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MENASSAT’s Bethlehem correspondent, Fadi Abu Saada, recalls the bloody events in Gaza and their impact on the lives of Palestinian journalists.

It was past two in the morning on Wednesday February 27 when the phone woke me from my sleep. When the phone rings at this hour, it is always bad news.

“Fadi, we have five martyrs in an Israeli raid on northern Gaza. Fadi, there are martyrs and casualties in a new attack on Jabalia. Fadi, a new raid on Bet Lahia and Khan Yunis.”

What have I done for my day to start this way?

I jumped from my bed, turned on my computer, and started working without thinking.

By dawn, the number of casualties exceeded twenty.

At 7 a.m. on that doomed day, I went to the office to continue working. The bombing was getting heavier by the second, and the number of wounded and dead was rising fast. 

We knew some of the names of the martyrs but none of the wounded, for the hospitals and the paramedics were barely keeping up with treating the casualties.

The atmosphere in the office was tense all day long. Stress was apparent on the faces of the reporters, the editors and even the technicians.

Thursday was similar to the previous day. 

Despite the continuing Israeli attacks on every inch of Gaza, Friday was a bit calmer.

We were able to breathe for a while, aware that it was only a lull in the storm. This is what I have learned from previous experiences.

Within the first hours of Saturday, the fourth day of what the Palestinians called “Gaza’s Holocaust,” while the Israelis preferred “Warm Winter,” the name given to the military operation, we heard about the death of ten more Palestinian citizens. 

We talked about “Black Saturday” or “Dead Saturday,” for it was black and deadly in every respect.

Imagine our feelings when the number of deadly casualties reached more than sixty by 6 p.m. with about 150 wounded.

Suddenly, I felt like I couldn’t possibly go on, so I called one of my colleagues to cover for me.

I had many reasons for this decision.

First, I was aware that I had lost my humanity in dealing with the dead, even though it was my people in Gaza dying.

Under tremendous stress, I found myself dealing with the dead as “just a matter of numbers.”

Terrified, I asked myself, “What has become of me?”

Second, I was utterly tired.

When a four-year old kid asked me what was happening in Gaza after seeing some of the footage on the news, I felt unable to answer him on this or any other matter.

How to explain what our days are like to someone who doesn’t know this place?

I could say that our days are all similar.

They start and end with one of the following words: killed, arrested, demolished, attacked, bombed;” the list of synonyms is endless.

At the end of each day, we are “psychologically sick” with an illness for which there is no treatment.

What if I tell you that we start every day knowing that it doesn’t differ from the previous one?

How are we be able to do that when our wounds are still bleeding, when there is no end in sight for our suffering?

What about our families? Do we give them the same disease we have? Will they be able to accept us everyday? 

The answer is Yes.

They are strong, as we are, or otherwise we would have not been able to carry on.

Only God knows how long will we be able to suffer in the future which doesn’t seem anywhere near.

The truth, which is also a disaster, is that we are still human.

As long as we can feel pain and emotional stress, we remain human. 

The truth is also that we are, first and foremost, Palestinians, even if we try to be neutral as journalists.

Even though we try to cover the events as they happen, we do it for our country and our people, in order to reflect the true situation to the whole world, and everybody knows that.

However, the main question that continues to worry me is this: Are there still people out there who feel with us, as we feel with others?

Do they feel the pain, the suffering and the despair that we witness and live every day?

Only you know the answer.
 
Fadi Abu Saada is MENASSAT’s Bethlehem correspondent, and the director of the Palestine News Network, www.pnn.ps

By FADI ABU SAADA

A Gaza court has banned the Palestinian newspaper al-Ayyam because of a three months old cartoon that was judged to be ‘defamatory’ to Hamas members of parliament. 

BETHLEHEM, Feb. 11, 2008 (MENASSAT) – On February 3, 2008, al-Solh court in Gaza ordered the halting of the publication, printing and distribution of al-Ayyam newspaper starting February 6. It also imposed suspended jail sentences and fines on three staff members of al-Ayyam.

The verdict was a result of a complaint by Hamas members of parliament who took offense at a cartoon published by al-Ayyam three months earlier. The cartoon, drawn by Palestinian cartoonist Bahaa al-Bakhari, shows Prime Minister Ismail Haniya addressing a group of bearded MPs who all have Haniya’s face and are holding up pictures also showing Haniya’s face. In the bottom right corner is the Arabic word “alla-sharaayiah” or “illegal.” It was published on the back page of the November 8 edition of al-Ayyam.

Upon publication, a group of Hamas MPs who considered the cartoon to be defamatory, filed a complaint against Akram Haniya, al-Ayyam’s editor in chief and an advisor to Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas, cartoonist Bahaa al-Bakhari, and Sami Qishawi, al-Ayyam’s Gaza office manager.

Last week, the Gaza-based court agreed with the Hamas MPs that the cartoon was defamatory.

‘Disrespectful’

In an interview with MENASSAT, Ismail Jaber, attorney general in the dismissed Hamas government, compared the cartoon with the Danish cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed which had the Muslim world in an uproar in 2006.

“The truth is that if a cartoon criticizes religion it is not covered by freedom of expression”, Jaber said. “In a previous incident, some cartoons depicted the Prophet, which is defamatory to our religion and our Prophet, while they claimed it is freedom of expression. They [al-Ayyam] are imitating them [the Danish cartoonist and newspaper], and they talk about freedom of the press. However, freedom of the press does not show disrespect to religion and religious aspects.”

In the case of al-Ayyam’s cartoon, Jaber said, “it disrespected religion by depicting [the Hamas MPs] as bearded men even though they are normal people, with a specific religion and without beards.”

An aggravating factor was the use of the word “illegal,” implying that Haniya’s government is illegal since it was dismissed by President Abbas last year.

“It is unacceptable to draw bearded men with the word ‘illegal,’” Jaber said. “What is legal then? I want to know.”

The court ruled that the cartoon was defamatory because it violated articles 2 and 3 of the 1936 penal code, as well as article 37 of the Publications Law issued by late President Yasser Arafat in 1995.

Al-Ayyam’s managing editor, Abdul Nasser an-Najjar, told MENASSAT from Ramallah that “the Hamas MPs should know that a cartoon is not a photograph. It doesn’t depict reality but offers a critical point of view.”

‘All this fuss’

The point of view, in this case, was that “if a session of the legislative council was held in Gaza, to which only Hamas MPs were invited, it would not be a legitimate session of the legislative council but only of Hamas.”

“We were surprised with the court decision about an incident that happened so long ago,” an-Najjar said. “We had hoped that Hamas would have withdrawn its complaint. Tis is a dangerous sign and a blow to the Palestinian media, especially since al-Ayyam has always tried and is still trying to cover events in an objective way.”

According to an-Najjar, “the cartoon is not defamatory at all. The cartoonist is an artist, and we cannot put boundaries on art unless it goes against the norms and values of the community or national unity, which is not the case here.”

Cartoonist Bahaa al-Bakhari himself is flabbergasted by the commotion. “The matter is so futile. I’m afraid to show my fellow artists around the world the cartoon that was the reason for my newspaper being banned. It does not warrant all this fuss.”

He also offered that, “Some people forget my identity. Not only am I a Muslim myself, but my ancestors are Sufi and all bearded. I would definitely not criticize my own family or my ancestors.”

He was not even criticizing the Hamas MPs as such, he said, “I was merely expressing my opposition to an idea and a concept. Who gives them the right to say who has the right to criticize and who doesn’t?”

The accused received suspended three-year jail sentences for the first violation, in addition to a $250 fine each for the second violation. Akram Haniya also received a one-month suspended jail sentence and a $1,500 dollars fine for the third violation.

FADI ABU SAADA
 
The death of the son of Hamas leader Mahmoud Zahhar in an Israeli raid has led to a surprising rapprochement between Fateh and Hamas – and it was all thanks to a small, privately owned radio station in Gaza.
Hamas leader Mahmoud Zahhar, left, bids farewell to his son Husam, the second son to be killed by the Israelis.

BETLEHEM, Jan. 24, 2008 (MENASSAT.COM) – Palestinians couldn’t believe what they were hearing when they tuned into Al-Shaab radio this week. After months of bitter in-fighting between Fateh and Hamas – in the streets, as well as in the media –, here was a radio program featuring both Fateh’s spokesman in Gaza, Fahmi Zaarir, and the Hamas spokesman, Ayman Taha. And they weren’t shouting at each other either.

Around the same time – on a much higher level –, Ahmad Hales, Fateh’s secretary-general in Gaza, met face to face with Ismail Ashqar, a Hamas representative to the legislative council, at Al-Shaab’s Gaza studios, where they shook hands and calmly discussed on air the latest political developments, including the conflict between their two parties.

All of this was brought about by the death, during last week Tuesday’s Israeli raid, of Husam Zahhar, the 20-year-old son of Hamas leader Mahmoud Zahhar. Husam, himself a Hamas militant, was the second of Zahhar’s three sons to be killed by the Israelis; in 2003, Khaled Zahhar died when an Israeli F-16 dropped a bomb on the family house in an attempt to assassinate the father. Husam was one of eighteen people – fifteen among them Hamas fighters – who died in last Tuesday’s fighting, the worst since the Hamas takeover of the Gaza strip.

The little radio station that could

The double tragedy that struck the Zahhar family touched a nerve with Palestinians across the party divide, and Al Shaab radio was quick to tap into this shared sense of loss.

“The media are the first soldiers in the battle between Fateh and Hamas,” Zou al-Fakkar Swairjo, the station’s manager, told MENASSAT.COM, “so we decided to use the death of Zahhar’s son for a greater good.”

Al-Shaab’s all-volunteer staff began to work the phones, calling up all the Fateh officials in their address books, and asking them to offer their condolences to the Zahhar family on the station’s air waves – which they did.

During the talk show that followed, Ismail Ashqar called on Fatah to return to dialogue as soon as possible and to take advantage of this atmosphere of unity. He stressed that there is no victor in the struggle between the two movements, and that the sole beneficiary is the occupation and its agents. He also renewed an invitation to president Abbas to visit the Gaza Strip.

Ahmad Hales agreed that what unites the two movements, and the Palestinian people in general, is more than what divides them. He added that the positive climate began after the Al-Shujaiyah massacre, when the two sides felt the need to heal the rift between them.

For a little while, it looked like the plan might backfire when Mahmoud Zahhar refused to accept the Fateh leaders’ condolences on the air. But that too turned into a blessing when Zahhar added that the condolences should rightfully be presented to him at his house, thereby extending an official Hamas invitation to the Fateh officials to come to his house – which they did.

It didn’t end there.

When the folks at Al-Aqsa, a sattelite station associated with Hamas, saw what Al-Shaab was doing, they didn’t want to be left holding the bag. So they too started putting officials of the rival party on the air.

Now, things were really happening. Al-Shaab is a small, privately owned radio station, affiliated with the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP). But Al-Aqsa is Hamas’ official mouthpiece and it was in the front lines of the media war between Fateh and Hamas. For the past months, Al-Aqsa has been involved in an ever deteriorating shouting match with Palestine TV, which it considers unrepresentative of the Palestinian people, and a mouthpiece for the Palestinian Authority, not to say Fateh.

“We also care about the unity of the Palestinian people,” Samir Mohsen, assistant manager of programming at Al-Aqsa, told MENASSAT.COM, admitting that, “Fateh’s initiative to present their condolences to the Zahhar family forced us to invite the Fateh leaders, among them Jibril Rajoub and Ahmad Hals, to speak on Al-Aqsa.”

Mohsen made no bones about it: what happened this week on the Gaza air waves was a huge step in bringing the Palestinian factions closer together. Still, he preferred to concentrate on the Israeli escalation rather than the Palestinian rapprochement.

“We at al-Aqsa have no problem with solving our internal problems, and reuniting the two parties is very important. The problem is that Israel is always trying to distract us from our problems, and this is the real danger that Gaza is facing and that could lead to its destruction.”

An end to the media war?

Over at Al-Shaab radio, manager Swairjo is determined to use the momentum created by Husam Zahhar’s death to its full potential.

“In the next few days, we plan to invite the head of the Palestinian Radio & TV Authority, Bassem Abou Soumayya, and someone high-up at Al-Aqsa, for an on-air discussion. We will try to get them to promise to put an end to this media war, which isn’t doing any good for either party.”

It is not the first time that the Palestinian media have tried to bring the two sides closer together. Just before the recent events in Gaza, the Palestine News Network (PNN) presented its “Initiative 2008: Freedom as a gate to dialogue.”

It invited Fateh and the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank to allow al-Aqsa to broadcast and work in the West Bank, as well as allowing the newspapers Al-Risala and Palestine, both affiliated to Hamas, to print and publish in the West Bank. On the other hand, Hamas was asked to release the journalists it has in its custody in Gaza, and to allow Palestine TV to broadcast again in Gaza, to protect the freedom of opinion and speech, and to stop the attacks against journalists.

PNN has succeeded in securing a formal answer from the former Palestinian Authority now representing Hamas in Gaza, and from Fateh in the West Bank.

[Editor's Note: Full disclosure: Fadi Abu Saada is the director of the Palestine News Network, www.pnn.ps.]

Fadi Abu Saada

BETHLEHEM, Jan. 8, 2008 (MENASSAT.COM) – For Ali Waked, a Palestinian journalist from Yafa working for the Israeli newspaper Yediot Ahronot, there can be no doubt about it: the Arab press is one of the main sources of news for the Israeli press. “We cannot deny the dynamism of some of the Palestinian and Arab news websites, which are sometimes the first to cover many events, even before the international news media,” he says.

Despite ongoing concerns about the professionalism and reliability of the Arab media – and the Palestinian media in particular –, Ali Waked assures us that  Israeli journalists rely on  Arab newspapers such as Ashraq al-Awsat and Al-Hayat , “because they are on the same level of expertise and professionalism as international newspapers, such as The Guardian, The New York Times and others.

Not everybody agrees.

Jacob Irza, of the Arabic-speaking service of Voice of Israel, doesn’t deny that some local, alternative Palestinian radio stations have been doing good work recently, outshining the official Palestinian media, which are severely handicapped by obsolete technology. But, says Irza, “I count on the Palestinian media for Palestinian news only. And even then, I continue where they stop. Whenever we see something of interest to us, we will investigate the story ourselves.”

Irza views the Palestinian media as very weak, even in comparison with the already weak Arab media. Primarily, it continues to suffer from a lack of freedom, especially in its dealings with political leaders and governments.

Arnon Rigoler, an analyst of Arab news in the Israeli media, laments the lack of accountability in the Arab media. He gives the example of The Guardian, and how that U.K. newspaper regularly publishes apologies for mistakes in past articles – something that is quite unimaginable in the Arab media.

“There are both positive and negative aspects to what is happening in Arab media is witnessing,” says Rigoler. “On the one hand, we have more media outlets than ever before, and that’s positive. On the other hand, only very few work with true professionalism or principles.”

In its defense, Rigoler admits that an important reason for the lack of professionalism in the Palestinian media is the weakness of the Palestinian Authority, and by extension, its laws and institutions.

Rony Shekid, of the Israeli newspaper Yediot Ahronot, is the most dismissive of Palestinian media. He feels there is no such thing as independent Palestinian media, and consequently he never relies on the Palestinian media as a news source. According to Shekid, any Palestinian news item needs to be checked not only for its veracity, “but also for the [political] reasons and the purpose behind it being published.”

Yoav Stern, an Arab news reporter for Haaretz, is less harsh in his judgment of Arab media.

“We consider many Arab newspapers, especially the ones published in London, and some of the satellite TV channels such as Al-Arabiya and Al-Jazeera to be reliable sources with no need to review or check,” he says.

Of course, he admits, “There definitely are different levels in the Arab media. Some news is worth being quoted and other news is not. Anything to do with Israel, for instance, we would never quote the Arab media; we would use an Israeli source instead.”

As far as the Palestinian media is concerned, Stern says, “We can’t deny that coverage of the local Palestinian news is good and professional.”

by Fadi Abu Sada

Not long ago, and not much more than a 100 meters from the house in which I grew up and where I still live, lay the greenest hill around Bethlehem. Jebel Abu Gheneim is no longer green. Instead the view–and so much more–has been spoiled by Bethlehem-area settlement number 19, better known as Har Homa.

Har Homa was originally designed to house 60,000 settlers, a figure that does not include the 750 new “housing units” Israel is now planning to add to it. The number 19 signifies the number of settlements encircling Bethlehem.

Surrounding this eyesore is an army road. This road is off limits to locals. We cannot cross it or near it. We cannot pick our olives at harvest time. The road is in constant use by Israeli army jeeps that waste little opportunity to disturb us with their horns and loudspeakers.

Living next to Har Homa for so long, I have been able to observe the transformation of this once green hill. It is odd to think that it took us 25 years to have lights installed on the main road from my house to nearby Beit Sahour, or Shepherds’ Field, while, since only 2002, Jebel Abu Gheneim has been transformed into a mountain of light and concrete.

But the energy with which the Israeli government provides for its settlers on our land is the least of the worries for those of us living nearby. More immediate concerns arise when we have to take our children to hospital and there is a closure, or fighting breaks out. When, as a father, you are prevented from looking after your own children, you soon realize the anger that powerlessness can bring and the shame of not even being able to explain to your children why their lives are so precarious.

Of course, Bethlehem has it better than other places. In Hebron, 400 settlers live in the middle of the city amid half a million Palestinians, destroying the commercial center in the old city and making inhabitants’ lives hell. This happens under the protection of an Israeli army that answers to a government that now claims it is serious in suing for peace with us.

The latest research by The Applied Research Institute of Jerusalem shows that nine new settlement outposts were established since the November 2007 Annapolis conference kick-started negotiations between the Palestinians and Israelis on reaching a final settlement. At the end of 2006, the total number of settlements on occupied territory numbered 144.

As such, these “final status” negotiations have not yet gone beyond the settlement issue, and matters get worse every time a new tender is announced and Israel clarifies exactly what it intends to happen to these settlements. Jerusalem, for example, is a “special case” because Israel considers that it has annexed the whole city and therefore settlements there are not covered by obligations under the roadmap. Meanwhile, Israel also considers only settlement outposts illegal. All other settlements were established with government approval and therefore must, at a minimum, be allowed construction for “natural growth”.

But all settlements in occupied territory are illegal according to international law (and this includes occupied East Jerusalem). And although the Palestinian side has agreed to discuss settlements in negotiations, the fact that Israel is unwilling to freeze all settlement construction (natural growth, inward growth or whatever other pseudonym for expansion Israeli officials use) is a signal to most Palestinians that this issue is preordained and Israel has no intention of negotiating the fate of settlements.

The settlement issue should be fairly straightforward to resolve, compared to other issues such as water, borders and refugees. Yet, the establishment of settlements ended the hope of Oslo and could well end hopes for this round of negotiations.

I still believe that peace can be reached one day. I believe there are hundreds of possible solutions not only for the settlements but for all the issues. But every time I look out my window at the neighbors that were imposed on me I find it more and more difficult to convince myself.- Published 31/12/2007 © bitterlemons.org

Fadi Abu Sada is director of the Palestine News Network, PNN.

By Fadi Abu Sada

(MENASSAT.COM) – Across most of the Arab world, the local media have often been likened to official state-run media, even when they are not. Analysts say they are almost uniformly non-independent and most often reflect only one point of view – that of a political party or another interest group. Others have pointed to what they say is an epidemic of unprofessionalism in the media.

Against this backdrop, a debate is emerging in the occupied Palestinian territories as to what role if any the alternative media are playing.

The vast majority of alternative media projects in the Palestinian territories are based on Western funding, whether from the European Union directly, or from European media outlets, or from projects financed by the U.S. State Department, or American media institutions.

A few days ago, the European Union signed on to a number of media projects in the Palestinian territories. Some of these address specific women’s and children’s issues, others focus on the training of journalists working at local radio stations, while still others hope to promote democracy and respect for human rights through television programming.

“The media environment in the Arab world in general, and in Palestine specifically, lacks free competition due to government control and because powerful families run their respective local media markets,” said Daoud Kuttab, director of the Contemporary Media Institution at Al-Quds University. “This leaves journalists with two possibilities: either to cooperate with these governments, or to look for unconditional support elsewhere.”

Kuttab, who is a partner in one of the recent E.U. media projects, said: “The European Union offers clear programs, and the methods used to select the projects and the media outlets are transparent, which greatly supports alternative media and leads not only to enhancing and developing them but also to making them a competitor for the official media.”

Internews, a U.S.-based NGO focusing on the development of independent media, was one of the organizations that was awarded support from the European Union. Its director, Khaled Abu Akar, said that using local private radio stations is extremely important in spreading the culture of democracy and human rights.

The Internews project is designed to strengthen the independent media sector by training local journalists to produce high-quality radio programs at their own stations. “These types of media literacy programs strongly enhance the concept of alternative media locally,” Abu Akar said.

Roy Dickinson, the Operations Director for the European Union in Occupied Jerusalem,  said: “Two months ago, we offered the BBC Trust Foundation $1 million in order to operate in Palestine on two levels. The first is based on reforming the Journalists’ Syndicate, while the second level is related to training the Palestinian media cadres about greater professionalism.”

Dickinson compared Palestinian media favorably to that of the Arab media in general, concluding that the level of professionalism of the local Palestinian media is in fact higher than its counterparts elsewhere in the Arab world.

Of course, there are still huge barriers to a successful alternative media market in Palestinian territories.

For one, it is cost-prohibitive to obtain licenses for radio and TV stations. High production costs and the deteriorating economic situation are also negative factors.

Raba Al-Arja is the director of a special radio project dealing with women’s and children’s issues. Al-Arja is producing the programming for the Palestine News Network – another institution that received funding from the European Union –, and he says what’s important is that these programs are made available for local radio stations to get the word out.

[Full disclosure: the author is the director of the Palestine News Network, Ed.]

“First, these radio stations obtain locally produced programs to raise their level of local radio production, which is a condition for operation, according to the Information Ministry. Second, these programs provide high-quality programming for local stations, and their messages benefit Palestinian society. Third, these radio stations receive financial benefits, which helps them to enhance their journalistic and technical level while Palestinians endure a dismal economic future,” Al-Arja said.

With his own program, Al-Arja said, “women and children get to express their opinions about issues that affect them directly. And at its best, this work should convey a sense of urgency straight to the decision-makers who may be able to do something about.”

Meanwhile, the larger issue of sustainability is one that all new media ventures will have to contend with as the international peace brokers attempt to forge a new Palestinian state amid the ruins of a failed peace process.

Fadi Abu Sada

BETLEHEM, (MENASSAT.COM) – Of all the cities in Palestine, Betlehem is by far the most beautiful. Especially at this time of year, when dozens of laborers are decorating the streets in preparation for Christmas. At night, when all the lights come on, it looks even more fabulous.

And yet, the city that beats with life during this time of the year is in reality a dead city.

The dead city remains largely hidden form the hundreds of journalists from all over the world who have begun to arrive in the city in order to cover the Christmas celebrations. It remains hidden to most of the Christian pilgrims who have come to celebrate Christmas in the birthplace of Jesus Christ.

As they arrive in Bethlehem from the North, which is the only possible approach due to the Israeli occupation, the pilgrims and the journalists might catch a glimpse of some of the ironic art on the security wall that Israel established in the city.

They might see the human leg protruding from the wall, or the portrait of an Israeli soldier checking the ID of a donkey, the Palestinian Child investigating an Israeli soldier, or the peace pigeon in the sights of a sniper already anticipating its death.

What they will not see is the historical path that Jesus Christ took from Jerusalem to Bethlehem, as this path has been closed off by the Israelis with a cement wall.

For sure, on Christmas, the Israelis will remove the wall for half an hour, just long enough for the Latin Patriarch Michel Sabah to arrive in Bethlehem, as if nothing had happened.

They also can’t see the Israeli soldiers at the checkpoints distributing flowers and sweets to the Christian pilgrims arriving in Bethlehem, telling them, “Welcome to Israel!”

Sure enough, visiting journalists will frequently focus on the secondary aspects of these ceremonies, such as the Christian emigration and its reasons. They might also highlight some of the Israeli measures in the sacred city, such as the issue of the separation wall, or the colonization fence around the city that consists of 19 settlements, and the deteriorating situation of tourism due to the occupation.

Palestine TV, the official channel affiliated to the Palestinian Authority, doesn’t remember Bethlehem unless it’s Christmas.

Here it is sending live broadcast cars to the city along with large crews of technicians to ensure 24 hours coverage of the event.

This is all because the Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas always visits Bethlehem at Christmas, and leads the mass. Covering his presence and participation is a big issue, and all the TV channels in the Arab World will carry it.

All this coverage doesn’t reflect real life in this sacred city.

Nabil Tawfiq Audi, an intermediate level teacher of Christian Religion, said that “the real Bethlehem is supposed to occupy a larger portion in the media during this event, and I don’t feel that this side is covered sufficiently in both the local and international media”.

The real Bethlehem might be the one of a group of youngsters who decided to form an unofficial framework under the name “Markab” [the boat]. Their aim is to collect money from the wealthy people who come to Bethlehem at Christmas in order to distribute it to the city’s poor.

“The media doesn’t know anything about this, and doesn’t mention the poor people of the city and the cruelty of their lives” , said Raja Awwad, a member of Markab.

According to Awwad, “the media intentionally overlook that we in Bethlehem are still living under the Israeli occupation, and that the occupation forces penetrate daily into the city in order to carry out assassinations and detention operations. They also ignore the fact that we are living in a small prison, whose doors are open only on holidays so that we can see new faces and feel - even for a short time - that we are still alive. After that, the doors will close once again, as if nothing had happened. Where does the media stand on that?”

Many happy returns!

Fabi Abu Sada is the Director of the Palestine News Network, www.pnn.ps

Fadi Abu Sada

These days, headlines for the Fatah-controlled press go something like this: “Hamas’ militia continues to perpetrate its crimes,” or “Hamas’ insurgent gangs do x, y, z.”  Whereas a newspaper opinion poll might be framed like: “What is the expected method for Hamas’ fall from power?”

On the other side of the embattled Palestinian territories in the Gaza Strip is the Hamas-controlled press with their own version of events. Their headlines may appear like, “Abbas’ Security Forces kidnap nine Hamas members”, with newspaper polls reflecting the recent attempt at a US-brokered peace map: “Following the Annapolis conference… Are you in favor of it?”

What then is the story in the West Bank and in the Gaza Strip with regards to reporting? Is there integrity and professionalism in the local news?

If you go through the Gaza-based Al-Risala newspaper - considered by observers to be Hamas’s official newspaper and known as the mouthpiece of the Islamic Salvation Party, or if you read the Al-Hayat al-Jadidah newspaper, the official newspaper of the Palestinian national authority, then you will find by-lines to stories that are well outside the scope of acceptable journalistic standards.

Al-Hayat al-Jadidah

Hafez Omar al-Barghouthi has been the chief editor of Al-Hayat al-Jadidah in Palestine since its establishment 12 years ago in 1995. When MENASSAT.COM asked Al-Barghouthi about the use of terms like “insurgent” in Al-Hayat’s bylines, such as in “Hamas’s insurgent militia,” he maintained it was indeed accurate considering what happened in Gaza last summer when Hamas won control of the Gaza Strip from security elements loyal to Fatah.

“It was an insurgency and the Hamas-affiliated militias are insurgents,” Al-Barghouthi said.

The paradox is that Al-Barghouthi himself is not partisan. He made it clear that he didn’t believe in the local media - calling it deceitful and unprofessional, accusing those who are managing the local media outlets of being amateurs at best.

Al Barghouti added that journalism in the West Bank and Gaza would have risen above the partisan rhetoric through its performance if only it had been professionally run. “Reporting will remain as a fabrication as long as the conflict between the two parties goes on. This type of journalism shameful for the Palestinian media.” 

Al-Barghouthi also described the Palestinian media as being in a stage of “decadence” - in large part because there is not a sense of independence. Journalists are often harassed if they write anything that may offend a political party, authority figure or even from Israeli figures displeased at a critique of the ever-present Occupation, he said.

“If you belong to a certain party and you suddenly decide to be a journalist, you become one. And if you decide to be the army commander on the war front you can become one as well. The only reason why you are granted that is because you are affiliated to the party.”

Al-Risala

In contrast to Hafez Omar al-Barghouthi, Wissam Ibrahim Muhammad is unabashed about the partisan nature of his paper.

Born in Libya in 1974, Ibrahim Muhammad is the chief editor of Al-Risala. He has not left the Gaza Strip in twenty years due to the occupation and the Israeli control over the Gaza borders. His newspaper, he said, focuses on the violations perpetrated by the authorities - in this case, incidents that involve Fatah actions against members of the Hamas movement.

“Such violations are carried in our newspaper’s main headlines depending on the identity of the person who was aggressed. If it is a lady, a female student or a Legislative Council member, for example, we lead with it,” Muhammed explained.

Historically, the newspaper has always been under the watchful eye of the Palestinian Authority and over the last ten years, until the Hamas takeover of Gaza, journalists were subject to questioning and arrests for anti-Fatah articles.

Still, Muhammed maintains that he has demonstrated professionalism as an editor since taking over the post in 2002. He says he recognized the predicament faced by ordinary citizens who were trying to follow the news more objectively, without the influence of political groups.

Muhammed said a lack of proper reporting has turned ordinary Palestinians into investigative journalists as they search for accurate information. 

“To be honest, the events and circumstances we have gone through and are still going through are exceptional and have had repercussions on all aspects of Palestinian life. People living in Gaza and the West Bank have been forced to align themselves behind political parties because they (the political parties) depended on us to be weapons that were (and are) available to them. These people supported the various factions during the events that erupted between Hamas and Fatah last summer,” Wissam said.

But newspaper circulation is down.

Al-Risala newspaper which used to sell 17,000 copies, 10,000 in the West Bank and the rest in Gaza, is now selling half as much and only in the Gaza Strip because there aren’t enough printing houses or paper available, and because it was prevented from printing and distributing its copies in the West Bank.

In contrast, Al-Hayat al-Jadidah, which is printed in Ramallah, is still reaching the Gaza Strip as usual.

Who to rely on for sourcing?

Najib Farraj, Agence France Press’ correspondent told MENASSAT.COM that professional journalists cannot rely on either Hamas’ or Fatah’s reports because of their clear party bias. He accused the party-run papers of being filled with lies and heresay.

Farraj said that because local media have failed to serve the public interest, average Palestinians were turning their backs on local media - television, radio and newspapers.

One Ramallah resident told MENASSAT.COM that she was “extremely afraid” to answer any questions of media bias. Although she declined to give her name, she said she was an educated housewife who followed the news regularly.

“The problem in the Palestinian case is that the information options are limited”, she said. “In other words: I have no choice but to read Fatah’s and/or Hamas’ newspapers and watch their satellite channel even though I can’t hide my distaste about what was being shown or written.” 

Accordingly, she said it is only by reading and watching both “biased media sources” at the same time that she is able to get some kind of an accurate picture of what was happening around her. Distancing herself entirely from the partisan media, she said, was impossible because there are no viable alternative sources of news.
 
“I don’t follow trivialities,” said Nizar al-Arja, the owner of a detergent factory from Bethlehem when describing the media situation between Fatah and Hamas.

“Each side is only promoting his party or side and the local news which is the nerve of the Palestinian citizens’ life is completely absent. I am among those who are very annoyed by the acuteness of the terms used by both sides in describing certain events or figures. What happened in Palestine is a domestic issue and I am bothered by how “our dirty laundry” is being exposed to the entire world,” al-Arja told MENASSAT.COM.

In the end, public opinion seems to suggest that little information can be hidden from the Palestinian citizen searching for the truth between the lines of party rhetoric. The issue is simply that the news has become like the citizens’ “daily bread” in this part of the world. They will therefore seek it their own way and will undoubtedly find it.

Fadi Abu Sada is the director of the Palestine News Network. and Menassat.com

By Fadi Abu Sada

BETLEHEM, Dec. 17, 2007 (MENASSAT.COM) – There have been very few attempts at tracking who is doing what media-wise in the Palestinian Territories. Certainly, there is sparse research to indicate how these media outlets are received by the Palestinian public. Until now.

In November, the Palestine Partners Center for Media Development (Shuraka’/PPCMD), in cooperation with the Palestine News Network (PNN), conducted a survey to gauge how Palestinians view their own media outlets.

The PPCMD described the poll as the largest of its kind. Carried out over a period of twenty days (November 1 - November 20), 1,531 Palestinians residing in the occupied areas of Jerusalem, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip were surveyed. All of those polled were aged 18 and above, with the margin of error being around 4 percent.

Three out of four Palestinian citizens surveyed said they trusted the media outlets and followed the news on a daily basis, something the PPCMD says is a relatively high percentage when compared with other similar media surveys conducted in the Arab world. Many also said they trusted the Arab media more than they trusted the Western media.

However, the majority of those surveyed also believed that their local media had failed to address the social and economic problems facing Palestinians today. In fact, the PPCMD poll indicated that Palestinians viewed this lack of news coverage as a failure of media responsibilities – the principal one being that Palestinian media failed to let the public know about other domestic developments - cultural, athletic, economic - and not just the political ones.

According to the poll, the local media coverage relied too much on the opinions of talking heads having clear partisan agendas versus relying on the voices of Palestinians from the streets – those affected by the policies of the Israeli government, the Palestinian factions and the Western powers who have maintained a crippling economic boycott of the Territories since Hamas was democratically elected in 2006.

Some 59 percent of those surveyed believed that the Palestinian government should avoid influencing the news in any way, while more than half of the women surveyed believed that media censorship mainly depended on the topic that was being addressed.

Over half of those polled also said that the local and international media were sympathetic to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas after he formed a “caretaker” government in July of 2007 following Hamas’ takeover of the Gaza Strip from security forces loyal to President Abbas’ Fatah factions.

The survey also formally identified some 70 television and radio stations operating in the Territories including the “state run” Palestinian Television and its accompanying radio station and the Hamas affiliated Al-Aqsa satellite channel.

Some 47 percent of those surveyed relied mostly on television and satellite channels as their main sources of information, with roughly 40 percent of those surveyed saying they preferred the Al-Arabiya satellite network compared with 35 percent that opted for Al-Jazeera.

Proving that radio is still a viable medium for information exchange, 15 percent of those surveyed relied on radio stations as their primary source of news, while the Internet was clearly an up-and-coming source for information with 16 percent of those polled saying they relied on the Internet for their news with the Maan and Ramattan online news agencies receiving the most support for online news.

Some 22 percent of those polled relied on daily newspapers as their primary source of news, with 45 percent of the viewing audience citing the Al-Quds al-Makdessiya newspaper as the most trusted news source. 34 percent preferred the Ramallah-based Al-Ayyam newspaper – with much of this readership coming from Palestinian youth aged 35 and younger and from women.

In the Gaza Strip, 43 percent of those surveyed trusted the Gaza-based Palestine newspaper with 33 percent showing their loyalty to Al-Ayyam.

Menassat.com Palestine Correspondent