The Fire These Times

This is my second conversation with Timour Azhari, a Beirut-based Lebanese journalist with Al Jazeera. I wanted to talk to Timour because few people are able to explain what’s happening in Lebanon with such clarity.  We went through the economic crisis and its political roots, the local and regional dimensions and how protesters and activists have  been reacting. We also spoke about how the average resident of Lebanon, both Lebanese and non-Lebanese (Ethiopian, Sudanese, Syrian etc), has been affected and what we could realistically expect to happen in the  coming weeks and months. The first episode was called: Lebanon’s October Uprising, Six Months Later (episode 8). You can follow the podcast on Twitter @FireTheseTimes. If you like what I do, please consider supporting this project with only 1$ a month on Patreon or on BuyMeACoffee.com. You can also do so directly on PayPal if you prefer. Patreon is for monthly, PayPal is for one-offs and BuyMeACoffee has both options. If you cannot donate you can still help by reviewing this podcast on Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. The Fire These Times is available on Apple Podcasts, Anchor, Breaker, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, Radio Public, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Castro and RSS. If it is not available wherever you get your podcasts, please drop me a message! Music by Tarabeat. Photo is by Dear.Nostalgia on Instagram, repurposed for this episode with permission.

I spoke with Jack Sapoch, coordinator of No Name Kitchen's border violence reporting, itself part of the Border Violence Monitoring Network (BVMN). We spoke about the EU's policy of violence against asylum seekers on the so-called 'Balkan Route' and how BVMN partners have been trying to document it and support those being victimised by it. BVMN works through a democratic and horizontal management, in which each NGOs (or partner) is involved in different areas and carries out several tasks: A group of NGOs which works on reporting (collecting pushback cases): No Name Kitchen, Collective Aid, Escuela con Alma, Re:Ports Sarajevo. A group of NGOs which dedicates its effort to the advocacy strategy: Are You Syrious, Centre for Peace Studies, Info Kolpa, Mobile Info Team, Mare Liberum. Rigardu, a German-based NGO which is responsible for the management and administrative coordination and forms the legal frame for the Network. Topics covered also include: the role of the Croatian government and other governments on the so-called 'Balkan Route'; EU-funded/supported (re)borderisation processes which violates the rights of asylum seekers; lack of awareness by EU citizens of this Balkan Route; and how BVMN uses open-source investigations like that used by Bellingcat and Forensic Architecture to uncover these abuses. You can follow the podcast on Twitter @FireTheseTimes. If you like what I do, please consider supporting this project with only 1$ a month on Patreon or on BuyMeACoffee.com. You can also do so directly on PayPal if you prefer. Patreon is for monthly, PayPal is for one-offs and BuyMeACoffee has both options. If you cannot donate you can still help by reviewing this podcast on Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. The Fire These Times is available on Apple Podcasts, Anchor, Breaker, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, Radio Public, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Castro and RSS. If it is not available wherever you get your podcasts, please drop me a message! Music by Tarabeat. Photo from the BVMN website by artist Ena Jurov.

This is a conversation with Ronnie Chatah, host of 'The Beirut Banyan' podcast and organiser of the Walk Beirut tour. We spoke about Ronnie's experience with storytelling and his desire to maintain the memory of those we have lost in Lebanon such as Samir Kassir, the journalist and historian assassinated 15 years ago, and his father Mohammad Chatah, the Lebanese diplomat who was assassinated in December 2013. We of course touched upon the current crisis in Lebanon since it has worsened beyond most predictions. You can follow the podcast on Twitter @FireTheseTimes. If you like what I do, please consider supporting this project with only 1$ a month on Patreon or on BuyMeACoffee.com. You can also do so directly on PayPal if you prefer. Patreon is for monthly, PayPal is for one-offs and BuyMeACoffee has both options. If you cannot donate you can still help by reviewing this podcast on Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. The Fire These Times is available on Apple Podcasts, Anchor, Breaker, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, Radio Public, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Castro and RSS. If it is not available wherever you get your podcasts, please drop me a message! Music by Tarabeat. Photo by Michal GADEK on Unsplash.

This is a conversation with Zoe Smith, a London-based writer with connection to the Carribeans. Zoe had written two pieces for The Correspondent which I wanted to talk to her about. The unthinkable has become reality. How can we build back better? Mutual aid is sweeping the world. Here’s how we make this anarchist way of organising last So how do we make mutual aid last? Using the examples of Barrios de Pie in Argentina or the mutual aid groups popping up in the UK and beyond, we tried to answer that question. You can follow the podcast on Twitter @FireTheseTimes. If you like what I do, please consider supporting this project with only 1$ a month on Patreon or on BuyMeACoffee.com. You can also do so directly on PayPal if you prefer. Patreon is for monthly, PayPal is for one-offs and BuyMeACoffee has both options. If you cannot donate you can still help by reviewing this podcast on Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. The Fire These Times is available on Apple Podcasts, Anchor, Breaker, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, Radio Public, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Castro and RSS. If it is not available wherever you get your podcasts, please drop me a message! Music by Tarabeat. Cover photo illustrated by Michelle Pereira for The Correspondent.

This is a conversation with Mohammed Sulaiman, a Palestinian writer and researcher who grew up in Gaza and currently works at the University of South Australia. The core of our conversation was Mohammed’s two essays for Hummus For Thought: Wretched of the Earth: Thoughts on Syria, Palestine and Discourse (2016) Israel and ‘The Right to Maim’ (2017) Topics discussed: growing up in Gaza and surviving the Israeli wars  and blockade; his and his partner’s difficult journey to Australia,  himself via Israel and herself via Egypt; the Western Left’s failures on  Syria and Bosnia as well as its relationship to Palestine; the  dehumanisation of Palestinians and Syrians; Israel’s politics of  domination; Israel’s ‘right to maim’ as inherent to colonial logic  through Jasbir Puar’s work; and Palestinians being asked to show  gratitude by self-appointed ‘saviors’. You can follow the podcast on Twitter @FireTheseTimes. If you like what I do, please consider supporting this project with only 1$ a month on Patreon or on BuyMeACoffee.com. You can also do so directly on PayPal if you prefer. Patreon is for monthly, PayPal is for one-offs and BuyMeACoffee has both options. If you cannot donate you can still help by reviewing this podcast on Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. The Fire These Times is available on Apple Podcasts, Anchor, Breaker, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, Radio Public, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Castro and RSS. If it is not available wherever you get your podcasts, please drop me a message! Music by Tarabeat.

This is a conversation with Peter Pomerantsev. He's a Soviet-born British writer and the author of two books: Nothing is True and Everything is Possible and This is Not Propaganda. He also runs the research initiative Arena based at the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE), an innovative programme dedicated to overcoming the challenges of disinformation. Topics discussed: Russian disinformation on Ukraine and Syria; the Brexit campaign; the Trump presidency; Maria Ressa's conviction in the Philippines; missed opportunities of Ukrainian-Syrian solidarity; 1990s Russia and the rise of Putin; pop-up populism; and how to deal with disinformation while being mindful of censorship fears. You can follow the podcast on Twitter @FireTheseTimes. If you like what I do, please consider supporting this project with only 1$ a month on Patreon or on BuyMeACoffee.com. You can also do so directly on PayPal if you prefer. Patreon is for monthly, PayPal is for one-offs and BuyMeACoffee has both options. If you cannot donate you can still help by reviewing this podcast on Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.

211 Ghanaian citizens returned home after working as migrant domestic workers in Lebanon and this is what one of them had to say about what her living and working conditions was under the racist Kafala system in a racist Lebanon. The footage comes from a report on Ghanaian TV which was posted on Twitter by @ThisIsLebanonLB: https://twitter.com/ThisIsLebanonLB/status/1275754162702041090

This is a conversation with Zeina Hashem Beck. She's a poet originally from Tripoli, Lebanon. We spoke about her poems of  course and about what it means to be thinking about Lebanon from outside  of Lebanon, especially since the October 17th uprising. We touched upon  mental health, struggling with poetry, and sectarian jokes. We also  mentioned our respective upbringings, her in Tripoli and myself in Mount  Lebanon, and what they reveal about modern Lebanese politics. You can follow the podcast on Twitter @FireTheseTimes. If you like what I do, please consider supporting this project with only 1$ a month on Patreon or on BuyMeACoffee.com. You can also do so directly on PayPal if you prefer. Patreon is for monthly, PayPal is for one-offs and BuyMeACoffee has both options. If you cannot donate you can still help by reviewing this podcast on Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. The Fire These Times is available on Apple Podcasts, Anchor, Breaker, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, Radio Public, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Castro and RSS. If it is not available wherever you get your podcasts, please drop me a message! Music by Tarabeat. Photo is a modified version of Zeina’s book ‘3arabi song’.

This is the audio version of Saleem Haddad's reaction to the death of Sarah Hegazy, which he posted on Instagram and which I'm re-posting here with permission.  Sarah Hegazy was a Queer activist from Egypt who was arrested after being one of many who raised a rainbow flag at a concert by Mashrou3 Leila in Cairo in 2017. She was tortured in Sisi's jail, driven to exile and sought asylum in Canada. She took her own life a few days ago. The Sisi regime has since used that event as an excuse to crack down on Egypt's LGBTQ population, a crackdown which continues to this day.  The silence of straight Arabs in Egypt, the MENA region and the rest of the world is complicity.  You can also listen to the episode on Sarah by The Queer Arabs Podcast. “Society clapped for the regime when it arrested me and Ahmed Alaa.” Sarah Hegazy, from her 2018 article translated into English by Mada Masr. Read here: https://madamasr.com/en/2020/06/15/opinion/u/a-year-after-the-rainbow-flag-controversy Story of the case from NPR: https://www.npr.org/2018/06/18/620110576/after-crackdown-egypts-lgbt-community-contemplates-dark-future I've interviewed Saleem Haddad previously (episode 18).

This is a conversation with Rula Asad, the co-founder and executive director of the Syrian Female Journalists Network (SFJN).  She is a freelance journalist and reporter covering women and human rights. She also reports on the issues faced by the Syrian Civil Society in Lebanon, Jordan and Turkey, in addition to being an experienced researcher and trainer focusing on women’s rights, gender equality in the media as well development in the MENA region.  I wanted to have this conversation with Rula to discuss some of the challenges around the difficult topic of gender and representation in the context of Syria and of Syrian women within the journalism field more specifically. You can follow the podcast on Twitter @FireTheseTimes. If you like what I do, please consider supporting this project with only 1$ a month on Patreon or on BuyMeACoffee.com. You can also do so directly on PayPal if you prefer. Patreon is for monthly, PayPal is for one-offs and BuyMeACoffee has both options. If you cannot donate you can still help by reviewing this podcast on Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. The Fire These Times is available on Apple Podcasts, Anchor, Breaker, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, Radio Public, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Castro and RSS. If it is not available wherever you get your podcasts, please drop me a message! Music by Tarabeat