Show Notes
"It is Abhorrent to Me to Stage a Picture…" A Conversation with George Azar Host: Luke Sheehan Music: Loafing Heroes - https://theloafingheroes.bandcamp.com
George Azar: An Introduction
George Azar was born in 1959, the descendant of Lebanese olive farmers who had set sail from Beirut a century earlier. They settled in South Philadelphia, a working-class enclave—later immortalized in 'Rocky'. It was a mix of Italians, Irish, Polish, Jewish, and Lebanese families, a tough, mafia-controlled neighborhood where people staked their claims street by street. After graduating from UC Berkeley in Political Science, he postponed graduate school to see first-hand a war he had only read about. He covered the Lebanese Civil War as a front line news photographer, immersing himself and seeing the conflict up-close. The war brought moments that could be scripted for an absurdist play, like the teenage Shia gunmen and snipers who called themselves "The Smurfs". For the dissonance between their youth, and the brutal violence they lived mirrored the contradictions his photography sought to capture. Azar learned the unwritten rules of the new industry where the pictures most in demand were 'Bang Bang' photos: high-drama, front-line images that convey the raw violence of war. His first photo captioned Machine Gun Alley, marked his entry into the profession. A strong image from the front line sold for $60, while a photo of a woman firing a weapon might land on front pages worldwide. Some photographers gave in to the temptation to stage scenes. Azar found the practice indefensible. "To me, it is abhorrent to stage an image." The photographs Azar values most capture often quiet, deeply human moments: an elderly man weeping into his bed, a mother standing amidst the ruins of her Gaza kitchen, and Palestinian shepherd in a field of yellow wildflowers that grace the cover of his book, 'Palestine, A Photographic Journey' (UC Press, 1991). Azar left Lebanon after the war physically and emotionally drained. He returned to Philadelphia, and worked for the local newspaper. But the pull of the Middle East proved irresistible. The First Intifada drew him back, beginning a new chapter in his career, this time focused on the freedom struggle in Palestine. In conversation, Azar shared astonishing stories: the Irish junkies linked to the IRA who lived above him; Issa Abdullah Ali, a renegade African-American soldier who converted to Islam, defected and joined Iran's Revolutionary Guard and fought the Israelis in the 1982 battle for Beirut; and his encounters with journalism legends Robert Fisk, Patrick Cockburn and photojournalist Don McCullen. The conversation unfolded against a backdrop of Israeli drone sounds, power outages, and rising tensions—a grim reminder that Lebanon is once again in the grip of war. The country faces yet another reshaping, one that will demand extraordinary resilience from its people and, perhaps, a reimagined political future.
More from Cassandra Voices Podcast
In this episode, Luke Sheehan engages with Róisín Michaux, the self-described "unemployed Twitter TERF" who lost her European Commission role after co-founding a gender-critical staff network. Hired on a special contract which was not renewed, the Commission, in her account, used this grey-area employment structure to remove her as a dissenting voice. The same grey-area contract status also allows the EC to deny that she was ever employed by them. The backstory to that provides a former EU insider's perspective on a contentious topic. Her TERF explorations have been taking her around the continent. A lacerating "shitposter" on X with a substack and podcast (Peaked), Michaux has taken up the task of exploring how "gender self-id" laws are being brought into force across the EU and among accession states. From here, Michaux goes into depth on her own working-class Dublin roots, her Brussels career, and the internal battle that started on a message board and eventually got her fired. The talk ranges from "autogynephilia" to detransitioning, the NGO-isation of Irish civil society, and parallels between the Catholic Church's old moral authority and today's activists and academics—weirdly, often based in the old ecclesiastical stronghold of Maynooth! Michaux is a combative voice in this debate, and—like her fellow Róisín (Murphy, of Moloko)—she is channeling a fiercely vocal Irish womanhood into an arena where the cultural combat had turned vicious before she ever got embroiled. It is remarkable that prominent gender critical Irish women like her, Helen Joyce and Stella O'Malley have been largely ignored by Irish media. Cassandra Voices can slip through where official Ireland has installed its barriers. Not everyone will welcome Michaux's strong stances on trans policy and activism. Her doggedness, wit and talent for sustained argumentation will leave a strong impression on all who listen. We welcome other voices on this topic; if you want to submit your point of view write to [email protected]. Episode Credits: Host: Luke Sheehan Music: Loafing Heroes - https://theloafingheroes.bandcamp.com Produced by Massimiliano Galli - https://www.massimilianogalli.com
adraic X. Scanlan joins Frank Armstrong to discuss his book Rot: A History of the Irish Famine, which explores the modernity of Ireland's experience with potato cultivation, culminating in the arrival of the dreaded blight phytophthora infestans in 1845. He reveals how Ireland became the guinea pig for British colonialism of the late nineteenth century, aspects of which linger to this day. Thus, the staggering inequality, pervasive debt, outrageous rent-gouging, precarious employment, and vulnerability to changes in commodity prices that torment so many in the twenty-first century were rehearsed in the Irish countryside before the potato failed. Episode Credits: Host: Frank Armstrong Music: Loafing Heroes - https://theloafingheroes.bandcamp.com Produced by Massimiliano Galli - https://www.massimilianogalli.com
American journalist Amanda Knox joins Frank Armstrong to discuss the case of English nurse Lucy Letby. Knox was herself falsely charged with murdering her roommate Meredith Kerchner in Italy in 2007 and spent four years in prison. Lucy Letby was a nurse working in the neonatal unit of the Countess of Chester hospital. She was found guilty of murdering seven babies in her care in 2023, based primarily on statistical evidence and statements she made apparently implicating her. Amanda has found parallels with her treatment by the British media, and points to major flaws in the prosecution case. Episode Credits: Host: Frank Armstrong Music: Loafing Heroes - heloafingheroes.bandcamp.com Produced by Massimiliano Galli - massimilianogalli.com
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