CovertAction Bulletin

While most social media platforms spy on us, manipulate our emotions with hidden algorithms, feed our data to governments on request and censor with no notice or transparency, can there be an alternative that’s friendly for everyone to use? We talk with John Kiriakou and Sean O’Brien about Pancake, a new messaging technology being built to address that question.

We also discuss the important news from November 3rd that a New York judge has declared that oral arguments in the case Kunstler v. CIA will be open to the public. The suit alleges that the Central Intelligence Agency conspired with UC Global to illegally spy on Julian Assange and his visitors - including lawyers - at the Ecuadorian Embassy.

Finally, we bring you a selection of voices from the November 4th March on Washington for Palestine. To see the entire rally, visit BreakThrough News on YouTube.



About our guests:
John Kiriakou is a journalist, former CIA counterterrorism officer, former senior investigator for the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and former counterterrorism consultant for ABC News. In 2007, Kiriakou blew the whistle on the CIA’s torture program, that torture was official U.S. government policy, and approved by then-President George W. Bush. He became the sixth whistleblower indicted by the Obama administration under the Espionage Act — a law designed to punish spies. He served 23 months in prison as a result of the revelation.

In 2012 the Ralph Nader family honored Kiriakou with the Joe A. Callaway Award for Civic Courage, he won the PEN Center USA’s prestigious First Amendment Award in 2015, the first Blueprint International Whistleblowing Prize for Bravery and Integrity in the Public Interest in 2016, and in the same year the Sam Adams Award for Integrity in Intelligence, given by retired CIA, FBI, and NSA officers. 


Sean O'Brien is a Visiting Lecturer at Yale Law School, where he teaches Cybersecurity and founded the Privacy Lab initiative. He is Chief Technology Officer at Panquake, recently launching the Panquake Me link cleaning, shortening, and archiving service. Sean developed a Web3 and Blockchain class at Yale as well as Hacking and Cybersecurity at the Lawfare Institute and was founding Head Tutor at Oxford University Cyber Security for Business Leaders. Sean’s expertise has appeared in The New York Times, Forbes, Bloomberg, Popular Science, AP News, NBC News, The Financial Times, Wired, The New Yorker, and more.
 

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November 4th has been declared an International Day of Solidarity with Palestine. Over 100 demonstrations will take place that day around the world in solidarity with Palestine, from Johannesburg to São Paulo, Berlin to Kuala Lampur, Athens to Algiers. 

Meanwhile demonstrations have continued across the world every day. All of this organizing and action flies in the face of the prevailing Western narrative that the world stands with Israel.

Washington, DC will be the site of a giant demonstration as part of that International Day of Solidarity. Dozens of organizations are mobilizing people on trains, buses, in carpools and even by plane to attend from as far away as Dallas, TX and San Juan, Puerto Rico.

We’re joined by Sean Blackmon, a DC- based organizer with the ANSWER Coalition who’s mobilizing for November 4th in the city.

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Protests across the world in solidarity with Palestine are building a support movement for the Palestinian resistance and cause, showing leaders that people from the US to the UK to Yemen and Jordan and beyond stand with the Palestinian people in their fight against the US-backed Israeli occupation. These protests are changing the shape of media coverage and influencing popular opinion and the debate over the issue.

At the same time, social media companies like Twitter and Meta have been attempting to censor pro-Palestinian content. One video listing the hospitals that Israel has bombed was taken off Instagram after gaining 12 million views. The Twitter account for Palestine Action US was not followable for many days. But information continues to spread quickly, keeping the solidarity movement going.

We’re joined by Janine Hourani of the Palestinian Youth Movement in the UK to talk about these movements and developments.

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On October 7th, the Palestinian resistance launched its Al-Aqsa Flood uprising against the decades-long occupation by Israel. Despite $3.8 billion every year in military aid from the US and a vast military and surveillance state, the Israeli government seemingly had no warning to this carefully-planned advance.

In response, Israel has declared a “total war” on Gaza. It’s shut down access to electricity and the Internet and more. Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said, “There will be no electricity, no food, no fuel, everything is closed. We are fighting animals and we act accordingly.” Israel has bombed the Rafah crossing into Egypt, leaving Gazans with no way to exit.

Within 4 days, the Israeli bombardment has left nearly 200,000 more people displaced in the Gaza strip, according to the UN, which also warns of a deepening of the already disastrous water crisis in Gaza.

Western politicians in the US and EU have been quick to condemn the Palestinian resistance and pledge their support to Israel. But across the United States and the world, protests have broken out in support of Palestine and the right of people to resist occupation and apartheid.

We’re joined by Yara Shoufani, a member of the Palestinian Youth Movement, which is a transnational organization with chapters across the US, Canada, and Europe, that is struggling for the liberation of Palestine. Find PYM on social media and at their website palestinianyouthmovement.com

For an on-the-ground report from Gaza, we are also joined by Wafa Aludaini, a Gaza-based journalist and activist and the 15th October Media Group’s manager. Wafa also works as an international correspondent with several international publications.

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The United Nations voted on October 2nd to authorize a military intervention in Haiti, led by the Kenyan government. 

But a long history of foreign intervention and occupation in Haiti has led to disastrous results for the Haitian people, whether at the hands of the United States, France or overseen by the United Nations. This intervention is being opposed by people in Haiti and by internationalists all over the world. As Camille Chalmers, a Haitian economist and coordinator of the ALBA Movimientos Haiti, said in an interview, “We believe that there is a way to end the insecurity generated by gangs by controlling arms trafficking. We know where all these weapons come from. They come from the United States and the border; and it’s not difficult, with the technological means that exist today, to control the flow of arms and ammunition.”

So what’s the real reason for this new intervention? Why is Kenya leading it up? For all that and more we’re joined by Jemima Pierre, the Haiti/Americas Co-Coordinator for the Black Alliance for Peace, editor of the Black Agenda Report newsmagazine, editor of the Black Agenda Review, and a professor in the Department of African American Studies and Department of Anthropology at UCLA.

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After their highly-watched 15th summit, the core member nations of Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa have accepted six new members: Argentina, Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, who will become members on January 1, 2024. More than a dozen other countries have applied for membership.

But what is BRICS? As the world trends from a unipolar hierarchy led by the United States, to a multipolar reality with nations like Russia and China playing key political and economic roles challenging the reach of the West’s sphere of influence, we investigate what this grouping is, perhaps more importantly what it isn’t, and how US empire is reacting.

We’re joined by Amanda Yee, host of Radio Free Amanda.

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In Argentina, the far right-wing Libertarian candidate Javier Milei of the Liberty Advances party won 30% of the country’s presidential primary, calling for an end to “Kirchnerism” - really, a call to end the social programs fought for and won by the Argentinian people. We dive deeper into the analysis of how we got here, and what this surge in popularity of libertarianism really means. 

Meanwhile in Guatemala, Bernardo Aréavlo de León of Movimiento Semilla won the Presidential election on August 20th and will be sworn in on January 14th of 2024. His defeat of the center-right Sandra Torres, candidate of the National Unity of Hope (UNE) party, by a margin of 58% to 37%, is a sign of change against the “pact of the corrupt”.

We’re joined by Zoe Pepper Cunningham, Co-Editor of People’s Dispatch to get a deeper understanding of what these results mean for their respective countries, for Latin America and more.

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A recent article in the New York Times attacked peace groups and activists who oppose the U.S. government’s drive towards war with China. Just days later, Senator Marco Rubio sent a letter to Attorney General Merrick Garland demanding an investigation into Code Pink, Tricontinental Institute for Social Research, Dongsheng and others named in the article.

While they differ on tactics or on domestic social issues, both wings of the mainstream establishment in the U.S. are united in their effort to prevent China from becoming a world power and threatening the imperialist order. We’re joined by Ben Becker, the Editor-in-Chief of BreakThrough News, to investigate this New McCarthyism and review the history of the Red Scare from World War I through the Civil Rights movement.

To sign the petition we mentioned in the introduction opposing the McCarthyist attacks on those speaking out against a new Cold War with China, go to https://peoplesforum.org/sign-on

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On July 26, former President Mohamad Bazoum was removed from power by a military general, Tchiani. This has set off a wave of condemnation and threats of military intervention from the US and France, for whom Bazoum proved to be a reliable ally. Thousands have rallied to support Niger’s new leadership since July 26, reportedly carrying banners reading ”Down with France” and “Foreign bases out”. The US has about 1,100 troops in Niger and France has about 1,500.

Rather than analyze the reasons behind abject poverty and anti-Western sentiment in Niger and much of the region, Western countries led by the US and France are pointing to Russian interest in the region while purposely ignoring their own neocolonial history.

To understand the situation in Niger and how it impacts the rest of the African continent, and the greater geopolitical landscape, we’re joined by Eugene Puryear, an author, activist and host of The Freedom Side on Breakthrough News.

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To sign the petition we mentioned in the introduction opposing the McCarthyist attacks on those speaking out against a new Cold War with China, go to https://peoplesforum.org/sign-on

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