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Michael Weiss Profile picture
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11 Apr, 4 tweets, 2 min read
It was sabotage, no cyberattack. And note American and Israeli intel confirming it to NYT. Mossad’s penetration of Iran is extensive.
nytimes.com/2021/04/11/wor… ImageImage
Leave aside the damage done to Iran’s nuclear program in this operation; the messaging here isn’t hard to parse.
So the goal here is twofold, as I see it: Hinder the program for its own sake and signal to Washington (assuming this wasn’t a joint operation—and it may have been) that time is on its side, not Tehran’s.
jpost.com/middle-east/ir…

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More from @michaeldweiss

Michael Weiss Profile picture
2 Apr
Got me a proper conspiracy theorist tonight at the bar in Queens. It started with “the Jews did 9/11” and it ended with “COVID doesn’t really exist, the hospitals are being paid.” Two hours later, I almost have him working for me. Stay tuned...
You’d be surprised how insecure these people are. All they want is a little attention...
Still not true, by the way!
Read 4 tweets
Michael Weiss Profile picture
26 Mar
Quite a yarn about a pro-Assad conspiracy theorist who believed he was corresponding with a Russian agent. In fact, Paul McKeigue was corresponding with the very organization he was trying to surveil and defame, @CIJAOnline, which posed as said agent. bbc.com/news/stories-5…
.@CIJAOnline has collected documentary evidence of the regime's war crimes -- including its chemical weapons attacks -- and is the target of a coordinated disinformation campaign.
To give a flavor of the kind of stuff McKeigue and his cohort have been peddling, he amplified this nonsense to account for the regime's 2018 Douma chemical weapon attack -- all based on a "dream" an anti-Semitic crank had after eating a pizza (no, really):
Read 9 tweets
Michael Weiss Profile picture
19 Mar
EXCLUSIVE: Estonian counterintelligence just caught another spy working within NATO. Only this one wasn’t recruited by Russia; Tarmo Kõuts was recruited by China. With @holger_r: thedailybeast.com/top-nato-scien…
"According to Aleksander Toots, the deputy director of KAPO and Tallinn’s top counterintelligence official, Kõuts was recruited in 2018 by...Beijing’s military intelligence...along with an alleged accomplice who is yet to be tried in court."
"The intelligence operatives handling him were operating under cover of a think tank. Inna Ombler, the prosecutor handling the case confirmed that Kõuts earned €17,000 -- a little over $20,000 -- for his espionage, which the Estonian government has since seized from him."
Read 6 tweets
Michael Weiss Profile picture
17 Mar
NEW: My overview about the ODNI report and how it doesn’t have to name (American) names—we know who you are: thedailybeast.com/us-intel-expos…
And this KGB manual helps explain so much of what’s in the ODNI: newlinesmag.com/reportage/you-…
Yes, “dupes.” The ODNI not doesn’t suggest the Americans were witting Russian agents and there’s an entire category devoted to those who are manipulated by Russian spies without those spies ever acknowledging who they work for. See the above piece.
Read 8 tweets
Michael Weiss Profile picture
16 Mar
Yes, and their methods slightly more elaborate than creating bogus Twitter personalities or buying Facebook ads. The reliance on *American* agents of influence and confidential contacts was arguably greater in 2020 than in 2016.
One need only look at how Prigozhin, for instance, evolved from remote online influence and mercenary activities to creating consultancy-style organizations and NGOs from Libya to Germany. There was zero chance this wouldn't affect the strategy toward the US, too.
They hooked the former mayor of New York City and the president's personal attorney -- a much bigger fish than all the minnows reeled in five years ago (Papadopoulos, Prince, Page, et al).
Read 6 tweets
Michael Weiss Profile picture
16 Mar
A few key points made in the ODNI.

1. "People linked to Russian intelligence," although unnamed here, laundered influence narratives by getting them covered in U.S. outlets and regurgitated by "prominent US individuals," including Trump affiliates.
2. The election infrastructure targeting was on a much smaller scale than in 2016 and appears to have been intent on data-harvesting, not rigging results (a hard thing to do).
3. This is awkwardly worded because it can be read that Kilimnik is "connected" to the FSB; he's almost certainly GRU given his background.
Read 8 tweets

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