An image from 'Control Room', a worth-watching documentary on Al-Jazeera news channel
Friday, February 23, 2007
Friday, January 16, 2004
US-Arab Publics: Minding the Gap
With a Qatari plan to launch an English-language satellite television in mid 2004 and a US project of an Arabic-language television network targeting the Middle East end of the year, the Arab and American publics might be experiencing another war, but this time to win their hearts and minds.
The ‘Information War’, as some media experts like to call it, comes in response to augmented concerns of both sides (the Arabs and the US) about their deteriorating images following the 9-11 attacks and the latest war against the former Iraqi regime.
Al-Jazeera in English
A Western media campaign against the Arab countries triggered by a long list of Arab members of Al-Qaeda network made the Arab governments more apprehensive about their image. The Arab League held several meetings and called for Arab cooperation to revamp their image in the West, but nothing fruitful came out of their summits and calls.
Leaning on the success of the Qatari Al-Jazeera, the Qatari government seems to be taking the initiative and acting alone towards better international understanding of the Arab causes and problems. A senior broadcaster at Al-Jazeera head office in the Qatari capital, Doha, told Cairo Times the Qatari government is planning to launch an English language channel, but that will not before mid 2004. “It will not be an English version of the current Al-Jazeera, but it will be independent, while co-operating with Al-Jazeera in Arabic.”
“It became clear the importance of addressing the Western mentality in a more persuasive way and more Western style while using a common language. The Arabs realized that this would help explain and defend themselves against what they consider a wave of hatreds and misunderstanding,” he said.
Al-Jazeera already has its English-language web site working since March. According to the BBC online, the site is ranked the eighth among the most searched news sites.
“After 9-11 it seemed there is an urgent need to bridge the gap between two worlds apart: the West and the Middle East. Each side wanted to reach out and talk to the other in a way, which is more convincing: talking the same language,” he said.
Beside Al-Jazeera’s sister English TV, some Arab satellite TV channels have started to offer some programs targeting English speakers. The Middle East Broadcasting Center, MBC, has launched MBC2 (Al-Thaniya), an English language entertainment channel with a daily news program that includes the day’s news and interviews with guests. The Dubai-based Al-Majd television has an English service channel presenting programs mainly about Islam.
America Speaks Arabic
Likewise, during its war on Afghanistan and then on Iraq, the US government felt Al-Jazeera’s and other Arabic channels’ airing of fighting have been drawing people’s wrath against the US in the Arab world. Senior US officials have repeatedly asked the Qatari ruler, Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al-Thani, to use his influence to tone down Al-Jazeera’s news coverage. The station, however, seems to continue its policy hosting anti-American political commentators and analysts and exposing the Arab public’s anti-American sentiment. For this, winning the hearts and minds of the Arabs and Muslims has become a necessity particularly with an American open-ended existence in Iraq.
The AFP reported in February that the US Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG), an autonomous agency that overseas US-funded broadcasts abroad, has allocated 30 million dollars to start up the Middle East Television Network.
The network is part of the State Department’s efforts to influence the Arab public opinion and it will help “overcome problems faced by Washington in coaxing Arab governments to air American official ads in state-run Arab channels and TV networks,” reported FreeRepulic.com, an American online news forum.
“Specific details of the new network were not immediately available although it is intended to be a companion to Radio Sawa, a new Arabic-language broadcasting service initiated by the BBG last year to provide news and entertainment to listeners in the Middle East,” it stated.
The US State Department also hired a veteran marketing expert, Charlotte Beers, to take over the task of buffing up the American image in the Middle East. According to the site, “Beers’ campaign relies on all forms of communication from the Internet to television. Her office will next target Islamic youth with a magazine and an education science and technology television show designed for 12-20 year old Egyptians.”
“Self interest or, as it is often said, to win “the hearts and minds” of people in the Middle East and Moslem world. Through the establishment of satellite TV, radio broadcasts, and Arabic publications, the American Administration will be able to override the Middle East media by directly disseminating its pre-packaged version of news and information,” says professor Yahya Kamalipour, head of the Department of Communication and Creative Arts at Purdue University in Indiana.
Kamalipour envisages an information war in full swing “as the US communication strategists (propagandists) are poised to influence the Arab and Muslim public opinion.” He believes Al-Jazeera has become a powerful medium of global communication and its increasing popularity has motivated the Bush Administration to counter it, as well as other exiting and emerging Arabic satellite TV channels, by starting new TV channels aimed at the Arab World.
“In fact, the Bush administration is engaged in a global communication campaign to mend the increasingly negative global perception of the US and to appease the approximately 1.3 billion Muslims throughout the world,” Kamalipour explains.
Marwan Kraidy, professor of international communication at the American University in Washington, thinks the US government has a certain political agenda for the Middle East; however, its success could not be based only on communication campaigns. “Most of the Arab audiences do understand and appreciate facets of US culture and society, but reject US foreign policy in the Middle East, with the Palestinian cause serving as a lighting rod.
“This is a very tricky issue, but in this age of abundant information, no power can redraw maps and changes geopolitics in secret. So, that will be a fascinating issue, and media war to observe,” Kraidy says.
Kamalipour agrees that action always speaks louder than words. “The best propaganda techniques, the most sophisticated marketing campaigns, the most professionally packaged media messages, and glittery publications will not work until and unless people in the US and throughout the world see meaningful and tangible positive economic, social and political results in their daily lives,” he says.
Al-Jazeera’s senior broadcaster also agrees it will take the US administration more than a TV channel to gain the trust of Arabs who will doubt the content of such a channel once he receives it because of the uncertainties about the US policies in the region.
“Unless the US TV channel-Arabic service addresses Arabs in a way which understands its cultural background and traditions- which is an important factor to gain success and win the hearts and minds of Arab viewers, it will be a waste of time and money,” he says.
Yomna Kamel
( an edited version of the report appeared in the Egyptian news weekly Cairo Times)
Cairo Times
The ‘Information War’, as some media experts like to call it, comes in response to augmented concerns of both sides (the Arabs and the US) about their deteriorating images following the 9-11 attacks and the latest war against the former Iraqi regime.
Al-Jazeera in English
A Western media campaign against the Arab countries triggered by a long list of Arab members of Al-Qaeda network made the Arab governments more apprehensive about their image. The Arab League held several meetings and called for Arab cooperation to revamp their image in the West, but nothing fruitful came out of their summits and calls.
Leaning on the success of the Qatari Al-Jazeera, the Qatari government seems to be taking the initiative and acting alone towards better international understanding of the Arab causes and problems. A senior broadcaster at Al-Jazeera head office in the Qatari capital, Doha, told Cairo Times the Qatari government is planning to launch an English language channel, but that will not before mid 2004. “It will not be an English version of the current Al-Jazeera, but it will be independent, while co-operating with Al-Jazeera in Arabic.”
“It became clear the importance of addressing the Western mentality in a more persuasive way and more Western style while using a common language. The Arabs realized that this would help explain and defend themselves against what they consider a wave of hatreds and misunderstanding,” he said.
Al-Jazeera already has its English-language web site working since March. According to the BBC online, the site is ranked the eighth among the most searched news sites.
“After 9-11 it seemed there is an urgent need to bridge the gap between two worlds apart: the West and the Middle East. Each side wanted to reach out and talk to the other in a way, which is more convincing: talking the same language,” he said.
Beside Al-Jazeera’s sister English TV, some Arab satellite TV channels have started to offer some programs targeting English speakers. The Middle East Broadcasting Center, MBC, has launched MBC2 (Al-Thaniya), an English language entertainment channel with a daily news program that includes the day’s news and interviews with guests. The Dubai-based Al-Majd television has an English service channel presenting programs mainly about Islam.
America Speaks Arabic
Likewise, during its war on Afghanistan and then on Iraq, the US government felt Al-Jazeera’s and other Arabic channels’ airing of fighting have been drawing people’s wrath against the US in the Arab world. Senior US officials have repeatedly asked the Qatari ruler, Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al-Thani, to use his influence to tone down Al-Jazeera’s news coverage. The station, however, seems to continue its policy hosting anti-American political commentators and analysts and exposing the Arab public’s anti-American sentiment. For this, winning the hearts and minds of the Arabs and Muslims has become a necessity particularly with an American open-ended existence in Iraq.
The AFP reported in February that the US Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG), an autonomous agency that overseas US-funded broadcasts abroad, has allocated 30 million dollars to start up the Middle East Television Network.
The network is part of the State Department’s efforts to influence the Arab public opinion and it will help “overcome problems faced by Washington in coaxing Arab governments to air American official ads in state-run Arab channels and TV networks,” reported FreeRepulic.com, an American online news forum.
“Specific details of the new network were not immediately available although it is intended to be a companion to Radio Sawa, a new Arabic-language broadcasting service initiated by the BBG last year to provide news and entertainment to listeners in the Middle East,” it stated.
The US State Department also hired a veteran marketing expert, Charlotte Beers, to take over the task of buffing up the American image in the Middle East. According to the site, “Beers’ campaign relies on all forms of communication from the Internet to television. Her office will next target Islamic youth with a magazine and an education science and technology television show designed for 12-20 year old Egyptians.”
“Self interest or, as it is often said, to win “the hearts and minds” of people in the Middle East and Moslem world. Through the establishment of satellite TV, radio broadcasts, and Arabic publications, the American Administration will be able to override the Middle East media by directly disseminating its pre-packaged version of news and information,” says professor Yahya Kamalipour, head of the Department of Communication and Creative Arts at Purdue University in Indiana.
Kamalipour envisages an information war in full swing “as the US communication strategists (propagandists) are poised to influence the Arab and Muslim public opinion.” He believes Al-Jazeera has become a powerful medium of global communication and its increasing popularity has motivated the Bush Administration to counter it, as well as other exiting and emerging Arabic satellite TV channels, by starting new TV channels aimed at the Arab World.
“In fact, the Bush administration is engaged in a global communication campaign to mend the increasingly negative global perception of the US and to appease the approximately 1.3 billion Muslims throughout the world,” Kamalipour explains.
Marwan Kraidy, professor of international communication at the American University in Washington, thinks the US government has a certain political agenda for the Middle East; however, its success could not be based only on communication campaigns. “Most of the Arab audiences do understand and appreciate facets of US culture and society, but reject US foreign policy in the Middle East, with the Palestinian cause serving as a lighting rod.
“This is a very tricky issue, but in this age of abundant information, no power can redraw maps and changes geopolitics in secret. So, that will be a fascinating issue, and media war to observe,” Kraidy says.
Kamalipour agrees that action always speaks louder than words. “The best propaganda techniques, the most sophisticated marketing campaigns, the most professionally packaged media messages, and glittery publications will not work until and unless people in the US and throughout the world see meaningful and tangible positive economic, social and political results in their daily lives,” he says.
Al-Jazeera’s senior broadcaster also agrees it will take the US administration more than a TV channel to gain the trust of Arabs who will doubt the content of such a channel once he receives it because of the uncertainties about the US policies in the region.
“Unless the US TV channel-Arabic service addresses Arabs in a way which understands its cultural background and traditions- which is an important factor to gain success and win the hearts and minds of Arab viewers, it will be a waste of time and money,” he says.
Yomna Kamel
( an edited version of the report appeared in the Egyptian news weekly Cairo Times)
Cairo Times
Tuesday, August 05, 2003
Online Opposition
Arab opposition uses net to skirt censorship
An on-line Libyan opposition newsletter repeatedly calls for the overthrow of Qadhafi's regime, another on-line paper fiercely attacks the Saudi royal family, and a third reveals the Tunisian government's repressive practice.
Propagating their political views while circumventing government intervention, Arab opposition groups began launching on-line media sites in the early 1990s. But how successful are they in transmitting their opinions with Arab regimes mounting efforts to curb the free use of the "Information Super Highway" and with illiteracy and the high cost of the technology severely limiting access?
With all Arab countries allowing open access to the Internet, Arab opposition groups deemed it the best medium for spreading their political views as it is difficult to censor.
Although most Arab opposition groups are aware that their on-line sites are not yet popular as well as being not easily accessible to the majority of Arab public, they seem optimistic about the future. They carefully watch, however, their governments' increasing efforts to control the Internet.
A recently released report by Human Rights Watch (HRW) titled: 'The Internet in the Middle East and North Africa: Free Expression and Censorship' says "some governments in the region have taken a more hands-off attitude toward the Internet- even as they enforce laws that curb other means of expression. This has created paradoxical situations in Egypt and Jordan, where newspapers or articles that the authorities censored became quickly available on-line without repercussions for those who read, posted, or forwarded them."
Abdel Bari Atwan, editor in chief of the London based daily Al Quds Al Arabi, thinks the Internet has pushed some Arab regimes to adopt more flexible media policies. He says his paper resumed distribution in Jordan after being banned for few months in 1998 for publishing articles attacking Jordan's policies. The Jordanian Ministry of Information rescinded its initial decision after the paper published its Internet address in several Arab and Jordanian papers, Atwan added.
A number of Arab countries including Algeria, Morocco, and the Palestinian Authority have not made any effort so far to control on-line content, which allows Internet users to obtain access to political and human rights information that the local print and broadcast media cannot publish, the HRW report states.
Tunisian Islamists publish their monthly newsletter Tunisia Insight on-line. They say they have launched an on-line newsletter due to the "lack of independent sources of information offering impartial news and analysis of the Tunisian situation on various levels: political, socio-economic and human rights. This is due the Tunisian government's absolute control of local media transforming it simply into a tool to enhance its image inside the country and abroad."
The Algerian Front Islamique due Salut (FIS), among numerous Web sites launched by banned Islamist groups, can be easily visited. Also, Moroccans can obtain access to information disseminated by the Polisario Front on the World Wide Web, HRW reported in June.
Meanwhile, in countries with more restrictive political regimes, the Internet is
seen as a real political threat.
"Governments have adopted various means to restrict the flow of information on-line. Saudi Arabia, Yemen, and the United Arab Emirates impose censorship via proxy servers, devices that are interposed between the end-user and the Internet in order to filter and block specified content," the HRW says in its report.
The Saudi opposition groups top the list of Arab opposition Web sites in terms of their numbers and the quality of service they offer. Among these are the Committee against Corruption in Saudi Arabia (CACSA) and the Movement for Islamic Reform in Arabia (MIRA).
According to CACSA's on-line newsletter, "A British company called JBB Consultancy Systems installed a monitoring and policing system in Saudi Arabia that filters objectionable sites. The 'Net Map' system also traces user patterns by identifying how often sites on the Web are visited and by spotting the movement of information. Through the use of a 'collection' device attached to the main telephone line and an alarm signal, the authorities can be alerted each time forbidden information is called up."
Internet still has limited reach
Yet, for some media researchers, the impact of the 'Information Super Highway' on the political arena in the Middle East might not be as great as some Arab governments think. Other factors must be taken into consideration. A substantial percentage of the Arab public is illiterate and has a low standard of living. For these people, gaining access to the Internet is not a high priority.
According to statistics released in May 1999 by Nua, Ltd., an information technology company, there are only 880,000 Internet users in the Middle East (including Israel) out of 165 million users world wide.
Not only is the equipment expensive, but most of the Web is in English, according to Ahmed Al Guday, media researcher at the American University in Cairo.
"In a country like Egypt with an illiteracy rate of 48 percent and limited financial potentials, only thousands out of more than 65 million Egyptians have access to the Internet. We should also take into consideration that a good percentage of people don't read English."
Hussein Amin, professor of mass communication at the American University in Cairo believes that limited Internet access keeps opposition groups weak. "On-line opposition papers do not form a threat to the Arab government and will not for some time. [There are] still many obstacles, like affordability and illiteracy, hindering such a kind of media from reaching the masses."
Among the hindrances to Internet access are the high prices of telephone lines, Internet service providers, and computers.
"Not all people can afford to buy a PC [personal computer] and even if they can, not all of them know how to use the Internet. We are talking about the mass of people who are not well paid and can hardly afford to buy more than one newspaper. Internet seems a kind of luxury for them," said Amin.
Most of those who frequently read on-line opposition papers are media researchers or students interested in media and politics, he explains.
Professor Jerrold Green of the University of California, Los Angeles, agreed adding that security and moral concerns stirred many Arab governments towards restricting access. Even if people manage to get Internet access, Green somewhat pessimistically concludes, Internet-based opposition groups have a long way to go.
"What significance may they have if local people notably, can but [choose not to] look at them?"
Yomna Kamel (Middle East Times, Cairo)
Dreams need planning to come true
When the first privately owned Arab satellite television, ART, experienced serious financial problems and had to sack dozens of its Italy-based staff few years ago, some media analysts expected that Arab businessmen would be reluctant to venture into similar visual media projects.
Yet, a couple of Saudi business tycoons who are connected to the Saudi royal family risked their money in another two television networks, the Orbit and the MBC. Though well funded by the Saudi petro-dollars, the three stations have been striving to survive since they were established in the early 1990s.
For Egyptian businessmen, the experience of investing in private channels is not entirely different. Until recently, the Egyptian government was reluctant to license for privately owned television channels leaving the Arab air dominated by the Saudi businessmen and the state-run television channels.
But with a sudden change in the government's attitude after the launch of the Nilesat 102 and the expansion of the Media Production City at the October 6 City, a good number of Egyptian businessmen and politicians competed to win licenses for television channels.
Taken by their enthusiasm for a business that has been shuttered for the private sector for decades, early signs of their financial situations indicate that the owners of the new channels rushed and risked their money without carefully studying the media market and their future opportunities of survival.
Three new private satellite channels, Dream TV 1 and 2 and Al Mehwar, were granted licenses in 2001 and started transmission via the Nilesat 102, marking a new era of Egypt's television industry.
The Dream TV 1 and 2 are owned by Ahmed Bahgat, an Egyptian businessman whose activities include electronics manufacturing, real estate and eventually TV business. Al Mehwar is a joint stock company owned by a number of Egyptian businessmen headed by Hassan Rateb, an investor in tourism projects in Sinai.
Marking the inauguration of Al Mehwar, the Minster of Information, Safwat A1 Sherif said, “We shall support the private sector in its first experiment, at their own request. We shall support the experiment with all our abilities particularly as the private sector realizes the difficulty of this experiment. The media industry is difficult and costly and needs the experience of long years.”
The Egyptian Radio and Television Union, ERTU, owns around 15 % of both channels. The ERTU’s contribution comes in forms of media materials and free use of the Media Production City’s studios.
Such a limited government support seems not helping much the infant channels since media analysts have noticed early signs of financial mal-performance and expressed doubts about their ability to be profitable.
A freelance television producer, who wished to remain anonymous, said just a year after it was launched, the Dream TV has already been experiencing financial problems and started cutting down some jobs.
“The story of other Arab private televisions seems to repeat itself. Rumors are widespread in the media community that the Saudi business giant, Al Waleed bin Talal, might venture in the Dream TV to provide financial backing, but nothing is confirmed,” she said.
Though admitting that it is not making profit at the moment, Dream TV general manager, Osama El Shiekh, said the channels are not experiencing financial problems and Ahmed Bahgat is still the sole owner of Dream TV.
“The television business is a long term investment. We have a plan to start making profit in three years time. The one-year old channels have succeeded to gain a good segment of the Arab audience by its mixture of entertainment on Dream 1 and serious programs on Dream 2,” Al Sheikh said.
Denying reports that Dream TV is depending only on the owner’s advertisements, Al Sheikh said the channels attract other advertisers and by next month they will be having more advertisements. An international company has just signed an agreement with Dream TV to run the advertising business for the channels, he added.
Passant Hassan, an announcer at Al Mehwar Television, however, said both channels experience financial problems. “Some staff are not paid their salaries and others get them very late,” she said. Changes in the channels’ management staff might be the reason for not being paid on time. Some of Dream’s staff already left the channel to join Al Mehwar.
Not getting enough advertisements might be another reason.
“At the moment, both Ahmed Bahgat and Hassan Rateb are using their channels primarily to advertise for their projects. They have had enough of advertisements on the local televisions’ screens and now they want to reach the foreign markets through their satellite channels, she said. “ It is their right to take up most of the channels’ time to serve their cause. Advertisements about their projects are given prime times and more frequency than those of external advertisers. This is quite discouraging for other advertisers.”
Early indications of financial problems facing the new private channels, in some media analysts’ points of views, reflect a chronic problem facing the private television industry in the Arab world.
“Sources of revenues for the private televisions, which are advertising and or paid subscriptions, do not cover the cost of their production. For free to air channels, the situation is more difficult since they depend mainly on advertising,” Professor Hamdy Hassan, Dean of the Faculty of Mass Communication at the Misr International University said.
Taking into account that both Dream and Al Mehwar are not pay- televisions, Hassan said they depend on advertisements and the call-in competitions. For those two sources of revenues to work, the channels have been trying to build up viewership. With its light entertainment programs, Dream has succeeded to attract more audience and advertisers than Al Mehwar, he added.
Apparently, these two sources do not cover the production cost of the channels’ programs though most of them are of the low-budget talk shows that fill in hours of transmission. Their failure to attract advertisers can be traced back to reasons related to the channel itself and others related to the market.
“Being a satellite channel does not encourage both the local advertisers and the international ones who are targeting Egyptian consumers. Advertisers do not want to place their advertisements on satellite channels favoring Egyptian local channels that reach millions of Egyptians,” a senior advertising executive at Tarek Nour Communications said.
There is a demand from some clients to have their products advertised on Dream TV since it has considerable number of viewers, but still it is a limited demand comparing to the Egyptian local channels though the channel is offering reduced rates for commercials.
Inaccurate rating of Egyptian and Arab televisions is another problem that leaves advertisers unsure how best to target viewers, he said
Adding to this, Hassan said, without having an identity or a “character” that attracts viewers and advertisers, the channels would not survive. “While Dream TV has managed to create an identity for itself focusing on the entertainment business in the first place, Al Mehwar, though seems more serious, is still looking for one, a thing that is quite discouraging for both viewers and advertisers.”
Not having an identity or a character reveals that neither feasibility studies nor planning policies had been adopted before they were launched.
“Who is their targeted audience, what is the expected cost and what are the sources of funding? All those questions should have been answered before the new private channels started transmission,” Jihan Rachty, former Dean of Cairo University’s Faculty of Mass Communication said.
Part of the problem of planning is determining the targeted viewers. Owners of the new satellite channels should realize that only 12% of the Egyptian people have satellite dishes. “Unfortunately, some businessmen venturing in media projects are looking for prestige and control. They are not interested in the business itself. That is why they do not have serious plans for such projects,” Rachty said.
The channels’ early problems could be part of an economic slump the Arab economies and the media market experience. Arab advertisers’ spending is declining too as a result of the current economic slump.
A report released by the Washington Institute for Near East Policy revealed that financing is a primary challenge facing the satellite television industry in the Arab world.
“ With annual costs in the tens of millions of dollars, few if any satellite television stations in the Arab world are turning a profit. Some have business plans, which rely on advertising revenue alone (so-called "free to air" channels), while others encode their transmissions and require a proprietary decoder and the payment of a monthly fee. Such fees, which run in the range of $10-$30/month and up, put satellite television beyond the reach of many in the region,” Jon B. Alterman said in the report.
At the present time, Alterman added, “the Arab advertising market appears too weak to allow a broad variety of free-to-air systems to prosper. The market is growing, however, and television spending is growing faster than the overall market.”
Commenting on the Egyptian experience, Jihad Fakhr El Din, head of the Dubai based Arab Media Research Center said, “TV privatization in Egypt comes at a time when the pan Arab market is extremely crowded. Even the major players in this market are suffering, both financial and audience losses.”
However, Fakhr El Din said there are many positive indications that the privately owned Egyptian TV channels are able to establish a foothold in the market.
“Well-thought out product concepts are required in order to capitalize on this initial success. One major limitation needs to be surmounted. Will they want to position themselves as Egyptian channels targeting the Egyptian market, or reaching out with a wider net, and that is the pan Arab market?”
Yomna Kamel
When the first privately owned Arab satellite television, ART, experienced serious financial problems and had to sack dozens of its Italy-based staff few years ago, some media analysts expected that Arab businessmen would be reluctant to venture into similar visual media projects.
Yet, a couple of Saudi business tycoons who are connected to the Saudi royal family risked their money in another two television networks, the Orbit and the MBC. Though well funded by the Saudi petro-dollars, the three stations have been striving to survive since they were established in the early 1990s.
For Egyptian businessmen, the experience of investing in private channels is not entirely different. Until recently, the Egyptian government was reluctant to license for privately owned television channels leaving the Arab air dominated by the Saudi businessmen and the state-run television channels.
But with a sudden change in the government's attitude after the launch of the Nilesat 102 and the expansion of the Media Production City at the October 6 City, a good number of Egyptian businessmen and politicians competed to win licenses for television channels.
Taken by their enthusiasm for a business that has been shuttered for the private sector for decades, early signs of their financial situations indicate that the owners of the new channels rushed and risked their money without carefully studying the media market and their future opportunities of survival.
Three new private satellite channels, Dream TV 1 and 2 and Al Mehwar, were granted licenses in 2001 and started transmission via the Nilesat 102, marking a new era of Egypt's television industry.
The Dream TV 1 and 2 are owned by Ahmed Bahgat, an Egyptian businessman whose activities include electronics manufacturing, real estate and eventually TV business. Al Mehwar is a joint stock company owned by a number of Egyptian businessmen headed by Hassan Rateb, an investor in tourism projects in Sinai.
Marking the inauguration of Al Mehwar, the Minster of Information, Safwat A1 Sherif said, “We shall support the private sector in its first experiment, at their own request. We shall support the experiment with all our abilities particularly as the private sector realizes the difficulty of this experiment. The media industry is difficult and costly and needs the experience of long years.”
The Egyptian Radio and Television Union, ERTU, owns around 15 % of both channels. The ERTU’s contribution comes in forms of media materials and free use of the Media Production City’s studios.
Such a limited government support seems not helping much the infant channels since media analysts have noticed early signs of financial mal-performance and expressed doubts about their ability to be profitable.
A freelance television producer, who wished to remain anonymous, said just a year after it was launched, the Dream TV has already been experiencing financial problems and started cutting down some jobs.
“The story of other Arab private televisions seems to repeat itself. Rumors are widespread in the media community that the Saudi business giant, Al Waleed bin Talal, might venture in the Dream TV to provide financial backing, but nothing is confirmed,” she said.
Though admitting that it is not making profit at the moment, Dream TV general manager, Osama El Shiekh, said the channels are not experiencing financial problems and Ahmed Bahgat is still the sole owner of Dream TV.
“The television business is a long term investment. We have a plan to start making profit in three years time. The one-year old channels have succeeded to gain a good segment of the Arab audience by its mixture of entertainment on Dream 1 and serious programs on Dream 2,” Al Sheikh said.
Denying reports that Dream TV is depending only on the owner’s advertisements, Al Sheikh said the channels attract other advertisers and by next month they will be having more advertisements. An international company has just signed an agreement with Dream TV to run the advertising business for the channels, he added.
Passant Hassan, an announcer at Al Mehwar Television, however, said both channels experience financial problems. “Some staff are not paid their salaries and others get them very late,” she said. Changes in the channels’ management staff might be the reason for not being paid on time. Some of Dream’s staff already left the channel to join Al Mehwar.
Not getting enough advertisements might be another reason.
“At the moment, both Ahmed Bahgat and Hassan Rateb are using their channels primarily to advertise for their projects. They have had enough of advertisements on the local televisions’ screens and now they want to reach the foreign markets through their satellite channels, she said. “ It is their right to take up most of the channels’ time to serve their cause. Advertisements about their projects are given prime times and more frequency than those of external advertisers. This is quite discouraging for other advertisers.”
Early indications of financial problems facing the new private channels, in some media analysts’ points of views, reflect a chronic problem facing the private television industry in the Arab world.
“Sources of revenues for the private televisions, which are advertising and or paid subscriptions, do not cover the cost of their production. For free to air channels, the situation is more difficult since they depend mainly on advertising,” Professor Hamdy Hassan, Dean of the Faculty of Mass Communication at the Misr International University said.
Taking into account that both Dream and Al Mehwar are not pay- televisions, Hassan said they depend on advertisements and the call-in competitions. For those two sources of revenues to work, the channels have been trying to build up viewership. With its light entertainment programs, Dream has succeeded to attract more audience and advertisers than Al Mehwar, he added.
Apparently, these two sources do not cover the production cost of the channels’ programs though most of them are of the low-budget talk shows that fill in hours of transmission. Their failure to attract advertisers can be traced back to reasons related to the channel itself and others related to the market.
“Being a satellite channel does not encourage both the local advertisers and the international ones who are targeting Egyptian consumers. Advertisers do not want to place their advertisements on satellite channels favoring Egyptian local channels that reach millions of Egyptians,” a senior advertising executive at Tarek Nour Communications said.
There is a demand from some clients to have their products advertised on Dream TV since it has considerable number of viewers, but still it is a limited demand comparing to the Egyptian local channels though the channel is offering reduced rates for commercials.
Inaccurate rating of Egyptian and Arab televisions is another problem that leaves advertisers unsure how best to target viewers, he said
Adding to this, Hassan said, without having an identity or a “character” that attracts viewers and advertisers, the channels would not survive. “While Dream TV has managed to create an identity for itself focusing on the entertainment business in the first place, Al Mehwar, though seems more serious, is still looking for one, a thing that is quite discouraging for both viewers and advertisers.”
Not having an identity or a character reveals that neither feasibility studies nor planning policies had been adopted before they were launched.
“Who is their targeted audience, what is the expected cost and what are the sources of funding? All those questions should have been answered before the new private channels started transmission,” Jihan Rachty, former Dean of Cairo University’s Faculty of Mass Communication said.
Part of the problem of planning is determining the targeted viewers. Owners of the new satellite channels should realize that only 12% of the Egyptian people have satellite dishes. “Unfortunately, some businessmen venturing in media projects are looking for prestige and control. They are not interested in the business itself. That is why they do not have serious plans for such projects,” Rachty said.
The channels’ early problems could be part of an economic slump the Arab economies and the media market experience. Arab advertisers’ spending is declining too as a result of the current economic slump.
A report released by the Washington Institute for Near East Policy revealed that financing is a primary challenge facing the satellite television industry in the Arab world.
“ With annual costs in the tens of millions of dollars, few if any satellite television stations in the Arab world are turning a profit. Some have business plans, which rely on advertising revenue alone (so-called "free to air" channels), while others encode their transmissions and require a proprietary decoder and the payment of a monthly fee. Such fees, which run in the range of $10-$30/month and up, put satellite television beyond the reach of many in the region,” Jon B. Alterman said in the report.
At the present time, Alterman added, “the Arab advertising market appears too weak to allow a broad variety of free-to-air systems to prosper. The market is growing, however, and television spending is growing faster than the overall market.”
Commenting on the Egyptian experience, Jihad Fakhr El Din, head of the Dubai based Arab Media Research Center said, “TV privatization in Egypt comes at a time when the pan Arab market is extremely crowded. Even the major players in this market are suffering, both financial and audience losses.”
However, Fakhr El Din said there are many positive indications that the privately owned Egyptian TV channels are able to establish a foothold in the market.
“Well-thought out product concepts are required in order to capitalize on this initial success. One major limitation needs to be surmounted. Will they want to position themselves as Egyptian channels targeting the Egyptian market, or reaching out with a wider net, and that is the pan Arab market?”
Yomna Kamel
Wednesday, July 30, 2003
Tuesday, July 29, 2003
Press Freedom: Different Approaches, One Cause
Violating people’s rights of having a free press has not always been a government’s practice. According to some media experts, economic, political and professional considerations might escalate these violations and impede the free flow of information.
Discussing the issue of ‘Press Freedom” came in the seventh session of a six-week workshop organized by Al-Ahram Regional Press Institute in cooperation with the Religious News Service from the Arab World, RNSAW. The workshop is titled 'Comparing Western and Egyptian perspectives in covering current affairs'.
A blend of media experts and human rights activists presented their perspectives of the ‘press freedom’ issue. A German human rights activist and three Egyptians, a theologian, an academic and a lawyer adopted different approaches in addressing the issue, but regardless of their differences, they have worked for one cause.
“Freedom of expression exists in societies with varying degrees. The amount of freedom individuals enjoy depends on economic and political variables. Economically powerful countries tend to respect it more than countries of poor economy,” said Dr. Jihan Rachty, Former Dean of Cairo University’s faculty of Mass Communication and professor of Mass Communication at the Misr International University.
Even within the same society, there is a tendency to restrict freedom of expression at times of economic or political crisis. “In the USA, freedom of expression was restricted during the 1930s when the American economy was not doing fine. Again, after the September 11 events, we saw a similar tendency because the country experienced a crisis,” Rachty explained.
Nevertheless, government’s attempts to impose restrictions on freedom of expression and freedom of the media are not acceptable. “The state should not intervene in the ‘media decision’,” she added.
Violations of freedom of expression are not always due to governmental practices and interventions. “Sometimes, we find market forces negatively affecting media freedom. When the media financially depend on the advertisers, they tend to abuse the media to propagate for certain ideas that serve their interests,” Rachty said.
Agreeing with her, Amir Salem, a human rights lawyer and activist, blamed both the political regime and the journalists of violating freedom of expression. “In a country like Egypt, the political system is underdeveloped. On one hand, neither do we have a powerful democratic parliament nor active political parties that can practice democracy as it should be,” Salem said.
On the other hand, he said, journalists’ practices sometimes are threatening the right of freedom of expression. Some journalists serve the state’s institutions, specially the state’s security authority. Others blackmail the society’s public figures and businessmen. Journalists’ professional malpractices create what we call the yellow press or ‘outrageous newspapers’, Salem said.
There is a need for journalists who are conscious and who are well aware of their countries problems, Rachty and Salem stressed. “Journalists of that type do not leave a room for the state to intervene and impose more restrictions on freedom of expression,” Rachty pointed out.
Unfortunately, some journalists act like judges accusing ministers, businessmen and other public figures, but without having enough evidences or supporting documents. They fail to distinguish between being a ‘watch dog’ and being a judge. “As a journalist, you do not have the authority of labeling any figure guilty until the court rules he is guilty,” Salem said.
Due to a series of cases where Egyptian public figures fell victims of libel and slander and invasion of privacy, the government imposed more restrictions in 1996. “Egyptian journalists face imprisonment and heavy fines in libel offenses, a matter that we do not accept,” Rachty said. “Imposing heavy fines on papers violating the law of libel and slander is an appropriate sentence, but sending journalists to jail because of their opinion is not acceptable,” she added.
According to the Committee to Protect Journalist, CPJ, “Between 1998 and 2000, six Egyptian journalists were jailed for libel and other criminal offenses related to their work. Three of them have been imprisoned more than once.”
“Tough provisions in Egypt's Press Code, approved in 1996, stipulate prison sentences of up to one year for journalists convicted of defamation, or up to two years if a public official files the suit. Fines can reach £E20,000 (US$4,400) for each offense. Other crimes—such as "inciting hatred," "violating public morality," "harming the national economy," and offending a foreign head of state—carry prison sentences of one to two years,” CPJ stated in its web site, www.wjp.org
While the Egyptian perspective of freedom of expression and press freedom traces violations to the country’s political and economic problems, the German experience sounded totally different.
The German print and broadcast media are free and independent, their coverage spanning the full spectrum of political views, said Dr. Otmar Oehring, Head of Missio Human Rights Office.
Neither are fines imposed on journalists nor imprisonment sentence. When a person brings a case of libel or slander before the court, it usually rules that the same publication must run a story, of the same size and location, denying and apologizing, Oehring said.
To be continued.
Yomna Kamel
Violating people’s rights of having a free press has not always been a government’s practice. According to some media experts, economic, political and professional considerations might escalate these violations and impede the free flow of information.
Discussing the issue of ‘Press Freedom” came in the seventh session of a six-week workshop organized by Al-Ahram Regional Press Institute in cooperation with the Religious News Service from the Arab World, RNSAW. The workshop is titled 'Comparing Western and Egyptian perspectives in covering current affairs'.
A blend of media experts and human rights activists presented their perspectives of the ‘press freedom’ issue. A German human rights activist and three Egyptians, a theologian, an academic and a lawyer adopted different approaches in addressing the issue, but regardless of their differences, they have worked for one cause.
“Freedom of expression exists in societies with varying degrees. The amount of freedom individuals enjoy depends on economic and political variables. Economically powerful countries tend to respect it more than countries of poor economy,” said Dr. Jihan Rachty, Former Dean of Cairo University’s faculty of Mass Communication and professor of Mass Communication at the Misr International University.
Even within the same society, there is a tendency to restrict freedom of expression at times of economic or political crisis. “In the USA, freedom of expression was restricted during the 1930s when the American economy was not doing fine. Again, after the September 11 events, we saw a similar tendency because the country experienced a crisis,” Rachty explained.
Nevertheless, government’s attempts to impose restrictions on freedom of expression and freedom of the media are not acceptable. “The state should not intervene in the ‘media decision’,” she added.
Violations of freedom of expression are not always due to governmental practices and interventions. “Sometimes, we find market forces negatively affecting media freedom. When the media financially depend on the advertisers, they tend to abuse the media to propagate for certain ideas that serve their interests,” Rachty said.
Agreeing with her, Amir Salem, a human rights lawyer and activist, blamed both the political regime and the journalists of violating freedom of expression. “In a country like Egypt, the political system is underdeveloped. On one hand, neither do we have a powerful democratic parliament nor active political parties that can practice democracy as it should be,” Salem said.
On the other hand, he said, journalists’ practices sometimes are threatening the right of freedom of expression. Some journalists serve the state’s institutions, specially the state’s security authority. Others blackmail the society’s public figures and businessmen. Journalists’ professional malpractices create what we call the yellow press or ‘outrageous newspapers’, Salem said.
There is a need for journalists who are conscious and who are well aware of their countries problems, Rachty and Salem stressed. “Journalists of that type do not leave a room for the state to intervene and impose more restrictions on freedom of expression,” Rachty pointed out.
Unfortunately, some journalists act like judges accusing ministers, businessmen and other public figures, but without having enough evidences or supporting documents. They fail to distinguish between being a ‘watch dog’ and being a judge. “As a journalist, you do not have the authority of labeling any figure guilty until the court rules he is guilty,” Salem said.
Due to a series of cases where Egyptian public figures fell victims of libel and slander and invasion of privacy, the government imposed more restrictions in 1996. “Egyptian journalists face imprisonment and heavy fines in libel offenses, a matter that we do not accept,” Rachty said. “Imposing heavy fines on papers violating the law of libel and slander is an appropriate sentence, but sending journalists to jail because of their opinion is not acceptable,” she added.
According to the Committee to Protect Journalist, CPJ, “Between 1998 and 2000, six Egyptian journalists were jailed for libel and other criminal offenses related to their work. Three of them have been imprisoned more than once.”
“Tough provisions in Egypt's Press Code, approved in 1996, stipulate prison sentences of up to one year for journalists convicted of defamation, or up to two years if a public official files the suit. Fines can reach £E20,000 (US$4,400) for each offense. Other crimes—such as "inciting hatred," "violating public morality," "harming the national economy," and offending a foreign head of state—carry prison sentences of one to two years,” CPJ stated in its web site, www.wjp.org
While the Egyptian perspective of freedom of expression and press freedom traces violations to the country’s political and economic problems, the German experience sounded totally different.
The German print and broadcast media are free and independent, their coverage spanning the full spectrum of political views, said Dr. Otmar Oehring, Head of Missio Human Rights Office.
Neither are fines imposed on journalists nor imprisonment sentence. When a person brings a case of libel or slander before the court, it usually rules that the same publication must run a story, of the same size and location, denying and apologizing, Oehring said.
To be continued.
Yomna Kamel
Monday, July 28, 2003
Bridging the Gap
When the BBC played the Azan in the background of a documentary on violence, Muslims were offended although a British reporter of Middle East Affairs said it was unpremeditated. But when it stopped referring to Israel’s planned killings of Palestinians as ‘assassinations’ and started using ‘targeted killings’ instead, it was inevitable to call it intentional misreporting of Arab affairs.
Such misreporting of Arab affairs is also a blatant practice by the American media, according to some Western experts in Middle East Affairs.
“Just as the BBC last month ordered its reporters to use the phrase “targeted killings” for Israel’s assassination of Palestinians, CNN –under constant attack from right-wing Jewish lobby groups- has instructed its journalists to stop referring to Gilo (Bayt Gala) as a “Jewish settlement,” said Robert Fisk, Middle East correspondent for the British newspaper, the Independent. “They must call the settlement, built illegally on occupied Arab land outside Jerusalem, “a Jewish neighborhood”.”
The debate over Western media coverage of Middle East affairs has been the topic of several heated discussions since the September 11th events, the latest of which came in a session organized by Al-Ahram Regional Institute for Journalism in cooperation with the Religious News Service from the Arab World, RNSAW.
The session, Bridging the Divide: Arab image in Western media, was an episode of a six-week workshop titled 'Comparing Western and Egyptian perspectives in covering current affairs'.
Though the participants in the panel discussion accepted the assumption that there is misreporting of Arab affairs by Western media, they presented different perspectives of the causes and the solutions.
Intentional and unintentional misreporting:
Cornelis Hulsman, Ds., editor-in-chief of RANSAW and coordinator of the workshop, believes there are one-sided reports in the West about the Arab World and for the purpose of responding to those reports; the RANSAW was founded in 1997.
Hulsman recalled some distorted reports produced by the Middle East Media Research Institute in Washington (MEMRI). “Such reports are usually based on quotes and comments taken out of context. Responding to the deliberate biased reporting should be by giving facts away from emotional reactions,” he said.
Bad intentions are not always behind distorted reporting about the Arab world.
“Sometimes distortions give the impression they were done on purpose. I believe you have to be very careful presuming this. Too often bad intentions were presumed while in fact they were not”, he added.
Andrew Hammond, Reuters’ correspondent in Cairo, agreed with Hulsman that not all Western media are biased. “It depends on the type of media: wire service, television or print media. When talking about news agencies’ practices, they are closer to objectivity more than any other medium. But sometimes, as a news agency’s reporter, you have to report others’ comments as they are even if you do not believe or disagree with.”
Hammond said he interviewed a US Department of State’s representative at the US Embassy in Cairo and the comments he gave were neither acceptable nor true, but he had to put them in his story because it was his duty as a reporter.
Television and print media produce in-depth stories and have rooms for analysis and opinions, which might distort sometimes the image, as it is the case with the Palestinians. ‘There is a debate going on in the BBC about its pro-Israeli reporting,” Hammond said. “That is why we should not generalize by saying all Western media are biased.”
Why the image is distorted:
From a journalistic perspective, the Western media, according to Hammond, is interested in covering issues like women and Islam, violence and Islam, sex and Islam, the Arab-Israeli conflict, anti-Semitism, lack of democracy, human rights, circumcision and economic reform.
Unfortunately, the coverage of such issue helps distort the image of Arabs more because the West does not respect Arab countries for lack of democracy and for their continual denial of their problems, Hammond said.
“The West respects countries that admit their problems. Adding to this, good news coming from Egypt is quite few. Economic reform is slow and the political scene is still,” he added.
Abdel Menaem Saeed, PhD, head of Al Ahram Center for Political and Strategic Studies, tackled the problem from a historical perspective.
“The issue of image has historical roots started with classifying Islam as an Eastern religion and Christianity as the religion of the West though both emerged and embraced in the East. Such classification suggested several clashes between the East and the West,” Saeed explained.
The gap was even widened by the Western media, which failed to truthfully report the Arab affairs. “The language bar contributes to the problem and I don’t mean just understanding the language, but the ‘soul’ of the language,” he said.
Quoting Bahgat Qurani, professor of political science at the American University in Cairo, Saeed said, “The image of the Arab in the Western media can be put in six Bs: the Bedouin, the belly dancer, the bazaar, the bomber and the backward.” “Along with such gloomy stereotyping of the Arab, there is a deliberate disregarding of the region’s good news.”
Egypt’s role in several international occasions and Arab contributions in human relief activities are not given proper coverage by the Western media, he said.
Disregarding the region’s good news and misreporting the Arab affairs especially the on-going Arab-Israeli conflict are not essentially intentional, V. Windfuhr, chairman of the Foreign Press Association and Correspondent of the German newspaper, Der Spiegel commented.
“Despite all books and publications issued about the region, still there is ignorance of basic facts about the area. A foreign correspondent of a prominent Western paper asked me once: Why Arafat wants Jerusalem? The question stunned me,” Windfuhr said.
Some journalists are sent to the region with no knowledge of the language and the culture. Their misreporting of the Arab affairs doesn’t reflect certain political attitudes, but it is the outcome of a different cultural and media environment they lived in, he explained.
Changing the Arab discourse…changing the Western stereotypes
Although uprooting long-lived stereotypes that have been reinforced by a serial of events since September 11th 2001 is not an easy problem to tackle in a single workshop where Western and Arab journalists exchanged their views, the panel discussion’s participants presented a number of solutions, each of which is worth studying.
While Windfuhr stressed the importance of having well-qualified journalists covering the Middle East Affairs, Hammond suggested solutions at two levels: the governmental and the non-governmental.
The Arab governments should be more frank and talk freely about their problems in order to gain the West’s respect and revamp their image in the Western media. At non-governmental level, the Arabs should give up talking about what should be done and what should not be and start taking actions.
“In Israel we find them keen to follow what is written about them in the Western media and keen to respond and pressurize the media to change whatever deemed anti-Israeli reporting. The Arabs should do the same,” Hammond said.
Both Hulsman and Saeed believed the solution should come from the Arab media. Changing the rough violent Arab discourse to a smooth dialogue will enable us to explain our points of view. “Imagine we have turned the sound off while watching Al Jazeera’s program ‘The Opposite Direction’. We will watch violent facial and body expressions which reflect the sort of discourse the Arabs have,” said Saeed.
Egyptian media articles are too emotional. Writers mix their own opinions with the obtained facts, a thing that is used against them by some Western media like the MEMRI. It is important for journalists to make a distinction between factual reporting and opinions to escape being misused, Hulsman concluded.
Yomna Kamel
Such misreporting of Arab affairs is also a blatant practice by the American media, according to some Western experts in Middle East Affairs.
“Just as the BBC last month ordered its reporters to use the phrase “targeted killings” for Israel’s assassination of Palestinians, CNN –under constant attack from right-wing Jewish lobby groups- has instructed its journalists to stop referring to Gilo (Bayt Gala) as a “Jewish settlement,” said Robert Fisk, Middle East correspondent for the British newspaper, the Independent. “They must call the settlement, built illegally on occupied Arab land outside Jerusalem, “a Jewish neighborhood”.”
The debate over Western media coverage of Middle East affairs has been the topic of several heated discussions since the September 11th events, the latest of which came in a session organized by Al-Ahram Regional Institute for Journalism in cooperation with the Religious News Service from the Arab World, RNSAW.
The session, Bridging the Divide: Arab image in Western media, was an episode of a six-week workshop titled 'Comparing Western and Egyptian perspectives in covering current affairs'.
Though the participants in the panel discussion accepted the assumption that there is misreporting of Arab affairs by Western media, they presented different perspectives of the causes and the solutions.
Intentional and unintentional misreporting:
Cornelis Hulsman, Ds., editor-in-chief of RANSAW and coordinator of the workshop, believes there are one-sided reports in the West about the Arab World and for the purpose of responding to those reports; the RANSAW was founded in 1997.
Hulsman recalled some distorted reports produced by the Middle East Media Research Institute in Washington (MEMRI). “Such reports are usually based on quotes and comments taken out of context. Responding to the deliberate biased reporting should be by giving facts away from emotional reactions,” he said.
Bad intentions are not always behind distorted reporting about the Arab world.
“Sometimes distortions give the impression they were done on purpose. I believe you have to be very careful presuming this. Too often bad intentions were presumed while in fact they were not”, he added.
Andrew Hammond, Reuters’ correspondent in Cairo, agreed with Hulsman that not all Western media are biased. “It depends on the type of media: wire service, television or print media. When talking about news agencies’ practices, they are closer to objectivity more than any other medium. But sometimes, as a news agency’s reporter, you have to report others’ comments as they are even if you do not believe or disagree with.”
Hammond said he interviewed a US Department of State’s representative at the US Embassy in Cairo and the comments he gave were neither acceptable nor true, but he had to put them in his story because it was his duty as a reporter.
Television and print media produce in-depth stories and have rooms for analysis and opinions, which might distort sometimes the image, as it is the case with the Palestinians. ‘There is a debate going on in the BBC about its pro-Israeli reporting,” Hammond said. “That is why we should not generalize by saying all Western media are biased.”
Why the image is distorted:
From a journalistic perspective, the Western media, according to Hammond, is interested in covering issues like women and Islam, violence and Islam, sex and Islam, the Arab-Israeli conflict, anti-Semitism, lack of democracy, human rights, circumcision and economic reform.
Unfortunately, the coverage of such issue helps distort the image of Arabs more because the West does not respect Arab countries for lack of democracy and for their continual denial of their problems, Hammond said.
“The West respects countries that admit their problems. Adding to this, good news coming from Egypt is quite few. Economic reform is slow and the political scene is still,” he added.
Abdel Menaem Saeed, PhD, head of Al Ahram Center for Political and Strategic Studies, tackled the problem from a historical perspective.
“The issue of image has historical roots started with classifying Islam as an Eastern religion and Christianity as the religion of the West though both emerged and embraced in the East. Such classification suggested several clashes between the East and the West,” Saeed explained.
The gap was even widened by the Western media, which failed to truthfully report the Arab affairs. “The language bar contributes to the problem and I don’t mean just understanding the language, but the ‘soul’ of the language,” he said.
Quoting Bahgat Qurani, professor of political science at the American University in Cairo, Saeed said, “The image of the Arab in the Western media can be put in six Bs: the Bedouin, the belly dancer, the bazaar, the bomber and the backward.” “Along with such gloomy stereotyping of the Arab, there is a deliberate disregarding of the region’s good news.”
Egypt’s role in several international occasions and Arab contributions in human relief activities are not given proper coverage by the Western media, he said.
Disregarding the region’s good news and misreporting the Arab affairs especially the on-going Arab-Israeli conflict are not essentially intentional, V. Windfuhr, chairman of the Foreign Press Association and Correspondent of the German newspaper, Der Spiegel commented.
“Despite all books and publications issued about the region, still there is ignorance of basic facts about the area. A foreign correspondent of a prominent Western paper asked me once: Why Arafat wants Jerusalem? The question stunned me,” Windfuhr said.
Some journalists are sent to the region with no knowledge of the language and the culture. Their misreporting of the Arab affairs doesn’t reflect certain political attitudes, but it is the outcome of a different cultural and media environment they lived in, he explained.
Changing the Arab discourse…changing the Western stereotypes
Although uprooting long-lived stereotypes that have been reinforced by a serial of events since September 11th 2001 is not an easy problem to tackle in a single workshop where Western and Arab journalists exchanged their views, the panel discussion’s participants presented a number of solutions, each of which is worth studying.
While Windfuhr stressed the importance of having well-qualified journalists covering the Middle East Affairs, Hammond suggested solutions at two levels: the governmental and the non-governmental.
The Arab governments should be more frank and talk freely about their problems in order to gain the West’s respect and revamp their image in the Western media. At non-governmental level, the Arabs should give up talking about what should be done and what should not be and start taking actions.
“In Israel we find them keen to follow what is written about them in the Western media and keen to respond and pressurize the media to change whatever deemed anti-Israeli reporting. The Arabs should do the same,” Hammond said.
Both Hulsman and Saeed believed the solution should come from the Arab media. Changing the rough violent Arab discourse to a smooth dialogue will enable us to explain our points of view. “Imagine we have turned the sound off while watching Al Jazeera’s program ‘The Opposite Direction’. We will watch violent facial and body expressions which reflect the sort of discourse the Arabs have,” said Saeed.
Egyptian media articles are too emotional. Writers mix their own opinions with the obtained facts, a thing that is used against them by some Western media like the MEMRI. It is important for journalists to make a distinction between factual reporting and opinions to escape being misused, Hulsman concluded.
Yomna Kamel
Searching for Common Values in Reporting the Arab-Israeli Conflict
When the New York Times reported the killing of a 10 months old Israeli baby girl and a four months old Palestinian baby girl in two separate stories earlier this year, the Palestinian Media Watch used them as evidences of what it called the US media pro-Israeli coverage of the conflict.
The Palestinian Media Watch analysed the stories and found out the headline used for the Israeli victim’s story was straightforward, active voice, directly accusing the Palestinians (Palestinians Kill Baby Girl in West Bank), while the magazine used a circuitous headline accusing the Israeli guns, not Israelis of killing a Palestinian baby (Littlest Victim in the Mideast: Israeli Guns Kill 4-month-old).
A photo of the Israeli baby, Shalhevet Pass, in her parents’ arms was shown with the story while no such a photo of the Palestinian baby, Iman Hajjo, was shown. “Both stories did not include a single quote from a Palestinian official while generous quotes (highlighted in light blues) from the Israeli Prime Minster, Ariel Sharon, and other officials were provided,” the Palestinian Media Watch stated.
Such a way of reporting on the Arab-Israeli conflict might have reinforced Arabs’ beliefs that they are not fairly treated by the US media and prompted them to accuse it of being biased. If the American news media are really biased, why are they so and what should the Arabs do to gain better coverage of their news?
In an attempt to answer these questions, Al-Ahram Regional Press Institute in cooperation with the Religious News Service from the Arab World, RNSAW, invited two Western media experts to a session of a six-week workshop titled 'Comparing Western and Egyptian perspectives in covering current affairs'.
Ralph Berenger, Assistant Professor of Journalism and Mass Communication at the American University in Cairo and Arne Fjeldstad, an associate professor of communication at the University of Oxford’s Institute of Communication Excellence, focused their discussion on the framing theory as a possible explainer of the way the Arab-Israeli conflict in reported.
Framing, according to Berenger, is how people make up their minds about a given situation. It is trying to explain how people get pieces of information, accept them, and perceive them through the process of selective perception. In perceiving information, people are affected by two internal mechanisms: the core opinion frame and the peripheral opinion frame.
The core opinion refers to the individual’s strongly held values and attitudes that are difficult to change while the peripheral opinion refers to the individual’s world view and the things that interest him. When receiving new pieces of information, the peripheral opinion frame selects what should be perceived and what should not according to values and attitudes held in the core opinion frame, he said.
When reporting stories, media practitioners tend to frame the issues affected by their core and peripheral opinion frames. “Each reporter is first a citizen of his country of choice or of birth and his primary loyalties to it,” Berenger said. Reporters are affected by their loyalties and sometimes they add to the problems by slanting, choosing what to cover and ignoring some aspects that might, if reported, help smooth the situation, he added.
Some reporters even distort the facts to fit in pre-conceived actions. They pre-conceive the stories before doing it. They come with certain bias out of their core opinion frame, he said.
Berenger discussed an example of framed reporting. There were eleven pictures taken by the AFP of a Palestinian man while being stopped and shot by Israeli soldiers in a checkpoint. Excluding a picture of a dynamite belt the Palestinian man had around his body or in the car makes up a different story.
Let the Truth speaks out:
Though Berenger admitted the hardness of getting out the truth, he said professional media practitioners could overcome their biases in reporting through recognizing their own preconceived ideas about the stories before they cover. “A professional knows himself or herself and his or her biases. First step is to recognize them,” he said.
Journalists should also understand that their coverage contributes to “a spiral of silence” among their readers and viewers. Berenger stated that spiral of silence is a common phenomenon in our societies where “voices that differ from ours are stilled by overwhelming covering and the perception that their comments are unwelcome or could even draw a hostile response if they differ from the accepted line.”
The third solution he suggested was to encourage editors to select photographs and stories that tell the story without inflaming the public emotions. Most important of all, according to Berenger, is to search for common values.
“Try to identify your personal frames and how they fit with universal values. Then, try to analyze the opposition’s frames and how they fit with universal values,” he said. “These values define our ‘humaness’. Some universal values that cut across religious, ethnic, cultural and social boundaries are truth, love, loyalty, honesty, freedom, respect, pursuit of happiness and the desire to be safe.”
A view from Europe:
Though the accusation of being biased is not only directed for the US media, but extends to the European continent also, Arne Fjeldstad said there has been a noticeable shift in the European media coverage of the Arab-Israeli conflict.
The European media tend to be pro-Palestinians because of Europeans’ perception of the word ‘occupation’. “After years of suffering from the German occupation, the Europeans have understood the meaning of occupation,” he said.
Fjeldstad presented what he called ‘the Potter Box’, which attempts to explain how journalists should frame their reporting. “The Potter Box contains four steps. The first is the empirical definition, which is related to understanding the facts about the issue of concern, and the second is to identify the values, which involves outlining the values inherent in the decision. The third step is appeal to ethical principles and the four is choosing loyalty,” he said.
Though Fjeldstad’s view of media practitioners’ duty seemed far theoretical than Berenge’s, both highlighted the need for journalists who understand the problems they are reporting and who have the power and responsibility to go beyond their own loyalties for the sake of revealing the facts.
Instead of framing the stories in a way that serves the journalist’s own interests and loyalties, Fjeldstad said it is legitimate for the journalist to add his own description of the situation after presenting the facts, but he has to clearly tell his readers that these ideas are his.
Attention given to the coverage of Arab news, especially the Arab Israeli conflict, has been mounting since the September 11th attack on the US.
A month before Al-Ahram Regional Press Institute in cooperation with RNSAW, organised its six-week workshop, the World Association for Christian Communication, WACC’s, the North American Regional Association, NARA-WACC, and the U.S. National Council of Churches’ Communication Commission co-organized a conference titled “Megaphones and Muffled Voices: What Constitutes Full and Fair Media Coverage of Israeli-Palestinian Issues?”
More than more 80 journalists and academics of diverse affiliations participated in the conference and agreed on a code of practices.
According to Carol J. Fouke-Mpoyo, a media liaison at the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the U.SA, the code of practices they have reached include these points:
· “The best of journalists do not only report what they see, hear or are told by official sources. They dig beneath the surface. They strive to get the other side or sides of the story.
· Balance of coverage is not achieved only in providing equal space or time to each side. There is no balance when an articulate, moderate and charismatic person is asked to represent one side and an uncompromising, militant, fiery and inarticulate ideologist is offered as a representative of the other side.
· Headlines should reflect the content of the story. Photographs should give a fair and accurate image of an event and not exaggerate an incident simply because the photograph is exceptionally dramatic.
· As much as possible, journalists should understand the language, the history and the culture of the people they cover.
· Covering such a sensitive, nuance-ridden subject as the Arab-Israeli conflict, journalists should be careful in using such loaded words and clichés as “terrorists,” “gunmen,” “Islamic bombers” and “fatalistic Muslims”.
Yomna Kamel
When the New York Times reported the killing of a 10 months old Israeli baby girl and a four months old Palestinian baby girl in two separate stories earlier this year, the Palestinian Media Watch used them as evidences of what it called the US media pro-Israeli coverage of the conflict.
The Palestinian Media Watch analysed the stories and found out the headline used for the Israeli victim’s story was straightforward, active voice, directly accusing the Palestinians (Palestinians Kill Baby Girl in West Bank), while the magazine used a circuitous headline accusing the Israeli guns, not Israelis of killing a Palestinian baby (Littlest Victim in the Mideast: Israeli Guns Kill 4-month-old).
A photo of the Israeli baby, Shalhevet Pass, in her parents’ arms was shown with the story while no such a photo of the Palestinian baby, Iman Hajjo, was shown. “Both stories did not include a single quote from a Palestinian official while generous quotes (highlighted in light blues) from the Israeli Prime Minster, Ariel Sharon, and other officials were provided,” the Palestinian Media Watch stated.
Such a way of reporting on the Arab-Israeli conflict might have reinforced Arabs’ beliefs that they are not fairly treated by the US media and prompted them to accuse it of being biased. If the American news media are really biased, why are they so and what should the Arabs do to gain better coverage of their news?
In an attempt to answer these questions, Al-Ahram Regional Press Institute in cooperation with the Religious News Service from the Arab World, RNSAW, invited two Western media experts to a session of a six-week workshop titled 'Comparing Western and Egyptian perspectives in covering current affairs'.
Ralph Berenger, Assistant Professor of Journalism and Mass Communication at the American University in Cairo and Arne Fjeldstad, an associate professor of communication at the University of Oxford’s Institute of Communication Excellence, focused their discussion on the framing theory as a possible explainer of the way the Arab-Israeli conflict in reported.
Framing, according to Berenger, is how people make up their minds about a given situation. It is trying to explain how people get pieces of information, accept them, and perceive them through the process of selective perception. In perceiving information, people are affected by two internal mechanisms: the core opinion frame and the peripheral opinion frame.
The core opinion refers to the individual’s strongly held values and attitudes that are difficult to change while the peripheral opinion refers to the individual’s world view and the things that interest him. When receiving new pieces of information, the peripheral opinion frame selects what should be perceived and what should not according to values and attitudes held in the core opinion frame, he said.
When reporting stories, media practitioners tend to frame the issues affected by their core and peripheral opinion frames. “Each reporter is first a citizen of his country of choice or of birth and his primary loyalties to it,” Berenger said. Reporters are affected by their loyalties and sometimes they add to the problems by slanting, choosing what to cover and ignoring some aspects that might, if reported, help smooth the situation, he added.
Some reporters even distort the facts to fit in pre-conceived actions. They pre-conceive the stories before doing it. They come with certain bias out of their core opinion frame, he said.
Berenger discussed an example of framed reporting. There were eleven pictures taken by the AFP of a Palestinian man while being stopped and shot by Israeli soldiers in a checkpoint. Excluding a picture of a dynamite belt the Palestinian man had around his body or in the car makes up a different story.
Let the Truth speaks out:
Though Berenger admitted the hardness of getting out the truth, he said professional media practitioners could overcome their biases in reporting through recognizing their own preconceived ideas about the stories before they cover. “A professional knows himself or herself and his or her biases. First step is to recognize them,” he said.
Journalists should also understand that their coverage contributes to “a spiral of silence” among their readers and viewers. Berenger stated that spiral of silence is a common phenomenon in our societies where “voices that differ from ours are stilled by overwhelming covering and the perception that their comments are unwelcome or could even draw a hostile response if they differ from the accepted line.”
The third solution he suggested was to encourage editors to select photographs and stories that tell the story without inflaming the public emotions. Most important of all, according to Berenger, is to search for common values.
“Try to identify your personal frames and how they fit with universal values. Then, try to analyze the opposition’s frames and how they fit with universal values,” he said. “These values define our ‘humaness’. Some universal values that cut across religious, ethnic, cultural and social boundaries are truth, love, loyalty, honesty, freedom, respect, pursuit of happiness and the desire to be safe.”
A view from Europe:
Though the accusation of being biased is not only directed for the US media, but extends to the European continent also, Arne Fjeldstad said there has been a noticeable shift in the European media coverage of the Arab-Israeli conflict.
The European media tend to be pro-Palestinians because of Europeans’ perception of the word ‘occupation’. “After years of suffering from the German occupation, the Europeans have understood the meaning of occupation,” he said.
Fjeldstad presented what he called ‘the Potter Box’, which attempts to explain how journalists should frame their reporting. “The Potter Box contains four steps. The first is the empirical definition, which is related to understanding the facts about the issue of concern, and the second is to identify the values, which involves outlining the values inherent in the decision. The third step is appeal to ethical principles and the four is choosing loyalty,” he said.
Though Fjeldstad’s view of media practitioners’ duty seemed far theoretical than Berenge’s, both highlighted the need for journalists who understand the problems they are reporting and who have the power and responsibility to go beyond their own loyalties for the sake of revealing the facts.
Instead of framing the stories in a way that serves the journalist’s own interests and loyalties, Fjeldstad said it is legitimate for the journalist to add his own description of the situation after presenting the facts, but he has to clearly tell his readers that these ideas are his.
Attention given to the coverage of Arab news, especially the Arab Israeli conflict, has been mounting since the September 11th attack on the US.
A month before Al-Ahram Regional Press Institute in cooperation with RNSAW, organised its six-week workshop, the World Association for Christian Communication, WACC’s, the North American Regional Association, NARA-WACC, and the U.S. National Council of Churches’ Communication Commission co-organized a conference titled “Megaphones and Muffled Voices: What Constitutes Full and Fair Media Coverage of Israeli-Palestinian Issues?”
More than more 80 journalists and academics of diverse affiliations participated in the conference and agreed on a code of practices.
According to Carol J. Fouke-Mpoyo, a media liaison at the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the U.SA, the code of practices they have reached include these points:
· “The best of journalists do not only report what they see, hear or are told by official sources. They dig beneath the surface. They strive to get the other side or sides of the story.
· Balance of coverage is not achieved only in providing equal space or time to each side. There is no balance when an articulate, moderate and charismatic person is asked to represent one side and an uncompromising, militant, fiery and inarticulate ideologist is offered as a representative of the other side.
· Headlines should reflect the content of the story. Photographs should give a fair and accurate image of an event and not exaggerate an incident simply because the photograph is exceptionally dramatic.
· As much as possible, journalists should understand the language, the history and the culture of the people they cover.
· Covering such a sensitive, nuance-ridden subject as the Arab-Israeli conflict, journalists should be careful in using such loaded words and clichés as “terrorists,” “gunmen,” “Islamic bombers” and “fatalistic Muslims”.
Yomna Kamel
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