Shawn Powers

Note: I will add hyperlinks throughout the text in the next few hours.

I was fortunate enough to attend the 2009 Al-Jazeera Forum this past weekend in Doha. This year’s forum was focused on “Power, Media and the Middle East,” and included seven panels over the course of three days. Among the panelists were Seymour Hersh, fresh off breaking yet another scoop on just how far ary American foreign policy has gone, Tony Burman (Managing Director of Al-Jazeera English), Joichi Ito (CEO, Creative Commons), Robert Fisk (The Independent) Ahmed El Sheikh (Editor in Chief, Al Jazeera Arabic), Ayman Mohyeldin (one of the two English-speaking journalists that reported from Gaza during the most recent flare-up), along with many others. Panel topics ranged from emerging powers—both in the region and globally—as well as media and politics, with a heavy dose of conversation about Gaza and the future of Palestinians more broadly. Overall, it was great conversation and I made new friends. After some thought, I had a few reactions that I thought I’d share:

(1) Crickets on Iraq. This point may need more emphasis: the word Iraq was used less than 5 times over the course of 10.5 hours of discussion of power, media and the Middle East. It was not the topic of a single panel, and more importantly, it only came up but two or three times in talking about the current rise of Iranian influence in the region. Not a single discussion took place, in either English or Arabic, that discussed about the future of Iraq, what impact the removal of a large amount of American troops would have for the country’s political future, the growing threat that Iraqi refugees may have on the region’s security, the relative (technical) success of the most recent elections, etc. Nothing. I brought this up over dinner last night with two colleagues—one American, the other Egyptian—and they concurred, after some thought, that the lack of mention of Iraq was indeed very, very strange and troubling. I can’t help but think to myself: is it possibly the case that, for the first time since the American-led invasion of Iraq in 2003, Americans are actually paying more attention to Iraq than Arabs? Wrap the noodle around that one.

(2) Gaza was a huge success for Al-Jazeera, but it also raised some questions that need to be addressed. For starters, as Sy Hersh said: “Al-Jazeera’s coverage of Gaza was phenomenal—everyone agrees.” The network had a total of 8 correspondents in Gaza throughout the conflict, including the only 2 English-speaking correspondents there. They stationed their journalists throughout the territory, got everything on tape and were integral to the effective contestation of the Israeli narrative of the conflict. And as public opinion polls show, while Israel did everything it could in terms of communications reach out (propaganda and public diplomacy), the attacks on Gaza set them back in terms of global support for their efforts. More importantly, after it had been established (rightly so) that Al-Jazeera had carried the torch in Gaza, an astute observer asked the following question, which went unanswered: “If everyone agrees that Al-Jazeera English’s coverage of Gaza was exceptional—and there seems to be a consensus—then why was the Arabic stream’s coverage dramatically different, more sensational, more image-driven, and less sophisticated than the English stream?” The reason why this is a critical question is that, while both the Arabic and English sides of Al-Jazeera understand their that their journalistic missions are different, neither has found a way to effectively describe why and how these missions are different without sounding like they are criticizing the other branch of the network. I bring this up because this problem is at the heart of AJE’s problems here in the US, and until they can better distance themselves from their Arabic-speaking colleagues without disrespecting them, the network’s image problems here will persist. Also, it is just a smart question.

(3) As it turns out, the West only has one news organization and everyone living in the West tunes into it and believes every word they hear/read. Okay, I’m obviously being facetious, but the phrase “the Western media” was thrown around and demonized as if it were literally and entirely owned and operated by AIPAC. I know—we all know—that the news media are going through some tough times. The 2009 State of Journalism findings were just recently released, and things are worse than ever. I got it. But there is diversity. And there are media taking the side of the Palestinians, particularly during the recent Gaza flare-up. Sadly, the two panelists that were chosen to represent the “Western media”—Seymour Hersh (The New Yorker) and Robert Fisk (The Independent)—not only failed to point out that monolithic conceptions of the Western media are somewhat inaccurate and certainly counterproductive, they were among its worst critics (especially in terms of quality of argument). The problem I have with these grand criticism on media in the “West” or “Arab world” is they result in the conclusion that the problem is the lack of accurate information being available in the other’s mediasphere, something that can be solved relatively easily (for instance, by establishing a news network to beam your “accurate” news towards the other’s region), sidestepping conversations about how to bridge the different news narratives being told on Western and Arab networks. Rather than negotiating complicated issues with smart colleagues, we walk away saying: “If only your people knew what my people knew, this whole Israel-Palestine thing would be easy. Man, this Kafka is delicious. Yum!” (True conversation)

(4) Afghanistan. It is a mess, the US is deploying a lot more troops there, and it is where Al-Jazeera really made a name for itself among the Western media elite after the US-led invasion in 2001. The forum concluded with a panel titled, “Understanding Instability in the Subcontinent: India, Pakistan & Afghanistan,” which included neither an Indian nor an Afghani. At the conclusion of the panel, after it had been established that Afghanistan was basically a total mess (fair), that the Taliban may be the best bet (I hope not) and that US-led efforts were doomed (an Afghani in the audience disagreed), Ibrahim Helal (Director of News for Al-Jazeera English) asked the panel: “Given the dire situation you’ve described is taking place in Afghanistan, and the likelihood that it will only get worse, can you offer any advice on how journalists should cover the war?” Helal also added, “Oftentimes it takes days for our correspondents to get between cities, not too mention the areas of actual conflict. What can we do to help?” (Imprecise quote, but accurate). Great question, no? Sadly, no one on the panel was able to offer constructive advice to Mr. Helal, and I couldn’t help but feel conflicted for the future of Afghanistan, its people, the troops, as well as journalists struggling to cover a war that is so difficult to report and is getting so little attention, despite its great significance to both the Arab and Western worlds.

Discuss?