying the Nevatim military airport in the Negev desert is gone. The Iranian missiles have destroyed itpic.twitter.com/0LRKX74cK7 — الأخ الكبير (@BIG__Brother7) October 1, 2024 However, Iran explicitly stated that its attack targeted military facilities exclusively, and video footage supports this claim, showing missiles primarily landing at these locations. The specific targets were Nevatim and Netzarim military bases, which are home to squadrons of F-35 and F-15 fighter jets, as well as the Tel Nof air base. 15 minutes of footage of Irans missiles hitting Israel.. pic.twitter.com/KvXn7kR3GI — Nadira Ali (@Nadira_ali12) October 2, 2024 All the evidence seems to support Iran’s narrative, as no Israeli non-combatants were killed, and there are no indications that civilian sites were directly targeted. An analysis of the video evidence, published by The Washington Post, concluded that footage of two dozen hits on military targets is consistent with missile strikes, not debris from interceptor missiles. The analysis noted that 20 impacts were recorded at Nevatim air base in the Naqab desert, three at Tel Nof base south of Tel Aviv, with an additional two missiles falling short near Mossad headquarters. While Iranian media has circulated various claims, including the elimination of half of Israel’s F-35 fighter jets, these reports have yet to be confirmed. However, emerging information does suggest such possibilities, though definitive evidence remains unavailable. Israel has maintained strict military censorship throughout the war, even redacting articles in the Israeli media about the treatment of Palestinian prisoners. This heavy censorship makes it difficult to fully determine the specifics of recent events. However, there is now irrefutable evidence of direct hits on military infrastructure. Satellite imagery released by Planet Labs revealed 32 distinct impact sites at the Nevatim air base. The evidence, including craters, damage to structures, and scorch marks, suggests that Irans missile strikes caused significant damage to hangars, buildings, and taxiways, and created a crater on one of the runways. According to an analysis of the satellite imagery led by Jeffrey Lewis, a professor at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterey, if Nevatim is representative, that would suggest that more than half got through. BREAKING: Satellite Images were released of the Israeli Nevatim air base, one of the airbases that was struck by Iranian missiles on October 1st. Satellite imagery shows an aircraft hangar being hit as well as other buildings and possibly also damage to the runway.… https://t.co/kn14bSqbv0 pic.twitter.com/uBBr5FMqhX — Arya آریا (@AryJeay) October 3, 2024 On Wednesday, the Israeli military acknowledged that several office buildings and maintenance areas were struck inside Nevatim base. This admission contrasts sharply with Israeli army spokesperson Daniel Hagari’s initial assessment, which stated that “there were a small number of hits in the center of Israel and some other hits in the [sic] southern Israel.” Although the Israeli government maintains that the attack was unsuccessful and did not disrupt their air force operations, the shift in tone following the release of irrefutable satellite images is telling. Shortly after the Iranian strike, Google users began noticing that images of Israeli territory had been blurred, making it difficult to assess potential damage. Notably, the U.S. has a unique law prohibiting commercial satellite imagery of Israeli territory, adding another layer of complexity to independent verification. While Israel has yet to release a detailed breakdown of what it claims was a successful air defense operation, the usual post-operation transparency—such as publishing percentages of missiles intercepted—has been notably absent. This silence is uncharacteristic, especially after what would typically be presented as a success story.   Context Behind the Strikes In contrast to the typical coverage of Israeli strikes on alleged Hezbollah and Hamas military targets in Lebanon and Gaza, CNN took a more critical stance regarding Irans potential targeting of Israeli military headquarters, emphasizing its placement within a densely populated civilian area. While discrepancies exist in media coverage of Israeli strikes compared to those targeting Israel, significant context is often missing from the broader narrative. Over the past year, tensions between Israel and Iran have escalated sharply. In December 2023, Israel assassinated Iranian military leaders, including IRGC commander Sayyed Razi Mousavi. In retaliation, Iran launched a ballistic missile strike on what it claimed was a Mossad headquarters in Iraq. In January 2024, the Israeli Air Force conducted airstrikes on the Mezzeh neighborhood in Damascus, Syria, a densely populated area. The attack resulted in the deaths of five senior IRGC officials, along with a significant number of Syrian soldiers and civilians. Tehran chose not to retaliate at the time, as ceasefire negotiations regarding Gaza were underway. In early April, Israel launched a series of airstrikes that targeted the consular section of Iran’s embassy in Damascus, resulting in the deaths of seven people. This unprecedented action prompted Iran to retaliate by firing around 300 drones and missiles, which targeted Israeli military sites as a warning. When the issue was raised before the United Nations Security Council (UNSC), both the United States and the United Kingdom expressed their support for Israel and blocked any condemnation of the Israeli airstrike in Damascus. On July 31, Israel carried out the assassination of Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran, marking a significant violation of Iranian sovereignty. At the United Nations Security Council (UNSC), the United States and the United Kingdom once again aligned with Israel in response to the incident. According to Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian, Western leaders had informed his government that if Iran refrained from retaliating for the assassination, they could help secure a ceasefire in Gaza. Pezeshkian has since called these assurances outright lies, pointing to Israel’s subsequent assassinations, attacks, and military operations in Lebanon. The Iranian government had previously refrained from launching retaliatory strikes against Israel, expressing hope that diplomatic efforts could help end the conflict in Gaza. However, following Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahus decision to expand military operations into Lebanon and amid heightened tensions with Iran, Tehran initiated Operation True Promise 2 in what appears to be a direct response. Feature photo | Incoming missiles fired from Iran illuminate the Jerusalem sky, Oct. 1, 2024. Mahmoud Illean | AP Robert Inlakesh is a political analyst, journalist and documentary filmmaker currently based in London, UK. He has reported from and lived in the occupied Palestinian territories and hosts the show ‘Palestine Files’. Director of ‘Steal of the Century: Trump’s Palestine-Israel Catastrophe’. Follow him on Twitter @falasteen47 The post Censorship and Damage Control: Israel’s Response to Iran’s Retaliatory Strikes appeared first on MintPress News.

[Category: Foreign Affairs, Iran military retaliation, Iran missile strikes Israel, Iran-Israel conflict, Israeli air force damage, Israeli censorship satellite images, Israeli military bases hit, Middle East missile strikes, Nevatim air base strike, Operation True Promise 2, Western media censorship]

— Gilbert Bigio: Israel’s Man in Haiti and the Architect Behind the US Migrant Crisis

 

at 10/4/24 6:55am

In December 2022, Canada imposed strict sanctions on Gilbert Bigio, frequently referred to as “Haiti’s only billionaire” and the deeply impoverished country’s “richest man.” He, along with two other super-wealthy Haitian citizens, was accused by Ottowa of using his outsized influence and power in the country “to protect and enable the illegal activities of the armed criminal gangs” that have been tearing Port-au-Prince apart for years. Since then, Bigio has remained at liberty and unpunished meanwhile, Haiti has slid ever further into catastrophe. Markedly, no other Western country notably the sanctions-happy U.S. followed Canada’s lead. While wave upon wave of UN-mandated peacekeepers from every corner of the world have been deployed to Haiti in recent years, they have been unable to quell  and often exacerbated the violence that has left the country without a functioning state or civil society. Kenya, currently leading an international “anti-gang” initiative in Port-au-Prince, recently called for the effort to be transformed into a dedicated U.N. peacekeeping operation. For his part, Latin American & Caribbean Studies Professor Danny Shaw has zero doubt that Bigio and others like him are fundamentally responsible for encouraging and facilitating Haiti’s collapse. He tells MintPress News, “Only a tiny, well-connected clique of white warlords completely isolated from the needs and reality of the 99.9% of the Haitian population has the necessary private airports, ports and border contacts to smuggle guns and other contraband objects into the country.” That the arms have kept flowing all along, and no action has been taken to neutralize the international criminal networks operated by Bigio, undergirding that influx, tends to suggest the tycoon’s illicit activities are actively, if quietly permitted by powerful elements within Western governments. As we shall see, Israel may lie at the forefront of Bigio’s international protection racket. Comprehending how he furthers Israel’s interests in Haiti and the wider region may be crucial to understanding how Tel Aviv’s tendrils extend elsewhere overseas. Professor Shaw notes that Bigio is also active in the neighboring Dominican Republic, working closely with President Luis Abinader. For example, Pablo Daniel Portes Goris, CEO of Bigio’s GB Energy company, is Abinaders financial advisor. Walkiria Caamaño and Joan Fernandez Osorio are Bigio executives working for the Dominican president. Shaw adds: Individuals like Bigio have historically been untouchable on both sides of the border. Dominican Republic elites have historically teamed up with corrupt Haitian leaders against the 99.9 percent of the island’s population. The Bigios and a handful of other multimillionaire families, along with their hired politicians, are a state within a state. Much of what occurs in Haitian politics, from political coups to targeted assassinations, can be traced back to the power struggle that occurs between them.”   ‘Admiration for Israel’ In reporting on Bigio’s sanctioning by Canadian authorities, the Western media universally refused to mention his lifelong dedication to Zionism or intimate, long-running ties with the Israeli state. This deficit is indefensible, given a February 2004 Jewish Telegraphic Agency report on the history of Jews in Haiti featured a lengthy portrait of the oligarch, offering some highly revealing, deeply suspect disclosures along the way. Bigio was described as the “de facto leader” of the country’s ever-diminishing Jewish community, routinely convening celebrations such as Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur at his “big, beautiful house” in “one of the few upscale neighborhoods in Port-au-Prince.” Despite not being “a religious man,” Bigio was “especially proud of the Torah scroll he keeps in his study the only Torah in Haiti.” Coincidentally, Israel’s founders were typically not observant Jews but predominantly atheists and evangelical Christians. They remain among Tel Aviv’s most rabid supporters today. The Jewish Telegraphic Agency revealed how Bigio’s grandfather and father emigrated to Haiti in the late 1800s and during World War I, respectively, part of a contemporary wave of Sephardi Jew arrivals from Egypt, Lebanon, and Syria. Thereafter, the oligarch’s forebears “prospered in the export of cotton, cacao and campeche wood.” Come the present day, Bigio and his family had expanded their Haitian operations to include “industry and trading,” a steel mill, and banking. These activities made them “extremely wealthy” in a country where: “About 50 percent of the population is illiterate, and 76 percent of children under age five are underweight or suffer from stunted growth.” Despite this, while residing in a “well-guarded” palatial home replete with “a luxurious swimming pool and a gazebo for outdoor parties,” Bigio dismissed suggestions average Haitians felt any “resentment” towards him or other wealthy expatriates in the country, which included a number of high-profile Israelis. Instead, he suggested, “If you know how to manage success, people admire you instead of hate you.” He also “laughed” when asked if he’d ever experienced antisemitism in the country. In this undated photo, Gilbert Bigio is seen holding a Torah scroll. Bigio is a devout Jew with close ties to Israel Bigio countered that Haitians “have a lot of respect for the Jews and a lot of admiration for Israel,” noting Haiti voted in favor of the 1947 UN partition plan for Palestine, which created Israel. In the present day, he added, Port-au-Prince “annually imports $20 million worth of Israeli goods, ranging from telecom equipment to Uzi machine guns,” and the pair enjoyed “good” relations. As the Jewish Telegraphic Agency noted, the tycoon was well-placed to comment on this issue: Bigio…is the honorary Israeli consul in Haiti, which explains the enormous Israeli flag in front of his house as well as his bulletproof Mercedes SUV.” This may mean Bigio enjoys de facto diplomatic immunity, which could partly explain how, despite the Canadian government’s censure, weapons continue to flow into Port-au-Prince without hindrance and how he has not faced prosecution or penalties stateside or elsewhere. Conversely, though, a 2004 Jewish Telegraphic Agency interview concluded with Bigio refusing to “discuss politics or offer a Jewish perspective on the current revolt” against Haiti’s democratically elected President, Jean-Bertrand Aristide. The unrest had been raging exponentially for two years by that point. Bigio explained: Our principle, which we respect daily, is to not mix in Haitian politics. Even after three generations, we are considered foreigners. So we believe that to have good relations with the government, we have to step aside. We take care of business, and let them take care of politics.”   ‘Bigio Empire’ Just two-and-a-half weeks later, Haiti succumbed to yet another brutal, death squad-initiated, CIA-orchestrated coup. The effects reverberate throughout the country to this day. Aristide’s removal from office was quickly followed by wholesale destruction of all his administration’s progressive achievements for average citizens, U.S.-imposition of a savage junta in Port-au-Prince, and murderous paramilitary crackdowns on the ousted President’s supporters and political base. The parlous state into which modern Haiti has been thrust directly results from these dire developments. That’s indeed no accident. The full extent of the cloak-and-dagger connivances that spurred Haiti’s February 2004 coup and the identities of influential individuals and organizations implicated in sponsoring, funding, and training insurrectionary forces responsible for expelling widely-beloved Aristide may never be known. Nonetheless, Bigio has been regarded as a key orchestrator of the insurrectionary upheaval. In the spirit of cui bono?, the oligarch contrary to his professed commitment to non-interference in Haiti’s political affairs seems an immediately obvious candidate for supporting Aristide’s downfall. A redacted copy of Bigios diplomatic passport Jeb Sprague, a leading academic researcher on paramilitarism in Haiti and transnational capitalism in the Caribbean, tells MintPress News that there were earlier attempts to remove Aristide’s second government from office before February 2004, in late 2000 in the lead-up to his government’s inauguration, in an attempted assault on the National Palace in December of 2001, and through a low-intensity contra campaign carried out in the country’s central plateau in 2002-2003: Bigio was widely suspected to have supported these abortive efforts, in conjunction with fellow industrialists and treacherous, high-ranking local police and security officials. Bigio, as well as some other oligarchs and leaders of the Haitian military, were placed on a U.S. government list of supporters of the Cédras junta, which seized power after the 1991 CIA-backed coup that ousted President Aristide.” Moreover, mainstream U.S. media has acknowledged Bigio’s industrial-scale profiteering from the dismantling of what remained of Haiti’s crumbling state institutions. Without minimum wages and protections for Haitian workers and state restrictions on foreign ownership and exploitation of the country’s industry and resources, his family’s financial interests expanded across the island encompassing both Port-au-Prince and the Dominican Republic exponentially. Among the most lucrative components of Bigio’s newly enlarged portfolio were energy, security, and shipping. The Miami Herald reported in December 2021: The conglomerate’s reach extends to the entire Haitian economy, from providing construction supplies and fuel to offering household necessities like cooking oil and food. He has branched out as well into the Dominican side of Hispaniola…Much of what is bought, sold or consumed in Haiti is likely to touch some corner of the Bigio empire.” Significantly, this expansion included building and overseeing Port Lafito, a significant export and import hub not far from the Haitian capital. It is here that the vast majority of heavy, war-grade weapons enter the country, then reach the hands of dangerous gangs and militias, therefore ensuring a state of constant crisis locally. In April 2018, a source with knowledge of the matter informed independent journalist Corey Lynn that the Israeli government assisted in Port Lafito’s construction: He can enter anything [into Haiti] he wants…He also has powerful lobbyists in Washington D.C. to help him keep control of his assets…He does not allow competition and will crush anyone trying to compete with everything he produces or imports…[Bigio] has a private army of about 80 men protecting himself, his home and establishments. He also makes full use of every military, paramilitary, and police force in the country. Every chief of police is on his payroll.” Sprague explained to MintPress that: The ‘families,’ with surnames like Bigio, Brandt, Madsen, Acra, and others, have maintained powerful positions at the heights of Hispaniola’s economy. Even so, they’ve transitioned over the closing decades of the 20th Century and into the 21st Century from long alliances with the coercive rule of the Duvaliers and ruling military factions to seeking out corporate inputs through the globalizing economy and working in line with U.S. soft power in the region. Some maintain important linkages to security firms and paramilitary groups and the arms trade.”   ‘Pariah State’ Lynn’s source further alleged Bigio “has close ties” to the Israeli military and uses “10 Israeli commandos for his personal security when he feels the situation is at a critical point.” A particularly “critical point” in recent Haitian history was a catastrophic earthquake that struck the island in January 2010. Almost immediately, Tel Aviv dispatched a sizable IDF “humanitarian” team to assist locals and authorities. It was a widely reported, grand publicity stunt that regionally provided the Israeli government with enormous positive PR. Perhaps unsurprisingly, Bigio’s family was centrally involved in facilitating and managing this effort. At the time, Amos Radian, Tel Aviv’s ambassador to the Dominican Republic and the Caribbean, told the Jerusalem Post: “[they] assisted in such a way that made us look so good.” This included donating “a football field-sized space,” which served as an IDF “field hospital.” Gilbert’s son Reuven boasted to the outlet that his family’s “desire to help” Tel Aviv’s propaganda initiative in Haiti “was unconditional”: People need help, we need to be there…Being in a city where there’s no synagogue, prayers are done at our house, Israel to us is the motherland. It’s the rock. It’s how we identify ourselves.” An Israeli guards a refugee camp for earthquake survivors in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, Nov. 27, 2010. Guillermo Arias | AP Before mass violence in Gaza erupted in October 2023, such displays of international magnanimity were a routine and devastatingly effective soft power play for Tel Aviv. For example, following Tbilisi’s routing in its five-day-long August 2008 war with Russia, Israel began repairing extensive damage inflicted on the country by Moscow’s forces. In the process, Israeli investors reaped over one-third of all reconstruction contracts handed out by the Georgian government. Fast forward to November 2012. The IDF viciously attacked Gaza, slaughtering hundreds of Palestinians and wounding thousands more. International outcry and condemnation was amply forthcoming but by and large, not in Georgia. Their government remained silent, and scores of average citizens even took to the streets of their capital to express solidarity with Tel Aviv. In the years since, Tbilisi has signed numerous big-ticket deals to purchase weapons, missile systems, and security service and police training from Israel. Georgia is just one country where Israel has pulled off such an international relations coup. These activities garner Israel an enormous amount of international goodwill, in turn reliably securing silence, if not outright support, for its slow-motion erasure of the Palestinian people. The oppressive methods and tools of control and mass killing that it uses on Gaza and the West Bank are then sold to its foreign allies. This is a longstanding strategy for Tel Aviv. In the 1980s, Israel formed close ties with governments in the Global South, including brutal Western-backed dictatorships in Argentina, El Salvador, Guatemala, the Philippines, apartheid South Africa, and Zaire, just as foreign powers were starting to distance themselves from these regimes. As a member of the Likud party, who once headed the Knesset foreign relations committee, explained in 1985: Israel is a pariah state. When people ask us for something, we cannot afford to ask questions about ideology. The only type of regime that Israel would not aid would be one that is anti-American. Also, if we can aid a country it may be inconvenient for the US to help, we would be cutting off our nose to spite our face not to.”   ‘Smart Fence’ Anti-Zionist Israeli Jeff Halper and independent Australian journalist Antony Loewenstein have both written extensively about how what remains of Palestine is a laboratory, replete with test subjects held in controlled conditions, for Israel. It is seldom considered today that Haiti was the U.S. Empire’s original testing ground for imperial connivances throughout Washington’s “backyard” for centuries and the entire globe since 1945. While Haitians often describe their country as the CIA’s “laboratwa,” the country is indelibly linked to resistance, its historical genesis in the rebellion against French rule producing the world’s first and to date only independent state governed by former slaves. Yet, ever since, the U.S. has engaged in a wide variety of tactics to deny Haiti’s sovereignty, hamper development, kill hope, and ensure relentless instability. But of course neverending chaos means the wealthy, such as Bigio, can enrich themselves at the local population’s expense untrammeled, while Washington is provided with constant justifications for interference, meddling and military occupation to support that goal. In December 2019, this malign international mission was codified into U.S. law with the passing of the Global Fragility Act. The legislation effectively grants USAID, which in part functions as an intelligence cutout, and “the Departments of State, Defense, and the Treasury” a blank check to interfere in and take action against “fragile states,” supposedly prone to conflict, extremism, instability, and poverty. Haiti was explicitly cited as an initial target country for the effort. Unsurprisingly, no reference is made in the law’s text to the fact that any “fragility” suffered in Port-au-Prince is explicitly caused by Washington’s machinations there over many years. Israel stands to profit handsomely from instability worldwide, and it is unsurprising that Tel Aviv similarly seeks to perpetuate upheaval and vulnerability internationally and take advantage of disasters to provide a pretext for coming to the rescue via assets like Gilbert Bigio. The Dominican Republic is currently constructing a “smart fence,” at some expense, to prevent the violence engulfing Port-au-Prince from spilling across its borders. The structure is of Israeli design and technology, modeled directly on Gaza’s apartheid walls, or “separation barriers,” as Israeli authorities refer to them. Dominican police patrol a border fence with Haiti eerily reminiscent of Israels apartheid walls in Gaza. Matias Delacroix | AP The Dominican Republic’s fence runs 160 kilometers, comprising reinforced concrete walls and a metal structure 3.90 meters high, crowned by an accordion of barbed wire with sharp blades. All along, 170 surveillance towers, spying systems, motion detectors, high-definition CCTV cameras with night vision and infrared capacity, checkpoints and 71 controlled access gates prevent anyone from getting in or out without permission. Meanwhile, a squadron of surveillance drones patrols 24/7, every inch. The fence’s mere existence ensures friction and literal division between the two countries, which could otherwise be comrades-in-arms while justifying Israeli and U.S. presence throughout the border strip. That presence is likely to endure, if not expand, as long as Gilbert Bigio’s ownership of Port Lafito guarantees an inevitable flow of weapons and other harmful contraband into the country. It was indeed not for nothing that Bigio’s father played a pivotal role in securing Haiti’s support for Israeli statehood back in 1947. Feature photo |  | Illustration by MintPress News Kit Klarenberg is an investigative journalist and MintPress News contributor exploring the role of intelligence services in shaping politics and perceptions. His work has previously appeared in The Cradle, Declassified UK, and Grayzone. Follow him on Twitter @KitKlarenberg. The post Gilbert Bigio: Israels Man in Haiti and the Architect Behind the US Migrant Crisis appeared first on MintPress News.

[Category: Investigations, National, News, Top Story, Gilbert Bigio Haiti, Gilbert Bigio Israeli influence, Haiti Dominican conflict, Haiti Dominican Republic border fence, Haiti gang violence funding, Haiti smuggling networks, Haitian billionaire sanctions, Israel Haiti connection, Israel weapons Haiti, Western complicity Haiti]

— US Marine Who Volunteered in the IDF Speaks Out as Lebanon Invasion Kicks Off

 

at 10/3/24 3:03pm

There is no concrete operational plan for the invasion of Lebanon, aside from a vague idea of dismantling Hezbollah infrastructure along the border and establishing a military “buffer zone” to allow displaced residents of northern Israel to return to their homes. “What will be the depth of the invasion? How much will be cleared? We don’t know,” said Yaakov Amidror, a former major general and Israeli national security adviser. “It will be decided based on the achievements on the ground.” As someone who spent the formative years of his life fighting in the nebulous American project that was the Global War on Terror, this language is all too familiar to me. Phrases like The battlefield environment is dynamic, and mission requirements will flex to compensate for an evolving tactical situation were common. It’s a reductive statement, but we all know how the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan ultimately turned out. They were dubbed Forever Wars precisely because there were no concretely defined and thus no achievable goals. Israel’s Lebanon invasion will likely be no different. The IDF faces challenging terrain for an invading force, an enemy embedded in the land, willing to fight and die for it, and dwindling political goodwill in the international community. Moreover, the IDF is far less capable, disciplined, and powerful than the U.S. military. This invasion is likely doomed, following a trajectory similar to the strategic defeat Israel endured during its 2006 invasion. The reason is simple: Israel has not updated its military doctrine or tactics, techniques, and procedures in any substantive way since the mid-2000s. Israels over-reliance on bombing campaigns, coupled with a lack of maneuverability and poor integration between combat arms—infantry, artillery, and armor—is being compensated for by an aggressive information operations campaign. The strategy is to create an image of Hezbollahs defeat and portray absolute victory for Israel by highlighting short-term tactical successes. The assassination of Nasrallah is the most recent example of this propaganda effort. Then there is the ongoing systemic issue within the Israeli Defense Force itself. Despite Israels highly militarized society, the IDF fundamentally lacks cohesive discipline, competence, training, and experience. At its core, it is a conscript-based army, with the majority of its reservists having only two years of military experience. In reality, they are closer to civilians than to professional soldiers. To explore this point further within the context of the Lebanon invasion, we are joined tonight on State of Play by former United States Marine Corps Drill Instructor, Sgt. Zuleyka Morales. Morales volunteered to work with the Israeli Army, and as someone raised as a Pentecostal Zionist in Puerto Rico, she was taken aback by the IDF’s complete lack of discipline and military bearing. This stark reality began her process of unraveling the constructed myths surrounding the Israeli state, starting with the widely accepted myth of extreme military competence. How can they possibly hope to prevail in the challenging operational environment of southern Lebanon if they can’t even manage the simple task of wearing boots, rather than flip flops, to morning formation? Greg Stoker is a former US Army Ranger with a background in human intelligence collection and analysis. After serving four combat deployments in Afghanistan, he studied anthropology and International Relations at Columbia University. He is currently a military and geopolitical analyst and a social media “influencer,” though he hates the term. MintPress News is a fiercely independent media company. You can support us by becoming a member on Patreon, bookmarking and whitelisting us, and subscribing to our social media channels, including Twitch, YouTube, Twitter and Instagram. Subscribe to MintCast on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and SoundCloud. Also, be sure to check out rapper Lowkey’s video interview/podcast series, The Watchdog. The post US Marine Who Volunteered in the IDF Speaks Out as Lebanon Invasion Kicks Off appeared first on MintPress News.

[Category: Behind The Headlines, National, Top Story, failed Israeli military operations, Hezbollah border conflict, IDF military discipline, Israel Hezbollah buffer zone, Israel Lebanon invasion, Israel military tactics, Israeli propaganda, Nasrallah assassination, Sgt. Zuleyka Morales, Southern Lebanon ground war]

— Wafa Al-Udaini: How Dehumanizing Western Media Coverage Led to a Journalist’s Murder

 

at 10/2/24 7:50am

On September 30, Wafa Al-Udaini became the 174th Palestinian journalist killed by Israeli forces in Gaza, a harrowing milestone made even more appalling by the chilling circumstances that preceded her death. Following her appearance on the U.K.s TalkTV, where she faced hostile interrogation, Al-Udaini received direct threats from the Israeli military, targeting both her and her family. Al-Udaini was killed in a targeted Israeli airstrike that struck her home in Deir al-Balah. The same attack claimed the lives of her husband and two young daughters, including a seven-month-old infant. Her two sons, Malek and Seraj, were left injured and must now face the unimaginable task of growing up without their parents, as orphans in a war-torn region. Al-Udaini was a dedicated journalist who regularly contributed to outlets such as Palestine Chronicle and Middle East Monitor. She also founded the October 16th Media Group, where she devoted much of her time to educating students and mentoring young media professionals in Gaza. As a journalist, al-Udaini rose to prominence through her coverage of the 2018-2019 Great Return March, working tirelessly to conduct interviews, document the events, and highlight the historical context behind the mass non-violent protest movement. A UN report on the Great Return March concluded that Israeli snipers had intentionally targeted women, children, journalists, disabled people, medical workers, and the elderly, resulting in hundreds of deaths and tens of thousands of injuries. I am so incredibly devastated by this news. Ive worked with Wafa closely in previous times before 7 Oct. She was the peak of kindness, happiness, and tact. Her dedication and commitment to Islam is supreme and something Ive never seen before. May Allah SWT bless her and… https://t.co/qce4eLZPv2 — Abubaker Abed (@AbubakerAbedW) September 30, 2024 When the war in Gaza began, al-Udaini worked tirelessly to report on the humanitarian crisis and the massacres of civilians. However, everything changed on October 16, when she was invited to appear on a TalkTV show hosted by Julia Hartley-Brewer. On the show, Hartley-Brewer first invited Israeli military spokesperson Peter Lerner, who made a series of unsubstantiated claims that she did not challenge. She accepted his use of the word massacre to describe the Hamas-led October 7 attack against Israel without issue. However, when al-Udaini appeared after him, Hartley-Brewers demeanor shifted from one of respect to visible disgust. When al-Udaini described Israeli attacks across Gaza as “massacres,” Hartley-Brewer quickly interrupted, questioning why she would use that term and mocking her characterization of the strikes. However, by that time, the death toll in Gaza had already reached 2,750, with nearly 10,000 injured—more than double the number of Israelis killed on October 7. During the interview, Hartley-Brewer pointed out that the Israeli military had instructed people to move to southern Gaza so that they can tackle the Hamas fighters. She then pressed al-Udaini on why she hadnt left her home in Gaza City. However, we now know that Israel continued to displace Palestinian civilians who fled the north, most of whom are now living in tents. Al-Udaini responded by asking, Why should I leave? This is my homeland. If someone asks you to leave, are you going to leave your home? Hartley-Brewer condescendingly replied, If someone said they were going to bomb me and my family to death, like youre saying a massacre, then yes, I would leave. By saying this, Hartley-Brewer insinuated that al-Udaini was actively endangering her family by choosing not to leave her home. This effectively shifted the responsibility away from the Israeli military’s indiscriminate bombing of residential buildings in northern Gaza, which they were threatening at the time and later carried out. Instead, the question was posed to al-Udaini and her family, asking why they didnt simply follow Israel’s orders. Israeli media quickly picked up on al-Udaini’s interview. That same night, al-Udaini received calls from individuals posing as members of humanitarian aid organizations, using foreign numbers. They inquired about the number of family members in her Gaza City home in the Rimal area. After hanging up, al-Udaini told me at the time that she suspected the callers were Israeli soldiers. When they failed to obtain information through this method, she began receiving direct threats against her family. A few days later, I called al-Udaini to ask whether she believed the harassment was connected to her interview on TalkTV. She told me it happened immediately afterward, and it seemed she had been targeted because of the interview. Although she continued her journalism work, al-Udaini was clearly frightened by the situation. She went quiet for a while and had to evacuate from her Gaza City home. “My children keep asking me, are we going to die?” Palestinian journalist Wafa al-Udaini @wafa_Gaza was killed today by an Israeli airstrike on her home in central Gaza, along with her husband and two children. BT spoke with her Oct 2023. Full video: https://t.co/5f08qWgDfL pic.twitter.com/JIzD7demll — BreakThrough News (@BTnewsroom) September 30, 2024 For some time, when I asked out of concern where she was, al-Udaini would respond, “I can’t say sorry.” It wasnt until months later when she felt safe enough, that she informed me she was living in a building in Deir al-Balah. After the October TalkTV incident, I had the opportunity to interview al-Udaini about her experience. She reflected on how deeply she had been affected by the encounter, stating, “The anchor killed me.” She conveyed the profound sense of disrespect and marginalization she felt during the interview—a sentiment that now resonates with a haunting clarity. “I’m frustrated because I never had the chance to fully articulate my position,” al-Udaini explained. “She interrupted me, only to abruptly end the conversation with, We dont have much time.' When asked about her personal experiences during the war beyond her professional work, al-Udaini responded, “Words cant really describe it. Ive lost so many friends, so many colleagues, so much family. I genuinely fear for my childrens future.” While it is impossible to definitively link the murder of al-Udaini, her husband, and two children directly to that interview, it undoubtedly contributed to the hardships they faced. Julia Hartley-Brewers dismissive and interrogative treatment of al-Udaini, a journalist and victim of Israel’s assault, stands in stark contrast to her respectful and unquestioning interview with Israel’s military spokesperson. Hartley-Brewer’s approach granted legitimacy to Israel’s narrative while simultaneously undermining the lived experiences of a Palestinian journalist who would later be displaced and killed by Israeli airstrikes. Unfortunately, al-Udainis murder barely registered among her fellow journalists, reducing her to a mere number—174—on the long list of members of the press whose deaths are overlooked by Western media and governments. Her life and work, like those of many others, have been met with silence, reflecting a broader indifference to the plight of Palestinians. Wafa al-Udaini was more than just a casualty of a Western media landscape that dehumanized her; she was a devoted mother, educator, mentor, tireless journalist, and a fierce advocate for human rights. Above all, she was someone I had the privilege to call a friend over the past decade. In conflict zones like Gaza, journalists should be safeguarded, but tragically, Israel has made them deliberate targets. Robert Inlakesh is a political analyst, journalist and documentary filmmaker currently based in London, UK. He has reported from and lived in the occupied Palestinian territories and hosts the show ‘Palestine Files’. Director of ‘Steal of the Century: Trump’s Palestine-Israel Catastrophe’. Follow him on Twitter @falasteen47 The post Wafa Al-Udaini: How Dehumanizing Western Media Coverage Led to a Journalists Murder appeared first on MintPress News.

[Category: Foreign Affairs, dehumanization in media, Gaza war coverage, Israel kills journalists, Israeli airstrike Gaza journalist, media complicity in Gaza war, Palestinian journalist killed, TalkTV interview consequences, targeted airstrikes on journalists, Wafa Al-Udaini airstrike, Western media Gaza conflict]

— After Nasrallah: Will Israel’s Next Move Be a Ground Invasion of Lebanon?

 

at 9/30/24 3:02pm

There is a breaking story from Saudi news channel Al Hadath claiming that an unidentified man, traveling from Iran to Lebanon, met with Nasrallah shortly before the leader’s death for the express purpose of shaking his hand. The handshake was purportedly intended to transfer a trackable substance onto Nasrallah’s palm. Who was the man? What was the substance? Perhaps it was a traceable radioactive isotope, detectable by a scanner hidden inside Hezbollah’s headquarters, thereby confirming his location. The Al Hadath report, as of now, cannot be independently verified. However, it has been widely disseminated by media outlets in the Arab and Hebrew world and is being used as a propaganda piece to reassert the deadly cunning of Israeli intelligence services, which was called into question after the intelligence failure on October 7. Despite the infamous pager attacks, the targeted killing of senior Hezbollah commanders, and rumors of a sophisticated tracking operation, one truth remains: decapitation strikes dont win wars. If Israel and its allies want to classify Hezbollah as a terrorist organization, they should take a lesson from America’s ill-fated 20-year Global War on Terror. Nasrallah was a controversial figure—hailed by many in the region as a symbol of anti-colonial resistance and by others as an agent of pro-Assad terror during the Syrian Civil War. Regardless of ones perspective, he was undeniably a dynamic leader who transformed Hezbollah from a guerrilla resistance force into the most powerful non-state military actor in the world. Now that he is gone, the question remains: What comes next? Hezbollah and Lebanon are undeniably in shock following recent events, but the strategic situation remains unchanged—an Israeli ground offensive into southern Lebanon would be catastrophic for the Israeli Defense Forces. However, with the far-right government in Israel unwilling to consider a ceasefire or a two-state solution to the Palestinian question, their political options appear increasingly limited, leaving invasion as a likely course of action. Despite Hezbollah being momentarily degraded, it will not cease its rocket attacks into northern Israel—a situation that has become intolerable for the Israeli public. As a result, a performative ground operation appears necessary, though potentially misguided. Following a series of successful attacks on Hezbollah leadership, the IDF and associated intelligence services now have the publics support and confidence to push forward with a limited offensive despite the long history of military failure in southern Lebanon. Israeli leadership believes this time will be different from the strategic defeat they suffered in 2006. With a limited window to exploit their recent victories, they see no better time to invade than now. Tonight on State of Play, we’ll delve into Israel’s impending operation, its stated goal of dismantling Hezbollahs military infrastructure along the border, and the push to establish a buffer zone inside Lebanon—an inherently colonial term for military occupation. We’ll also explore why such a ground operation could have catastrophic consequences for Israel. Greg Stoker is a former US Army Ranger with a background in human intelligence collection and analysis. After serving four combat deployments in Afghanistan, he studied anthropology and International Relations at Columbia University. He is currently a military and geopolitical analyst and a social media “influencer,” though he hates the term. MintPress News is a fiercely independent media company. You can support us by becoming a member on Patreon, bookmarking and whitelisting us, and subscribing to our social media channels, including Twitch, YouTube, Twitter and Instagram. Subscribe to MintCast on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and SoundCloud. Also, be sure to check out rapper Lowkey’s video interview/podcast series, The Watchdog. The post After Nasrallah: Will Israel’s Next Move Be a Ground Invasion of Lebanon? appeared first on MintPress News.

[Category: Behind The Headlines, Foreign Affairs, Top Story, Hezbollah crisis, Hezbollah power struggle, Hezbollah response Nasrallah, Israel ground invasion, Lebanon war risks, Lebanon-Israel conflict, Middle East military escalation, Nasrallah assassination impact., Nasrallah death, Nasrallah legacy Hezbollah]

— Israel Killed 21 Members Of My Family In Gaza – Lowkey meets Ahmed al-Naouq

 

at 9/27/24 3:04pm

The MintPress podcast “The Watchdog,” hosted by British-Iraqi hip-hop artist Lowkey, closely examines organizations about which it is in the public interest to know—including intelligence, lobby and special interest groups influencing policies that infringe on free speech and target dissent. “The Watchdog” goes against the grain by casting a light on stories largely ignored by the mainstream, corporate media. In less than one year, Israel has managed to turn Gaza into rubble. A recent estimate by a global health expert suggested that around 335,000 Gazans could have been killed as a result of the Israeli attacks. Today, “Watchdog” host Lowkey speaks to one of the survivors of the Israeli bombing, Ahmed al-Naouq. Ahmed al-Naouq grew up in central Gaza and moved to the United Kingdom to attend Leeds University. In 2015, he co-founded We Are Not Numbers, a non-profit group that seeks to tell the stories of Palestinians to the world. The grief began right away for al-Naouq. “On the 7th of October, my fiancé’s house was bombed, and she lost her brother,” he told Lowkey, adding: We were lucky because, only two days before the war, she managed to escape Gaza and go to meet with me. And I know that if she did not travel with her parents, all of them would have been killed on the first day of the war.” For Lowkey, the Israeli attack on Gaza is of historic proportions. He compared it to the 13th-century Mongol invasion of Baghdad in its similarity in that it destroyed thousands of years of civilization. What has been done, he said, was so intensely violent, not just physically but culturally, that it is almost incomparable. On al-Naouq, Lowkey noted that his story: Really tells us the wider way in which Palestinians have been stripped of their humanity and killed on an industrial scale in Gaza. And it stands as a testament to the will to survive, regardless of the bullying, gangsterism and intimidation from the Zionist project.” Al-Naouq, a journalist by training, lambasted the deceitful Western media coverage of the attacks, stating: The media doesn’t care about its own audiences. They don’t care if they don’t know the truth or not. They are seeking their own interests. And clearly, those interests do not correlate with the truth, so we are challenging that by writing our own stories.” After nearly twelve months of bombing, those attacks show little sign of slowing down, primarily because Western governments continue to supply Israel with the hi-tech weaponry it needs to continue and defend its actions in international bodies such as the United Nations. Israel has recently stepped up its strikes on Lebanon and Syria, with Hezbollah and resistance forces in Iraq vowing to respond in kind. The United States, meanwhile, has increased its military capacity in the region, sending the aircraft carrier, the U.S.S. Harry S. Truman to the Mediterranean in a show of support for Israel. U.S. troops in the region now top 50,000. Thus, the prospect of a wider war beckons, meaning that stories like al-Naouq’s will, tragically, become even more common. Make sure to watch the full interview to hear a unique, first-hand experience of a Gazan living through the Israeli onslaught. Lowkey is a British-Iraqi hip-hop artist and academic and political campaigner. As a musician, he has collaborated with the Arctic Monkeys, Wretch 32, Immortal Technique and Akala. He is a patron of Stop The War Coalition, the Palestine Solidarity Campaign, the Racial Justice Network and The Peace and Justice Project, founded by Jeremy Corbyn. He has spoken and performed on platforms from the Oxford Union to the Royal Albert Hall and Glastonbury. His latest album, Soundtrack To The Struggle 2, featured Noam Chomsky and Frankie Boyle and has been streamed millions of times. The post Israel Killed 21 Members Of My Family In Gaza – Lowkey meets Ahmed al-Naouq appeared first on MintPress News.

[Category: Behind The Headlines, Foreign Affairs, Podcasts, Top Story, Ahmed al-Naouq, Gaza bombing, Gaza survivor story, Israel Gaza war, Israel-Palestine conflict, Lowkey, Lowkey interview, lowkey rapper, Palestinian Resistance, Watchdog podcast, We Are Not Numbers, Western media Gaza coverage]

— Hamas, Israel, and the Fog of October 7: What We Know Now

 

at 9/27/24 7:16am

It has now been one year since the October 7 attack, led by Hamas al-Qassam Brigades. There are two diametrically opposed versions of that day: the Israeli narrative and what the evidence suggests. On October 7, at 6:30 a.m., the Qassam Brigades, the armed wing of Hamas, launched a military assault targeting Israeli military positions, Kibbutzim, and surrounding areas. According to a 16-page report issued by the group, titled Our Narrative, their stated mission was to attack Israeli military positions and seize captives to exchange for thousands of Palestinians held in Israeli prisons. The report also acknowledged certain faults in their actions. Israel’s narrative claims that an unprovoked terrorist attack was launched against them, deliberately targeting civilians, including allegations of beheadings, burning, and dismemberment of babies, as well as a premeditated mass rape campaign. U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris described the events as “the worst atrocity against the Jewish people since the Holocaust.”   The Death Toll On October 7, it was quickly reported that at least 413 Palestinians were killed in Israeli airstrikes across the Gaza Strip. However, the Israeli death toll underwent several revisions before an accurate figure emerged. Initially, the Israeli government stated that 1,400 Israelis had been killed. On November 10, 2023, this number was revised down to around 1,200, with officials attributing the discrepancy to difficulties in differentiating between Israeli and Palestinian bodies due to severe burns. The final Israeli death toll from the October 7 attacks stands at 1,139, including 815 civilians and 324 soldiers, police, or security officers. This would suggest a civilian-to-combatant ratio of roughly 3.5:1, assuming all deaths were caused by Palestinian attackers. Other accepted statistical breakdowns report 695 civilian deaths and 373 combatants, along with 71 foreigners. This highlights the ongoing debate over who should be classified as a civilian, as many off-duty soldiers and trained fighters took up arms during the attack, shifting their status from civilians to combatants. According to a March 25 article written for Newsweek by John Spencer, chair of urban warfare studies at the Modern War Institute (MWI) at West Point, Israel has created a new standard for urban warfare in its war on Gaza. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu later cited Spencers article during his speech to U.S. Congress in July. Spencer’s argument is flawed, as he relies on Israeli ratio claims that dont hold up when examining the official death toll in Gaza, particularly when accounting for the women and children killed. Spencer references the 2016-2017 Battle of Mosul in Iraq to justify what he deems an acceptable civilian-to-combatant ratio in U.S. wars, highlighting a 4:1 ratio where 10,000 civilians were killed for every 2,000 ISIS fighters. Using this military logic and assuming Hamas was responsible for every Israeli death on October 7, they achieved a more favorable civilian-to-combatant kill ratio than the U.S. did in Mosul. Notably, this was accomplished without the use of modern precision weapons. Although this comparison may deviate from the core issue and is not an appropriate way to assess the events between Gaza and Israel, it is crucial to understand the logic behind the Israeli narrative about October 7 and what it continues to justify today.   Who Killed Who? The October 7 assault began with a breach of the Separation Fence between the Gaza Strip and Israel, as rockets were launched to provide cover for Hamas fighters using paragliders. Suicide drones also targeted Israeli army monitoring equipment and automatic machine gun towers. The attack, which Hamas named Operation Al-Aqsa Flood, initially targeted a series of military bases, outposts, and Israeli soldiers stationed at the Erez/Beit Hanoun Crossing. However, it also struck Israeli Kibbutzim, or settler communities, located around the Gaza periphery. Various other civilian sites were also attacked, most notably the Nova Music Festival, where hundreds were reportedly killed. According to the Israeli narrative, Hamas intentionally targeted the festival. This account was echoed in a recent BBC documentary titled We Will Dance Again, which aligns with Israels version of events. The documentarys director, Yariv Mozer, commented on the Nova Festival attack, reinforcing this interpretation. A brutal fundamentalistic movement [Hamas] is obsessively looking to destroy the values of Western society. These were young people at a music festival celebrating life, love, and peace: very naïve and free-spirited. And they faced the most horrific people, who value death.” However, as early as November, Israeli police reports concluded that Hamas had not initially planned to target the Nova Festival, with their primary objective being a nearby kibbutz, Re’im. Israel’s Channel 12 published findings from the first report, which included information from Hamas documents and interrogations. According to these sources, Hamas fighters only became aware of the festival during the operation and entered the grounds from a nearby highway. According to a report published by Haaretz, police analysis found that most partygoers had fled the Nova Festival approximately half an hour before any gunfire was heard. Additionally, the report indicated that an Israeli military helicopter had opened fire, resulting in the deaths of some festival participants. A United Nations human rights report, released on June 12, confirmed the presence of at least eight attack helicopters in various locations and noted that it was aware of reports suggesting these helicopters had been used to attack civilian vehicles at the festival site. The report further stated: The Commission found that Israeli authorities prioritised identifying victims, notifying families and allowing for burial rather than forensic investigation, leading to evidence of crimes, especially sexual crimes, not being collected and preserved. The Commission also notes the loss of potential evidence due to inadequately trained first responders. An investigation published in Yediot Aharonot in January concluded that at least 70 vehicles were destroyed by Israeli tank, drone, or helicopter fire, following orders from senior Israeli military command to prevent the capture of hostages at any cost. In December 2023, footage surfaced showing an Israeli tank firing on a civilian home in Kibbutz Beeri. It was later confirmed that Israeli forces were responsible for the deaths of 13 Israeli civilians in that incident, further supporting these revelations. Several videos show Hamas fighters engaging in violent actions within civilian areas, including indiscriminate firing, killing non-combatants, and throwing grenades into shelters. This evidence highlights instances of violence, but it does not conclusively prove that these actions were part of a broader premeditated strategy. There is still no definitive evidence regarding the full extent of responsibility for the majority of civilian deaths that occurred on October 7. Another important consideration is that Hamas was not the only group involved in breaching the Gaza separation fence on October 7. At least five different Palestinian resistance groups reportedly followed suit, targeting Israeli military sites and settlements. It is estimated that over 4,000 people crossed the fence that day. While Hamas led the mission, it remains unclear how many Israeli deaths were caused by fighters from these other armed groups.   A “Mass Hannibal” Event? Despite the questions raised by outlets such as The Cradle and the investigative articles published by Mondoweiss, the Electronic Intifada, and The Grayzone—which pointed to Israel’s infamous Hannibal Directive as a potential factor—this body of work has largely been dismissed and labeled as conspiracy theories. It is important to note that the Hannibal Directive, a controversial Israeli military order designed to prevent the capture of soldiers—even if it means killing them—was acknowledged by Israeli Air Force Colonel Nof Erez in December 2023. He referred to October 7 as a mass Hannibal event. However, widespread acceptance of Israel’s implementation of the Hannibal Directive on that day only came after Israels Haaretz published a detailed article on July 7. The bombshell Haaretz article, citing army sources, was released just before the results of an internal Israeli military investigation into the events of October 7 were published. The investigation confirmed that the Hannibal Directive had been triggered that day. However, it contained several inconsistencies, including a claim that Israeli tank fire did not kill any civilians at Kibbutz Be’eri. This assertion was later debunked by eyewitness accounts, forensic analysis, and video evidence, casting doubt on the investigations credibility and raising concerns about accountability within Israeli forces. A recent investigation by ABC News effectively compiled all relevant information from Israeli sources regarding Israel’s use of the Hannibal Directive. The report laid to rest any doubts that the directive had not been implemented on a large scale, providing clear evidence that it played a significant role in the events of October 7.   40 Beheaded babies Israeli media, government officials, and their Western counterparts have repeatedly circulated several unverified claims about the events of October 7. These included allegations such as the beheading of 40 babies, infants being hung on clothing lines, and a pregnant woman whose baby was reportedly cut from her womb. Many of these stories were initially promoted by the ZAKA rescue agency, which has faced its own controversies, including corruption allegations. The organization was founded by Yehuda Meshi-Zahav, who has been accused of serious criminal offenses. According to confirmed reports, one baby tragically died on October 7, killed by a bullet during crossfire. Other claims regarding babies have been debunked. During Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s July address to the U.S. Congress, he introduced a new narrative about October 7, claiming that two children hid in a basement only to be murdered by Hamas fighters. However, no record or evidence substantiates this claim, and no children matching the description have been reported. There have also been allegations of a mass rape campaign carried out by Hamas on October 7, which have been featured in documentaries like Sheryl Sandberg’s Screams Before Silence. The documentary presents interrogation tapes from the Shin Bet as evidence of these claims. However, serious investigations have dismissed these tapes, as they were reportedly recorded under conditions of torture, making them unreliable sources of evidence. Despite widespread reports from mainstream media outlets in the West that mass rapes occurred on October 7, Israeli police have not been able to verify any of the alleged incidents. There is currently no forensic evidence, documented intent, identified victims, or credible witnesses supporting these claims. The largest investigation into the Hamas rape allegations, published by The New York Times, became controversial when the family of a woman cited as a central case in the story publicly refuted the claims. The article quickly became the subject of a scandal, further casting doubt on the validity of the allegations. Praised across the media, an Israeli lawyer named Cochav Elkayam-Levy established what she was calling a “civilian commission” to investigate the Hamas rape campaign. Yet, despite all the positive press, she was later exposed for sharing countless fake rape stories and soliciting millions of dollars for a commission, of which she was the only member. This led to a number of Israeli government officials publicly distancing themselves from her and accusing her of “inaccurate” research. At the request of the Israeli government, UN Special Representative Pramila Patten undertook an eight-day mission to gather evidence of sexual violence allegedly committed on October 7. This effort culminated in a report summarizing the findings. Although the nine UN experts involved in the trip did not have an official investigative mandate, they released some key observations from their visit. The UN report concluded that Israelis were “subjected to various forms of conflict-related sexual violence,” though it stopped short of providing definitive conclusions. Instead, it stated that such incidents were possible. Notably, the report debunked two specific allegations as unfounded. One involved a woman reportedly found separated from her family with her pants pulled down. The investigation determined that a bomb squad had altered the crime scene, and the bodies moved, leading to uncertainty about the details of the alleged incident.   What The Evidence Says The Hamas-led October 7 attack remains one of the most politicized events in recent history, with its details being used to justify the ongoing violence in Gaza. The facts surrounding the incident are still being debated, with various narratives continuing to twist the specifics of what occurred that day. What is clear is that Hamas launched a coordinated military campaign on October 7, with the involvement of at least five other Palestinian resistance groups. The attack targeted Israeli military positions and settlement areas with the stated objectives of striking Israel’s southern command and capturing individuals to exchange for Palestinian detainees. During the course of these operations, intense firefights ensued, and numerous violations of international law were likely committed. Many extreme claims about October 7, such as those involving babies and decapitated women, have been debunked. Verified cases of killings with light weapons occurred, and Israels invocation of the Hannibal Directive led to civilian deaths. While its difficult to determine how many were killed by Israeli forces versus Palestinian groups, the scale of destruction suggests Israel was responsible for a significant portion of the casualties. Allegations of sexual violence on October 7 remain unproven. While individual cases may have occurred, no evidence supports claims of an orchestrated mass rape campaign. Investigations have not confirmed any specific cases but suggest such crimes could have occurred. While the overall picture of October 7 has become clearer, an independent investigation is necessary to fully understand the events. Israel has blocked such an inquiry and destroyed evidence, likely fearing it would reveal inconvenient truths that could undermine what little public support remains for its ongoing military operations in Gaza, the West Bank, and Lebanon. Feature photo | Illustration by MintPress News | Photo by AP Robert Inlakesh is a political analyst, journalist and documentary filmmaker currently based in London, UK. He has reported from and lived in the occupied Palestinian territories and hosts the show ‘Palestine Files’. Director of ‘Steal of the Century: Trump’s Palestine-Israel Catastrophe’. Follow him on Twitter @falasteen47 The post Hamas, Israel, and the Fog of October 7: What We Know Now appeared first on MintPress News.

[Category: Foreign Affairs, Top Story, Gaza War, Hamas attack, Hannibal Directive, Israel Gaza conflict, Israeli military operations, Israeli narrative, mass rape allegations, october 7, October 7 investigation, Propaganda]

As of 10/22/24 5:22am. Last new 10/17/24 10:57am.