66 episodes

The new MintPress podcast hosted by British-Iraqi hip hop artist Lowkey -- The Watchdog, closely examines organizations in the public interest including intelligence, lobby, and special interest groups influencing policies and that target dissent. The Watchdog goes against the grain by casting a light on stories largely ignored by the mainstream, corporate media. Listen to the latest Lowkey music on iTunes (https://music.apple.com/us/artist/lowkey/157616301) and Spotify (https://open.spotify.com/artist/7lNJ1ZVAHcx6V4HqC68xRY)

The Watchdog Lowkey

    • News
    • 5.0 • 33 Ratings

The new MintPress podcast hosted by British-Iraqi hip hop artist Lowkey -- The Watchdog, closely examines organizations in the public interest including intelligence, lobby, and special interest groups influencing policies and that target dissent. The Watchdog goes against the grain by casting a light on stories largely ignored by the mainstream, corporate media. Listen to the latest Lowkey music on iTunes (https://music.apple.com/us/artist/lowkey/157616301) and Spotify (https://open.spotify.com/artist/7lNJ1ZVAHcx6V4HqC68xRY)

    How Britain is Helping Israel to Bomb Gaza, with Matt Kennard

    How Britain is Helping Israel to Bomb Gaza, with Matt Kennard

    Even after more than 100 days of genocidal attacks on Gaza, the Israeli assault continues to rage. The onslaught itself is very well documented by courageous Palestinian journalists who risk their lives daily. However, the role of Western governments in all this is not nearly as widely reported.
    Joining “The Watchdog” today to talk about this issue is returning guest Matt Kennard, a writer and investigative journalist for Declassified UK. Kennard has broken several stories about secret British collaboration and support for Israeli actions, which he will discuss today. Previously, he worked as a reporter for The Financial Times and was a fellow and a director of the Center For Investigative Journalism in London. His latest book is “Silent Coup: How Corporations Overthrew Democracy.”

    On October 13, the U.K. government announced it was deploying a wide range of military assets to the Eastern Mediterranean area, including spy planes and 1,000 troops. From its military bases in Cyprus, the British military has been flying large numbers of supply flights to Israel, helping sustain the Israeli attack. As Kennard noted, in December 2020, the U.K. government signed a secret military agreement with Israel that likely commits it to “defending” the apartheid state if it comes under attack.
    Britain’s military hub in the region is RAF Akrotiri, a vast, sprawling military compound in southern Cyprus. It is not only the center of British imperialism in the Mediterranean but is also home to more than 120 U.S. airmen and hosts of spies from the N.S.A. From there, both countries project their power across the Middle East, Europe, and North Africa.
    But even as the British government supports Israel, the Israeli state is attempting to penetrate and interfere in U.K. politics. In 2019, Alan Duncan revealed that he was blocked from becoming Middle East Minister in Theresa May’s cabinet at the behest of the Israelis because of his mildly pro-Palestine positions. The Conservative Friends of Israel – which acts as a front group for the Israeli state – wields enormous power within the party, including the ability to make and break political careers.
    The Labour Party is also deeply connected to Israel, to the point where Israeli lobbyists have funded 40% of Keir Starmer’s shadow cabinet. This kind of “entrenched espionage” eats away at and makes a mockery of the idea of British democracy, Kennard told Lowkey today
    Support the showThe 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.

    Lowkey is a British-Iraqi hip-hop artist, 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, 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.

    • 1 hr 25 min
     The Israel Lobby Got Me Fired! - Lowkey Speaks to David Miller

     The Israel Lobby Got Me Fired! - Lowkey Speaks to David Miller

    For nearly a decade, Professor David Miller has been in the crosshairs of the pro-Israel lobby. But in recent years, their campaign against him has intensified. Miller was fired by Bristol University in the U.K. following a ferocious campaign by the Israel lobby, which even led to direct government intervention in the case. He has been holding the university to account in an employment tribunal and expects the results very soon. In this episode of “The Watchdog”, host Lowkey catches up with Miller to hear the latest on his case. 
    Professor Miller has a long background in studying P.R. and propaganda, originally focussing on media spin on Northern Ireland, the HIV/AIDS crisis and the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. It was the latter that first brought him to study Islamophobia and how it functions in society. 
    Today, Miller and Lowkey described how so much of the hostile atmosphere towards Muslims is actually driven by the state and committed Zionist organizations that try to influence it. For example, 12 of the top 13 funders of the Islamophobic Henry Jackson Society, a British think tank that influences U.K. public policy, were groups founded by Zionists. And three-quarters of the organizations that fund these Islamophobic groups also bankroll the building of illegal Israeli settlements in the West Bank. 
    Miller was sacked from his position as Professor of Sociology after a pressure campaign involving Zionist student groups and even members of parliament, who accused him of “inciting hatred against Jewish students.”
    In 2019, a student filed a complaint against him, claiming he was racist toward Jewish people. 
    But that was only the start of the affair. After Miller was acquitted, there began a massive media campaign against him, leading to more than 100 members of the House of Commons and House of Lords signing a letter demanding he be sacked. 
    This massive state intervention into the freedom and independence of academia is a free speech issue that few of those who make it their business to supposedly champion the free flow of ideas have touched.  
    The Kafkaesque witch hunt against Miller bears a strong resemblance to how Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn was hounded out of politics. Ironically, Miller’s book, “Bad News for Labour: Anti-Semitism, the Party and Public Belief,” details how bogus charges of anti-Semitism were weaponized against Corbyn in order to defame and destroy him.
    Support the showThe 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.

    Lowkey is a British-Iraqi hip-hop artist, 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, 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.

    • 52 min
    Palestine Action On Trial, with Huda Amori

    Palestine Action On Trial, with Huda Amori

    The British state – and quite possibly its Israeli counterpart – are attempting to shut down Palestine Action. Since its founding in 2020, the activist group has launched hundreds of operations against arms factories across the United Kingdom, especially Israeli ones. Its goal is to break British complicity in the Israeli military-industrial complex. Palestine Action has already caused serious economic damage to companies like Elbit Systems.
    Joining Lowkey on this edition of “The Watchdog” is Huda Amori. Born in the U.K., Amori is a Palestinian-Iraqi whose father was chased out of his home by Israeli soldiers in 1967 and forced to flee without even a pair of shoes.
    Decades later, Amori has found a way to fight back, using direct action to occupy and shut down Elbit Systems, Israel’s largest arms firm. With the help of the community in her native Oldham, Amori and Palestine Action’s occupation has forced Elbit Systems to leave the town and sell their factory at a substantial loss. Last summer, they abandoned their London headquarters. And last winter, the British Ministry of Defence canceled around £280 million (around U.S.$340 million) of contracts with the company.
    Amori is about to go to court and stand trial for her actions. She is looking at the possibility of receiving considerable jail time. Apart from the usual offenses, she and others have been charged with blackmail – a charge with serious consequences, as she explained to Lowkey today:
    One of the most concerning things about the blackmail charge is that it allows [the authorities] to put on orders. If you are convicted and imprisoned, even after your release from prison, you can be banned for life from campaigning, from signing a petition, from doing anything towards campaigning for the freedom of the Palestinian people. So it is clearly extremely politically motivated.”
    Amori and the other members of Palestine Action maintain they are not criminals and are, in fact, attempting to disrupt a criminal enterprise whereby Britain aids an illegitimate occupation by an apartheid regime by supplying it with weaponry crucial in harassing, surveilling and killing Palestinians.
    Despite the smears and condemnation from mainstream politicians, and despite the serious consequences they are facing (nine group members have been sent to jail), Palestine Action remains resolute in its determination to shut down the illegal occupation. 
    Support the showThe 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.

    Lowkey is a British-Iraqi hip-hop artist, 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, 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.

    • 38 min
    The Other 9/11 with Roberto Navarrete and John McEvoy

    The Other 9/11 with Roberto Navarrete and John McEvoy

    9/11 is a date that will live in infamy. But for much of the world, September 11 conjures up images of another deadly assault against freedom and liberty. Exactly 50 years ago today, the democratically-elected socialist president of Chile, Salvador Allende, was overthrown in a far-right military coup led by General Augusto Pinochet.
    Today, “Watchdog” host Lowkey talks to two guests who know the story of “the First 9/11” better than almost anyone. Roberto Navarette was a 17-year-old medical student at the time of the coup, and was imprisoned – like tens of thousands of his countrymen – in open air stadiums. He survived being tortured and shot by the regime, and eventually escaped, settling in the United Kingdom.
    Ironically, the U.K. government had actually been working very hard to ensure Allende’s downfall, and later to keep Pinochet in power, as John McEvoy’s work has revealed. Based on documents obtained under Freedom of Information laws, McEvoy has shown how the U.K.’s MI6 had been training Latin American police and militaries in torture tactics and other ways in which to suppress domestic dissent. Britain had long had strong economic interests in the region, considering it an unofficial part of its empire. McEvoy is an academic, historian and journalist specializing in uncovering Britain’s relationship with Latin America. He is currently producing a documentary film – “Britain and the Other 9/11” about the U.K. government’s covert campaign against Allende and its subsequent support for Pinochet.
    Today, Lowkey speaks to Navarette and McEvoy about the coup and its legacy on the world.
    Allende was a particular threat to the establishment in Washington and London. Not simply because he was a Marxist head of state, but because he was democratically elected and believed in coming to power through entirely legal means. This, for Navarette, terrified many in the West, as it undermined completely their claims about socialism being an anti-democratic ideology. 
    The 1973 coup reverberated around the world. Not only did it become the blueprint for further U.S.-backed operations in Latin America, but Chile became a laboratory for neoliberal economics. The country was flooded with economists from the University of Chicago, who promised to transform it into a modern utopia.
    Instead, the nation was ruined, with economic crashes and total devastation for ordinary Chilean citizens. The rich, along with foreign corporations made out like bandits, and neoliberalism began to be adopted wholesale across the world, leading to the rampant inequality that plagues the planet today.
    Support the showThe 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.

    Lowkey is a British-Iraqi hip-hop artist, 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, 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.

    • 1 hr 7 min
    Understanding the Niger Coup, with David Hundeyin

    Understanding the Niger Coup, with David Hundeyin

    The world holds its breath. Last month, the Nigerien military overthrew President Mohamed Bazoum, declaring an end to his corrupt reign and a new era of anti-imperialist, pan-African struggle. While most Nigeriens actually support the move (a new poll found that 73% of the country wants the army to stay in power) Niger’s West African neighbor Nigeria has strongly objected, and has tried to organize an invasion force to restore Bazoum. 
    The regional body, the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), has condemned the events in Niger. But its 15 member states are split on how to react. Western powers, however, including France and the United States, have supported boots on the ground, and even considered sending troops themselves – a move that could draw Russia into a conflict that could make Libya or Syria look minor by comparison.
    Here to explain the tense situation that could ignite a world war is David Hundeyin. Hundeyin is an investigative journalist from Nigeria and the founder of “West Africa Weekly.”
    While the coup has been opposed in the West, Hundeyin explains that inside the country, the military is seen – rightly or wrongly – as leading “anti-imperialist movement; a popular movement against French imperialism.”\
    The threat of invasion is far from an idle one. Since 1990, ECOWAS has launched military interventions in seven West African countries, the most recent being in the Gambia in 2017. The group’s actions have ignited significant pushback across the region, with many describing it as a tool of Western imperialism. 
    Currently leading ECOWAS is Nigerian president, Bola Tinubu. Tinubu has earned plaudits in the West as a defender of democracy and someone not willing to let another country be taken over by the army. While Tinubu has been praised in the media, his own background calls into question his democratic credentials. As Hundeyin’s reporting exposed, Tinubu made his fortune from trafficking heroin in Chicago and had hundreds of thousands of dollars seized by the U.S. government. There are many other U.S. cases against Tinubu which have never seen the light of day, prompting many to speculate that he is an American intelligence asset.
    Will the new government succeed? Will African be plunged into war? And what is the U.S. role in all of this? To find out more, watch the full interview here.
    Support the showThe 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.

    Lowkey is a British-Iraqi hip-hop artist, 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, 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.

    • 58 min
    Keir Starmer’s Relentless Pursuit of Power, with Matt Kennard

    Keir Starmer’s Relentless Pursuit of Power, with Matt Kennard

    Labour Party leader Keir Starmer is many bookmakers’ favorite to become the next prime minister of the United Kingdom. Yet behind the politician’s bland, squeaky-clean image lies an individual relentlessly obsessed with power and how to attain it.
    From being an ally of socialist leader Jeremy Corbyn as recently as 2019, Starmer has pulled the Labour Party far to the right in an attempt to return them to their position as the red wing of the British oligarchy. 
    Today’s guest on “The Watchdog” with Lowkey is Matt Kennard. Kennard is a writer and investigative journalist with the British outlet Declassified UK. Previously, he worked as a reporter for The Financial Times and was a fellow and a director of the Center For Investigative Journalism in London. He has recently published a five-part series of articles on Starmer’s past and his connections to British and American state power. His latest book is “Silent Coup: How Corporations Overthrew Democracy.”
    Before becoming an elected politician, Starmer was a barrister and served as head of the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS), a body that oversees roughly 800,000 prosecutions per year. “Starmer started at the Crown Prosecution Service in 2008. And his time at the CPS is marked by how reactionary and how establishment-friendly he is,” Kennard told Lowkey. Kennard’s recent journalistic work also showed that Starmer secretly served on the Trilateral Commission, a shadowy organization with deep connections to the U.S. national security state. Starmer did not tell his boss, Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, as the latter would surely have vetoed the appointment, especially as Starmer worked closely with two former heads of the CIA at the Trilateral Commission. Meanwhile, CIA chief Mike Pompeo declared that the U.S. would do everything it could to stop Corbyn from coming to power.
    All the while, Starmer was living it up on the public purse. Kennard’s research has found that Starmer billed the British taxpayer nearly £500,000 (around U.S.$630,000) in expenses, including £160,000 on a chauffeur-driven car during his first two years in the position. “This is a guy who likes living it up, basically,” Kennard said. 
    Support the showThe 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.

    Lowkey is a British-Iraqi hip-hop artist, 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, 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.

    • 1 hr 16 min

Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5
33 Ratings

33 Ratings

kat8478493 ,

Enough

Thank you for discussing these forbidden topics.

Luvismyrlgn ,

Thank you for everything

Incredible artist and podcast. Please cover the ongoing covid that’s being downplayed as it’s a current eugenics project

incompletions ,

Profound

Lowkey has taught me so much since I first found his music at 12 years old. At that time I could relate with his lyrics such as “I relate because that child could’ve been me” regarding the brutalization of the Middle East and North Africa. However as I grew I became more interested in the names he mentioned in his music, leading me to learn about many great people I otherwise would’ve never known existed. I am so happy MintPress has invested and given him a platform to share more of his knowledge, this time through long form conversation with amazing people. Anyone who wants real perspective, not diluted by fear of the effects of non compliance with the status quo, will be very satisfied with this podcast. Just give it a listen, and see what you think. You only stand to learn from this content.

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