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Summary IGC Readings week 6 2018 - Miles & Kalb, Savietz
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IGC 2018 week 6 readings: Al Jazeera (Miles) & The israeli-hezbollah war of 2006 (Kalb, Savietz)
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Miles: Think again: Al Jazeera It is vilifed as a propaganda machine and Osama bin Laden's mouthpiece. In truth, though, Al
Jazeera is as hated in the palaces of Riyadh as it is in the White House. But, as millions of
loyal viewers already know, Al Jazeera promotes a level of free speech and dissent rarely
seen in the Arab world.
"Al Jazeera Supports Terrorism" False, though the network makes litle atempt to
disassociate itself from those who do. Afer all, when Al Jazeera ofers its estimated 50
million viewers exclusive interviews of Osama bin Laden, it’s easy to confuse access with
endorsement. And when a journalist who conducts those interviews is jailed for collaboration
with al Qaeda, as Tayssir Alouni was in a Spanish court last year, the line between impartial
observer and impassioned supporter is certainly blurred.
But the network has never supported violence against the United States. Not once have its
correspondents praised atacks on coalition forces in Iraq. The network has never captured
an atack on the coalition "live," and there’s no evidence Al Jazeera has known about any
atack beforehand. eespite claims to the contrary, the network has never aired footage of a
beheading.
Allegations of supporting terrorism remain just that — allegations.
"Al Jazeera Is AntiiSemitic" Wrong. Just as Al Jazeera has proven willing to present al
Qaeda’s "perspective," it has also devoted airtime to and welcomed another regional pariah
— Israel. The network was the frst Arab channel to allow Israelis to present their case in
their own words, in Hebrew, English, or Arabic. This move was a major departure from past
practices and truly shocked the Arab public. Until Al Jazeera arrived, most Arabs had never
even heard an Israeli’s voice. Al Jazeera regularly airs clips of Israeli ofcials within news
bulletins and conducts live interviews with six to t0 Israelis each month. The network covers
Israeli afairs extensively and is widely watched in Israel. In fact, Al Jazeera gives more airtime
to Israeli issues than any other channel outside Israel itself.
Although many Westerners think Al Jazeera has a proiArab bias, many Arabs believe exactly
the opposite.
"Al Jazeera Is Spreading Political Freedom" Wishful thinking. It’s true that Al Jazeera
established the tradition of investigative reporting in the Arab world and rolled back the
boundaries of debate within Arab families, breaking all kinds of taboos about what could be
discussed on television. In fact, Al Jazeera’s programs about Western politics have done more
to inform Arabs about democracy than any nation or station. However, to assume satellite
television will transform Arab societies into transparent, just, and equal democracies is to
presume that the current state of afairs in the Arab world results from an information
defcit, which is not true. Except in the most authoritarian Arab countries, news has long
been available to determined citizens via the BBC or Voice of America radio, and neither one
of those remade the region. Al Jazeera encourages free speech in the Middle East, but that is
no substitute for real political reform. Just because a woman in Saudi Arabia can now see a
debate on TV, and can even contribute in real time, doesn’t mean she can go out and vote in
an election or join a political party. Arab autocrats have come to realize that even if
information on satellite TV cannot be packaged and manipulated the way it was with statei
run media, Al Jazeera may not be as deadly a threat to their regimes as they frst feared. Arab
press unions, like Arab opposition political parties, are still prevented from growing strong.
"Al Jazeera Is Biased" True, but no more so than Fox News or CNN. Al Jazeera employs the
same stringent editorial processes as the Western media, but it ends up with a diferent
product. euring the war in Iraq, Al Jazeera’s tone was notably sympathetic to the Iraqis and
hostile toward the Americans. Similarly in Afghanistan, the Taliban was ofen presented as
the noble underdog and America as the vengeful, colonial aggressor. A general cynicism
about Arab regimes allied to America is detectable, and though Al Jazeera has employees
, from many religions, including Jews, the network is clearly sympathetic toward the
Palestinians. This bias in no way invalidates the network’s news. Knowing it is scrutinized
more rigorously than any other news channel in the world, Al Jazeera is fastidious in
presenting all sides of a story. Certainly compared to most other Arab news stations, Al
Jazeera remains a model of professionalism and objectivity. If Al Jazeera has a bias, it is a
commercial one. eespite the fact that it enjoys an estimated annual budget of around $t0 0
million, subsidized largely by the gasirich Emir Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa AliThani of Qatar, Al
Jazeera wants to win audience share and it wants to sell advertising. The network has
consistently lost money since its launch, which is unsurprising, as no Arab channel makes a
proft. The network targets a particular demographic (namely Arab men over the age of 25),
and, like the mainstream cable networks or FM radios stations in the United States, it tries
hard to pitch itself to viewers by luring them with dramatic trailers and leadiin segments.
"Al Jazeera Is Censored" Not yet. It presents itself as a beacon of free speech and editorial
independence in the region. eespite its dependence on the state, Al Jazeera regularly
criticizes Arab regimes, including Qatar’s. Yet there remains a deeply held belief from
government ministries right down to the Arab street that the Qatari ruling family is the real
power behind Al Jazeera. The exact nature of the relationship remains opaque, but it is a
testament to the vision of the emir that, so far at least, he has been tolerant. Whether he will
continue to keep his fngers of the channel remains to be seen.
"Al Jazeera Wants to Compete with CNN and the BBC" Yes, and it plans to. This fall, a
sister Englishilanguage station, called Al Jazeera International, or AJI, will launch around the
world. It expects to reach 30 to 40 million households on its frst day. AJI is directly
competing with BBC World and CNN International for the world’s Englishispeaking audience
of t billion people. Although it has hired a large number of Western journalists, it won’t look
much like CNN. "We’re the frst news channel based in the Mideast to bring news back to the
West," says Nigel Parsons, managing director of AJI. "We want to set a diferent news
agenda." And CNN and the BBC are taking the new global competition seriously.
"Only Arabs Will Watch Al Jazeera International" Not so fast. This venture is the biggest
challenge yet for the network. Whereas the launch of the Arabic Al Jazeera network meant
competing with the likes of Egyptian, Lebanese, and Saudi television, Western networks are
much meatier competition, and Al Jazeera will face them on their home turf. In English. For
its part, AJI has said it will focus on developingiworld issues and use more indigenous
reporters and freelancers than other channels. It is widely expected to win large market
share in Asia, where the Al Jazeera brand already enjoys a favorable reputation and where
many more people speak English than Arabic. Pakistan has t60 million Muslims, and
Indonesia, the world’s most populous Muslim country, has 2t5 million Muslims, many of
whom will be interested in following events in the Arab world closely. Of course, it won’t be
so easy to break into America. Even securing distribution for AJI has been tough: As of press
time, not one U.S. cable company had ofered to carry the channel as part of a general news
package. Ironically, it is the world’s freest media market that poses the biggest challenge to
Al Jazeera. None of which changes the fact that Al Jazeera has permanently reshaped the
landscape of world news to and, soon, from the Arab world. In a region where the United
States is engaged in a protracted war in one country and the West as a whole faces a nuclear
impasse in another, it hardly makes sense to simply turn the dial — and remain confned to
an echo chamber of recycled opinion. If Al Jazeera International hits the airwaves this fall,
America would do well to tune in.
Kalb & Saivetz: The IsraeliiHezbollah war of 20 0 6: The media as a weapon in asymmetrical confict
For 34 days in the summer of 20 0 6, the world’s atention was once again riveted on the
Eastern shores of the Mediterranean. There, in Lebanon, a lovely country of cedar trees and
sectarian strife, a bloody war erupted between Hezbollah and Israel.
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