Forum looks at media's role in Middle East
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By Sean J. Miller | Wednesday, September 27, 2006 |
Arab satellite media outlets like Al Jazeera are dramatically changing the political landscape of the Middle East, journalists with the Stanley Foundation said Tuesday night.
“Our relationship with the region has mostly been state to state,” said Keith Porter, one of two journalists who addressed a forum at the Bettendorf Public Library, organized by the World Affairs Council of the Quad-Cities. “These new stations have created a new pan-Arab awareness and a feeling of organization. We need some way to engage with that.”
Porter and another journalist from the Muscatine-based Stanley Foundation, Kristin McHugh, traveled to Qatar and the United Arab Emirates in December 2005 to produce an hour-long radio documentary called “24/7 The Rise and Influence of the Arab Media.”
“The proliferation of media is something that governments, even repressive governments can’t keep out,” McHugh said. “It really broke that stranglehold of information.”
There are now more than 200 Arabic satellite television stations, she said. Washington has tried to deliver its message directly to the Arab-speaking world through its own Arabic language satellite and radio stations, McHugh said.
“It’s very slick presentation. But that doesn’t necessarily mean that’s effective,” she said,
U.S. policymakers long have sought to contain the influence of the most popular Arab satellite media outlet, Al Jazeera.
The network has been accused of being anti-American, in part because it broadcasts the taped messages of Osama bin Laden. Since 2002, U.S. forces have bombed Al Jazeera’s bureaus in Kabul and Baghdad, Porter said. “That doesn’t necessarily improve their coverage of the U.S.”
Washington needs people who can appear on Arab language broadcasts if it wants to get its message out, he said. “The U.S. should engage them. We need to get better at that.”
Al Jazeera is set to launch an English-language network by the end of the year, Porter said. But it is unclear whether Americans ever will see it because cable companies might shy away from carrying the channel for fear of the response it would generate, he said.
The city desk can be contacted at (563) 383-2450 or newsroom@qctimes.com.
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