Post Globalization: Identity, language and Arab Rights

By Bouthaina Shaaban

18 April 2008

My guest, a senior Western media person said, this age of information has changed so much; we used to feel we are here, on our own, watching events and conveying them the way we see fit without any interference from any one. Today we feel we are in the middle of events because of the attempts made to convince us to change or adjust the news item one way or another. The parties who try to interfere, before, or complain afterwards, about an idiom or a picture have exhausted us and made the flow of information part of the political battle. I answered: But the Arabs do not try to interfere with you as they still believe in the free Western media, although Western coverage of events in the Arab world prove that there is no such thing as free or objective media. I gave him one example of the massacre that Israel perpetrated in Gaza during the first week of March 2008, killing 140 Palestinians including 39 children and 12 mothers, and yet I saw the name or the picture of none of these victims in Western press, whereas when the 8 Israeli students were killed, Western newspapers competed to publish the full stories of the victims and the tragedy that has befallen their families and friends caused by this huge loss. My guest commented that part of the reason may be logistic, as we do not have an office in Gaza because we are afraid that our people may be kidnapped or killed, and the Israeli checkpoints do not make it easy to any one to reach the place of event at the right time. I responded by saying that I have written previously that the Israeli fences and barriers inside the occupied territories are not only directed against Palestinians, but also against the international media to prevent any one from covering their crimes against the Palestinians. That is why they killed the British, Tom Hurndall, James Miller and the American activist Rachel Courie in order to terrorize every one from reaching the Palestinians. But, I added, if it is difficult for the camera to reach there what about the print media, why can't they publish next day the names, ages and pictures of the victims? He smiled and responded: to be honest with you, our offices are bombarded with a flow of information and we receive none from the Arabs. Convenience, laziness and sometimes, lack of time, make journalists choose from what is available rather than look for unknown, alternative sources. He is right and this is certainly true, but what is true also is that during the last seven years, no one in the Western world has condemned the killing of an Arab child in Iraq or Palestine or Lebanon, which invites me to understand that for the Western world, an Arab life is not equal to a human life. Once I said that, silence fell, my guest looked the other way and we both found the way to change the topic as the reasons for this are understood, though not voiced, by either of us.  

          Here I go back to the topic I started last week that, as Arabs, we feel the pain and humiliation of our children being slaughtered in cold blood, but we do not devote the time and energy to make sure that the pain of their loss touches on the conscience of humanity. In the absence of the Arab version of the story, the Israeli version passes as the only one. There is countless number of examples to prove this point. I shall cite only a few, for decades, the Israeli military machine kidnaps Palestinian men, women and children from their homes, schools, farms, and offices, and deposits them in the darkness of its terrible jails. But the news about this reads, usually, as follows: "Israeli military detains a woman suspected of planning to plant a bomb near an Israeli point". "Detains" is used for holding some one for minutes or hours for questions, but the real act is "kidnapping". Israel used the same term "detains" to describe the "kidnapping" of the speaker and 25 members of the elected Palestinian Parliament members, and they are still in prison for years. Even Arab press refers to them as "prisoners" while they are "kidnapped" from their homes, or offices. As for "suspected of planting a bomb" which has been used for years is never questioned or verified. Israel describes the crime of slaughtering 140 Palestinians as "operation", and the world media follows suit.

There is no doubt that our adversaries are devoting time, money and energy to win the media war against the Arabs, and the media war is, at least, as important, today, as the military battles fought by armies and resistance fighters. A word could be more effective than a bullet, and a picture, such as that of Muhammad al-Durra, may change people's minds about the nature of the Arab-Israeli struggle. Isn't it about time that the Arabs devote enough attention to this linguistic and information war and not only in their language but in other languages, so that the entire world could hear and see the truth of the crimes perpetrated against the Arabs, their land and rights in Palestine, Iraq, and Lebanon as well as in Sudan and Somalia.