The mood is becoming upbeat in

By Daoud Kuttab

It has always been a problem for journalists. How to carry on the profession of journalism without being accused of sympathizing with the person you are covering. Ever journalist who covers a conflict can’t help but have some sympathizes for his subject. Internationally famous columnists Tom Friedman once told me that a good journalist always shows his subject that he is genuinely interested in what he is saying. You have to give the person you are interviewing the feeling that you are handing on every word he or she is saying, he explained.

Professional journalists of course have a responsibility of reflecting what their subjects are saying and not what they themselves are thinking. Journalists covering a murder are not murderers, and those interviewing thieves are not criminals. We are simply messengers and therefore we should not be judged by the message, even if it is a very ugly message.

Tayser Allouni is a journalist. His personal thoughts and sympathizes are his right and are protected by the universal declaration of human rights. But for a Spanish court to punish him for appearing to be supportive with Usam Ben Ladin to seven years in prison is wrong and must not be tolerated by defenders of human rights and freedom of expression. This punishment reminds us of the worst days of American Mcarthism or those under the Franco dictatorship.

In the 1980s Abie Nathan an Israeli peace activists who ran the Voice of Peace radio station from the Mediterranean was jailed for six months because his interview with Yaser Arafat in Lebanon was  declared a violation of an Israeli law that considered sympathy for the PLO equal to support of a terrorist organization. Peace supporters, including many in

As a Palestinian journalists I have often found myself in having to defend why I am interviewing Israelis. Closed minded Arab nationalists consider such interactions with Israelis tantamount with sleeping with the enemy and attacked me for what they considered "normalization of relations with the Zionists aggressors."

 Journalists are professionals whose main job is to seek the truth and to present all points of view. This is what we try and teach young Arab journalists who are trying to break out of the once closed Arab media. Al Jazzera was a breath of fresh air to supporters of independent media because it provided a badly needed outlet that had been denied Arabs for many years. By presenting both the points of views of governments and that of the opposition, Al Jazzera and the other new media outlets greatly weakened  Arab government media monopolizes.

The verdict of the Spanish court must raise the blood pressure of every lover of independent media the world over. Supporters of the freedom of expression and the right of all, including those whose opinions we might not like, must not let this judgment pass. If showing sympathy when interviewing Ben Laden is a crime, one day, the mere sympathy with anyone opposed to the government point of view or that of the majority will become a crime. The model of a tolerant Spain and that of enlightened

Daoud Kuttab is an award winning Palestinian journalist. He has suffered harassment from both the Israelis and the Palestinians. He is the founder of the Arab world’s fist Internet radio station and the director of the

by Daoud Kuttab

 Some of the speakers and participants said a conference called for by the Palestinian Authority to discuss how to have an effective public relations campaign was tens of years overdue.

Titled “Talking to the world”, the invitation was issued by Information Minister Nabil Shaath and attended by the top public and private brass of the Palestinians, including President Mahmoud Abbas, Prime Minister Ahmed Qureia, Hanan Ashrawi, Palestinian journalists and media activists. Held in Ramallah, the two-day conference reviewed the political scene in America, Europe and Israel.

Participants discussed the status of the Palestinian cause in French, Spanish, German, Italian and even Japanese-speaking countries. They focused on the local media scene, the attitude of international wire services, the Hebrew press, looking at print, television and Internet media outlets. The first major disagreement occurred in the opening session. Chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat stated that the world knows what is happening to Palestinians while member of the Palestinian Legislative Council Hanan Ashrawi insisted that the world doesn’t and surely doesn’t understand the Palestinian reality.

Some commentators attempted to bridge the gap by saying that the bare facts of what is happening in the occupied territories are available for those interested in finding them, but that the overriding image of the Palestinians is negative. By and large, the discussions, working groups, side debates and discussions during coffee breaks and meal outings focused on the English and Hebrew media.

The only other issue of continued attention, other than that of the media in the US and Israel, was the international image of Palestinians, primarily on television. While many diaspora Palestinians felt that support from communities in the West showing solidarity could result in change, the majority agreed that the key to change is in Palestine and in the hands of Palestinians at all levels. They pointed to the need for a unified official position by the Palestinian Authority or the absence of coordination between the public and private sectors in Palestine and for a change in the Palestinians’ attitudes. Creating the office of a spokesperson, with professionals not politicians, and a daily paper of talking points could go far in reflecting the Palestinian public position. Speaker after speaker criticised the mistaken attempt to present the Palestinian struggle as that of a Palestinian mother appearing to celebrate the death of her son and refusing to show her real feelings or a militant exhibiting a child carrying a weapon or a masked 16 years old parading with a Kalashnikov.

The need to humanise the Palestinian image through encouraging human interest stories and documentaries was emphasised repeatedly, but the suggestion to break the camera’s attempt to film some of the negative images was rejected. Improving the Palestinian image is not strictly a media issue. A number of astute speakers pointed out the absence of leading political groups and representatives of Palestinian factions who need to be involved in the job of educating the public about the need to stop idolising death and militarisation of the struggle. Discussion of the image of Palestinians in the Israeli media received much attention. Leading Palestinian media activists who are citizens of Israel spoke about the absence of a serious attempt to reach the Israeli public at all levels.

The fear that such effort could be considered normalisation, that some feel, was quickly rejected and the need to genuinely understand the holocaust was referred to as one of the first steps in trying to reach out to Israelis. The participants were surprised by the strength of the statement made by Nabil Shaath on the issue of incitement in the Palestinian media. He told the conferees what happened when he found out what was an anti-Jewish Friday sermon given by a Gazan sheikh which was aired live on Palestine TV. After explaining some of what was said, Shaath sharply attacked the sheikh, announced in the presence of the director of Palestine TV that this particular clerk will never appear on Palestine TV and that he insisted on the following week to make sure that a sermon espousing the opposite points of view was delivered. Shaath also discussed how he plans to reorganise the official media (making them genuinely a public service broadcasting), to cancel the need for licensing of newspapers and the way he hoped to regulate the private audiovisual media in a way that will make them more effective, with regulators’ only work to be focused on issues of public taste, as decided by representatives of the public.

The image of Palestinians in the world was summarised by one speaker as having one of the world’s most just causes represented by some of the worst defenders. An attempt to change that, even a small one as that initiated by the Palestinian Authority, can lead to significant results. The key will be in the implementation, follow up and the seriousness of the Palestinian leadership in pursuing such endeavour.

by Daoud Kuttab

 The world community has suddenly become interested in the media scene in the Arab world. It is not clear whether this is a result of the success enjoyed by some Arab satellites or simply an attempt to find a way to win the hearts and minds of Arabs and Muslims, as part of the West’s “war on terror”. Major countries, among them the US, Sweden, UK, EU, are pouring millions of dollars supposedly towards making the Arab media more independent, and media groups are coming together to see what are the needs of the media in this region of the world. For those of us struggling for independent media in this area, this is generally good news, although we must be aware of the many pitfalls that can accompany such an abrupt interest in this sector.

A quick survey of the media scene in our region shows that governments have always had overwhelming influence in almost every aspect. They either own or control almost all the media. There is government monopoly on radio and TV in most Arab countries; newspapers are often nominally owned by private individuals but in almost all the countries these businesspeople are partially or entirely subservient to governments who can make or break a private newspaper through a variety of administrative, legal and political pressure points. Governments also have influence on the media through the journalists’ syndicates. Big businesses, including local representatives of multinationals, are often in tandem with autocratic governments, at times having a negative effect on independent media, often encouraging pro-government media and generally favouring centralised media instead of decentralised local and community media. As long as governments control media, the ability of independent media to exist and flourish is next to impossible. Therefore, media reform must be directed towards either seeking ways to lobby governments to end their control and support for some media outlets at the account of others or, conversely, (and until such a change takes place) create a mechanism so as to subsidise media not supported by governments, thus establishing some sort of equilibrium between government-supported and private-supported media. Such support can be done creatively so as not to make donors part of the problem rather than part of the solution.

 Some examples in this direction are the Danish government’s International Media Support NGO, which funds the programme Eye on the Media and the Arab Reporters for Investigative Journalism (ARIJ), in which it is funding the research of investigative reports and subsidising the media outlets that allow their staff to take time off to do research by covering the cost of a replacement staff person while the journalist is busy doing the investigation. Other ideas can include support for radio and TV production and subsidising a newspaper supplement that deals with environment, women or youth. There is need for agents of change, and since this is a dynamic field, we need to invest effort and resources in supporting individual champions that are willing to fight for reform. Such support will encourage them to continue taking risks and also help create role models for younger media practitioners. Funding these champions also helps them avoid making compromises. Media-related prizes and other incentives can go a long way in providing psychological and practical support as well.

The information revolution has provided technological tools to allow media champions to push for change and reform even under the most dictatorial regimes. Such innovative and experimental ideas needs to be supported technically and financially. While donor-supported programmes can have many positive results, there are a number of pitfalls that donors must be aware of. Too many donor-driven programmes which reflect their desires (often in good faith) end up in failure because too little effort is made to hear what the recipients want. On many occasions the enthusiasm of donors has led them to lend support to nothing more than paper organisations. Donor funding has also at time gone to people who are in the business of fundraising and can spout all the correct jargon with little substance to back this up.

The region is full of examples in which donors created programmes that are duplicates. Journalists and media activists sometimes suffer when taking financial support from donors. While this is not always the fault of the donors (recipients often take the risks knowing the potential dangers), it is important that donors be aware of the possible backlash. Donor-driven programmes are usually well-funded, thus driving wages higher and potentially hurting small independent media, the group that needs to be helped the most. Certain well-funded programmes are often taking away business from small- and medium-scale media producers. While the situation in the Arab world in general, and Jordan in particular, is quickly changing for the better, much work is still needed. While issues such as imprisonment of journalists, liberalising the airwaves and access to information can be addressed through laws, the more difficult problem of creating an environment that respects freedom of expression will take much longer and will require efforts from schools, political parties and civil society.