The coup plot comes just a month and a half after President Nicolás Maduro was reelected in the presidential election, which to date, the US has refused to recognize
In a press conference given on September 14, Venezuelan Interior Minister Diosdado Cabello announced that authorities had dismantled an operation reportedly backed by the Central Intelligence Agency of the United States and the National Intelligence Center of Spain, which sought to assassinate President Nicolás Maduro, Vice President Delcy Rodríguez, Cabello, and other government officials. The minister announced that Venezuelan authorities had seized 400 weapons from the US and arrested 14 mercenaries who were involved in the plot. Among the arrested is Wilber Joseph Castañeda, an active US military officer and Navy Seal. Two Spanish citizens were reportedly also arrested, José María Basua and Andrés Badasbe.
#ÚltimoMinuto| Ministro de Interior @dcabellor da detalles de la operación sobre Venezuela que han sido detectados y desarticulados.
Algunos puntos claves:
✔️ Fueron decomisadas 400 armas que provenían de EEUU para asesinar al presidente Nicolás Maduro, la Vicepresidenta… pic.twitter.com/ztdATsYVDq
Officials stated that according to a document they seized from one of the detainees, the plot included attacking the Miraflores Palace and other public institutions, in addition to carrying out sabotage actions against various public services to generate chaos.
According to officials, those arrested possessed between 10-12 weapons in their homes that were set to be used in the destabilization plan. Cabello noted that many of those arrested also have links to Venezuela’s far-right opposition network.
He added that the weapons seized by authorities were brought to the country in “apparently legal” shipments and received by groups linked to the extreme right.
One of the leaders of the illegal arms trafficking network in the country, Cabello claimed, is a man who is already a fugitive from Venezuelan justice, Iván Simonovis. “Because of the capture of this weaponry here in Venezuela, they have taken actions in other countries that have included the murder of people. Simonovis knows what I am talking about,” he stated.
Venezuela has demanded that the United States government respond to the incident and “clarify the use of its agencies and the use of its territory to traffic weapons aimed at overthrowing a democratically elected government.”
Cabello declared: “The United States is behind this operation, they are delivering these weapons so that they circulate freely and reach Venezuela…They can say what they want, their agents are confessing. Castañeda is the head of the operation [of] the CIA here and they have a link with criminal groups in Venezuela.”
Regarding the Venezuelan state’s intelligence capacities, Cabello stated: “Let the world know that we are going to use all the necessary mechanisms to repel, to defeat these groups of mercenaries, of terrorists who try to undermine peace and order in Venezuela…prepare to be defeated again.”
Venezuelan people marched in the rain on July 30 in defense of the electoral results. Photo: Zoe Alexandra
Social and workers’ movements across the world have launched a campaign to stand in solidarity with the Venezuelan people as they face a wave of attacks following the presidential elections.
On August 9, the ALBA Movimientos, a platform of social and political movements from across the Americas and the Caribbean, the International Peoples’ Assembly, the Simon Bolivar Institute, and the Assembly of Caribbean Peoples, launched a campaign titled: “For Democracy and Sovereignty: Hands Off Venezuela!” The campaign comes in the aftermath of Venezuela’s presidential election and a wave of seemingly coordinated attacks from right-wing political actors, mainstream media, and US and its allies.
The launch document states that, for several months, a media campaign has been created to question the legitimacy of the elections in the Caribbean country. “From the hegemonic media, with political and diplomatic strategies, it has been sought to install an idea of the illegitimacy of the recent Venezuelan electoral process,” states the communiqué.
The joint statement affirms that the campaign mentioned above against the legitimacy of the Venezuelan electoral process has been shaped from several communicational fronts: creating doubts about the technological capacity of the electoral machines, reinforcing the 930 economic sanctions against Venezuela, generating violence in the streets and illegally self-declaring González Urrutia as president of the country, among others.
The geopolitical importance of Venezuela, both for its geographic location and vast natural resources, are at the center of the current dispute, the organizations argue. “It is impossible [to understand the situation of] Venezuela without placing it in the regional and global geopolitical context: its privileged place in world oil production, its common goods placed at the service of the people, the place it occupies in the multipolar world together with the emerging countries, and of course, its leadership of a project of union and regional integration in Latin America and the Caribbean that gives continuity to the defeat of the FTAA and keeps alive the horizon of continental sovereignty far from the designs of the United States”.
In this way, the document invites progressive and revolutionary organizations to combat the media campaign imposed by the national and international opposition to Venezuela, which, according to the document, is directly aligned with the imperialist interests of the United States.
On August 9, the launch day of the campaign, the movement platforms have called on organizations across the globe to mobilize on the streets and on social media in support of Venezuela.
🇻🇪 BREAKING! The people of New York City say “HANDS OFF VENEZUELA” and “NO to US Intervention” in front of New York Times Headquarters
While The New York Times has been engaged in a misinformation campaign to encourage and justify US-led coup attempts and economic warfare… pic.twitter.com/TbMXycKvr4
South African workers speak out in support of Venezuela
The National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (NUMSA), in a press release issued on August 8, 2024, congratulated the Venezuelan people for holding free and fair elections, as well as congratulating the re-election with more than 51% of the votes of Nicolás Maduro as president of Venezuela.
NUMSA also questions the media campaign against the legitimacy of the electoral process that could lead to a coup d’état in Venezuela. According to the communiqué, “These media houses are not neutral. Their role is to advance the interests of capital and to promote US imperialism and hegemony. It is not in the interest of Western powers to endorse the elections in Venezuela…We are deeply concerned that US propaganda is being reproduced by many media houses that have sadly been trapped into reinforcing attempts at a coup by imperialism against the will of the Venezuelan people.”
In addition, the NUSMA communiqué insists on the close relationship that the Venezuelan opposition has with the geopolitical interests of the United States, including the friendship that María Corina Machado has professed with the Zionist government of Israel; “The United States does not have a commendable history in defending the dignity of most people. Today, we can take one look at the US-backed genocide against the Palestinian people to know this. It, therefore, comes as no surprise that the right-wing opposition coup leader in Venezuela is a Zionist”.
Likewise, the NUMSA communiqué recognizes the great economic and geostrategic value of Venezuela in current international relations, which is why there are imperial powers that seek to control the political future of Venezuela at any cost so that the recognition of the elections would be a way for the people to reaffirm their sovereignty and their ability to decide their future without the interference of other countries: “the US has set its sights on the enormous mineral wealth of Venezuela and seems determined to expropriate these through the imposition of a puppet regime under the leadership of Edmundo González. Against this backdrop, all progressive forces must reaffirm their unwavering commitment to the sovereignty of Venezuela. We call on our government, media, governments, and media houses worldwide to uphold the principles of peace, democracy, and national self-determination by acknowledging the outcomes of the Venezuelan election.”
Anti-imperialist and progressive movements from across the world are gearing up for the international campaign to condemn the so-called hybrid war against Venezuela and express their support to its struggle for sovereignty and democracy.
Aysenur Ezgi Eygi was shot dead by Israeli forces (Photo via Wafa)
The shooting occurred while Israeli forces were violently suppressing a weekly protest against an Israeli settlement
26-year-old US activist Aysenur Ezgi Eygi succumbed to her wounds on Friday after being shot by Israeli forces at a protest in Beita, to the south of Nablus. Headlines from Western mainstream media sources have already attempted to obscure who killed the solidarity activist, with CNN stating “American activist shot dead during protest in West Bank, Palestinian officials say,” CBS News writing, “American woman Aysenur Eygi killed in Israeli-occupied West Bank, US confirms,” and BBC writing. “American activist shot dead in occupied West Bank.”
Hey how’d they die, Matt? Was it magic? Who or what killed Aysenur?
The shooting occurred while Israeli forces were violently suppressing a weekly protest against an Israeli settlement. Israeli forces employed live ammunition, stun grenades, and tear gas, and also resulted in the injury of an 18-year-old Palestinian man via shrapnel. Eygi was reportedly part of the Faz’a campaign, which aims to mobilize international solidarity activists on the ground in Palestine to protect Palestinian farmers from Israeli settlers and military forces. Eygi was also an activist with the International Solidarity Movement, a Palestinian-led organization committed to resisting the occupation.
ISM released a statement condemning Eygi’s killing, quoting multiple ISM members. ISM volunteer Mariam Dag (a pseudonymn) witnessed the shooting, and said ““We were peacefully demonstrating alongside Palestinians against the colonization of their land, and the illegal settlement of Evyatar. The situation escalated when the Israeli army began to fire tear gas and live ammunition, forcing us to retreat. We were standing on the road, about 200 meters from the soldiers, with a sniper clearly visible on the roof. Our fellow volunteer was standing a bit further back, near an olive tree with some other activists. Despite this, the army intentionally shot her in the head.”
Dag continued, “This is just another example of the decades of impunity granted to the Israeli government and army, bolstered by the support of the US and European governments, who are complicit in enabling genocide in Gaza. Palestinians have suffered far too long under the weight of colonization. We will continue to stand in solidarity and honor the martyrs until Palestine is free.”
The Palestinian Ministry of Foreign Affairs condemned the “brutal execution committed today by Israeli occupation forces,” stating that “the ministry views this act as part of the ongoing crimes perpetrated by the Israeli occupation against the Palestinian people, including genocide, forced displacement, and the targeting of individuals who show solidarity with the Palestinian cause.”
The Ministry “calls on the international community, human rights organizations, and global institutions to take urgent action to provide international protection for Palestinians. The Ministry urges these entities to fulfill their legal and moral responsibilities by addressing violations, including genocide, forced displacement, illegal settlements, and extrajudicial killings, and to hold Israeli war criminals accountable.”
It is unclear how the United States will respond, beyond offering their “deepest condolences.” Israel has killed several US citizens, including two Palestinian-American teenagers earlier this year, Mohammad Khdour and Tawfic Abdel Jabbar, both 17 years old, also shot by Israeli forces. US Secretary of State Antony Blinken again offered condolences for the teenagers “who reportedly were killed,” but did nothing more than call for an investigation.
“We’ve made clear that with regard to the incidents you’ve alluded to, there needs to be an investigation. We need to get the facts. And if appropriate, there needs to be accountability,” Blinken said at the time.
The families were unsatisfied with the US’s response. “We don’t need talking, man,” said Adnan Khdour, uncle to Mohammad Khdour, killed by Israeli forces in the West Bank. “We need something. We want to see something.” The US has never conditioned aid to Israel based on the killing of a US citizen.
Eygi’s killing recalls the high-profile case of Israel’s murder of US activist Rachel Corrie in 2003, who was run over by a bulldozer trying to demolish a Palestinian home in Rafah. The United States did nothing to punish Israel, despite US officials themselves claiming that the Israeli investigation into Corrie’s death was not “credible.” In fact, the US itself is complicit in the killing as the Caterpillar bulldozer which killed Corrie was supplied by the US as part of its aid to Israel.
The Party for Socialism and Liberation, a US-based socialist political party active in the Palestine solidarity movement, said of Eygi’s killing: “This killing, like so many others, was carried out thanks to weaponry provided by the United States. We demand the Biden administration end all aid to this genocidal regime. The killers of Aysenur should be brought to justice, alongside the killers of thousands of Palestinians.”
Bodies of Palestinians, including babies, who were killed in the Israeli army’s attack on the Nuseirat Refugee Camp are brought to the Aqsa Martyrs Hospital morgue in Deir al-Balah, Gaza on August 30, 2024. (Photo: Ali Jadallah/Anadolu via Getty Images)
“Harris is saying she will reject 77% of Democrats, 61% of Americans, international law, domestic U.S. law, and basic humanity to continue the flow of weapons to Israel while it stands accused of genocide,” said one analyst.
Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris said in a CNN interview that aired late Thursday that, if elected in November, she would not change the Biden administration’s policy of steadfast military support for Israel, rejecting widespread calls for an arms embargo to help bring about an end to the devastating assault on Gaza.
“I’m unequivocal and unwavering in my commitment to Israel’s defense and its ability to defend itself, and that’s not gonna change,” said Harris, recounting the horrors of the Hamas-led October 7 attack. “Israel had a right, has a right to defend itself.”
Acknowledging that “far too many innocent Palestinians have been killed,” the vice president responded “no” when CNN‘s Dana Bash asked whether a Harris administration would implement a “change in policy in terms of arms” and withhold even “some” weapons shipments to Israel.
Watch:
HORRIFIC. It's extremely clear that Kamala Harris would do the same as what Biden is doing on Gaza: "Would you do anything differently? For example, would you withhold some U.S. weapons shipments to Israel?" Kamala Harris: "I'm unequivocal and unwavering in my commitment to… pic.twitter.com/EQ0gV6vcFP
The CNN appearance marked Harris’ first major television interview since becoming the Democratic nominee, a change at the top of the party’s 2024 ticket that Palestinian rights advocates hoped would open the door to a fundamental shift away from the Biden administration’s Gaza policy—which has been to arm Israel to the teeth while tepidly pressuring the country’s far-right government to protect civilians and agree to a cease-fire deal.
“The vice president’s statement was morally indefensible and politically shortsighted as the lack of American consequences for Netanyahu’s horrific assault on Palestinian civilians in Gaza has emboldened Israel to now invade the West Bank,” Layla Elabed and Abbas Alawieh, co-founders of the Uncommitted National Movement, said in a statement Friday. “Vice President Harris must turn the page from one of the most glaring foreign policy failures of our time by aligning with the American majority that opposes sending weapons to Israel’s assault on Gaza.”
Despite Bash’s characterization of calls for an arms embargo against Israel as a demand from the “progressive left,” survey data has shown that a majority of U.S. voters oppose sending weapons to Israel as it commits appalling war crimes in Gaza and the West Bank. Since October, the U.S. has sent Israel over 50,000 tons of weaponry.
“Harris is saying she will reject 77% of Democrats, 61% of Americans, international law, domestic U.S. law, and basic humanity to continue the flow of weapons to Israel while it stands accused of genocide,” Middle East scholar Assal Rad said late Thursday, citing the results of a recent CBS News/YouGov poll.
A separate poll commissioned by the IMEU Policy Project suggested that voters in key U.S. battleground states would be more likely to vote for a Democratic nominee who pledged to withhold weapons from Israel.
The CNN interview aired as Israel continued its multi-day assault on the West Bank, a deadly military campaign that the head of the United Nations and others warned could become an extension of the nearly 11-month war on Gaza, during which Israel has killed more than 40,600 people, displaced 90% of the enclave’s population, and sparked famine across the territory.
On Thursday, Israel’s military killed five Palestinians in an airstrike on a vehicle convoy of the Washington, D.C.-based American Near East Refugee Aid (ANERA) agency. It is a violation of U.S. law to provide weaponry to a country obstructing the delivery of American humanitarian aid.
Note: In May, the Biden-Harris State Department admitted it’s “reasonable to assess” that Israeli forces have used US weapons in ways “inconsistent” with international law.
Still, Harris — after months of failed attempts to secure a ceasefire — says she wouldn’t change policy: https://t.co/cyXw7Hoqk7
The attack on the ANERA convoy came a day after Israeli forces opened fire on a World Food Program vehicle, forcing the U.N. agency to suspend employee movement in Gaza.
Harris’ refusal to express openness to an arms embargo against a military that has repeatedly targeted aid and healthcare workers, journalists, and other civilians sparked immediate backlash from Palestinian rights advocates, including at least one member of Congress.
Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.), the only Palestinian American in the U.S. Congress, said Harris’ answer signaled that “war crimes and genocide will continue.”
Yonah Lieberman, co-founder of IfNotNow, called the Democratic nominee’s answer on Gaza “terrible” and “out of touch with voters, especially those in key battleground states who Harris needs to feel motivated to go to the polls.”
“Poll after poll after poll tells us that a majority of Americans and even more key Democratic constituencies want the US to stop giving arms to Israel that it’s using to kill and displace Palestinian families,” Lieberman added. “Not sending bombs to Israel is politically expedient and—quite obviously!—the morally correct thing to do for anyone reading the daily headlines of Israeli massacres being done with U.S. weapons.”
In an op-ed for Common Dreams on Friday, RootsAction national director Norman Solomon warned that “time is running out for Kamala Harris to distance herself from U.S. policies that enable Israel to continue with mass murder and genocide in Gaza.”
“Polling shows that a pivot toward moral decency would improve her chances of defeating Donald Trump,” Solomon wrote. “But during her CNN interview Thursday night, Harris remained in lockstep with President Biden’s unconditional arming of Israel.”
This story has been updated to include a statement from the Uncommitted National Movement.
The Petra Nova Carbon Capture Project is seen on December 20, 2016 in Houston, Texas. (Photo: Marie D. De Jesus/Houston Chronicle via Getty Images)
“The fossil fuel industry delays climate action, distracts from real solutions that would end the fossil fuel era, and does everything in its power to squeeze the last drops of profit from a dying industry, at the expense of all of us.”
Among the world’s wealthiest countries, the U.S. leads the way in spending public money on so-called climate “solutions” that have been proven to “consistently fail, overspend, or underperform,” according to an analysis released Thursday by the research and advocacy group Oil Change International.
The group’s report, titled Funding Failure, focuses on international spending on carbon capture and fossil-based hydrogen subsidies, which continues despite ample data showing that the technological fixes have “failed to make a dent in carbon emissions” after 50 years of research and development.
The report details how five countries account for 95% of all carbon capture spending, with the U.S. investing the most taxpayer money in the technology, at $12 billion in subsidies over the last 40 years.
Norway comes in second with $6 billion going to carbon capture and storage, while Canada has spent $3.8 billion, the European Union has spent $3.6 billion, and the Netherlands has poured $2.6 billion into the technology, with which carbon dioxide emissions are compressed and utilized or stored underground.
“It is nothing short of a travesty that funds meant to combat climate change are instead bolstering the very industries driving it.”
Harjeet Singh, global engagement director for the Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty Initiative, told The Guardian that the subsidies amount to a “colossal waste of money.”
“It is nothing short of a travesty that funds meant to combat climate change are instead bolstering the very industries driving it,” said Singh.
While proponents claim carbon capture and storage reduces planet-heating carbon emissions, OCI notes, it was originally developed in the 1970s “to enhance oil production, and this remains its primary use,” with the technology “barely” reducing emissions.
High-profile carbon capture failures in the U.S. include the Petra Nova project in Houston, Texas, which cost nearly $200 million in taxpayer funds and whose captured emissions were later used for crude oil production, and the FutureGen project, “which swallowed $200 million and never materialized.”
“Investing in carbon capture delays the transition to renewable energy,” reads OCI’s report. “Instead of wasting time and money on technologies that do not work, governments must commit to justly and urgently phasing out fossil fuels before it’s too late.”
Despite the lack of data supporting the use of carbon capture, the group said, countries including the U.S. are “preparing to waste hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars on these ineffective technologies, further benefiting the fossil fuel industry.”
OCI highlighted how the U.S. and Canada, while ostensibly fighting the climate crisis, have spent a combined $4 billion in public money to explicitly “pay oil companies to produce more oil,” with the subsidies going to carbon capture for “enhanced oil recovery.”
The report also found that in addition to the $12 billion in taxpayer funds the U.S. has spent on carbon capture and fossil hydrogen—a leak-prone gas produced through energy-intensive processes that cause their own emissions—the government has spent an estimated $1.3 billion on the 45Q tax credit, which allows companies to write off tax for every ton of carbon dioxide they store underground.
The Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) increased the amount given to companies in 45Q tax credits from $35 to $60 per ton, meaning that the subsidy could grow to over $100 billion in the next 10 years.
OCI’s Policy Tracker shows that overall public spending on carbon capture and hydrogen could grow by between $115 billion and $240 billion in the coming decades.
“We need real climate action, not fossil fuel bailouts!” said OCI in a post on social media.
The group’s report also highlights that fossil fuel giants such as ExxonMobil have shifted from carbon capture skeptics to outspoken proponents of the technology—with the company bragging to investors that carbon capture and hydrogen would help its Low Carbon Business Unit make “hundreds of billions of dollars” and grow to be “larger than ExxonMobil’s base business.”
Exxon didn’t launch its carbon capture efforts until 2018, having spent several years and hundreds of millions of dollars on another “climate solution” that ultimately failed: the use of algae to make biofuels.
Since then, Exxon has “pushed for direct government funding for carbon capture, particularly at the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE),” successfully lobbying for $12 billion allocated in the Bipartisan Infrastructure Bill in 2021 for “carbon management research, development, and demonstration.”
Exxon also lobbied for the increased rate of the 45Q tax credit in the IRA and “played a ‘central role’ in drafting a 2019 DOE-sponsored report on carbon capture that determined Congress would need to create an incentive of around $90 to $110 per ton to support carbon capture deployment,” according to OCI.
The Guardian on Thursday reported that Exxon still “chases billions in U.S. subsidies for a ‘climate solution’ that helps drill more oil,” describing how the oil giant hosted an event at the Democratic National Convention earlier this month where senior climate strategy and technology director Vijay Swarup praised the IRA for helping Exxon pursue carbon capture and said: “We need new technology and we need policy to support that technology. We need governments working with private industry.”
Exxon’s enthusiasm for carbon capture, said OCI, is an example of how “the fossil fuel industry delays climate action, distracts from real solutions that would end the fossil fuel era, and does everything in its power to squeeze the last drops of profit from a dying industry, at the expense of all of us.”
