Gorilla Radio with Chris Cook, Sathish Balasunderam/Pitasanna Shanmugathas, David Rovics Sept. 18, 2024

This Week on GR

by C.L. Cook - GRadio.Substack.com

 

September 18, 2024

Welcome to Gorilla Radio, recorded September 18th, 2024

 Listen. Hear.

Few in Canada will likely have heard of Neelan Tiruchelvam, but for those in the ex-patriot Sri Lankan community, the Harvard-educated human rights lawyer, mediator, and champion for peace was, at the end of the last century, the best hope of bringing together the Tamil minority community with the Sinhalese ruling class to avert civil war. His assassination in 1999 put an end to those hopes, and history records what happened next.

Sathish Balasunderam is a Canadian Tamil and lawyer involved in "left politics" out east. Sathish is also a collaborator with Pitasanna Shanmugathas, the writer, director, producer, and editor of the acclaimed documentary series, 'Truth to the Powerless: An Investigation into Canada’s Foreign Policy' - on a new project based on the life of Neelan Tiruchelvam.

Pitasana Shanmugathas and Sathish Balasunderam in the first half.

And; while the news is fresh: Yesterday, Israel attacked Lebanon. That's hardly news; Israel has been bombing there for nearly a year, (and much else besides for decades more) but what is new is the nature of the attack. Everyone has heard by now of the "pager bombs". As I write, eleven are confirmed dead, with many hundreds more injured. After nearly a year of horrors and crimes never witnessed, it seems we've got further to descend yet.

But, David Rovics is not cowed. He says, "Whatever's happening next, I aim to be singing about it!" David's an itinerant singer/songwriter, essayist, and anarchist. Fresh from the anti-climactic Democratic National Convention in Chicago, Rovics and partner in musical rhymes, Kamala (the Good) Emanuel, a.k.a. 'The Ministry of Culture' are touring the continental Northwest, with gigs in Washington State, Oregon, and right up here in B.C.

 

David Rovics and Titanic entertainment amid the icebergs in the second half.

But first, Sathish Balasunderam and Pitasanna Shanmugathas on the life and times of Neelan Tiruchelvam, Sri Lanka's hero for peace.

 

Song: Aysenur

Artist: David Rovics

 

Chris Cook hosts Gorilla Radio, at: GRadio.Substack.com.  Check out the GR blog at: http://gorillaradioblog.blogspot.ca/

Gorilla Radio with Chris Cook, Dimitri Lascaris, Salam Hamdan September 11, 2024

This Week on GR

by C.L. Cook - GRadio.Substack.com

September 11, 2024

 

Welcome to Gorilla Radio, recorded September 11th, 2024

 

Listen. Hear.

Eleven months in to Israel's genocide, and every day brings news of atrocities that can mean nothing less than the determination to erase entirely the Palestinian people from their homeland. Watching governments, and the institutions of the West obfuscate and obscure the truth of this disaster - as grotesque as the worst crimes of the last century - while too allowing war profiteers flourish by it, is a new kind of evil; one that damns us all.

Last night, the candidates for the presidency of the United States presented to the People their case for election; but neither Donald Trump, nor Kamala Harris could utter a word of condemnation of what Israel is doing, or provide any promise of bringing this horror to a stop. How could they, when America is the engine driving this Holocaust?

Dimitri Lascaris is a journalist, lawyer, and long-time activist for social justice. He’s been traveling extensively in and reporting from West Asia for several months; most recently in Lebanon. His articles from there, around the region, and from his home base in Greece are available at his site, DimitriLascaris.org, and you can tune in to his interview program, Reason2Resist on Rumble, Youtube, and Twitter.

Dimitri Lascaris in the first half.

And; as Gaza suffers bullets and bombs, deprivation and disease, its chief tormentor has turned an eye to the West Bank. Thousands have been rounded up as prisoners already; sent away to the infamous concentration camps, where unspeakable crimes are committed every day - as they have since the beginning - only amplified many hundred-fold times. That method of Israel's genocide, its modus operandi as seen these terrible months in Gaza, is repeating itself now in the rest of the Occupied Territories.

Salam Hamdan is a Palestinian political activist and Social-Feminist. She's been reporting the increasingly desperate situation in her West Bank home for months, where arbitrary arrests and random assassination are the first and favourite tools of the terrorist state.

Salam Hamdan from the centre of the malestrom in the second half.

But first, Dimitri Lascaris and finding reason to resist.

Chris Cook hosts Gorilla Radio, on the internet at: GRadio.Substack.com. Check out the GR blog at: https://gorillaradioblog.blogspot.ca/