The Facebook Garden of Eden

I agree with Eden Abergil when she says that the posting of her pictures on Facebook has been blown out of proportion.

This fresh faced lady had only intended to share with her loved ones 'the best time of her life' in the Israeli 'Defense' Forces; a formative experience in the life of many Israelis. This is a coming- of-age time to be cherished, remembered and revisited whatever career path these youngsters choose for their future. Blindfolded or not, the Palestinians are at best stooges and at worst a nuisance in an exclusively Israeli production. Theirs is not dissimilar to the role ascribed to Red Indians in a Spaghetti Western. They don't speak much, and when they do it is to utter robotic nonsense in a heavy accent. Without them the decorum just wouldn't be complete but the same could be said of the cactus or the olive tree.

So here goes Eden, a model soldier as she claims... or did she mean a soldier model. Having been dubbed 'super-sexy' by her commenting friends as she poses all smiles for the camera while elderly Palestinian men stare into the darkness of their blindfold. There is no hint of her feeling sorry for these helpless characters then, and now that she is made to explain her behaviour. Her reluctant apology addresses the potential public relation damage inflicted on Israel, not the moral dimension of her actions.

What is lacking here is not shame. Eden is not a 'bad apple' in the league of a Lynndie England torturing and sexually abusing in Abu Ghreib. No, she is boringly mainstream in a society that has relentlessly dehumanised its enemy to justify its own 'humane' project born out of the Prison camps of WW2. What is lacking instead is empathy: a skill that is harnessed in health professionals and that is actively supressed in military personnel (across the globe). The added dimension in the case of Israel is that its civilian society also suffers from the inability to empathise with 'the other'. As such, Eden cannot be blamed for not identifying at any level with the Palestinians, in their suffering but also in other mundane aspects of their lives (She jokes for example on whether the blindfolded man has a Facebook profile, as if such thing was inconceivable...for a West Bank Arab).

Having been quick to condemn, the Israeli military is unlikely to update its core curriculum in consultation with Amnesty International or the Quaker movement. Eden, had she still be enrolled would not have been lectured on the fact she has humiliated men who have daughters of her own age; living breathing human beings with an intellect, a story and a future. She would instead be encouraged to listen and learn from the polished Mark Regev as he quickly reclaims the moral high ground against the barbarian hordes that threaten civilisation.

Down and Dirty in Jeddah

By Joseph El-Khoury

Sex is the ultimate taboo in any society. It is the subject that mesmerises audiences from Amsterdam to Tokyo passing through...Jeddah.

A storm has been brewing over the closure of the offices of the Lebanese Broadcasting Corporation (LBC) in Saudi Arabia following the personal on screen revelations of a Saudi citizen. Given the LBC’s obsession with ratings and the delivery of a competitive product in the murky world of Arab Satellite Broadcasting, it is no surprise that they chose to milk the subject of sex through their bold talk show ‘A7mar bel Khatt El 3areed’( Red in bold writing) fronted by a babyfaced rising star, Malek Maktabi. Having started as a propaganda tool for the Christian Lebanese militias in the mid-1980s, over the years, LBC has gradually shed any ambition of being a political messenger and has focused instead on winning the broader Arab market, where political debates (even in other countries) disturb and upset. The problem with that approach is that no debate on social issues can be apolitical, since the two are inextricably linked. Policies are dictated by society and in turn dictate social behaviour. The process is open and transparent in democratic societies but not in the Arab world. Debating sexual behaviour, domestic violence or religious beliefs is not only a challenge to patriarchal tradition and the moral authorities of the realm, but one step away from asking tough questions on the state of the economy, human rights and foreign policy. Individual liberties and political freedom go hand in hand; a fact that Arab regimes, may they be presidential dictatorships or religious monarchies, are very aware of and actively counteract. The means of control will vary from secular Damascus to conservative Khartoum and so far have proven successful. That said, it is no surprise that it was the Saudis who proved most sensitive to the sexual adventures of one of their compatriots. Religious dogma and politics are one in Saudi Arabia where the ruling family’s claim to power since their ascendance in the first part of the 20th century is inseparable from the domination of the militant group of Islamists known as the Wahhabis. Furthermore, the culprit is the LBC, a network with an ex-Christian identity now mostly owned by Prince Al Waleed Bin Talal, a Saud himself but not part of the ruling inner circle. Confronted with this explosive cocktail mix, the tenants of the moral order and political stability in the Kingdom had no choice but to act. The rhetoric on ‘negative cultural influences’ and ‘habits that are foreign to Saudi society’ were brought out for the benefit of the masses, who are unlikely to witness the excesses of their rulers in the clubs of London or the Casinos of Monte-Carlo.

Malek Maktabi will most likely be asked to down tune his program to less threatening topics, making it virtually unwatchable. May we suggest covering the Palestinian-Israeli for a change? At least we all agree we support the Palestinians, or is that denial as well?

The Peasant and the Student: Iran in the eyes of the West

By Jihad Bitar

Media Analyst

http://arabmediareview.blogspot.com

Just wondering…

“Iran’s Revolution” or “Iran’s Summer Breeze”? This debate has been going on in the western press for the last week. Is Iran heading towards a change of regime or is it just a “very unusual” event that will “eventually die down”.

I will publish later in the week a detailed report with numbers and data on how the Western and Arab media are viewing this “Revolutionary/Summer Breeze”; but first results suggest that the western press is actually divided on another matter:

Is the Iranian split between Ahmadinejad and Moussavi’s supporters, social or religious based?

It seems that US press is focusing on the religious divide between “fundamentalists” (Ahmadinejad supporters) and “reformists” (Moussavi), whereas European media prefers to talk about the clashes between “students” (Moussavi) vs. “rural” Iranians (Ahmadinejad), thus hinting at a socio/economic divide.

Some sources are mixing both visions, assuming that if you are a “student”, you must be a “reformist”, whereas “rural peasants” are surely fundamentalists…

If the western media is right, then if you ever meet a fundamentalist bearded student fighting it out with a clean-shaved reformist peasant; then you’d better either buy a new pair of glasses, or call your psychiatrist.

"زيْ ما هوِّي"

نصري الصايغ
منقول من صحيفة السفير اللبنانية في 08/06/2009

هذا المقال للأستاذ نصري الصايغ الذي نشرته صحيفة السفير اللبنانية اليوم يؤشر بشكل مباشر وبليغ على عمق ازمة النظام التي يعيشها لبنان والتي تمثّل الخطر الفعلي على بقائه وطناً وكياناً. أزمة النظام السياسي تهدّد بقاء الوطن.

هذه انتخابات وفق النظام الطائفي، للمرة الثالثة عشرة، وستتكرر. سيتغير الشكل وقد يتبدل النظام، لكن الطائفي في لبنان قد تحجّر. وعليه، لا بد من الوصف: الطائفي لا عقل له. عقله مستعار، أو مبثوث فيه، وفق الشرطية «البافلوفية». العقل الطائفي يصوّت ولا يختار. ينسخ ويسمع ويستجيب فوراً وينساق بسرعة. يُقاد، مع شعور بالفخر. يخشى التفرد ويشتاق دائما الى تنفيذ المهمات الطائفية، بلكنة «وطنية»، وشعارات النقاء «الايديولوجي والأخلاقي والإنساني».
الطائفيون يتراءى لهم أنهم يفكرون، فيما هم يملكون في بواطن دماغهم، آلات لتسجيل الأقوال الشرطية الآتية من فوق، من لدن الزعيم أو المرشد السياسي أو القائد «الشعبي»، أو المرشد الديني. الطائفي إنسان مروَّض جداً، ولديه حماسة شديدة للتمتع بشرطية الولاء. لذلك، هو يجمل تبعيته، بتبني «القضية» المعمول بها رواجا.
كلب «بافلوف» يتبرع بلعابه. هذا هو قانون الاقتران الشرطي. الطائفي، لا يتبرع بلعابه، بل بوجوده كاملا، فإذا لم يأته الأمر من فوق، طالب به. لأنه في وضعية المستعد للتنفيذ.
محمد عابد الجابري فسّر علاقة أخلاق الطاعة بالسلطة والناس. واعتبر ان هذه العلاقة من أشرس الموروثات الصامدة حتى الآن في البنية البطريركية، بحسب ما قدم هشام شرابي، في أطروحته النقدية لبنية المجتمع العربي. ولا بد من عودة الى هذا المقام، ذات يوم.
المشهد الانتخابي، على جمال تقليده للنظم الديموقراطية، وعلى ما يترسب منه على الإبهام من حبر خاص، غير قابل للامحاء، يقرب بين الناخبين. فإذا كان لهذا الإبهام المحبّر، صفة عدم الاستعمال مرة ثانية، إلا أن زوال الحبر، يعيد تفريق اللبنانيين الى أصولهم الطائفية الى لحظة ما قبل الانتخاب. وسيكون اللبنانيون «زي ما هم عليه»، قبل الانتخاب وبعده. سيعاد استعمالهم «زي ما هم». لن يخرج الطائفي من رحم أمه أبدا، هو بحاجة إلىه ليرضع منه وجوده ومعيشته الاقتصادية وتوازنه النفسي. طمأنينته داخل رحمه الاجتماعي ـ داخل طائفته، لأنها جغرافيته وتاريخه وبصمات روحه.
المشهد الانتخابي أمس، سيسفر عن تبعثر جديد، وتصلّب قديم. التبعثر في الشكل، والتصلب في شرايين العقل. والعقل الطائفي يفرز فرزاً عجيباً: عدوه مقيم في بلده، ويمد يده لعدو من الخارج. مرة يكون ايران ومرة أميركا، ومن قبل عبد الناصر، وبعده دمشق، وأحيانا، وبلا خجل، اسرائيل. عقل يبحث عن عدو يشاركه في استعدائه لذاته.
ستتفتق عبقرية السياسيين اللبنانيين، بعد فوز القوى الطائفية، ذات الـ14 آذار، وذات الـ8 آذار، بإيجاد صيغة يشترك فيها «الأعداء» (لا الخصوم) ضمن صيغة «عدوين: واحد قوي وآخر ضعيف، أو متساويين في القوة والضعف.
المشكلة ليست في من انتخبناهم، بل في «لماذا انتخبناهم، والكثير منا يعرفهم رذيلة رذيلة، ومعصية معصية، وانقلاباً بعد انقلاب، وشعارا ينفيه شعار. مشكلتنا، أننا نوالي ونطيع، ولا نسأل ولا ننتج». نفضل الرضاعة على الزراعة».
لا حلول، بغير السياسة، ولا سياسة بغير الثقافة. (السياسة في لبنان بلا ثقافة) وأول مبدأ ثقافي سياسي في الديموقراطية، هو اعتبار الناس مرجعية الحكام. لا مرجعية لأي قائد، مهما علا شأنه، إلا إذا كان جذره شعبه وناسه، وطبقته وثقافة بلاده. عندنا، القيادات الطائفية مرجعيتنا... جيّرنا هذه المرجعية بسبب التخلف الثقافي، إلى من هم فوق، عائليا وراثيا، ماليا، طائفيا، مذهبيا ومافيوزيا. جيّرنا مالنا لهم، وبتنا عراة، لا نملك من ذاتنا، سوى آذان، تنتظر الأمر لتطيعه، وتنفذه، بتفان وصدق...
الاحتشاد أمام صناديق الاقتراع، لو أنه بني على الاختيار الحر، في سباق نظام انتخابي متحرر طائفيا، (كما نص اتفاق الطائف) لكان لبنان سيتغير حتما ولكانت سلطته قادرة على أن تحكم فيها أكثرية وتعارضها أقلية، وكلاهما لا ينتسب إلى طوائف بل إلى مواطن بصيغة الجمع، أما وقد بلغ الاحتشاد الطائفي مداه... وظهرت النتائج على ما هي عليه، فليس لنا أن نتنبأ بلبنان جديد، لأنه، سيكون «زي ما هوِّي».

Bloggers Bearing Witness in Gaza: Bias or Added Value to Media Coverage?

By Najate Zouggari *

Source: BBC Website/Middle East

The relationship between ‘warbloggers’ and journalists is precisely not a peaceful one. It is often caricatured - with some reason - as the encounter of frustrated failed journalists with professional ones jealous of their privileges. Donald Matheson and Stuart Allan** in a chapter entitled ‘War Zone: The Role of Warblogs in Iraq’ are thinking about the collaboration between what they call mediasphere and blogosphere. They say that blogs cannot be separated from the mediasphere to which they respond. In the case of the recent war on Gaza, it seems on the contrary, that the blogosphere was an impulse of news and the main source of information. Matheson and Allan’s model, which was applied to the 2003 invasion of Irak, could clearly be inverted as far as the 2008 Gaza offensive is considered.

Their main conclusion is still valid though:
‘the dominant model of the foreign war correspondent, developed during the relatively information-scarce nineteenth-century, relied upon the correspondent having a monopoly of information and the status of an expert by dint of being present on foreign soil and having general journalistic skills. Such a model becomes less tenable when news editors and readers have instant access to multiple voices, both journalist and lay, experiencing the news event in question from an array of perspectives in multiple locations.’ Matheson, Allan (2007, p.87)

Some of these multiple voices are put together on Global Voices, a platform started by the Berkman Centre for Internet and Society at the Harvard Law School. Ethan Zuckerman and Rebecca MacKinnon founded this valuable meeting point in 2004. Four years later, it became a central independent resource for anyone interested in listening others’ voices. MacKinnon told the BBC: ‘If bloggers are out there creating media and talking about things that the mainstream media isn't covering, that may also help push the mainstream media to recognise that there are a lot of things out there that people care about that they've simply failed to cover.’***

From Gaza, with Love is a blog - created on Blogspot - by Mona Al-Farrah, a physician and human rights activist who actually was in Egypt while the bombings started. Her messages revealed though an authentic voice, transmitting directly in the blogosphere the news she received from her friends, before they got into the mediasphere. At least, when they eventually reached it. She was giving her phone number in case someone - journalists? - would like to speak with her. Mohammed Fares Al Majdalawi, film maker and social worker in Gaza strip, published a post on Mona’s blog (4/01/2008): ‘There is a horror in every minute (...) I have two message to the world, (...) to the lovers of peace and freedom in the world. First message: Imagine your life with no electricity, destroyed homes, missiles night and day, no food. Imagine your children and your family telling you they are afraid of the missiles (...) My second message: End the siege and stop the killings, stop the demolitions of our houses.’ ****

The lack of professional mediacy might be considered as an evidence of bias. Technically, however, the blogger is making himself available by putting his mobile phone number online, at the end of his post. Any journalist or any simple reader is invited to check the facts. Many bloggers like Mohammed kept writing, as far as they got an internet access. Hopefully, the mediasphere - not entirely - echoed the cries and stories of the blogosphere. Al Jazeera English, from Gaza, had a Twitter feed which gave the general public an opportunity to follow - and check - the news almost at the same time as a new post was published.

Passing through both mediasphere and blogosphere is a way for the audience to get really involved in the news process instead of absorbing passively the crumbs delivered by mainstream media. It is a chance for professional journalists to share a conversation with this sort of active public, as well as with non-professional writers and witnesses. It is worthwhile noticing how Al Jazeera English, at some point, realized the perfect combination between blogosphere and mediasphere through an experimental platform called ‘War On Gaza. Experimental Beta’. On this website, a map was available and accidents could be submitted through the site, Twitter and mobile phones (SMS). Then, they were checked and possibly validated.

In conclusion, ‘truth in a war zone’ does not depend anymore on the monopoly of information by foreign correspondents. It is more likely a dialogue between an active blogosphere and a open mediasphere that values the intelligence of its audience by putting it in the centre of the news process - in a shared rationality.

* French Journalist Living in London, Visit her Blog

** Maltby S., Keeble R. (2007) Communicating War. Memory, Media and Military. Bury St Edmunds: Arima Publishing
*** Boyd C., (2005). "Global voices speak through blogs," BBC NEWS Technology, April 6, 2005.
**** From Gaza, With Love (Mona El-Farra)

Related Links:
From Gaza, With Love
Gaza Today
Rafah Today
Diary of a Palestinian mother
Aljazeera Labs

May Chidiac or the Curse of the Living Martyr

By Joseph El-Khoury

May Chidiac crowned herself the ultimate drama queen last Monday in a country where drama queens, and they are mostly of the male sex, dominate the political and media horizon. Her impromptu resignation speech at the end of her weekly debate show on LBC made me cringe in my seat. It was intimate, personal, raw; incoherent...basically it made for painful watching. The speculations are rife over May’s true intentions, and many have extended the cynical analysis to predict that her performance was a platform to launch her political career with the upcoming elections or a less radical move to the relaunched MTV (for Murr TV) in March. The new station is likely to be better anchored in the March 14^th camp, unlike LBC which has been living a state of schizophrenic schism for many months. Obviously May had to invoke Jesus and a number of foreign and local saints to justify her behaviour. For those who have had any contact on a personal level with May Chidiac, it will be no secret that her personal views are those of the traditional Christian Right that dominated the landscape in the ‘Christian Ghetto’ of the 1980s. Her allegiance to the Samir Geagea of the ‘Lebanese Resistance’ era is unshakable. As the war ended the LBC and her staff underwent an intensely challenging ‘rehabilitation’ to allow them to function in this reunited Lebanon, where others had opinions that sounded repulsive and worthy of sniper fire only a few years earlier. The LBC was under pressure to succeed because they were by far the best placed, technically and professionally, to dominate the televised landscape in the post civil war era. They succeeded at a high cost, principally because of the astute maneuvring of Pierre Daher and the circumstances that surrounded the demise of the Lebanese Forces in the 1990s. May Chidiac’s public but skin deep conversion to the values of this multifaith/multiideological Lebanon served her image as a presenter well until the Cedar revolution. It did not resist the flames that engulfed her car on the 25^th September 2005, the result of a bomb planted by professionals that remain unidentified nearly 4 years later. I will not linger on the psychological impact that such event can have on the life of any individual, even less on that of a successful reasonably attractive lady in the prime of her life. Reactions to trauma are difficult to gage form a distance, without falling in the trap of cheap psychobabble. However a reassessement of priorities and attitudes, however temporary, is to be expected, especially when the physical injuries act a s a permanent reminder of the event.

May Chidiac chose to use her scars and her recovery to advance her cause, and she was encouraged in this by her political sponsors, who also incidentally contributed to her medical bills. The climax came when, pointing at herself with her index finger she reiterated that she was a ‘living martyr’. The problem with this concept is that, while dead martyrs are generally placed on a pedestal, their qualities highlighted and their weaknesses ignored, it is partly out of the respect extended to every deceased. This is because the dead are unable to take or give criticism. May’s public performance proves that the living version still enjoys this function. As others who belong to this category (Marwan Hamade, Elias El Murr) will tell you, the ‘privileged’ status of having survived an assassination attempt cannot be abused in a country where blood is cheap and martyrs count in the tens of thousands since 1975. The harsh reminder came from the usual suspects, the masters of sarcasms at the Al-Akhbar newspaper in the pen of Mr Pierre Abi Saab. In his enthusiasm to chastise May Chidiac’s psychodramatic performance he neglected to mention that the blood of sacrifice has been waved unashamedly at the masses and in the face of opposition for many years. Ironically it is elements within his camp that have long been promoting psychodrama as a political tool, and that ‘Living martyr’ was the name of a Hezbollah operation against Israel in 1994, incidentally the subject of an upcoming movie directed by the Syrian Najda Anzour. From 2005, The Hariri media machine did not hesitate to recycle martyrdom, aggressively and visually instilling guilt in the hearts and minds of the population. The ‘Truth’ (Hakika) placards spread across Beirut are still a witness to their tactics. In my opinion, May’s public display of distress was unprofessional and of bad taste but she was only applying the lessons from years of experience debating our political leaders

حرب غزة ومعارك المثقّفين العرب

وائل عبد الرحيم

أشهد ان بعض الصحافة المحسوب على ما يسمى تيار الاعتدال والموضوعية ينشر هذه الايام مقالات جريئة على نحو مخجل ومتبجح موجع. اشهد ان بعضنا يعين الظلم والعدوان والفاشية. اشهد ان معظمنا مستلب ومهزوم. اشهد اننا نكتب ترفاً قبيحاً، أشهد اننا فعلاً لا نستحي. نتكلم عن الارهاب والتطرف، ونعيد ونزيد في التهدئة والمعابر ومبادرات الحلول المؤجلة، ونصفي أحقادنا على جثث اطفالنا وبناتنا، ونتجاهل القتل والموت وإرهاب إسرائيل ووحشية جيشها الهمجي. تباً لنا ولمواقفنا المفتعلة وقلوبنا المريضة.
داوود الشريان – الحياة 06/01/09


كشفت الحرب الإسرائيلية الأخيرة على غزة المأزق السياسي والثقافي الذي تعيشه شريحة واسعة من مثقفي "تيار الاعتدال العربي". وإن كانت هذه الكلمات السابقة للكاتب داوود الشريان، وهو والصحيفة التي يكتب فيها محسوبان على تيار الاعتدال، جاءت كإنذار جادّ وحقيقي للمعتدلين العرب حتى يفطنوا إلى أيّ درك انحدروا في مقاربتهم الصراع العربي الإسرائيلي، وكيف أن مواقفهم لا ترقى إلى نصف ما يطرحه حزب "ميريتس" مثلاً، فإنها لا تكفي لتبيان الانفصام الكبير الذي اصاب كتّابنا ومثقفينا.
فهؤلاء قدّموا مقاربة سطحية ومرتبكة تساوي بين عدوان واضح في إجرامه وبين فصيل إسلامي مقاتل لديه أخطاؤه وخطاياه الكبيرة لكنه يبقى في النهاية نتاج هذا الصراع الذي لا ينتهي مع استعمار كولونيالي رسّخ وجوده على حساب حقوق تاريخية وإنسانية وطبيعية لشعب فلسطين، وليس حتماً سبباً له.
ولم يكن هذا الفصام مستجداً وليس جديداً لدى مثقفي الاعتدال العربي، لكن حرب غزة كشفت العورات بشكل صارخ وأظهرت أن "الديمقراطية العربية" التي ينادي بها هؤلاء ليست إلا كذبة ملفّقة تسقط أمام مهمة الدفاع عن أنظمة فاشية في قمعها ورجعية في بناها السياسية. كم كان مخزياً حقاً كيف استُنفرت صحف بيروت وكتّابها للدفاع عن الرئيس مبارك وخادم الحرمين الشريفين في حملة منسّقة ومنظمة لم تسثن كاتباً واحداً من كاتب العامود إلى الصحافي في قسم المحليات، فتحركت أوركسترا كاملة ومنتاغمة مستخدمة كل ديالكتيك هيغل للدفاع ليس عن الديمقراطية العربية التي يبشّرون فيها، بل عن أنظمة لا تقلّ عن خصمهم النظام السوري دموية وديكتاتورية.
قد نفهم أن كاتباً من هنا وكاتباً من هناك انبريا للدفاع عن موقف هذه الدولة أو ذاك الرئيس، لكن ان تخرج مانشيتات صحف بيروت وعواميدها شديدة الشبه بتلك اليافطات التي رفعتها بعض أفران المناقيش في الأحياء الشعبية لبيروت الغربية انتصاراً لجلالة الملك هذا وسيادة الرئيس ذاك، فهذا أمر مخز فعلاً.
حينما انطلقت ثورة الأرز اللبنانية في آذار / مارس 2005 كتب الصحافي Lee Smith في "الويكلي ستاندرد" بعد لقائه وليد جنبلاط في قرية المختارة عن حقيقة مشاعر الزعيم الدرزي "الديمقراطي". تحدث يومها لقرّاء هذه المجلة الأمير كية الناطقة باسم المحافظين الجدد المهزومين اليوم، عن أنّ هذا الديمقراطي المستجدّ يمتلك عقلية التاجر المركانتيلية الانتهازية )Weekly Standard 03/05/2005). جنبلاط كان تمنى قبل أشهر الموت لبول وولفويتز بصواريخ المقاومة العراقية. لم يستمرّ المحافظون الجدد بالتحكم في السياسة الخارجية الأميركية، سرعان ما أصبحوا عبئاً على جورج بوش فسمح الأخير لكوندوليزا رايس بتطهير وزارة الخارجية من أصدقاء ديك تشيني، وأبعد دونالد رامسفيلد عن وزارة الدفاع.
في العالم العربي من يأسف على هزيمة جورج بوش، لكن يوجد أيضاً من أسف قبل ذلك على هزيمة المحافظين الجدد بعدما كان بعيد حرب العراق يعبّ من سيل إغراق أيديولوجي كاد يطيح بالحدّ الأدنى للمنطق السياسي.
في حرب غزة ظهرت البقايا المتحوّلة لهذا "الإغراق".. مواقف لمثقفين بدت في أفضل الأحوال نافرة مربكة.
نقرأ للدكتور شاكر النابلسي تحليلاً "بسيكولوجياً" فذّاً للصراع العربي الإسرائيلي تحت عنوان "غزة تفتقد اليوم قباني ودرويش" وهو يلقي بمسؤولية ما أسماه الهيجان العاطفي للشارع العربي على أصحاب "الشعر التافه" الذين صنعوا تلك الرومانسية للقضية الفلسطينية ويقول في ذلك "فإذا كانت القضية الفلسطينية نكبة على العرب وجيوشهم، فهي نعمة مباركة على الشعر العربي. ويكفي أن يكون الشاعر فلسطينياً، لكي يكون الشاعر المُبرّز، ونجم المهرجانات والفضائيات والندوات، حتى ولو كان شاعراً من الدرجة العاشرة".
أمّا طارق الحميّد رئيس تحرير صحيفة الشرق الأوسط السعودية فلم يرَ في غزّة إلا "مسرحية دموية مقيتة تتكرر على مدى عقود، باسم القضية الفلسطينية.. نفس المشاهد، والأكاذيب، لا جديد فيها إلا الضحايا. فصيل يتاجر، وجرائم إسرائيلية، وشجب واستنكار عربي". موقف محايد لإعلامي لا يخفي انحيازه لمليكه!
خضير طاهر الكاتب العراقي الذي جعلته صحيفة إيلاف الالكترونية نجماً كان الأكثر صراحة في التعبير حينما عنون مقاله "الجيش الاسرائيلي يسحق عملاء ايران في غزة"، في استعادة على ما يبدو لكلمات فصيح اللغة العربية السابق ومخترع العاميّة اللبنانية سعيد عقل حينما رحّب بـ"الجيش الاسرائيلياني البطل" خلال غزو بيروت عام 1982.
مواقف هؤلاء تضاف اليها آلاف الكلمات المصفوفة التي أُهرقطت دفاعاً عن أنظمة الاعتدال. ولست أجادل في صحة الموقف المصري او السعودي. فلست ناخباً لأقيّم هذين الموقفين أو أقوّمهما انتخاباً، ويحق لمبارك أن يقفل معابره ما يشاء طالما أن صندوق الاقتراع ليس الحدّ الفاصل في تقرير مصيره، ويحق للملك عبدالله بن عبدالعزيز أن يصرّ على ما يراه صواباً فشرعية مُلكه مستندة إلى عرش السماء وسيوف "مجاهدي" محمد بن عبدالوهّاب التي فتحت الرياض. تماماً كما لا يكترث بشار الأسد بمواقف شعبه وهو المكرّس وريثاً أبديا للسلالة الجمهورية المالكة التي أسّسها والده الطاغية.
ويحقّ لكاتب العامود في صحف بيروت أن ينتشي بعلمانيته وأن يتحمّس في الوقت نفسه للدفاع عن حكم طائفي ودينيّ في السعودية يمنع حتى التعددية في المذهب الواحد ويطبّق الشريعة الإسلامية في أقسى عقوباتها من جلد وقطع رقاب وأيادٍ.
ويحقّ لكاتب يدعي الليبرالية والديمقراطية ان يدافع عن نظام يسجن زملاءه بتهم باطلة ويزجّ بأيمن نور في الزنازين المعتمة، ويحمي سلطة الأزهر التي ليس لديها عمل إلا تطليق الدكتور نصر حامد أبوزيد من زوجته واتهامه بالردّة.
يحقّ لهؤلاء الكتّاب أن يعطوا الأمثلة الصارخة على تناقضهم مع ما يرفعونه من شعارات، ولو كانوا يتمتعون بالذكاء الكافي والاحترام لأنفسهم لذهبوا في الاتجاه الذي كرّسه العزيز وسام سعادة في تشديده صراحة على الخطّ المحافظ للاعتدال. حسناً فعل وسام سعادة في ذلك، لأنه كان الأكثر صدقاً ونزاهة في كلّ ما كُتب حينما دعا إلى قيام "اليمين الدستوري الإستقلالي سياسياً، والمحافظ اجتماعياً (ابتداء من العائلة) والليبرالي اقتصادياً والانتقائي النقديّ ثقافياً" (المستقبل 16/11/2008).
الأكيد أن "الديمقراطية العربية" التي يطرحها بعض المثقفين للتنظير فحسب لم تعد شرعية طالما أنهم يتعاملون مع شعوبهم كما يتعامل طبيب نفسي مع مريض (على طريقة شاكر النابلسي في نظرته إلى الرأي العام العربي)، وهم يضمرون لها كراهية شديدة وخوفاً منها أن تأتي بحماس انتخاباً أو بمحمد عاكف إذا سقط النظام في القاهرة، متناسين أن ما يدفع الشعوب العربية إلى أحضان الإسلاميين ليس إلا فساد البديل والتناقض الصارخ الذي يحمله وأيضاً الموقف من الصراع العربي الإسرائيلي.
ومن هنا وحتى يتبلور بديل آخر، نصيحة لمثقفي الاعتدال بتخفيف اللهجة وكبح الشتائم المتبادلة مع مثقفي المعسكر المقابل، فإذا كانوا يتهمون أسعد ابو خليل وابراهيم الأمين بأنهما بوقين للأنظمة القمعية، فإنهم هم أيضاً أبواق لأنظمة أخرى لا تقلّ قمعية... وسيأتي يوم يتصالح النظام الرسمي العربي مع بعضه البعض، فلهم أن يحفظوا خطّ المصالحة مع من سيُفرض عليهم من متصالحين.
أما "الديمقراطية العربية" فتبقى حاجة ماسّة للمضطهدين والمقموعين ومستلبي الإرادة، وهي ليست ترفاً، وليست تمويلاً غير حكومي أو حكومي لمراقبي الانتخاب، بل هي الحقيقة الصارخة لما سيُسقَط من أوراق في صندوقة الاقتراع فيما لو حكم هذا الصندوق عالمنا العربي.

The Unbearable Excuse of Impartiality

By Joseph El-Khoury

A young girl, from the Al Solton family, at Al Shatee school where she has been staying
since being displaced from her home by the current conflict in the Gaza,
January 10, 2008. Eman Mohammed/Save the Children

The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) has refused to broadcast an emergency appeal on behalf of the Disasters Emergency Committee (DEC), a coalition of Aid agencies. Since 1963 this umbrella organisation has been involved in setting up efficient aid relief to victims of natural disasters and armed conflict across the world.

Representing well established charities the likes of Oxfam and the British Red Cross, they can hardly be suspected of pro-Hamas sympathies. Their websites reads: "At times of overseas emergency, the DEC brings together a unique alliance of the UK's aid, corporate, public and broadcasting sectors to rally the nation's compassion, and ensure that funds raised go to DEC agencies best placed to deliver effective and timely relief to people most in need".

In response to numerous calls, including from British Government officials (Douglas Alexander, Ben Bradshaw) and the tireless veteran MP Tony Benn, Caroline Thomson (CEO) echoed today the earlier words of the corporation’s Director General Mark Thompson, in his insistence that the decision was motivated by a commitment to ‘impartiality’. This surprising decision reveals a lack of sensitivity to the suffering of thousands of Palestinian casualties (wounded, orphaned, displaced etc) following the Israeli assault on Gaza.

If balanced reporting is a highly regarded value in complex conflicts, impartiality is a sad excuse for not airing an appeal to victims of war, regardless of the identity of the aggressor. Reading through the viewers comments on their online portal, one could argue that some support can be found among sections of the public for their editorial line so far on this matter. Obviously many others, including many British TV Licence payers (effectively those who fund the BBC as a public service) are appalled by it and have also made their thoughts clear in the comments section.

Abstract impartiality might have been achieved on the Gaza conflict, except that the BBC might realise that it has lost any relevance in its coverage of the Middle East, notably among Arab and Muslim audiences (An ironic state affairs at a time they are launching their Persian TV service). This relevance was earned the hard way through the excellent truly balanced reporting over the years by reporters of the class of Jeremy Bowen and Alan Johnston, to only name a few.

By emulating Sky and the covert pro-Israeli stance of the Rupert Murdoch-controlled media, the bureaucrats might have reassured the Right Wing pro-Israeli section of their audience, who have long accused the BBC of anti-Israel bias at the hint of any criticism...but by doing so this well respected and loved institution might have lost its soul.

Related links:
- BBC defends Gaza appeal decision
- To donate to the Gaza appeal

صباحك سعيد سيّدي جنرال احتياط في جيش الدفاع

وائل عبد الرحيم

In war-time, truth is so precious that she should always be attended by a bodyguard of lies
Winston Churchill, Late British Prime Minister

كمّ هائل من المعلومات، أخبار وصور، صحف تمتلئ بمقالات رأي.. هذا يبكي على غزة ويرثي لحال سكانها، ثمّ يرفع "بنان قلمه" مشهّراً بهذا الزعيم أو ذاك، منظّراً، مربّيا وموجّهاً، او "محلّلاً" بحياد مهني بارد.
وأحدهم يجلس وراء مكتب أنيق، مستخدماً التقنيات الحديثة في الاتصال بهذا أو ذاك من "أطراف الصراع" يدعوهم ليحتلّوا مساحة الشاشة لبضعة دقائق أو أكثر بقليل من الثرثرة المتبادلة مع مذيع منتشٍ.
وفي مكان آخر، هنالك من هوّ مدجج بنظريات الحياد التي خضع إليها في معسكرات التدريب الإعلامي، يمارس الرقابة على الصور التي تبثّ.. النيرانُ المندلعة من الأبنية المحروقة بأطنان المتفجّرات تكفي لتأكيد مصداقية ناقل الخبر.. أما صور الأطفال مقطوعة الرؤوس فليست من الحياد في شيء...
الدمُ ممنوع على الشاشة، والغضب ممنوع على الشاشة، والحزن مقنّن. والتوازن يفترض أن تُنقل صور منازل القتلى في غزة، فيما يعدّد الناطق باسم جيش الدفاع الإسرائيلي كم إسرائيلياً أصيب بـ"الهلع" في أشدود نتيجة سقوط صاروخ غراد صيني يحمل كيلوغراماً أو اثنين من المواد المتفجرة.
قُتل 42 طفلاً في مدرسة تابعة لوكالة غوث اللاجئين، وأصيب اسرائيليان في بئر السبع بجروح طفيفة جدّاً فيما "أصيب" 8 آخرون بـ"الهلع".. قال الناطق العسكري لجيش الدفاع.
ويبتسم المذيع للضيف الإسرائيلي، فهو يحرجه بأسئلة "محكمة" تدلّ على مهنيّة خالصة. وبعد أن يُحرَجَ الضيفُ، يشكره مضيفُه بحياد بارد "مهني جدا".
وغداً سيضطرّ آخرُ أن يحدّثُ أحدهم في "أورشليم" يدعوه ليملأ الشاشة أيضاً. سيقول له بلكنة فلسطينية متعمدة لا تخضع للرقابة "مرحباً"، ويختمها بـ"شكرا لك يا سيّدي".
لكّنه، عندما يعود إلى المنزل في المساء، سيتخيّل سيناريو آخر متفلتاً من ضوابط "الحياد المهني" مع ضيفه الثقيل في "أورشليم".
سيرفع سماعة الهاتف ويقول له "أنت الجنرال احتياط في فلسطين المحتلة؟.. نريدك أن تشارك معنا من مكانك عبر الأقمار الصناعية.. هل أنت موافق؟ آه هذا جيّد.. سيتصلون بك من القدس المحتلة لاتخاذ الترتيبات اللازمة. آه، تسألني عن اسمي؟ ما لك باسمي قلت لك اسم المؤسسة وهذا يكفي.. عفواً ليس لديك الحقّ بأن تسألني عن جنسيتي.. على العموم أنا لبناني.. أنت يا ضابط احتياط من أين أنت؟ أعرف أعرف أنك اسرائيلي، أنت إسرائيلي بحكم القوّة، لكنني أسألك عن بلدك الأم.. بولندا أم النمسا أم أنكّ روسي؟ أم عربي من العراق أو اليمن؟.. لا بدّ ان لديك موطناً أصلياً ولدت فيه أو ولد أبوك. أنت من الاشكيناز أم السفارديم؟ أليس من حقي أن أسألك، فأنت كنت قبل قليل تسألني إذا كنتُ مسيحياً أو مسلماً.. انا أيضاً لديّ الحق في سؤالك. هل أعطوا والدك تعويضاً عن منزله في وارسو؟ آه جيّد لأنني سمعت أن ألمانيا لا تزال تدفع الأموال لضحايا المحرقة.. جيّد أنهم عوّضوك عن منزلك، على العموم يمكنك دائماً أن تذهب إلى هناك بصحبة العائلة لزيارة موطن الآباء والأجداد ولقاء من تبقى من أقارب.. طبعا عندما تكون الأمور في فلسطين المحتلة مضبوطة ولا تضطرون الى الخروج في غارة لقتل بضع عشرات من المدنيين وقطع رؤوس أطفالهم بقنابل زنة الطن التي تبيعكم إياها أميركا بسعر الكوكا كولا. أنا أحسدك يا جنرال احتياط، فانا أيضاً أمي ولدت في فلسطين المحتلة، ومنازل جدّي وأخوته مسجّلة ضمن "أملاك الغائبين". يعني مصادرة يا سيد جنرال احتياط بفعل قانون شرّعتموه قبل 50 عاماً. وللأسف يا سيّد لن يتاح لي أن أزور فلسطين المحتلة، وجدّي مات وهو يثرثر عن "أملاكه" هناك. هذا يكفي يا سيّد جنرال احتياط، تحدثنا كثيراً وتعارفنا في حفل العلاقات العامّة الهاتفية هذه، لدي الآن وغد آخر سأحاول الاتصال به، ولكنه وغد عربي هذه المرّة. آه بالمناسبة كم طفلاً قتل جيش دفاعكم اليوم؟ ألا تعرفون أن الأطفال ينتقمون من قاتلهم بأن يطلقوا لعنة تصيب نساء القاتل عندما يحمَلنَ؟ لكن ربما أكون مخطئاً، وربما يتطبّع القتيل بطباع القاتل ولو بعد جيل.. أنت تفهمني جيّداً يا جنرال احتياط، أليس هذا ما حدث معكم؟. ألم يأخذ المتورطون في جيش الدفاع بعضاً من طباع قاتل آبائهم؟... لا تخجل يا جنرال احتياط، ولوّ؟ ما في غيرنا على التلفون... على كل حال اتمنى أن يتعلّم ضحاياكم بعضاً من خصالكم، لكنني يا جنرال احتياط أتمنى أن يتعلموا بعضاً من أفضلها.. ألستم أنتم يا ضباط جيش الدفاع الذين استمريتم بملاحقة النازيين المسؤولين عن جرائم الحرب التي ارتُكبت بحق الملايين من الأبرياء في الحرب العالمية الثانية؟. لاحقتموهم 30 عاماًً بعد الحرب، وصلتم إليهم حتى في أميركا الجنوبية، وانتزعتموهم من دفء عائلاتهم.. وكنتم محقين في هذا.. كذلك هؤلاء الأطفال الذين تقتلونهم كلّ يوم، فإن إخوتهم سينتزعونكم من دفء عائلاتكم يوماً ما ومن أمام أحفادكم المذهولين، وسيقدمونكم الى المحاكمة يوم ينتصر العالم للعدل والقانون.. أما هذا العالم اليوم، المجرّد من القيم الإنسانية، فهو ملعون أبوه كما هو ملعون أبوك الذي بنى الكيبوتز على أنقاض قرية فلسطينية وفلح أرضاً دفن فيها صاحبها.. كفى حديثاً الآن يا جنرال احتياط، ولا تنسََ أن تأتي في الموعد المحدد إلى الاستوديو فلديّ وظيفة يجب أن أتمّها وأقبض راتبي في نهاية الشهر".
وفي اليوم التالي يذهب صاحبنا إلى عمله، ويتصل بضيفه في اورشليم، "مرحباً سيدي، صباح جميل أليس كذلك.. آه إنه الظهر عندكم في أورشليم؟ آه نعم أنا من لبنان، يا سيّد.. آه معك حقّ نحن جيران ويوجد الكثير من النقاط المشتركة بيننا.. أليس أحيرام الفينيقي هو الذي أهدى خشب الأرز إلى سليمان الحكيم لبناء الهيكل؟ نعم نعم انا قرأت التوراة. صحيح إنني من أبوين مسلمين ولكنني منفتح على كل الثقافات.. حسناً ما رأيك إذا تحدثنا قليلاً في العمل.. شكراً لك يا سيدي هذا من حسن ذوقك. تعرف إننا نحرص على الحياد..."..
وبين الحين والآخر يسترق صاحبنا النظر إلى تلك المحطة الفضائية في تلك "المشيخة الخليجية المتخلفة" ليرى وجوه الأطفال الذين قتلهم مجتمع الاحتياط الإسرائيلي.

صحافّيو غزة في دائرة النار الإسرائيليّة

فيما الجيش الإسرائيلي يمنع بشكل كامل دخول الصحافة الأجنبية إلى غزة، فإن تدفق المعلومات من القطاع لم يتوقف حيث نشط الصحافيون الفلسطينيون رغم كل المخاطر لنقل الخبر بالصوت والصورة إلى العالم. ونهار الأربعاء توفّي المصوّر التلفزيوني باسل فرج (22 عامً) متأثّراً بجروح أصيب بها في الغارة التي استهدفت مقر جمعية "واعد" للأسرى، في حي تل الهوا، جنوب مدينة غزة، في اليوم الأول للغارات الإسرائيلية.
وكان فرج يعمل مصوراً للتلفزيون الجزائري وفي شركة فلسطين للانتاج الإعلامي، وهو من سكان حي الشجاعية في مدينة غزة. كذلك يعاني إيهاب الشوا الذي يعمل في وكالة رامتان للأنباء من جروح نتيجة إصابته بشظية في فخذه الأيمن بعد 10 دقائق من أوّل هجوم صباح يوم السبت الماضي.
وفي اتصال معه يقول الصحافي مفيد أبوشمالة لموقع Arabdemocracy من غزة إن الصحافيين الفلسطينيين وخاصة مصوّري التلفزيون والمراسلين يتحركون وفق معطيات وإرشادات لا تقي من مخاطر الإصابة "لا سيّما وأن هذه الإرشادات تفيد في حالة المواجهة الميدانية بالأسلحة الخفيفة، وإن ما لديهم من سترات واقية لا تحميهم من ضربات الصواريخ التي تتساقط (أحيانا بشكل عشوائي) على مدنيين ومؤسسات خدماتية وبضمنها مرافق الأونروا".
ويعمل مفيد في وكالة رامتان في غزّة التي استطاعت أن تقدّم خدمة إخبارية حيّة ومتميّزة استندت إليها معظم الفضائيات العربية في نقلها للحرب التي تشنّ على القطاع.
ويقول أبو شمالة إن الصحافيين الفلسطينيين في القطاع يسعون لتغطية العدوان بالحد الذي يضمن لهم السلامة نظراً لعدم وجود معارك ميدانية قريبة يمكن تصويرها عن قرب.
ويضيف "كذلك فإن تحركات سيارات البث أيضاًُ معرضة للخطر رغم أنها تحمل علامات تلفزيونية وما شابه ذلك، وبالأمس ذهبتُ إلى مستشفى الشفاء فوجدت أكثر من 30 صحافياً ينتظرون وصول المصابين والجثث من ضحايا العدوان ويكتفون بتصويرهم على باب المستشفى باعتبار أن ذلك يكفي".
ويتابع "نحن في رامتان بدورنا لا نستطيع توقّع مكان وزمان الضربة التالية لذا فإننا نصوّر على الهواء مباشرة سماء غزة وتتحرك الكاميرا بشكل شبه منتظم في محاولة لرصد أي هجوم وتصويره على الهواء وهذا ما حدث في الأيام الماضية خلال وجود مراسل للجزيرة أو غيرها في حالة لايف مثلا".
وفيما يخصّ التغطية الإخبارية المكتوبة، يشير أبوشمالة إلى أن الصحف الفلسطينية لا تصل إلى غزة، و"موظفوها يعتمدون أخبار الوكالات في هذه الأيام، وأما مراسلوها فلا يوجد لديهم شبكة اتصالات تساعدهم في توصيل الأحداث للصحيفة، وكذلك فإن شبكة الجوّال وقعت ولم تعد قادرة على تحمل الضغط".
ويوجد نوع آخر من المصاعب التي يعانيها الصحافيون في غزة، يلخّصها أبوشمالة بـ"الظروف الحياتية العادية" التي "تشكل عنصراً ضاغطاً على حياة الصحافيين كغيرهم من المواطنين للانشغال في تدبير أمور الحياة من ماء وكهرباء ودقيق أو ربطة خبز، بل حتى بطاريات الجوال تشكل معاناة للصحافي عند التفكير أو البحث عن طريقة لإبقائها مشحونة باستمرار لا سيما وأن الكهرباء مقطوعة منذ 5 أيام متواصلة ولا يوجد سولار أو بنزين للمولدات المنزلية".
وحتى الآن لا يوجد تماس مباشر بين الصحافيين والجيش الإسرائيلي داخل غزة، "لأن طبيعة هذه المعركة غير عن سابقاتها فلا معارك أرضية داخل المدن وإنما ضربات جوية متلاحقة على أهداف منتشرة على طول القطاع وعرضه". ولكن أبوشمالة يرى أنه "لو حدثت اشتباكات داخلية فمن المتوقع استهداف الصحافيين قبل تحذيرهم لأنه يبدو لا يوجد أي خط أحمر بعد ضرب سيارات الإسعاف والمستشفيات والمدارس والمساجد".
ويعطي أبوشمالة مثالاً لما حدث في مدرسة الفاخورة الثلاثاء التي قتل فيها 42 طفلاً وأمرأة ورجلاً مسنّاً "من الذين طلبوا الإيواء والاحتماء تحت راية الأونروا ظناً منهم أنها تحميهم". ويردّ الصحافي الفلسطيني على تبرير الجيش الإسرائيلي لما حدث بأنه كان يردّ على إطلاق صواريخ من المكان"، فيشير الى ضعف هذه الحجة، حيث أنه "إذا كانت إسرائيل تمتلك تقنيات حربية دقيقة التصويب فلماذا تستخدم صواريخ زنتها طن في مكان يعتبر مدنياً ولماذا لا يستخدمون أسلحة أقل وزناً وأكثر تصويباً ضد المسلحين أنفسهم إذا كانت رواية الجيش في هذه الواقعة صحيحة، ولكن يبدو أن الجيش الذي يواجه مقاومة عنيفة غير مرئية بالنسبة له يستعيض عنها بضرب متعمد لمنشآت مدنية ليوقع أكبر عدد من القتلى ويزعم عبر وسائله الإعلامية أنها تضم مسلحين".
وعن رأيه في منع إسرائيل دخول الصحافيين الأجانب إلى القطاع يقلّل أبوشمالة من تأثيره على التغطية "لأن معظم الوكالات المشهورة لديها مراسلون ومصورون منتشرون في غزة كرامتان تقريباً ومنها رويترز وفرانس برس وإيه بي تي أن وإيه بي وغيرها".
يُشار إلى أن منظمات حقوقية عالمية منها هيومن رايتس ووتش طالبت الحكومة الإسرائيلية بأن "تسمح فوراً للصحافيين ومراقبي حقوق الإنسان بالدخول إلى غزة"، والالتزام بحُكم المحكمة الإسرائيلية العليا الصادر في 31 ديسمبر/كانون الأول 2008 بهذا الخصوص.

Arabdemocracy

When 400=4: The Mathematics of Israeli propaganda

By Joseph El-Khoury

The Israeli onslaught on Gaza is the latest example of the type of asymmetrical warfare that has characterised armed conflicts over the past 20 years, specifically those involving a Western Military Power. In many ways, the fire-fight with Hamas is a repeat of the 2006 war with the Hezbollah on Lebanese soil: Large scale artillery strikes from the air, sea and ground followed by an invasive ground offensive that is all but certain in the Gaza case. The asymmetry is apparent in the military resources, manpower, technological advances and intelligence available to both parties but also in the collateral human cost. In 2006, Israel lost 158 citizens, most of them soldiers on duty. On the Lebanese side the estimated toll was between 1000- 1300, the majority of which were civilians (30% children under 13 according to UNICEF sources).During this latest round of fighting the Palestinians have suffered around 440 mortal casualties (25% civilians according to the UN) in 8 days while Israel have reported the death of 4 civilians from rockets fired on Israeli towns from Sderot to Ashdod and beyond. Despite the discrepancy in numbers and the extent of the devastation on the Palestinian side, foreign commentators felt it their duty to provide a balanced view of the conflict, against all odds. This effort to avoid being accused of biased generates some heroic attempts to equate the impact of the conflict on both sides. To bolster their case, the Israelis had to come up with alternatives to combat the flood of images coming out of Gaza showing torn limbs, dead babies and bleeding corpses scattered around a parking lot. Despite the efforts of official medias to sanitise the war for their sensitive audiences through a ban on gore and blood, the availability of alternative sources of information and the cyber activism of Palestinians and their supporters have ensured that the reality of the war is still accessed by a significant number of people who make up mainstream opinion in the West. Although many would argue that International sympathy for the Palestinians is yet to protect them or advance their cause, there is little doubt that without it the Israelis would have carried out their fantasies of apartheid at a faster pace. Israel anyway is concerned about its image, and the Zionist lobby has promptly risen to the rescue recycling old myths and creating new ones with the aim to perpetuate the overarching myth of the Israeli David vs. the Arab Goliath on which it relies to remind Europe of its guilt and responsibility towards the Jewish people.

In this optic, the internal racist anti-Arab discourse is kept under wrap. Another one emerges on the blogosphere and in the media, in which Israelis claim ‘never to have disliked Arabs’ as if this century old conflict was a popularity contest and the IDF’s intention was to bomb Gaza into friendship. On the other hand, Arabs are portrayed as full of unexplained hatred towards Jews. Paralleling that we are confronted to a deliberate almost orchestrated emphasis on psychological trauma experienced by the Israeli side. Without minimising the impact of any loss on indiviudals, the theory is that in the absence of fatalities, ‘stress’ generated by the Kassam rockets and the existence of the Palestinians in the first place is equivalent to the carpet bombings of entire villages (Bint Jbeil) and crowded slums (Rafah). So the average British or French spectator is invited to connect with the plight of the nice middle class family in Siderot who lives under constant threat from rocket attacks. The nice family is carefully chosen to hail from some European country and frequently retaining some of the habits of that country facilitating the process of identification. The personal stories seem familiar, the dog, the family dinner, and the blue eyed children; all in contrast with the portrayed lives of the poor Palestinian living his refuge in overcrowded noisy dwellings. Western audiences have little in common, at least superficially with these families and as a consequences struggle to feel their pain and empathise with their suffering beyond the basic human short-lived reflex. In fact, their plight is even used against them, as they seem to revel in it encouraged by the militant rhetoric emanating from radicals who praise and glorify pain to boost morale. For Westerners, these words are difficult to contextualise except through their own experience of the effect of Muslim martyrdom. But unlike Hamas, those who are actually interested in a solution for the Palestinians cannot ignore Western public opinion and should cultivate it to understand the Palestinian perspective beyond self-serving pity. To counter Israeli propaganda, a revised communication strategy is more vital now then ever before.

Guerilla Footwear

By Joseph El-Khoury

Muntadar Al Zeidi did what many Arabs could only fantasize about: Giving George Bush a piece of their mind. The shoe throwing incident coupled with a traditionally crafted verbal insult (You dog!) pretty much summarises the general mood in the Middle East in response to the relentless patronising and misleading discourse of the Neo-Conservative administration for the past 8 years. It is no coincidence that the action of Mr Al Zeidi came at the moment that Mr Bush was praising the achievements of years of occupation, as if relating the completion of a chemistry school project, with complete disregard to the suffering they had sown in Iraq. Even for those uninterested in the political context, the video clip of the shoe throwing incident, was funny: A respectable man in a suit ducking from a flying shoe aimed at his face. Substitute anyone with status to GW Bush and the scene is still YouTube worthy. It has the pulling power of a video on Pandas cuddling or cats fighting, retaining an entertaining quality no matter how many times you watch it.

There is a strong argument for peaceful shoe throwing (the soft sole version) to be upheld as a genuine guerrilla tactic across cultures and settings. Imagine a shoe being thrown, for example, at Gordon Brown, Nicolas Sarkozy, Thabo Mbeki, King Abdullah of Jordan or Hugo Chavez. All would be justified for one reason or the other and certainly as funny to watch. This technique could even be adopted by the most unconventional of leaders such as Mr Ahmadinajjad of Iran or Muaammar Kaddafi of Libya to settle disputes. It would not the first time in history that a shoe is used to affirm a political point of view. On October 12th 1960, The Soviet Leader Nicolas Khrouchtchev banged his shoe against a desk to silence the Filipino representative to the UN general Assembly. He also called him ‘a jerk, a stooge and a lackey of Imperialism’. At the time, no cultural dimension was attributed to the use of the shoe, although it was followed by a dissection of the personality of Khrouchtchev and the Communist regime behind him.

As the first shots of the incident in Iraq were beamed around the world, so called experts on Middle Eastern customs sought to highlight the cultural significance of shoe throwing. Whether well meaning or not, their attempts seemed a blunt misuse of cultural contexts to distract from the core issues at stake. The best insight came from the victim, President Bush himself, who likened it to having the middle finger waved at you. Other Western equivalents could also be: heckling, throwing eggs or rotten tomatoes or running naked across a football pitch. We will soon find out whether this was a clever plan cooked up by radicals with Iranian connections or just a spontaneous display of emotions. Whatever Muntadar’s motivation, the message was a universal one and did not require the elaborate cultural interpretations clumsily thrown in by the Foreign press, as if discussing the strange rituals of an obscure Amazonian tribe. Having gone through rigorous search, the shoe was probably the safest option available, easy to take off and with limited potential for serious damage. It is a civilised expression of extreme disgust and an ethical advancement on suicide bombing and plane hijacking. I echo Dean Obeidallah who wonders sarcastically in the Huffington Post whether shoe throwing is perceived positively in any culture. At this rate Lonely planet and other travel guides will be warning backpackers travelling through the Middle East to steer clear from irritable Arabs in a solid pair of Timberlands.

مجد سورية الأسير وعار الإعلام والإعلاميين

وائل عبد الرحيم

يُحاكم في سورية قياديو إعلان دمشق للتغيير الوطني الديمقراطي المعتقلون منذ أشهر بتهم سياسية عوّدنا نظام الحكم في سورية على تضمينها أبعاد الارتباط بالخارج والعمالة، رغم ضحالة هذه المزاعم والادعاءات.
والحال أن من يحاكم في سورية هم كوكبة من نساء ورجالات الشام الديمقراطيين الوطنيين، ونخبة من الكفاءات الشريفة التي تضرب جذورها في العمق السياسي التاريخي للشام، والتي لم تصبها لوثة السياسات الكبيرة، فاستمرت تعضّ على الجرح وتوائم خطابها الرافض للديكتاتورية والفساد مع رفضها الذوبان او الارتهان لحسابات الدول.
هذه المعارضة في 'دمشق الشام' هي معارضة مبدئية، ولعلّ مواجهة نظام حكم سليط اللسان يزخر خطابه باتهامات التخوين والخيانة ويتربع على عرش القضايا الكبرى تستدعي من مناضلي إعلان دمشق ورفاقهم من الناشطين الوطنيين في سورية تأكيد الطابع المبدئي للمواجهة.
هذا كله مفهوم، ومفهوم ايضاً ان يستشرس النظام الذي يفاوض الإسرائيلي، ويسعى لنيل رضا الأميركي، في الدفاع عن نفسه فيستعيد اساليب البطش والتنكيل الأمنية.. لا حاجة لتبيان الرابط بين الديكتاتورية والفساد، بين القمع وبين إقصاء المجتمع السياسي السوري عن نقاش القضايا الكبرى، هذه القضايا التي تكتسب هالة القدسية في خطاب التخوين، ويُمنع النقاش فيها حينما ياتي وقت التفاوض والصفقات الكبيرة منها والصغيرة.
لكن.. ما أريد ان الفت النظر إليه، هو الغياب شبه التام للإعلام العربي ولا سيما الفضائيات عن إيفاء هذه القضية حقها.
فإذا كان مفهوماً ان الإعلام الرسمي في الدول العربية يتجنب 'التدخل' في شؤون 'الأشقاء' كي لا يتدخلوا هم في شؤونه أيضاً (!)، إلا ان الإعلام 'الخاص' او المستقل لم يشذّ عن هذه القاعدة.
'الجزيرة' مرتهنة بالكامل إلى علاقتها بالنظام السوري وارتباطها بالأخوان المسلمين في الوقت نفسه، وتغيب عن التركيز على الاعتقالات إلا كجزء من تحصيل حاصل حيث تفرض أبسط قواعد المهنية ان لا يتم تجاهل الخبر.. لكن لا البرامج تتناولها ولا التغطيات الطويلة التي عوّدتنا عليها هذه المحطة. فالتغطية خجولة.
اما 'العربية' فتقترب من هذه المسألة بقدر ما تتلاقى مع نفخها المستمر لتضخيم حجم تحالف عبدالحليم خدام – صدر الدين البيانوني الموغل في حساباته الإقليمية والدولية والبعيد عن تمثيل التطلعات الحقيقية للمعارضة الوطنية السورية في الداخل.
البي بي سي التي أطلقت تلفزيونها العربي، تزاوج بين 'حياديتها' المعلنة وضعف إمكانياتها المالية لتبعد عمّا يثير غضب الأنظمة، وهي التي تفخر بانها بدأت الإرسال مبكراً ذات صباح لتغطية إطلاق الأسرى اللبنانيين من سجون إسرائيل، تتغاضى عن واقع أنها محكومة بمراعاة اضطرارية (مراعاة تهزّ ضميرها المهني!) لمتطلبات العمل في الدول العربية.. فلا تريد مشاكل ولا قطع علاقات، وفي الوقت نفسه تعزف معزوفة القومية العربية الإسلاموية البلهاء بأموال دافعي الضرائب في بريطانيا.
العار في كلّ ذلك، انه وعلى الأقل منذ اعتقال فداء حوراني ورفاقها في نهاية 2007 لم يخرج برنامج تلفزيوني واحد على الأقل على أثير هذه الفضائيات للحديث عن هذه القضية.
هو عار ليس فقط على ممولي هذه الفضائيات، بل على العاملين فيها وعلى كبار محرريها، لأننا نعرف كلنا كإعلاميين ان ثمة هامشاً من الحرية معطى لهم.
لكن ما العمل حينما يكون الإعلامي ضابط نفسه قبل ان يضبطه الاخرون؟
الم يحن الوقت للتفكير جدياً بكسر حلقة الاحتكار والحصار والنضال من اجل إعلام عربي حرّ مرتبط بقضايا مجتمعاتنا وليس بالسياسات الضيقة لبعض الدول، او بالنزعات الشخصية لبعض 'كبار' مثقفي إعلامنا في الداخل والمهجر؟

Middle Eastern Egos

By Bachir Habib

Image: Courtesy of http://maloof.wordpress.com

“Khomeini chose Reagan, and freed the hostages the moment he was sworn in as president. Khaled Meshal, Ahmad Jabari and Muhamad Deif (of the Hamas military wing in Gaza) are now working for McCain. This may yet do some good for the hopes of peace”.

In Hamas for Mc Cain, Amir Oren, Haaretz, 22-04-2008

Arab Egos are always present in different shapes and forms in political salons. They sit around and watch political talk shows, analyze situations, move on to cafés and make statements as if they were bonafide members of think tanks or political science experts. If interviewed by a radio or news channel in the street, they rarely react as citizens but as prominent politicians. This is for the average citizen. If we step into the journalistic sphere things get even worse. The number of invalid analysis and unfounded pretentions fill tens of newspapers pages everyday.

But it seems this is not only an arab problem but one of an overinflated Middle Eastern Ego. From Tel Aviv to Teheran passing by Beirut, Ryadh and any Middle Eastern Arab capital, reading the local newspapers gives a false impression that the Middle East is having a major impact on every foreign elections results. The quote introducing this article is one example. We have seen many others and we will be reading many more. From those who claim that the Hezbollah supports Barack Obama in his race for the US presidency or that the Democrats would negotiate with Teheran in case they make it to the White House. Others in the 'political Market' hypothesize that Mc Cain will continue George Bush’s policy and will push towards tougher sanctions against Teheran. At the opposite end of the spectrun, as Oren said in his article “Meshal working for Mc Cain may yet do some good for the hopes of peace”.

The Middle East is definitely playing a role in the US elections on three specific levels:The first one is Israel’s Security.The second one is the American troops presence in Iraq.The third one is the policy to be adopted towards Iran’s nuclear program (which is an issue directly related to Israel’s security). However, these three levels are present in the US campaigns for presidency not because they are vital to Washington but because they have to be part of the debate between the candidates. Whether it is Mc Cain or a Democrat who wins, the Middle East will be dealt with as usual, via Congress Partisan and bipartisan commissions following a very stable lead lines in American foreign policy: US National Interest. It might disappoint those in the Middle East who think that a change in Washington will bring solutions to the Middle East problems, or will prolong the war many are profiting from. The reality is that,after November 2008, the task of the new president in the White House will be to deal with the economic crisis and its impact on the American Citizen.

In the Middle East and especially in our Arab Countries, governments and oppositions will have wasted much time and energy betting on elections happening thousands of miles away to find out that 'plus ca change plus c'est la meme chose' as the French say. In the meantime the problems in our societies, from Human and Political Rights to economical and social conditions remain, with no one to tackle them and most sadly with no sign yet of any serious alternative to our Monarchs, Oligarchs and Tyrants.

Ignorance Strikes Again: Persepolis Banned in Beirut

By Bachir Habib

Picture: Courtesy of www.fourteenfilms.typepad.com

Once again, ignorance strikes in Lebanon. Marjane Satrapi’s Persepolis is the latest victim of our very “intellectual” General Security Censorship Department.
I first discovered Persepolis in Beirut, when I came across the series of comic books on which the movie is based.

Reading Persepolis was an amazing experience; I can easily label it as “Iran’s modern history for dummies”. Watching the movie was even better, for it operates on several levels. On one level it is a very simple and accessible piece of work that even a child can watch and enjoy. It is a highly emotional autobiography that tells the simple story of an Iranian girl growing up in the last years of the Pahlawi’s dynasty in Iran. She witnesses the rise of the Islamic Republic after 1979 and the implementation of the strict Islamic social and cultural code of conduct.
On another level It can be viewed as a very complex work focusing on how psychologically painful the experience of a teenager who is sent to live alone in a country with a very different culture (in 1983, at the age of 14, Satrapi was sent to Austria, by her parents in order to flee the Iranian regime).

The most sophisticated part of the movie is the historical and political angle through which Satrapi tells a vastly ignored part of Iran’s History. Through the experience of her socialist and communist family, from intimidation to imprisonment and killing, she shows how the Iranian Islamic Regime established its legacy by anihilating the Left who was the real avant-garde of the social and political movement that ended the Shah’s reign.

Banning Satrapi’s work in Iran may not be surprising, but banning it in Lebanon has a very different signification. I will not go into a political diatribe to convince my reader that Hezbollah is an Iranian proxy. But simply, this movie and comic books add to the debate about Hezbollah’s role and political ambitions the kind of argumentation the party wants to avoid because it ruins years of efforts to give the very fundamentalist party of god a “modern and tolerant” face.
Those who know about Lebanese politics know for sure how powerful Hezbollah is in certain spheres of the Lebanese Administration, notably the General Security where the committee of censorship sits.

The outright banning of Persepolis is an added clue to the true Hezbollah. But the lesson from the Film is elsewhere, it is for the emerging “Neo-Left” in Lebanon and the Arab World, who picture Hezbollah today as the natural heir to the socialist and nationalist liberation movements of the sixties and seventies. For those “leftists” engaged in a marketing and propaganda campaign on behalf of “the resistant Hezbollah-Damascus-Teheran-Caracas Axis” Persepolis sends a very clear message: Help the fundamentalists to power once again and you will be at the receiving end of their first bullit.

Persepolis won the Jury Prize of Cannes Film Festival (2007), and was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Animated Feature in January 2008.

Language, Media and Propaganda

Sometimes events and encounters serve to validate your point of point of view or reassure you that persevering against all odds is worthwhile. At a Cambridge University Conference, we did not need to hear from Yonatan Mendel* what we already knew for us to feel validated in our conviction that a fair and just peace would be possible one day in the Middle East. The mere fact we were hearing a balanced political discussion at all outside the usual animosity that separates Arabs and Israelis on this issue was enough.
As one of the speakers, he went on to talk about how language had been used and abused by the Israeli media to market its side of the story both within Israel and in the West. The following article in the London Review of Books (6th March 2008) revisits this same theme.

Arabdemocracy

"A year ago I applied for the job of Occupied Territories correspondent at Ma'ariv, an Israeli newspaper. I speak Arabic and have taught in Palestinian schools and taken part in many joint Jewish-Palestinian projects. At my interview the boss asked how I could possibly be objective. I had spent too much time with Palestinians; I was bound to be biased in their favour. I didn't get the job. My next interview was with Walla, Israel's most popular website. This time I did get the job and I became Walla's Middle East correspondent. I soon understood what Tamar Liebes, the director of the Smart Institute of Communication at the Hebrew University, meant when she said: 'Journalists and publishers see themselves as actors within the Zionist movement, not as critical outsiders.'

This is not to say that Israeli journalism is not professional. Corruption, social decay and dishonesty are pursued with commendable determination by newspapers, TV and radio. That Israelis heard exactly what former President Katsav did or didn't do with his secretaries proves that the media are performing their watchdog role, even at the risk of causing national and international embarrassment. Ehud Olmert's shady apartment deal, the business of Ariel Sharon's mysterious Greek island, Binyamin Netanyahu's secret love affair, Yitzhak Rabin's secret American bank account: all of these are freely discussed by the Israeli media.

When it comes to 'security' there is no such freedom. It's 'us' and 'them', the IDF and the 'enemy'; military discourse, which is the only discourse allowed, trumps any other possible narrative. It's not that Israeli journalists are following orders, or a written code: just that they'd rather think well of their security forces.

In most of the articles on the conflict two sides battle it out: the Israel Defence Forces, on the one hand, and the Palestinians, on the other. When a violent incident is reported, the IDF confirms or the army says but the Palestinians claim: 'The Palestinians claimed that a baby was severely injured in IDF shootings.' Is this a fib? 'The Palestinians claim that Israeli settlers threatened them': but who are the Palestinians? Did the entire Palestinian people, citizens of Israel, inhabitants of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, people living in refugee camps in neighbouring Arab states and those living in the diaspora make the claim? Why is it that a serious article is reporting a claim made by the Palestinians? Why is there so rarely a name, a desk, an organisation or a source of this information? Could it be because that would make it seem more reliable?

When the Palestinians aren't making claims, their viewpoint is simply not heard. Keshev, the Centre for the Protection of Democracy in Israel, studied the way Israel's leading television channels and newspapers covered Palestinian casualties in a given month - December 2005. They found 48 items covering the deaths of 22 Palestinians. However, in only eight of those accounts was the IDF version followed by a Palestinian reaction; in the other 40 instances the event was reported only from the point of view of the Israeli military.

Another example: in June 2006, four days after the Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit was kidnapped from the Israeli side of the Gazan security fence, Israel, according to the Israeli media, arrested some sixty members of Hamas, of whom 30 were elected members of parliament and eight ministers in the Palestinian government. In a well-planned operation Israel captured and jailed the Palestinian minister for Jerusalem, the ministers of finance, education, religious affairs, strategic affairs, domestic affairs, housing and prisons, as well as the mayors of Bethlehem, Jenin and Qalqilya, the head of the Palestinian parliament and one quarter of its members. That these officials were taken from their beds late at night and transferred to Israeli territory probably to serve (like Gilad Shalit) as future bargaining-chips did not make this operation a kidnapping. Israel never kidnaps: it arrests.

The Israeli army never intentionally kills anyone, let alone murders them - a state of affairs any other armed organisation would be envious of. Even when a one-ton bomb is dropped onto a dense residential area in Gaza, killing one gunman and 14 innocent civilians, including nine children, it's still not an intentional killing or murder: it is a targeted assassination. An Israeli journalist can say that IDF soldiers hit Palestinians, or killed them, or killed them by mistake, and that Palestinians were hit, or were killed or even found their death (as if they were looking for it), but murder is out of the question. The consequence, whatever words are used, has been the death at the hands of the Israeli security forces since the outbreak of the second intifada of 2087 Palestinians who had nothing to do with armed struggle.

The IDF, as depicted by the Israeli media, has another strange ability: it never initiates, decides to attack or launches an operation. The IDF simply responds. It responds to the Qassam rockets, responds to terror attacks, responds to Palestinian violence. This makes everything so much more sensible and civilised: the IDF is forced to fight, to destroy houses, to shoot Palestinians and to kill 4485 of them in seven years, but none of these events is the responsibility of the soldiers. They are facing a nasty enemy, and they respond dutifully. The fact that their actions - curfews, arrests, naval sieges, shootings and killings - are the main cause of the Palestinian reaction does not seem to interest the media. Because Palestinians cannot respond, Israeli journalists choose another verb from the lexicon that includes revenge, provoke, attack, incite, throw stones or fire Qassams.

Interviewing Abu-Qusay, the spokesman of Al-Aqsa Brigades in Gaza, in June 2007, I asked him about the rationale for firing Qassam missiles at the Israeli town of Sderot. 'The army might respond,' I said, not realising that I was already biased. 'But we are responding here,' Abu-Qusay said. 'We are not terrorists, we do not want to kill . . . we are resisting Israel's continual incursions into the West Bank, its attacks, its siege on our waters and its closure on our lands.' Abu-Qusay's words were translated into Hebrew, but Israel continued to enter the West Bank every night and Israelis did not find any harm in it. After all it was only a response.

At a time when there were many Israeli raids on Gaza I asked my colleagues the following question: 'If an armed Palestinian crosses the border, enters Israel, drives to Tel Aviv and shoots people in the streets, he will be the terrorist and we will be the victims, right? However, if the IDF crosses the border, drives miles into Gaza, and starts shooting their gunmen, who is the terrorist and who is the defender? How come the Palestinians living in the Occupied Territories can never be engaged in self-defence, while the Israeli army is always the defender?' My friend Shay from the graphics department clarified matters for me: 'If you go to the Gaza Strip and shoot people, you will be a terrorist. But when the army does it that is an operation to make Israel safer. It's the implementation of a government decision!'

Another interesting distinction between us and them came up when Hamas demanded the release of 450 of its prisoners in exchange for Gilad Shalit. Israel announced that it would release prisoners but not those with blood on their hands. It is always the Palestinians - never the Israelis - who have blood on their hands. This is not to say that Jews cannot kill Arabs but they will not have blood on their hands, and if they are arrested they will be released after a few years, not to mention those with blood on their hands who've gone on to become prime minister. And we are not only more innocent when we kill but also more susceptible when we are hurt. A regular description of a Qassam missile that hits Sderot will generally look like this: 'A Qassam fell next to a residential house, three Israelis had slight injuries, and ten others suffered from shock.' One should not make light of these injuries: a missile hitting a house in the middle of the night could indeed cause great shock. However, one should also remember that shock is for Jews only. Palestinians are apparently a very tough people.

The IDF, again the envy of all other armies, kills only the most important people. 'A high-ranking member of Hamas was killed' is almost a chorus in the Israel media. Low-ranking members of Hamas have either never been found or never been killed. Shlomi Eldar, a TV correspondent in the Gaza Strip, bravely wrote about this phenomenon in his book Eyeless in Gaza (2005). When Riyad Abu Zaid was assassinated in 2003, the Israeli press echoed the IDF announcement that the man was the head of the military wing of Hamas in Gaza. Eldar, one of Israel's few investigative journalists, discovered that the man was merely a secretary in the movement's prisoner club. 'It was one of many occasions in which Israel "upgraded" a Palestinian activist,' Eldar wrote. 'After every assassination any minor activist is "promoted" to a major one.'

This phenomenon, in which IDF statements are directly translated into media reports - there are no checkpoints between the army and the media - is the result both of a lack of access to information and of the unwillingness of journalists to prove the army wrong or to portray soldiers as criminals. 'The IDF is acting in Gaza' (or in Jenin, or in Tulkarm, or in Hebron) is the expression given out by the army and embraced by the media. Why make the listeners' lives harder? Why tell them what the soldiers do, describing the fear they create, the fact that they come with heavy vehicles and weapons and crush a city's life, creating a greater hatred, sorrow and a desire for revenge?

Last month, as a measure against Qassam militants, Israel decided to stop Gaza's electricity for a few hours a day. Despite the fact that this means, for instance, that electricity will fail to reach hospitals, it was said that 'the Israeli government decided to approve this step, as another non-lethal weapon.' Another thing the soldiers do is clearing - khisuf. In regular Hebrew, khisuf means to expose something that is hidden, but as used by the IDF it means to clear an area of potential hiding places for Palestinian gunmen. During the last intifada, Israeli D9 bulldozers destroyed thousands of Palestinian houses, uprooted thousands of trees and left behind thousands of smashed greenhouses. It is better to know that the army cleared the place than to face the reality that the army destroys Palestinians' possessions, pride and hope.

Another useful word is crowning (keter), a euphemism for a siege in which anyone who leaves his house risks being shot at. War zones are places where Palestinians can be killed even if they are children who don't know they've entered a war zone. Palestinian children, by the way, tend to be upgraded to Palestinian teenagers, especially when they are accidentally killed. More examples: isolated Israeli outposts in the West Bank are called illegal outposts, perhaps in contrast to Israeli settlements that are apparently legal. Administrative detention means jailing people who haven't been put on trial or even formally charged (in April 2003 there were 1119 Palestinians in this situation). The PLO (Ashaf) is always referred to by its acronym and never by its full name: Palestine is a word that is almost never used - there is a Palestinian president but no president of Palestine.

'A society in crisis forges a new vocabulary for itself,' David Grossman wrote in The Yellow Wind, 'and gradually, a new language emerges whose words . . . no longer describe reality, but attempt, instead, to conceal it.' This 'new language' was adopted voluntarily by the media, but if one needs an official set of guidelines it can be found in the Nakdi Report, a paper drafted by the Israeli Broadcasting Authority. First set down in 1972 and since updated three times, the report aimed to 'clarify some of the professional rules that govern the work of a newsperson'. The prohibition of the term East Jerusalem was one of them.

The restrictions aren't confined to geography. On 20 May 2006, Israel's most popular television channel, Channel 2, reported 'another targeted assassination in Gaza, an assassination that might ease the firing of Qassams' (up to 376 people have died in targeted assassinations, 150 of them civilians who were not the target of assassinations). Ehud Ya'ari, a well-known Israeli correspondent on Arab affairs, sat in the studio and said: 'The man who was killed is Muhammad Dahdouh, from Islamic Jihad . . . this is part of the other war, a war to shrink the volume of Qassam activists.' Neither Ya'ari nor the IDF spokesman bothered to report that four innocent Palestinian civilians were also killed in the operation, and three more severely injured, one a five-year-old girl called Maria, who will remain paralysed from the neck down. This 'oversight', revealed by the Israeli journalist Orly Vilnai, only exposed how much we do not know about what we think we know.

Interestingly, since Hamas took over the Gaza Strip one of the new 'boo' words in the Israeli media is Hamastan, a word that appears in the 'hard' news section, the allegedly sacred part of newspapers that is supposed to give the facts, free from editorialising. The same applies to movements such as Hamas or Hizbullah, which are described in Hebrew as organisations and not as political movements or parties. Intifada is never given its Arabic meaning of 'revolt'; and Al-Quds, which when used by Palestinian politicians refers only to 'the holy places in East Jerusalem' or 'East Jerusalem', is always taken by Israeli correspondents to mean Jerusalem, which is effectively to imply a Palestinian determination to take over the entire capital city.

It was curious to watch the newspapers' responses to the assassination of Imad Moughniyeh in Syria two weeks ago. Everyone tried to outdo everyone else over what to call him: arch-terrorist, master terrorist or the greatest terrorist on earth. It took the Israeli press a few days to stop celebrating Moughniyeh's assassins and start doing what it should have done in the first place: ask questions about the consequences of the killing. The journalist Gideon Levy thinks it is an Israeli trend: 'The chain of "terrorist chieftains" liquidated by Israel, from Ali Salameh and Abu Jihad through Abbas Musawi and Yihyeh Ayash to Sheikh Ahmed Yassin and Abdel Aziz Rantisi (all "operations" that we celebrated with great pomp and circumstance for one sweet and intoxicating moment), have thus far brought only harsh and painful revenge attacks against Israel and Jews throughout the world.'

Israeli correspondents on Arab affairs must of course speak Arabic - many of them indeed studied it in the security establishment's schools - and they need to know the history and politics of the Middle East. And they have to be Jews. Strikingly, the Israeli-Jewish media prefer to hire journalists with average Arabic rather than native speakers, since they would be Palestinian citizens of Israel. Apparently, Jewish journalists are better equipped than Arab Israelis to explain 'what Arabs think', 'Arab aims' or 'what Arabs say'. Maybe this is because the editors know what their audience wants to hear. Or, even more important, what the Israeli audience would rather not hear.

If the words occupation, apartheid and racism (not to mention Palestinian citizens of Israel, bantustans, ethnic cleansing and Nakba) are absent from Israeli discourse, Israeli citizens can spend their whole lives without knowing what they have been living with. Take racism (Giz'anut in Hebrew). If the Israeli parliament legislates that 13 per cent of the country's lands can be sold only to Jews, then it is a racist parliament. If in 60 years the country has had only one Arab minister, then Israel has had racist governments. If in 60 years of demonstrations rubber bullets and live ammunition have been used only on Arab demonstrators, then Israel has a racist police. If 75 per cent of Israelis admit that they would refuse to have an Arab neighbour, then it is a racist society. By not acknowledging that Israel is a place where racism shapes relations between Jews and Arabs, Israeli Jews render themselves unable to deal with the problem or even with the reality of their own lives.

The same denial of reality is reflected in the avoidance of the term apartheid. Because of its association with white South Africa, Israelis find it very hard to use the word. This is not to say that the exact same kind of regime prevails in the Occupied Territories today, but a country needn't have benches 'for whites only' in order to be an apartheid state. Apartheid, after all, means 'separation', and if in the Occupied Territories the settlers have one road and Palestinians need to use alternative roads or tunnels, then it is an apartheid road system. If the separation wall built on thousands of dunams of confiscated West Bank land separates people (including Palestinians on opposite sides of the wall), then it is an apartheid wall. If in the Occupied Territories there are two judicial systems, one for Jewish settlers and the other for Palestinians, then it is an apartheid justice.

And then there are the Occupied Territories themselves. Remarkably, there are no Occupied Territories in Israel. The term is occasionally used by a leftist politician or columnist, but in the hard news section it doesn't exist. In the past they were called the Administered Territories in order to conceal the actual fact of occupation; they were then called Judea and Samaria; but in Israel's mass media today they're called the Territories (Ha-Shtachim). The term helps preserve the notion that the Jews are the victims, the people who act only in self-defence, the moral half of the equation, and the Palestinians are the attackers, the bad guys, the people who fight for no reason. The simplest example explains it: 'a citizen of the Territories was caught smuggling illegal weapons.' It might make sense for citizens of an occupied territory to try to resist the occupier, but it doesn't make sense if they are just from the Territories.

Israeli journalists are not embedded with the security establishment; and they haven't been asked to make their audience feel good about Israel's military policy. The restrictions they observe are observed voluntarily, almost unconsciously - which makes their practice all the more dangerous. Yet a majority of Israelis feel that their media are too left-wing, insufficiently patriotic, not on Israel's side. And the foreign media are worse. During the last intifada, Avraham Hirschson, then the minister of finance, demanded that CNN's broadcasts from Israel be closed down on the grounds of 'biased broadcasting and tendentious programmes that are nothing but a campaign of incitement against Israel'. Israeli demonstrators called for an end to 'CNN's unreliable and terror-provoking coverage' in favour of Fox News. Israeli men up to the age of 50 are obliged to do one month's reserve service every year. 'The civilian,' Yigael Yadin, an early Israeli chief of staff, said, 'is a soldier on 11 months' annual leave.' For the Israeli media there is no leave."


* Yonatan Mendel was a correspondent for the Israeli news agency Walla. He is currently at Queens' College, Cambridge working on a PhD that studies the connection between the Arabic language and security in Israel.