We extend our deepest sympathies to Rupert’s wife and children, to his colleagues at the Sunday Mirror, and we wish Phil a speedy and full recovery.

Rupert’s death reveals the risks faced by journalists trying to cover this war. Eight years into the US/UK-led occupation of Afghanistan, the country is becoming ever more dangerous for the media. It is thanks to journalists like Rupert that the British public has a picture of the disaster unfolding in that country.

We are sad, but we are also angry.

The Nato occupation of Afghanistan is propping up a deeply corrupt, bloody and unpopular regime in Kabul. British support for US imperial ambitions in Asia requires that a price be paid by soldiers, by journalists and by the civilian
populations of Afghanistan and Pakistan.

That price is too high.

We will continue to do everything possible to campaign to bring the troops home.

Media Workers Against the War
info@mwaw.net
tel 07801 789 297 ]]> http://mwaw.net/blog/2010/01/11/death-of-rupert-hamer-in-afghanistan/feed/ 0 http://mwaw.net/blog/2009/07/09/groundhog/ http://mwaw.net/blog/2009/07/09/groundhog/#comments Thu, 09 Jul 2009 21:37:46 +0000 MWAW http://www.mwaw.net/2009/07/09/groundhog/ What a difference two weeks makes. The media have swung from triumphalism to despair as British troops have died almost daily during Operation “Panther’s Claw” in Helmand.

“Triumph for Brits in raid on Helmand” was the Mirror headline on June 23. “Commanders hailed the assault as ‘very successful’, with no British soldiers killed and none seriously wounded,” reported the Telegraph on the same day.  “Taliban crushed” proclaimed the Star, while the BBC had “UK forces ‘encounter few Taliban’” – “British forces on a major operation in Afghanistan say they have encountered little resistance from the Taliban.”

And then on July 1 came the first of seven British deaths in as many days.

But we have been here before. Unfounded media optimism has been a feature of every new “push” in Afghanistan – victory is always just around the corner. Operation “Panther’s Claw” was given the headline “British troops in final push to clear out insurgents” by the Independent on Sunday. Yet the “one last push” nonsense is always followed by a fresh bout of grim news.

“After the fighting, a battle for hope” was the headline in the Guardian above a full-page report from Afghanistan in September 2006, which claimed that “Nato’s anti-Taliban offensive in southern Afghanistan is now entering its mopping-up phase.” Over and over again the media proclaim that a turning point has been reached, that the fighting is over and now the troops will “win hearts and minds”. Over and over the fighting escalates once more, with more civilian deaths and more British troops killed.

“Job done: Taliban are on the run” proclaimed a headline in the Sunday Times in early 2007. After Musa Qala was retaken at the end of that year, a leader column in the Independent talked about “a turning point in the conflict”, a “watershed”, with a new focus on reconstruction and diplomacy meaning that, “for British troops, what could be described as the ‘combat phase’ here was drawing to a close, with a new reconstruction phase beginning”.

And when US president Obama announced a “surge” of 20,000 troops to the country this year, the media was inevitably full of speculation that this would “end the afghan stalemate”, as a Daily Mirror headline put it. But the US troops had hardly hit the ground when the Telegraph warned: “Fears of Afghan summer of death” as British casualties were mounting, and the forces in Helmand faced “something of a groundhog day”.

The real groundhog day, however, is in the media’s reporting – newspapers and broadcasters repeatedly clutch in ignorance at the latest optimistic pronouncement from the military, which is shortly disproved by events.

At times the uncritical parroting of army propaganda borders on the absurd. The Telegraph, Scotsman and BBC, among others, all reported that British troops has seized large quantities of poppy seeds for opium production at the start of “Panther’s Claw”. These turned out to be mung beans.

The media fails to look behind the robotic optimism of the army spin-doctors, and so misses the real story of Helmand. And because of these lies people are dying.

Every Friday night at 8pm Channel 5 is showing Air Force Afghanistan, claiming to be a documentary series about life for British forces at Kandahar air base. With Pizza Hut and Burger King, three canteens, an ice hockey rink, football pitches, three state-of-the-art gyms, two massage parlours, and even a disco run by the Dutch army, the Kandahar base comes across as wet dream for teenage boys. The series is designed to sell the idea of war as a macho all-action adventure playground for a Top Gear audience. The commercial breaks carry ads for the army, and when the same series was shown (with a different title) a few months ago clicks on the RAF’s careers website quadrupled.

The killing in Helmand shows that it’s time for these lies to stop.

The media is using the deaths to try to whip up demands for yet more troops and yet more armour to be sent to Afghanistan. No more groundhog days – get the troops out now.

With speakers:

Stephen Grey, investigative journalist embedded with British troops in Helmand and author: “Operation Snakebite: The Explosive True Story of an Afghan Desert Siege“, and “Ghost Plane: The True Story of the CIA Torture Program”

Guy Smallman, photojournalist, recently returned from Afghanistan

Seumas Milne, columnist, the Guardian

And others

Monday July 13, 7pm

Friends Meeting House (small hall)

173 Euston Road, NW1 2BJ, opposite Euston station

Map: http://tinyurl.com/p33vhf

All welcome!

Hosted by Media Workers Against the War / Stop the War Coalition

www.mwaw.net / www.stopwar.org.uk

Speakers appear in a personal capacity

For more information and flyers: tel 0207 801 2768

The BBC Trust’s preposterous attack on Jeremy Bowen last week is a crude attempt to push back the wave of protest inside the BBC over the DEC appeal decision. If Bowen is slapped down, they calculate that no other BBC journalist will dare to speak out.

The Trust’s report itself has been massively spun by the right-wing press – in no way is it a demolition of Bowen’s journalism, let alone proof that he is in any way biased against Israel.

We call on all our supporters to urgently:

• Scan the report summary (pages 4-15)
• Read Robert Fisk’s superb comment on the report
• Note the research showing BBC bias IN FAVOUR of Israel

• Email Jeremy Bowen with your support: jeremy.bowen@bbc.co.uk

• Copy your emails to the BBC Trust: trust.enquiries@bbc.co.uk

The petition comes as the latest form of protest from BBC staff to Thompson’s decision. A number of BBC National Union of Journalists (NUJ) branches have already called upon Thompson to reverse his decision.

The DG has had at least a couple of meetings with staff members concerned about the DEC issue over the past weeks. In both meetings Thompson faced strong criticism from staff who felt that his decision, far from preserving the impartiality of BBC, has in fact caused considerable damage to the organization’s reputation.

The petition reads:

To Mark Thompson,

As BBC employees we are writing to express our deep disappointment with your decision to reject broadcasting the Disasters and Emergency Committee Gaza Appeal.

We strongly disagree with your assessment about the effect that such a broadcast would have on the impartiality of BBC. By denying the victims of the humanitarian crisis in Gaza a chance of assistance, the BBC is actually taking sides. DEC aid appeals for victims of armed conflicts have been broadcast by BBC in the past, such as the appeals for Congo and Darfur, and we see no reason why the victims of this conflict should be treated differently. Far from preserving the impartiality of BBC, we feel this decision has in fact caused considerable damage to our organization’s reputation.

Today the BBC stands alone among British broadcasters – with the exception of Sky News – in its refusal to air the appeal. Numerous public figures have spoken out against this decision and thousands of complaints have been made to the BBC. All this shows that BBC is out of line with British public opinion on this matter.

We strongly urge you to reverse your decision, in order to preserve the reputation of BBC as an impartial and fair organization, not only among license fee payers but also among our audience worldwide. Over several decades the BBC has managed to build a large audience base in different parts of the world and we feel that your decision has seriously damaged this global standing.

The victims of Gaza deserve the aid appeal like any other victims of humanitarian crises. The conflict they are caught in is as controversial as any other armed conflict in the world and singling them out is what harms the BBC’s reputation of impartiality.

As a journalist I love being first with the news so when I was handed a red hot exclusive story a few hours ago I could barely contain myself. I already had a captive audience having just finished a live broadcast for Press TV in front of scores of members of the Viva Palestina convoy which is currently making its way through Morocco.

“Listen up everyone,” I shouted as they walked towards their hotel from the car park where Press TV’s outside broadcast vehicle was parked.

They turned and gathered around and then the words came tumbling out: “Ten minutes ago police released the Burnley Three without charge and they are heading our way to hook up with the convoy.”

Most times I never get to see peoples’ reactions to my exclusive news breaks, but this time I did and the “wow” factor was amazing. Viva Palestina convoy members jumped up and down for joy and shouted “Allahu Akbar”. 

I was referring to the three men who had been arrested as part of an anti terrorist operation which just happened to be performed on the eve of departure for the history-making convoy led by George Galloway.

Of course the so-called anti terror raid made huge headlines in the British media which had, until that moment, shown little or no interest in Viva Palestina. I wonder if the convoy gets the same amount of newsprint and airtime devoted to this good news story to re dress the balance. I doubt it.

I didn’t get a chance to see George Galloway’s reaction, but as the leader of the 110 vehicle British aid convoy bound for Gaza, he has now spoken of his anger at the high profile Lancashire Constabulary police action which led to the arrest of nine innocent men who set off to join the Viva Palestina convoy last Friday.

Six of the nine were released without charge some days ago and are now heading for Tunisia in three vehicles laden with humanitarian supplies for the people of Gaza. But three more were detained in custody for almost a week before being released without charge this afternoon.

The negative publicity which the arrests attracted had a knock on effect and Viva Palestina organisers said that there was a drop of 80% in donations. Sadly the media continues to give Viva Palestina a wide berth, with a few notable exceptions including Press TV.

This is a real shame because they’ve really missed out on some excellent stories including:

• Heroic convoy members saving the lives of Moroccan police men after a near-fatal road crash near Fes;
• Heroic London mother-of-six battling cancer continues her mercy mission for the sake of the children of Gaza;
• History in the making as Morocco and Algeria open their land borders for the first time in nearly two decades to let the mercy convoy pass.

/p> Of course most of those making the headlines are muslims and as we know, the Islamaphobic media in Britain prefers to write about Muslims in a negative way. 

But this flawed news judgment reflects badly on them and not the Viva Palestina crew who come from all parts of Britain – they might not have been born in the UK but they are doing their adopted country proud.

Yvonne Ridley is on board the Viva Palestina convoy with film-maker Hassan al Banna Ghani to make a documentary for television

PUBLIC MEETING – ALL WELCOME!

With speakers:

Ghada Karmi, Guardian columnist
  Richard Horton, The Lancet
Jeremy Dear, general secretary, NUJ
Lauren Booth, presenter, Press TV
Jane Shallice, Stop the War Coalition
BBC journalist
Student from King’s College occupation

Monday February 2

7pm

Old Cinema lecture theatre
Westminster University
309 Regent Street
London W1B 2UW
Nearest tube: Oxford Circus
Map: http://tinyurl.com/dj6ywh

ALL WELCOME!

Hosted by Media Workers Against the War www.mwaw.net

More info: info@mwaw.net, tel 07801 789 297

Download the leaflet here: http://mwaw.net/gaza.pdf

Led by a panel of establishment figures chaired by Sir Quentin Thomas, it took evidence from all sides, including Greg Philo’s detailed research “Bad News from Israel” and a quantitative study by the Communications Research Centre at Loughborough University.

It also saw the top secret Balen Report – an unpublished internal report prepared for BBC management by its senior editorial adviser on the Middle East, Malcolm Balen, in 2003 – about which there has recently been speculation that it showed anti-Israel bias at the BBC.

Entitled “Report of the independent panel for the BBC governors on impartiality of BBC coverage of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict“, the review was widely seen as confirmation that the BBC is biased towards Israel. The headline in the Times, for example, on the day after the report was published, read: “BBC news ‘favours Israel’ at expense of Palestinian view“.

The report itself concluded: “One important feature of [the BBC's problems telling a complicated story] is the failure to convey adequately the disparity in the Israeli and Palestinian experience, reflecting the fact that one side is in control and the other lives under occupation. Although this asymmetry does not necessarily bear on the relative merits of the two sides, it is so marked and important that coverage should succeed in this if in nothing else.”

It continued: “We recommend the BBC should make purposive, and not merely reactive, efforts to explain the complexities of the conflict in the round, including the marked disparity between the positions of the two sides, and to overcome the high level of incomprehension among the audience.”

Page 22 of the report states:

“Among the findings from the quantitative content analysis which the researchers judge to be most important for the Panel are these: …

that a disparity (in favour of Israelis) [brackets in original, ed.] existed in BBC coverage taken as a whole in the amount of talk time given to non-party political Israelis and Palestinians;

that a disparity (in favour of Israelis) existed in BBC coverage taken as a whole in the amount of talk time given to Israelis and Palestinians;

that there was a broad parity in BBC coverage taken as a whole in terms of the appearance of Israeli and Palestinian party political actors;

that a disparity (in favour of Israelis) existed in BBC coverage taken as a whole in terms of the appearance of non-party political Israeli and Palestinian actors;

that a disparity (in favour of Israelis) existed in BBC coverage taken as a whole in terms of the appearance of Israeli and Palestinian actors”.

At least three BBC NUJ workplace branches have passed motions calling on the BBC to transmit the Gaza aid appeal. A petition is circulating within the corporation which concludes: “The victims of Gaza deserve the aid appeal like any other victims of humanitarian crises. The conflict they are caught in is as controversial as any other armed conflict in the world and singling them out is what harms the BBC’s reputation of impartiality.”

The latest issue of Ariel, the BBC’s internal staff magazine, carries 10 letters on the BBC’s refusal to air the Gaza appeal – all are critical of the decision.

Here is a selection posted on the Media Lens message board:

1. The director general’s comments defending the BBC’s decision not to broadcast the DEC appeal appeared timid and unconvincing.

The main reason given is that he doesn’t want to compromise our reporting impartiality, because the issue of aid to Gaza is controversial. The flaw in this argument is that we are allowing the combatants (or their allies) – in this case Israel – to define whether or not an appeal for aid is legitimate. It is a curious logic to argue that we are defending the principle of impartiality by caving in to Israeli pressure.

There is a smell of fear about this decision – fear of controversy, fear of criticism, fear of repercussions. Perhaps this is the true fallout from the Hutton report, Queengate and Jonathan Ross; an organisation so mired in fear that it finds itself able to sacrifice aid to the victims of war for a principle that nobody (outside the BBC higher echelons) seems to believe was at stake.

Staff member, London factual

2. For the first time in my career I am ashamed to work for the BBC. The Disasters Emergency Committee – made up of the 12 biggest aid charities including the British Red Cross and Save the Children – has asked for help in raising money for the people in Gaza. Even the government has pledged money. The head of the UN says the situation in Gaza is ‘outrageous’. People are dying because of a lack of food, medicine and basic sanitation. The BBC has decided not to broadcast the appeal because it believes impartiality would be at risk. I believe the message the BBC is sending out is clear. And it is not impartial.

Staff member, BBC London

3. Whatever the politics of the situation it is obvious that Gaza is in the middle of a massive humanitarian crisis, people are suffering and need help. The BBC’s own coverage of flattened homes and parents mourning lost children amid the rubble clearly demonstrates that. The decision not to broadcast the appeal opens the BBC up to justified accusations of bias towards Israel and implies that the people of Gaza only have themselves to blame for what happened.

Staff member, News interactive, Plymouth

4. The BBC points to question marks over how the funding would be delivered, but that hasn’t stopped us running other DEC appeals where the distribution of funds is far from straightforward – Goma for example. And anyway, surely the mechanics of the appeal aren’t our problem. We’ve run appeals for victims of conflict before, so why not these people? We don’t need to mention the cause of the conflict or assign blame when we run the appeal, or schedule it near a news or current affairs programme. We just need to get vital funds for people who have no food, water, shelter or medical supplies.

Staff member, TV news

5. The refusal to carry the Gaza appeal insults the intelligence of licence fee payers, implying that they are unable to tell the difference between a charity appeal and a political broadcast. It also undermines the BBC’s claims to impartiality. In almost every war there is contentious debate about who is responsible for the consequent humanitarian crisis. Why is it only in the case of Gaza and, previously, Lebanon that this debate has been used to justify refusing to broadcast an appeal?

Staff member, multiplatform productions

1. BBC director general Mark Thomson says: “The danger for the BBC is that this could be interpreted as taking a political stance on an ongoing story. When we have turned down DEC appeals in the past on impartiality grounds it has been because of this risk of giving the public the impression that the BBC was taking sides in an ongoing conflict.”

When a dog savages a child, it is not “impartial” to stand back and watch the child bleed. On the contrary – it is to side with the dog. Thompson’s shibboleth of impartiality in reality means siding with Israel against the suffering people of Gaza.

Veteran Middle East correspondent Robert Fisk puts it like this:

“I think it is the job of journalists to be impartial on the side of those who suffer most. I was present on the same street when a Palestinian suicide bomber walked into a Sbarro pizzeria in Jerusalem August 2000. When I got to the scene there was a woman with a chair-leg through her, a child with no eyes, Israelis of course in West Jerusalem. I wrote about the victims and the survivors. I did not give equal time, I did not give balance to the article by giving 50% of my report to the spokesman for Islamic Jihad.

“When I was in the Sabra and Shatila camps in Beirut September 1982 where Israel’s militia allies from Lebanon, the Falange, had gone into the camp and murdered and massacred and eviscerated and raped women for two days while the Israelis watched, as we learned from the Israeli report the Kahan commission report the following year, I did not give equal time to the IDF spokesman, I concentrated on the victims and the survivors. That is what our job is to do.

“When we are reporting a football match in the UK we can give equal time to both sides or a public enquiry into new motorway. But the Middle East is not a football match, it is a massive tragedy of blood, sorry and revenge. And we need to reflect that.”

As a former BBC World Service current affairs producer wrote to his colleagues this weekend: “The question of partiality is a red herring. It is for the general public to respond to a humanitarian disaster as they choose.”

2. Mark Thompson again: “The BBC should not broadcast the DEC appeal “because Gaza remains an ongoing and highly controversial news story within which the human suffering and distress which have resulted from the conflict remain intrinsic and contentious elements.”

Other DEC appeals broadcast by the BBC are no less political than Gaza. Any disaster is “controversial” in as much as its root causes are contested. The BBC broadcast the DEC appeal for victims of fighting in the Congo last November, for example. A more “controversial” conflict it is hard to imagine. But the BBC does not deem that war central to its coverage, and so it was permissible to broadcast an appeal for its victims.

The BBC also broadcast the DEC’s Burma cyclone appeal last May. Again, the death toll from that cyclone is a highly political issue, and Western powers are keen to oust the military regime in Burma. But because it could be portrayed as a “natural disaster” the BBC deemed it permissible to broadcast the DEC appeal.

So BBC top management thinks its is legitimate to broadcast disaster appeals if it can get away with ignoring the political roots of disasters or pretending that they are not political at all. In the Gaza case this is impossible, but it does not follow that previous appeals were less political. It is simply that the Congolese and Burmese lobbies are far less influential than the Israeli lobby.

The Gaza decision by the BBC board is not therefore a matter of principle, as Mark Thompson tries to argue, but a matter of political expediency.

Thomson’s number 3, chief operating officer Caroline Thompson, admitted as much when she told al-Jazeera: “We never say never and clearly, if the DEC came to us with another request when things have calmed down and we didn’t have the same worries about the controversial nature of this, we would look at it again in that light.”

“Things calming down” means the restoration of the status quo, when it becomes legitimate in the BBC Board’s eyes to support emergency appeals because they do not raise any fundamental questions about the causes of the suffering.

This goes to the heart of the coverage of the Gaza crisis over the past month. In the eyes of the pro-Israeli camp, the carnage in Gaza is justified by the context. The corollary of this position is that it is not in fact necessary to show the carnage, because the context – Hamas rockets etc – justifies it. For this reason, we have seen far too little of the bloody reality of Gaza on our screens.

However, the sheer scale of the destruction – the DIME weapons, phosphor bombs, targeting of schools and refuges – threatens the Israeli argument. That is why Israel prevented Western journalists from entering Gaza.

The British public needs to see these images of Gaza in order to make an informed decision on the Israeli case. Broadcasting the DEC appeal would in fact restore some balance to the mainstream media coverage since December 27.

4. Chief operating officer Caroline Thompson claims that the BBC refused to carry aid appeals before, for Lebanon and Afghanistan. But in neither case were those appeals made by the DEC, as the Independent on Sunday points out. The fact that a committee of 13 aid agencies is able to agree an appeal ought to be testimony to the degree of consensus that the humanitarian crisis is above politics

5. Mark Thompson says on his blog: “One reason [for turning down the Gaza appeal] was a concern about whether aid raised by the appeal could actually be delivered on the ground.”

Here Thomson is taking issue with the DEC itself, which consists of the foremost charities in the land, namely: ActionAid, British Red Cross, CAFOD, Care International, Christian Aid, Concern, Help the Aged, Islamic Relief, Merlin, Oxfam, Save the Children, Tearfund World Vision.

The DEC states:

“Gaza has been under a blockage for the past three years. Throughout the shelling some DEC Member Agencies, working directly or through local partners, have managed to continue limited activities, providing food and medical care. The current ceasefire is enabling Humanitarian actors to commence needs assessments. Trucks are now arriving in Gaza, many of which are carrying humanitarian supplies. DEC Member Agencies and the UN are scaling up their response and have applied for additional visas for International staff to enter Gaza.

“The DEC members are committed to humanitarian principles including independence and have confirmed they are able to work without hindrance from the Hamas controlled authorities both to identify who are the most needy and to channel assistance to them directly, either through their own staff or well established local non governmental partners. The DEC members have submitted lists of partners and their banking arrangements, to insure proper systems are in place.”

Thompson is a broadcaster, not an aid specialist, and should therefore confine his remarks to broadcasting.

Jon Snow, Channel 4 News anchor, told the Observer that the BBC should accept the judgment of the aid experts of the DEC. “It is a ludicrous decision. … I think it was a decision founded on complete ignorance and I am absolutely amazed they have stuck to it.”

6. Former BBC director general Greg Dyke has stepped in on the side of the BBC Board: “I can understand why the BBC has taken this decision, because on a subject as sensitive as the Middle East it is absolutely essential that the audience cannot see any evidence at all of a bias.”

But inaction by the BBC means that the audience will see a clear bias in favour of Israel. Why should the BBC be more scared of being accused of pro-Palestinian bias than pro-Israeli bias? It is because Israel is the client state of the UK government’s ally, the United States, is armed by both the US and the UK, and shares strategic interests of these governments.

As a senior BBC news presenter told the Observer: “I’ve been talking to colleagues, and everyone here is absolutely seething about this. The notion that the decision to ban the appeal will seem impartial to the public at large is quite absurd.”

7. Sir Michael Lyons, chairman of the BBC Trust, said he is “concerned that the level and tone of some of the political comment is coming close to constituting undue interference in the editorial independence of the BBC”.

Let’s be clear: this government doesn’t give a monkey’s about BBC independence. After the government-inspired Hutton Report in 2004 that decapitated the organisation, the BBC’s top management has slavishly toed the government line on the “war on terror”.

The concern of Ben Bradshaw, Douglas Alexander and Hazel blears is rather that the BBC Board’s outrageous decision will undermine public faith in the corporation, which is often a useful tool for the establishment.

Martin Bell, the former BBC foreign correspondent, told the Observer that “a culture of timidity had crept” in at the BBC. “I am completely appalled,” he said. “It is a grave humanitarian crisis and the people who are suffering are children. They have been caught out on this question of balance.”

8. Caroline Thomson, interviewed on Today on Radio 4, said: “From the BBC’s point of view, the most important thing is that we keep our reputation and trust with the audience.”

But the audience’s trust is precisely what the BBC risks losing by banning the Gaza aid appeal.

As a senior BBC news presenter told the Observer: “Most of us feel that the BBC’s defence of its position is pathetic, and there’s a feeling of real anger, made worse by the fact that, contractually, we are unable to speak out.”

* * * *

We are working to fix the “comments” function on this blog. In the meantime please email your comments to info@mwaw.net

This fact was ignored by ALL the mainstream media apart from Rory McCarthy in the Guardian.

Here is the same report on Reuters TV, and on Democracy Now radio.

Yet ALL the British papers carried the Israeli accusation that Hamas had been
firing rockets from within the compound: the BBC, the Independent, the Telegraph, the Times, the Scotsman, and the Daily Mail.

And here is the Israeli Defence Force official lie, cited everywhere, that “mortar shells were fired at IDF forces from within the Jabaliya school“.

Why has the fact that the IDF blatantly lied about this massacre not been reported widely?

An on-the-record, authorised quote from a UN spokesperson spilling the beans on a private admission by the Israelis that they were lying – surely a newsworthy story?

Below there follows a transcript of Fisk’s remarks on Israeli censorship, journalistic impartiality and Middle East history, which includes the following key observation:

“When we are reporting a football match in the UK we can give equal time to both sides or a public enquiry into new motorway. But the Middle East is not a football match.”

You can listen to the full programme on the World Service website. Or you can cut and paste into your browser this link to the podcast: http://downloads.bbc.co.uk/podcasts/worldservice/whys/whys_20090106-2005a.mp3

Other journalists involved in the programme were Gil Hoffman, chief political correspondent and analyst at The Jerusalem Post, Greg Philo, research director of Glasgow University Media Unit, author of Bad News from Israel, and Jasim Azawi, presenter, Al-Jazeera.

Presenter: How do you get to the truth during a war? How do you tell the difference between facts and lies? Did Israel break the ceasefire or did Hamas? Do the Israelis target civilians or does Hamas use human shields? With both sides accusing the other of propaganda and spin, we’ve assembled a cast of respected correspondents to talk to you about how they go about trying to blow away the fog of war.

…Robert Fisk, I was reading your piece in the Independent today, could you tell listeners your impressions of coverage of the conflict so far?

Fisk: The identifying mark of it is that the Israelis have prevented western correspondents from going into Gaza to witness with their own eyes what they are doing and what Hamas is doing. This has presented the world with a very one-sided picture in which the suffering of the Palestinians is not told through Western eyes and the suffering of Israelis is.

What is interesting, and I think what indeed may be a worthwhile by-product of this effective censorship by the Israelis, not allowing Western correspondents into Gaza, is that we are hearing the voices of Palestinians themselves unhindered by what I think is often the false balance of western media reporting in which they speak directly to their audience of their own experiences under fire, just as of course the Israelis can speak directly the Palestinians are doing so, and doing so without the presence of a western journalist to guide them or guard them or intervene if they say something which the western journalist doesn’t like.

And in this sense we may be seeing through censorship by the Israelis – which is a big mistake, and I gather quite a lot of Israelis think it think it’s a mistake as well. We may be seeing the beginning of something fruitful in journalism where the people who actually do the suffering on every side will be able to tell their own story, not though our filtering lens.

[discussion]

Fisk: Can I come in here for a second? If the western journalists were in Gaza they would be able to talk not to the man the street but to the man and the woman and the child in the hospital. And we can’t do that, none of us can. And that is the problem.

It’s not that the images are a distortion – the images are real. The distortion is when we’re told afterwards that the Palestinians deserve it or indeed that the Palestinians had it coming to them because Hamas was using them, Hamas was in the school.

I’ve been reporting the Middle East for 32 years. We had this in ‘82. We were told in 1996 after the Qana massacre by Israeli artillery that the 106 civilians got killed because Hezbollah gunmen were among them in the refugee centre in the UN base. It was totally untrue. And I actually predicted in the paper this morning that we’d hear that Hamas was in the school. And sure enough, here we are again.

I think what we need is a much freer voice, not among the Palestinians but in Israel. One of the things I keep pointing out, and I think my colleague in the Jerusalem Post will agree, is that you have some fine correspondents who are Israelis. Amira Hass [Haaretz], who I admit is a friend of mine, Gideon Levi [Haaretz], whom I haven’t met, who is a brilliant journalist. I wish we were covering their stories, running their reports in our papers, because they are certainly more courageous than our journalists.

[discussion]

Presenter: This is not a balanced conflict when you look at the death toll on either side. So can we be balanced in our reporting?

Fisk: I think it’s a bigger picture than this. We aren’t talking about balance between casualties. When we’re talking about 20 Israelis dead in 10 years, as I said in my piece in the Independent this morning that is a very grim figure. But when we are talking about 600 Palestinians dead in 9 days this is grotesque, not just disproportionate.

I think it is the job of journalists to be impartial on the side of those who suffer most.

I was present on the same street when a Palestinian suicide bomber walked into a Sbarro pizzeria in Jerusalem August 2000. When I got to the scene there was a woman with a chair-leg through her, a child with no eyes, Israelis of course in West Jerusalem. I wrote about the victims and the survivors. I did not give equal time, I did not give balance to the article by giving 50% of my report to the spokesman for Islamic Jihad.

When I was in the Sabra and Shatila camps in Beirut September 1982 where Israel’s militia allies from Lebanon, the Falange, had gone into the camp and murdered and massacred and eviscerated and raped women for two days while the Israelis watched, as we learned from the Israeli report the Kahan commission report the following year, I did not give equal time to the IDF spokesman, I concentrated on the victims and the survivors. That is what our job is to do.

When we are reporting a football match in the UK we can give equal time to both sides or a public enquiry into new motorway. But the Middle East is not a football match, it is a massive tragedy of blood, sorry and revenge. And we need to reflect that

We also need to look at history. Not enough journalists in my view take history books into war. Nobody has – I know our paper has but I haven’t seen any other paper explain it – have asked: why are all these Palestinians in Gaza? Many of them, their families, 93% I gather, actually come originally from that part of Palestine that became Israel. In other words these missiles that have been falling from Hamas are landing on land that before 1948 belonged legally to the families who are now in Gaza. That is an ironic situation that in any war we would be pointing out. In the Balkans that would be paragraph two.

Presenter. The problem is that people just don’t agree on the history in this conflict

Fisk: A lot of Israelis and a lot of Arabs do now agree on the history. Things have changed since the old days when the story was that all the Arabs left Palestine because they were ordered to leave while the Arab armies drove the Israelis into the sea. They were not ordered to leave by radio stations on the Arab side. If you read Benny Morris, if you read Ari Shlaim – there’s a wonderful article in today’s Guardian – who lays this all out, you’ll find that Israeli historians today, many of them, and Arab historians and British historians are actually coming together to see a common picture. I think that’s one of the few hopes in the Middle East at the moment, that the story is coming together. It’s not necessarily a different history any more.

[ENDS]

Greg Philo also pointed out in the discussion that if a state limits of coverage in the way that Israel has it is a form of censorship. All organisations should say this. It should be labelled as censorship. It needs to be made an issue in the news.

Second, there needs to be a rigorous policy of making both sides heard. In Bad News From Israel we found that the Palestinian view was not being put. It has the effect of creating an environment in which Israeli perspective dominates. So if Israel says we invaded because of the rockets, we need to hear the Palestinian view that the rockets are being fired because of the humanitarian crisis that has been created here.

Middle East expert Juan Cole reports the background to al-Zeidi’s protest here. Millions of people around the world will feel nothing but sympathy for his actions.

But there is no doubt that the journalist’s life is in extreme danger from the Iraqi government and US forces, who have an appalling record of detaining, abusing, torturing and killing journalists.

The respected Committee to Protect Journalists describes the situation for Iraqi journalists in 2007 like this:

“The Iraqi government continued to commit a wide range of press freedom abuses that included censorship, arbitrary detentions, threats, physical attacks, and harassment. … Throughout the year there were numerous reports that security forces harassed journalists by physically assaulting them, seizing their footage, interrogating them, and expelling them from press conferences or from official offices…

“The vast majority of victims continued to be Iraqis, most of whom were singled out by armed groups and murdered with impunity. … Threats have forced many Iraqi journalists to live clandestinely, leave the profession altogether, or flee the country.”

In making his protest yesterday, al-Zeidi also acted as a professional. The only way for an Iraqi journalist to convey to the world the level of hostility to the Americans in Iraq is to protest in this fashion – revealing that you cannot be a journalist there without selling yourself to the government or putting your life in extreme danger.

As the Washington Post reported in October, the US government is paying private contractors in Iraq a further $300 million over the next three years to produce “news stories” and “public service advertisements” for the Iraqi media in order to expand what the US military calls “information/psychological operations” in Iraq.

This content is then broadcast by the Iraqi media without telling the audience. One contractor told the Post: “They don’t know that the originator of the content is the US government. If they did, they would never run anything.”

The US influence over Iraqi media is extensive. For example, the US pays local papers to run articles by US troops. As one Iraqi journalist told the Christian Science Monitor a year ago: “We thought the fall of [Saddam Hussein] would usher in a new era of press freedom, but now all of that has been quashed by religious institutions and the government itself. We all practice self-censorship for one reason or another.”

Al-Zeidi’s protest is no different from that of the campaigners who “pied” Phil Woolas in October after the immigration minister made racist remarks. The Iraqi government should treat al-Zeidi’s protest as such, and should release him immediately.

Please write to these organisations and ask them to raise al-Zeidi’s case as soon as possible:

International Federation of Journalists: ifj@ifj.org
(Please copy in the IFJ Middle East section: sarah.bouchetob@ifj.org and monir.zaarour@ifj.org)

National Union of Journalists: info@nuj.org.uk

Reporters Without Borders: rsf@rsf.org

Committee to Protect Journalists: info@cpj.org

The story is so pathetic that it barely warrants serious discussion. But it’s there in the Times. On page 4. And the article is typical of so much media reporting of Islam.

The paper published this “news” item on October 27 under the headline “Police warned of Ramadan tension during 2012 Games”.

The story claimed that Scotland Yard was concerned that the 2012 Olympics in London would “clash” with Ramadan, making it harder to “reduce tensions between Muslims and police” during the Games.

Instead of offering any proof, however, that a religious festival could present a problem for police, the Times article switched in its second paragraph to speculation about terrorism. The 40th anniversary of the shoot-out at the Munich Olympics – in which 9 Israeli hostages died after they were taken hostage by Palestinians – meant there was an “Islamic terrorist threat” to the 2012 Games, the paper said.

Only then did the story returned to Ramadan and the London Olympics. It quoted the head of the highly respected Woolf Institute of Abrahamic Faiths that the police would need some basic training to deal with religious issues that might arise during the Games: “During Ramadan you’re going to have a lot of tired, hungry, less evenly tempered people because they haven’t eaten for 18 hours.”

The implication is clear: tired, hungry Muslims are more likely to lose their temper and… commit a terrorist attack on the Games.

MWAW contacted Dr Ed Kessler, head of the Woolf Institute.  He wrote back that he was “very unhappy” with the Times article, which “failed to depict the conversation” that he had had with the paper’s reporter. He said it was “sensationalism of the worst kind” and was “inaccurate in its reporting about the Olympics, Ramadan and the proposed Munich commemoration”.

Dr Kessler has written to the Times to complain, but the paper has yet to publish his letter.

The Times’ method is clear: take a bit of flimsy information from the police, slap on some unrelated speculation about terrorism, throw in a quote – torn out of context – from a respected source to make the piece appear reasonable, and let the reader draw their own racist conclusions. The article is constructed to make it appear that fasting during Ramadan makes Muslims more likely to commit a terrorist atrocity.

This is dog-whistle reporting: the article is couched in reasonable language but sends out a clear message that Islam is dangerous.

It is because of reporting of this kind that MWAW is holding its conference this year on Islamophobia.

Dave Crouch

One of our supporters wrote to the reporter whose byline accompanied the piece. He replied:

“We publicised a police appeal in exactly the same way we would publish a police appeal for a missing person, a rape suspect or a murder suspect.”

Our supporter wrote back to him:

“Your comparison of anti-war protesters with rape and murder suspects pretty much sums up why the mainstream media has so little credibility these days. You blindly parrot the police’s line without question and do not even ask any of the thousands of protesters in attendance what actually happened that day. What inspiring journalism on your part.”

Often reporters’ bylines appear on stories that they are unhappy about – senior editors present their material in ways that suit the newspaper’s editorial line, rather than the reporter’s understanding of the truth.

But in this instance it is clear that the reporter in question agreed wholeheartedly with the police. As the Stop the War Coalition noted, the reporter made “no attempt … to speak to the organisers of the demonstration, or indeed anyone who actually attended the protest without a police uniform”.

This was just plain bad journalism, and as such is indefensible. The reporter allowed himself to be an uncritical mouthpiece for views with which he agreed, rather than attempting to dig beneath the police press release and establish the facts.

Here is the full text of the article in The London Paper, which can  be found at: http://tinyurl.com/4jz33q

SUSPECTS SOUGHT OVER STOP THE WAR VIOLENCE

By Richard Moriarty

25/09/08

photos of four young men at top with byline

Picture caption: “Police are seeking these four men in connection with June’s Stop the War protest, which was marred by widespread disorder.”

THESE four men are wanted for questioning by police investigating a violent demonstration against George Bush, during which officers were pelted with metal bars, sharpened sticks and bottles.

At least 10 officers were hurt after protestors breached barriers during a Stop The War protest in Parliament Square as the US President visited George Brown.

Up to 2,500 people gathered at the height of the demo on 15 June and some, thought to be anarchists, tried to get through police lines to Downing Street. Police used batons to fight back, resulting in 25 arrests. Deputy Assistant Commissioner Chris Allison said: “The Met will always facilitate lawful protest but what we will not tolerate is attacks on our officers under the guise of demonstration.

“We maintained a barrier line as part of security for the visit of President Bush. In a climate where London is at a severe level of threat from global terrorism, any attempt to breach security to protect the President had to be defended.

“What our officers did not deserve was to be the subject of such violence. A number of officers had sharpened sticks poked into their eyes.”

Anyone with information should call the investigation team on 07500 768 607, or Crimestoppers anonymously on 0800 555 111

(article ends)

Stop the War wrote to The London Paper, which refused to publish this letter:

“Your story about the demonstration in London on 15 June to protest against the visit of President Bush is one sided and full of unsubstantiated claims. Of the article’s two paragraphs one is almost wholly given over to quotes from Police Commisioner Chris Allison. The rest of the copy paraphrases a Metropolitan Police press release.

“Despite very serious allegations made against anti-war protestors,including the publication of 4 pictures of people apparently ‘wanted’ by the police, no attempt seems to have been made to speak to the organisers of the demonstration, or indeed anyone who actually attended the protest without a police uniform.

“The claim that Police officers ‘were pelted with metal bars’ for example is a complete fabrication. Given the accounts of the demonstration carried at the time in the press which described and pictured police baton attacks on peaceful protestors this article badly let down your readers, most of whom no doubt oppose Bush’s wars.”

On the day that the British government revealed details of its plan to throw £400bn at the banks, the Sun splashed on “£170,000 benefits so mum of 7 can live in £1.2m mansion”.

The Sun made its argument clear: “Taxpayers hit by the credit crunch fund the swish seven-bedroom home enjoyed free by Afghan migrant…” The tone of the paper’s coverage was summed up by one of its readers: “I’m disgusted by what’s going on. Surely we should be taking care of our own people first.”

Instead of the multimillionaire bankers ripping off the country and ravaging the economy, the papers now turned to an easier target: 35 year old Toorpakai Saiedi and her 7 children.

The Evening Standard took up the story and ran with it three days in a row. Of course the Express and Mail got stuck in. Ealing Council’s reaction? It sacked three temporary workers whom it blamed for the situation.

And this was even before the columnists got started. Carol Malone in the News of the World described she wanted to “smack” the “workshy” Afghan woman. “It’s a given with refugees these days that the minute you hit British soil and step aboard the benefits gravy train, you need never do anything for yourself ever again.”

Rod Liddle in the Times suggested that the Taliban had the right idea in driving Ms Saiedi out of Afghanistan. Tony Parsons in the Mirror spelled it out:

“Personally, I can’t tell the difference between the unemployed investment banker and that Afghan woman who is in the news because she receives £170,000 a year in benefits. … To me this mother-of-seven looks exactly like the scalded fat cats who are being bailed out from Canary Wharf to Wall Street.”

These ravings made Richard Littlejohn sound mild in comparison.

The facts: Ms Saedi receives £1,600 a month – under £20K p.a. – to feed a family of eight. The private LANDLORD gets £12,000 a month from the state to house the family because there is no council housing.

Susie Rushton in the Independent is the lone sane voice among the press jackals. She writes that she is “ashamed by our sneaky, racist press”:

“Never mind that Mrs Saiedi appears to be highly deserving of asylum, and needs a seven-bedroom house because her kids are too old to share rooms; that she is diligently learning English; that she struggles to pay bills; nor that, thanks to the ludicrous property boom in the capital, £1.2m pounds doesn’t actually buy “a mansion” – even as prices fall, that’d hardly get you a two-bedroom flat in Notting Hill. It does however buy a pleasant enough family-sized house in a cheap part of west London.”

As the economic crisis bites, the media will lash out at the weakest and most defenceless people in society. If they are Muslim, they make an even easier target.

This is why the Media Workers Against the War conference “Under siege: Islam, war and the media” is potentially such an important event. For us, slump + war = resistance.

Dave Crouch

I was absolutely enraged. I couldn’t believe that 400 editors could have signed up to this.

Why?

Because we have a protocol which we live by on every working day of the week which is that if someone vulnerable in terms of national security is making a movement or whatever we may well know about it but we won’t in fact tell the listener

If Brown is going off to Iraq you know perfectly well because you have to make your own arrangements but you don’t talk about it

It seems to me that there was nothing so very different about a movement of Prince Harry to Afghanistan and if they wanted complete secrecy it could fit with that protocol

The argument from the media organisations that went along with it was that this was in essence what they had sort of done.

No, and it’s not true. I am certainly aware that the basis of the discussion was: if you do not sign up to this he will not go, we will not deploy. Therefore the media suddenly became charged with a role in the deployment of a soldier to Afghanistan, which seemed a most bizarre position to be in.

This was propaganda, this was not journalism, this was not ferreting about to get at the truth, this was doing somebody else’s bidding, this was the picture that the Ministry of Defence and others wanted put across the front pages of the newspapers, this was a hole in one for the Palace, the military authorities and Prince Harry, there was no journalism involved at all, not one element of it.

The media, certainly the BBC, who were in this like everyone else, would dispute that, they would say that the quality of access, that one of the reasons that the deal took some time to stitch together was that arguments over – it appears to me anyway, they appear to be saying – the quality and amount and depth of access, so they are saying that the access enabled them to tell more of the story, to let listeners and viewers see more of what is really going on in Afghanistan because of the access they got because of the deal they had done.

That’s complete garbage, isn’t it.

Do you think…?

Absolute garbage. What was going on? What was going on was a number of posed photographs. Did they say: “We moved around the village and Harry posed on a motorbike. Whose it was we don’t know, it was red, it was probably nicked from some Afghan.”

What was the truth? Does an air traffic controller actually shoot from a machine gun nest? The BBC didn’t reveal this to us.

No, this was a series of manipulated photo-opportunities, it was not journalism and did not in any sense describe what was going on in Afghanistan.

Were you surprised at the reaction to your comments?

Not remotely. Not remotely. Do you think 400 editors who have sold their souls for a mess of pottage are in some way going to start being nice to me about my one lone voice of rebellion? No, absolutely not.

But I know I was right. And I have to tell you, I have had a vast mailbag from editors, friends, journalists, other people saying: “Spot on mate” – and viewers too.

Has it done the prince any good?

I think it’s done the press a lot of harm. Has it done the prince any good? Of course. Of course it’s a much better image than someone rolling around in the street half drunk.

Two peace boats, the “Free Gaza” and the “Liberty”, sailed from Cyprus to Gaza almost three weeks ago carrying 45 activists seeking to bring attention to Israel’s blockade of Gaza.

Most of her fellow protesters left on the same boats they arrived in last week, but Lauren and several other activists chose to remain behind.

Israel controls all access to Gaza, although there is one border crossing at Rafah for pedestrians into neighbouring Egypt. Israel insists, however, on the right to screen all goods travelling from Egypt to Gaza and the pedestrian crossing opens rarely. This means crossing into Israel is now the only realistic means for Lauren to leave.

“This is a punishment, and it’s a warning to the people who may in the future want to come on the boat: imprisonment in the largest internment camp in history,” Lauren told the Times.

“It seems we are political prisoners, if you like, of Egypt and Israel’s blockade of Gaza,” she told Press TV.

Lauren is Tony Blair’s sister-in-law. Tony Blair is official Middle East peace envoy.

A third peace boat is due to arrive in Gaza on September 22 carrying doctors and members of the European parliament.

The UN investigation found that “the destruction from aerial bombardment was clearly evident with some seven to eight houses having been totally destroyed and serious damage to many others. Local residents were able to confirm the number of casualties – including names, age and gender of the victims.”

This is far from an isolated incident.

In the latest case at the end of August over 70 people are believed to have been killed in a massive bombardment of villages in southern Helmand province.

In July, coalition troops admitted that air strikes in Helmand killed civilians, as local people claimed that between 50 and 80 people, many of them women and children, had died.

Also that month, 47 people were killed and nine wounded on their way to a wedding in eastern Afghanistan. Among the dead were 39 women and children, including the bride-to-be.

More than 200 civilians were killed by coalition troops in Afghanistan in June, far more than are believed to have been killed by Taliban militants. The growing toll of civilian deaths came as the US airforce disclosed that it dropped over 272 tonnes of bombs on Afghanistan in June and July this year – more than the whole of 2006.

And how has this story been covered in the British media? Paratroopers shot dead four Afghan civilians on July 26, close to the site where, less than 48 hours earlier, snipers had killed a British army dog handler – and his dog.

None of the media coverage named the dead Afghans. But several outlets named the dog that died, and its pedigree.

In January 2007 the British papers went wild over a “Rescue bid by heroes strapped to helicopters“. Describing how British soldiers had tied themselves to the wings of a helicopter to retrive a soldier’s body, an army spokesperson told the Mail:

“It was a leap into the unknown. It was an extraordinary tale of heroism and bravery of our airmen, soldiers and Marines who were all prepared to put themselves back into the line of fire to rescue a fallen comrade.”

Under the headline “Heroes of Helmand: the first amazing pictures“, the Observer talked of “a mission that carried echoes of Saving Private Ryan”, “a trip into the unknown, a mercy mission that has already etched itself into contemporary military folklore”.

The Guardian effused that the mission evoked “the manner of the heroes of the second world war film Flight of the Phoenix”.

The Times had this wonderful line: “Reports said that soldiers from 45 Commando Royal Marines did not want their 30-year-old section commander falling into the hands of insurgents, who they feared would mutilate his body.” Top marks there for demonising the enemy.

The Telegraph reported the operation’s success, followed by an army spokesperson’s words that it showed “the level of camaraderie and bravery of those soldiers involved.”

Now that the full MoD report on the mission is out, however, we learn that it was a tale of “poor training, confusion and friendly fire“. In the midst of the chaos, a British gunner had opened fire and shot another soldier dead. “A devastating board of inquiry report released by the Ministry of Defence exposed a catalogue of errors,” said the Guardian.

Of course most papers buried this news, and the Sun managed to tell it as a story of “MoD betrayal“.

So – when will the British media learn not to take MoD press releases at face value?

Dave Crouch

With Peter Wilby, columnist for the Media Guardian, formely editor of the New Statesman and the Independent on Sunday

Tom de Waal, Caucasus editor at the Institute of War and Peace Reporting

Stop the War Coalition speaker (tbc)

Tuesday September 9

7pm

Pearson Lecture Theatre
University College London, Gower Street WC1
Nearest tube: Warren Street or Euston

Map: click here

All welcome!

Download a leaflet for the meeting as a PDF file

More details: mediawar@riseup.net, or tel 07801 789 297

Called by Media Workers Against the War

Pete Wilby on the media coverage of war in the Caucasus:
In the Media Guardian

Tom de Waal on the war:
In the Financial Times
In the Guardian

N.B. our original meeting on Somalia on Sept 10 has been postponed because of the Caucasus crisis

The Guardian correctly notes: “The disclosure that a Whitehall counter-terrorism propaganda operation is promoting material to the BBC and other media will raise fresh concerns about official news management in a highly sensitive area.”

According to the paper, the secret services’ report says: “We are pushing this material to UK media channels, eg, a BBC radio programme exposing tensions between AQ leadership and supporters. And a restricted working group will communicate niche messages through media and non-media.”

These revelations raise very serious questions about recent corporate media coverage of the “war on terror”.

In June there was a string of stories in the British press stressing that al-Qaeda was “down but not out”, suffering set-backs in Iraq and Afghanistan – precisely the message being pushed by Whitehall counter-intelligence, according to the Guardian story. For example, Times columnist Gerard Baker wrote: “We are winning this war on terror“.

Yet the crisis in Pakistan and the killing of 10 French and 9 Canadian soldiers in Afghanistan in successive weeks shows what rubbish this is.

The secret services in the UK and US have a disgraceful record of planting mis-information and propaganda in the media.

In the run-up to the Iraq war, the Observer’s reporter David Rose became a mouthpiece for MI5 and MI6 propaganda – by his own admission. Rose now deeply regrets this.

In April the New York Times exposed that the Pentagon conducted a major campaign of placing retired generals on US TV news to put the case for war in the run-up to the invasion of Iraq. In 2002 Rumsfeld’s “Office of Strategic Influence” inside the Pentagon had to be scrapped after it emerged that the OSI planned to plant “black propaganda” in foreign media.

The news that counter-intelligence is targetting the BBC should be a wake-up call to all journalists.

There were serious doubts about the story’s authenticity, however. For example, the Metro and the Telegraph reported that the circumstances of her arrest remain unclear, with US officials saying she turned herself in but Iraqi police claiming she was caught after behaving suspiciously.

The Guardian, however, published the claims of the Iraqi police without a shred of probing or scepticism. For example, the paper said that the girl’s father “had carried out a suicide bombing”, while Arabic TV stations showed both the girls’ parents sitting indoors.

Moreover, publishing Abu Ghraib-like photos and video of the young woman in such a humiliating situation verged on the pornographic. The Iraqi police certainly appeared to be enjoying the interrogation.

The Iraqi police have been shown on many occasions in the past to have made up stories. The widely-reported claim that women with Down’s syndrome blew themselves up in a market in Baghdad in February was full of holes.

Everyone in Iraq knows that all the police do after the bombing is washout the evidence. On numerous occasions eyewitnesses have said an explosion was a car bomb – with government number plates – while the police and the puppet government claim it was a suicide bomber. The truth is always the first casualty in these incidents.

All these recent claims about Iraqi women suicide bombers are either made by the US or by the Iraqi puppet government of the Green Zone in an attempt to show that the resistance in Iraq is defeated and therefore resorting to desperate measures. But very few people in Iraq believe that these security forces are there to protect them. According to Mohamed Al Dayni, member of the Iraqi parliament, there are at many documented cases of rape committed by members of the Iraqi security forces, yet to be properly investigated or prosecuted.

I telephoned the reader’s editor of the Guardian to lodge a complaint, in a polite but upset voice. The woman who answered the phone breathed a sigh down the phone as I was explaining to her my complaint as if she was bored.

Can I suggest that people write a short email or make a telephone call to the reader’s editor to complain about the Guardian’s article: reader@guardian.co.uk,
0207 7134736

Tahrir Swift

Whenever, to coin a phrase, a war breaks out in a faraway country of which we know little, I am reminded of a news editor I once worked for. He would go to a wall map showing the location of the paper’s correspondents, produce a ruler, and measure the distance of each from the area in question. Regardless of travel links or national boundaries, he decreed that the nearest should go.

It was a bit like that, I imagine, in many media offices when the conflict between Georgia and Russia broke out. Not only was it August, when many reporters are on holiday, it was also the Olympics, and the few still on duty were mostly in Beijing. The Financial Times headline, “Georgia says Russia at war“, may have seemed strange, but it summed up the state of Fleet Street’s verifiable knowledge as the armies moved into action. In the age of 24-hour news, however, the press cannot hang about waiting for reporters to arrive. Readers want bombs, tanks and death tolls. They need to be told who are the goodies and baddies. News, remember, is part of the entertainment industry.

Into the vacuum stepped the Georgian government. Its president, Mikheil Saakashvili, speaks English, wants to join Nato, sent troops to Iraq, got himself educated at Harvard, cultivates a media-friendly style, and sends Georgian university exam papers to be marked in Britain, though whether he expects to get them back is another matter. He took power in the Rose revolution of 2003-04 and professes to be a democrat. He’s clearly an all-round good egg. And he has a PR firm, Aspect Consulting, based in Brussels, London and Paris, which also acts for Exxon Mobil, Kellogg’s and Procter and Gamble.

Almost hourly over the five-day war, press releases landed on foreign news desks. “Russia continues to attack civilian population.” The capital Tblisi was “intensively” bombed. A downed Russian plane turned out to be “nuclear”. European “energy supplies” were threatened as Russia dropped bombs near oil pipelines. A “humanitarian wheat shipment” was blocked. Later, “invading Russian forces” began “the occupation of Georgia”. Saakashvili’s government filed allegations of ethnic cleansing to The Hague. Note the use of terms that trigger western media interest: civilian victims, nuclear, humanitarian, occupation, ethnic cleansing.

It would be unfair to accuse the British press of accepting the Georgian PR uncritically. Most papers dutifully reported that a Georgian attack in the breakaway province of South Ossetia, where most people want to join Russia, started the conflict. But casual readers might have struggled to understand that. The Mail’s headline announced: “‘1,500 die’ as the Russian tanks roll in” [August 9]. Only in the last paragraph of the story did it become clear that the Georgians, not the Russians, were alleged to have killed 1,500.

Russia’s behaviour, newspapers implied, was in a quite different category from Georgia’s. In the Sunday Times, Russian tanks went “rampaging” in South Ossetia, while Georgian tanks merely “moved”. If Georgian forces had bombarded civilians, it was “reprehensible”, the Telegraph allowed. Russia, however, was “offending every canon of international behaviour“. An analysis in the same paper avoided any mention of how Georgia provoked the crisis. Saakashvili was “paying the price” for his pro-western foreign policy. A “resurgent Russia” was “itching to flex its muscles and burning with post-imperial hubris”.

Such comments are illuminated by substituting Britain or America for Russia, and Iraq for Georgia. Try “resurgent Britain … itching to flex its muscles”, etc.

As the conflict went on, press coverage became more balanced, with several commentators noting, to quote the Independent’s Mary Dejevsky, that “it is quite hard to argue that there is one law for assisting Albanians in Kosovo and quite another for Russians and Ossetians in Georgia”. Increasingly, the press portrayed Saakashvili as a self-regarding fool who blundered into a war he was bound to lose.

But Georgia’s actions in South Ossetia went largely unexamined, and it was hard to find, from press accounts, what refugees from the province were fleeing from. Again, the Georgians played the PR game more skilfully. Western correspondents were welcomed into Gori and shown areas apparently bombed by the Russians. Saakashvili held international media phone conferences, got himself on TV news channels and even found time, within hours of war breaking out, to write for the Wall Street Journal. Russia, by contrast, allowed little access to South Ossetia. Its government attempted no comparable media offensive. Though it also has a PR agency, GPlus Europe in Brussels (and Ketchum in Washington), it was not asked to issue press releases. As a source wryly put it, “the press release is not a common tool of the Russian government”.

The brief war in the Caucasus was a classic example of the situation outlined in Nick Davies’s book Flat Earth News. Most newspapers hadn’t a clue what was going on and lacked sufficient resources to find out. So skilfully presented PR was at a premium. Most journalists treated it with at least some scepticism, but it inevitably had an effect. If there was a military war, there was also an information one, and Georgia got the better of it.

This was a very serious piece of journalism, broadcast at an extremely sensitive time – on the anniversary of the 7/7 terrorist attacks on London. Channel 4 made sure the documentary was copper-bottomed by commissioning accompanying research by the excellent Cardiff School of Journalism team under Prof Justin Lewis. Moreover, Oborne produced his own pamphlet to go with the film, “Muslims Under Siege“. Both should be required reading for journalists.

The mainstream media’s response to Oborne’s challenge, however, has so far been disappointing, and by no means matches the seriousness of the issues he raises.

The Independent gave Oborne space for two major articles, one of which in its media section, and columnist Mark Steele last week demolished the Sun’s response to Oborne. The Mail gave him a double page spread.

But apart from a few comment pieces by Muslims praising the documentary in the Guardian, the Observer and the Times, and a splendid piece by the Guardian’s Seamus Milne, the response has been either silence or hostility.

The Observer’s Andrew Anthony slagged it off, accusing Oborne of “blasting himself in the foot“. In the Sindy, Hermione Eyre accused Oborne, of all people, of “white liberal piety“. To add insult to injury, Oborne was disgracefully thrown out of parliament for distributing his pamphlet to MPs.

Readers of this blog might wish to questions aspects of Oborne’s approach, which, for example, doesn’t make explicit the link between the rise of Islamophobia and the “war on terror”. But we share his criticisms of the war in Iraq. In his Dispatches documentary in March, “Iraq’s Lost Generation”, he said: “The British Government has misled us in the run-up to war and is in denial now about what we are leaving behind. It has failed to bring liberal democracy to Iraq, brought danger to the streets of London, damaged our international reputation, alienated millions of our fellow citizens and betrayed the values we stand for in a moral and strategic disaster.”

It is time for the dangerous Islamophobia that is rampant in the British media to be recognised and debated.

We must not let the issues that Oborne has raised be brushed under the carpet.

N.B. Last week the Independent reported record numbers of racist incidents – from verbal abuse to stabbings – are being reported to police, fuelling fears that levels of Islamophobia are rising.

Take the Guardian, for instance. Since Hilary Clinton’s remark on April 22 about “obliterating Iran”, the paper and its website have published over 100 items mentioning Israel in the context of the spread of nuclear power or weapons in the Middle East – about one every day. Yet only 8 of these mention Israel’s nuclear capacity, and only 4 appeared in the newspaper – the rest were online comment pieces, which carry far less import.

Of the newspaper articles, only one specified the size of Israel’s nuclear arsenal. The other two brief mentions in news items are here and here. The final mention came in a comment piece by Jonathan Freedland which was overwhelmingly an argument against Tehran.

In the same period, the paper published two editorials on Iranian nukes with no mention whatsoever of Israel’s nuclear weapons. One merely repeated Freedland’s handwringing of the day before, the other talked about “declaration of nuclear assets” – but without mentioning Israel’s undeclared weapons.

Notably, former US president Jimmy Carter talked at length about Israel’s nukes at a press conference at the Hay literary festival in May. The Guardian reported Carter’s press conference, but ignored that aspect of it.

As the US and Israel prepare for war on Iran, non-reporting of the balance of nuclear power in the Middle East adds to the sense that “something must be done” about Iran, strengthening the assumption that Iran is in the wrong and action of some sort is justified.

We saw this over Iraq. The US media specialist Ed Herman calls it “normalising the unthinkable“. MWAW will be writing to the Guardian on this score.

Malik’s crucial test case succeeded in reining in the police, who had raided his house in March in search of his notes. The court’s main ruling two weeks ago spelt out that the police have no right to conduct speculative “fishing expeditions” to force journalists to hand over their research.

But the case has starkly revealed how the terror laws mean journalists must go to the authorities if they suspect that a source has information about “terrorism”.

Given the broad-brush definition of terrorism in the Terrorism Act 2006 – which includes “glorifying” terror and possessing terrorist materials without the intention of committing an offence – the latest ruling means many Muslims will perceive journalists as a direct extension of the police. Anyone with genuine information about the terrorist milieu will have to weigh up the risk that talking to a reporter is like talking to the cops.

The court’s first ruling, however, was welcomed by Malik, who stressed how it circumscribed police powers. He told Free Press: “It’s a victory for common sense in that, from the wider perspective, we can protect confidential sources – that’s a big victory.

“The High Court said production orders are allowed, but in my case they really do have to be precisely drafted, the police can’t just go on fishing expeditions. Protecting journalists’ sources should be paramount, and now the High Court has said even in terrorism cases journalists are allowed to maintain confidential sources.”

The NUJ also emphasised how the initial ruling sent a clear signal to police that they can’t see journalists as “simply another tool of intelligence gathering”. Speaking outside the High Court after the ruling was announced, general secretary Jeremy Dear said that Greater Manchester Police had “failed to recognise the special nature of journalistic material. Rather than take the time to consider what information they really needed, the police went fishing, hoping a general order would dredge up something of use.”

Malik is an established freelance who has written extensively on terrorism for national newspapers and magazines. He is working on a book with the former Islamist Hassan Butt, who is linked to a forthcoming terrorism trail in Manchester in the autumn. Greater Manchester Police, who raided Malik’s home in March in pursuit of his notes, have also served draft production orders on the BBC, the Sunday Times, Prospect magazine and CBS demanding that they hand over materials they believe to be connected with the case.

Malik’s High Court appeal is the first major test of the application to journalism of the Terrorism Act 2000, sections 19 and 38B (the latter was added in 2001) of which make it a criminal offence to withhold information. Formerly police had to satisfy a judge that the information they sought from a journalist was closely related to a “serious offence” – the 2000 Act contains no such restriction.

Malik said: “This makes it almost impossible for journalists working in the field of terrorism. It’s been a scythe hanging over our necks since it was enacted in 2000. Journalists in the field have been breaking the law and hoping they won’t get prosecuted.”

He believes the issue came to a head because the police decided he would be in no position to defend himself, so they imposed a wide-ranging production order. But the NUJ and the Sunday Times agreed to pay his costs.

There is a maliciousness in the police attack on Malik. As the court ruling states, the police interest in Malik is in what he can tell them about Hassan Butt, and not in whether he has committed offences under sections 19 or 38B. However, according to the Court, on May 9 Butt was arrested and extensively interviewed by police; he told them his earlier public statements about involvement in Al-Qaeda were untrue. He has now been released without charge.

The case shows that journalists face enormous difficulties researching the roots of Islamist extremism in Britain. As a result, policies aimed at preventing terrorism will come to rely even further on the shadowy secret services and the ill-informed prejudices of the Murdoch press.

Moreover, the line between legitimate support for resistance to western intervention in Iraq and Afghanistan and supporting “terrorism” will be further blurred, increasing the stigma attached to the Muslim community, where hostility to government foreign policy is strongest.

A range of high profile figures and organisations have supported Malik’s case. On March 19 leading figures from journalism and civil liberties organisations, including Jonathan Dimbleby and Shami Chakrabarti, signed a letter to the Times warning of its implications.

Dave Crouch
A version of this article will shortly appear in Free Press, www.cpbf.org.uk

The most influential armchair soldier in the Western world is back in his metaphorical fatigues. Yes, it’s Field Marshal David Aaronovitch, who championed the invasion of Iraq with more vigour than any fellow officer in Her Majesty’s First Light Pundits. There have been times in recent years when David seemed to be taking the weeniest backward baby-steps towards admitting that, on Iraq, he may perhaps have dropped the tiniest of bollocks. However, these faint flickerings of the reverse lights on the tank have been quickly extinguished by defiant challenges to opponents, on the exquisitely subtle lines of: “Do you want Saddam back, is that what you want?”

And now, far from succumbing to self-doubt, the Field Marshal wishes to invade Zimbabwe and oust Mugabe, which he believes would be another military piece of cake. “How many South African or British soldiers would it take to unseat the junta and disperse the Zanu-PF veterans?”

This is not a rhetorical question, of course. Having unleashed that military brain on the logistical problems, and consulted with his masters at the MoD, he well knows the precise answer, although the Official Secrets Act of course precludes him from sharing the information. Without dwelling on the ramifications of such retro-colonialism in a country that remains so sensitive on the point, lesser thinkers foresee a grave danger of hideous civil unrest. They forget that David was correct to ignore that outlandish prospect so far as Iraq. We salute the Field Marshal for the indefatigability of his faith in interventionism, and look forward to him leading his troops into battle.

And he very well might. Visitors to The Times website will relish a three-minute video of David training for a triathlon in August. Frankly, he looks in amazing shape for a chap turning 54 a week from today, especially in an aerodynamic bodysuit on Brighton beach, and it’s suspected that the Field Marshal may be training less for that triathlon than because, tiring of all the desk work his military role imposes, he intends personally to spearhead the initial raid on the presidential palace in Harare.

Would the first Times employee to find him digging a latrine in the Wapping car park please let us know?

Michelle has been an inspirational figure at the Daily Express and Star, leading campaigns against the newspapers’ racism and Islamophobia, making the union’s “Journalism Matters” campaign a great success and fighting to build strong grassroots union organisation. She has been open about her opposition to the occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan.

Journalists’ working conditions are intimately connected to the quality of the public service they provide, as Nick Davies has shown in “Flat Earth News”, which sets out to explain the media’s failure on Iraqi WMD. The government’s assault on the BBC over its coverage of the “war on terror” has included massive job cuts, particularly in news and current affairs.

Targetting of the media by the military in war zones has made journalists’ work more dangerous, while “terror law” restrictions on reporting at home threaten journalists with arrests and prosecutions. For these reasons the NUJ needs a deputy general secretary who recognises the importance of the war for our union.

See Michelle’s election website here: www.michelle4dgs.org.uk

Alarming changes are taking place in the BBC World Service structure and we are asking for your help.

The management has decided that 50% of language services should be transferred to countries where the language is spoken. As the law in most of those countries does not allow foreign media organisations to operate locally, the BBC is setting up private companies instead – BBC Pakistan Ltd., BBC India Ltd., BBC Nepal, etc.

Although preparations for offshoring different languages have been going on for the last 3 to 4 years, management neither took staff into confidence nor informed the unions of their plans. Hindi and Urdu services were told only a couple of months ago that 80% of Hindi and 50% of Urdu transmission and staff are to be transferred to BBC India and BBC Islamabad. Similar plans are in the pipeline for Nepali Service and there are signs that Bengali service will follow suit. Needless to say terms and conditions will be down-graded, and staffing levels will/may be cut.

The management argues that in the face of growing media competition we need to be closer to our audience. This is completely false premise and an extremely risky experiment which will mean moving independent journalists into the control zones of the governments of those countries and obliging them to comply with restrictive media regimes in those countries.

BBC World Service has built its reputation as the most independent and trustworthy international news organisation without its 32 language services ‘being close’ to their audiences. This is the most important issue in our campaign to stop offshoring plans. BBC World Service has earned respect and trust of its audience all over the world precisely because it was far removed from the political pressure of those countries and is perceived to be independent and unbiased. Programmes being broadcast from local stations and conforming to local media laws and political demands will not have the same authority, and BBC’s status as the world leader will be damaged for good.

Please support our campaign. Please discuss it at your next chapel/branch meeting; let people know in your communities, especially those from other Asian sub-continent; invite us to your meeting. And write to World Service management expressing your concern and challenging the wisdom of their plan, which is really about cost cutting.

You can write to:
Nigel Chapman – Director BBC World (nigel.chapman@bbc.co.uk)
Richard Sambrook – Director Global news
Thomson – Director General BBC
Sir Michael Lyons – Chairman BBC Trust

David Miliband – Foreign Secretary
Ede House
143 Westoe Road
South Shields
NE33 3PD
Telephone
(0191) 456 8910
Email: milibandd@parliament.uk

Thank you for your help.
Arjum Wajid
MoC
NUJ South Asia Chapel

1. SATURDAY: MWAW activists’ meeting
2. Police use “terror” laws to attack journalists
3. MEETING: Racism, war and Muslims
4. George Bush in London, protest Sunday June 15
5. So wrong for so long: US newspapers and Iraq
6. Somalia: Hidden catastrophe, hidden agenda
7. Media coverage of Palestine and Israel
8. From Basra to Beirut: US is gunning for Iran
9. Join our campaign

1. SATURDAY: MWAW activists’ meeting

There will be an activists’ meeting of Media Workers Against the War to discuss campaigning priorities this Saturday (May 31) at 2pm in the Terrace Café, South Bank Centre (nearest tube: Waterloo, Embankment). We’ll sit outside if the sun shines…

Agenda items include the news blackout on Somalia, Alton’s editorship of the Indie, an autumn conference, MWAW media briefings, and lots more

All welcome! Please R.S.V.P. to this email or call Dave on 07801 789 297

2. Police use “terror” laws to attack journalists

Journalists face arrest, prosecution and even deportation under “anti-terror” laws that give police extensive new powers. The government is rushing to deport an Algerian editor after police seized him for downloading a document from a US government website. The case follows the ongoing attempt by police to force a leading journalist to hand over notes from interviews with a former Islamist.

Read the full article here: www.mwaw.net/2008/05/28/terrorlaws

3. MEETING: Racism, the war on terror and the Muslim community

The War on terror has been accompanied by a rise in racism targeted at Muslims. Stop the War are hosting a series of meetings across the country with high profile speakers.

London meeting: Tuesday June 3, 7.30pm

With speakers:
Moazzam Begg, George Galloway MP, Anas Al-Tikriti, Lindsey german, Louise Christian, David Edgar

Bishopsgate Institute
230 Bishopsgate EC2M
www.bishopsgate.org.uk
Nearest tube: Liverpool Street

Called by: Stop the War Coalition www.stopwar.org.uk

4. Bush in London protest

War criminal George Bush will be visiting Britain on Sunday 15 June. No doubt he will receive a sycophantic welcome from Gordon Brown. The anti-war majority, however, will recall the hundreds of thousands who have died, the millions driven from their homes and the utter devastation resulting from the illegal attacks on Iraq and Afghanistan.

Stop the War will be organising a protest in London on that Sunday. For details, watch this space: www.stopwar.org.uk

5. So wrong for so long: US newspapers and Iraq

For the first time a mainstream editor – who just happens also to be a professional media-watcher – has written a book attacking the Iraq war coverage by the US corporate press.

Read the full article here: www.mwaw.net/2008/05/23/mitchell

6. Somalia: Hidden catastrophe, hidden agenda

Media Lens has a very useful summary of the realities underlying Bush’s war of terror on Somalia and the media’s failure to report it. It demonstrates how the government’s strategic silence on the proxy “war on terror” being fought in Somalia is reflected in press reporting:

Read the analysis here: http://tinyurl.com/6z8saz

7. Media coverage of Palestine and Israel

Arab Media Watch has compiled a study on the different language used to describe Israeli and Palestinian deaths. It shows that Israeli deaths are afforded strong, emotive adjectives, while Palestinian fatalities are reported in a much more sanitised, measured way.

View the full report here: http://tinyurl.com/4545nf

8. From Basra to Beirut: US is gunning for Iran

Robert Fisk sees the recent eruption of conflict in Beirut as a “proxy” war between Washington and Tehran. Add this observation to US recent accusation that Hezbollah is training Iraqi militants in Iran, and the American military’s promised dossier on Iran’s role in the Iraq war, and we can see that the old drumbeat of war on Iran is growing louder again.

Read the full article here: www.mwaw.net/2008/05/21/iran

9. Join us!

Join Media Workers Against the War to help us campaign for fair coverage of the “war on terror” and troops out of Iraq and Afghanistan.

Who we are: www.mwaw.net/about

Download a standing order form – a few pounds a month would be a huge boost to our campaign:

http://mwaw.net/standingorder.pdf

Mitchell’s writing shows what comment should really look like – in contrast to the shallow hand-wringing that often passes for op-eds and editorials on Iraq in the British press. From the very start of the invasion he has raged at the media’s triumphalism and its downplaying of the loss of life. After Bush landed on an aircraft carrier on May 1, 2003, to declare “mission accomplished”, Mitchell slammed the New York Times’ coverage.

Four years later he was attacking the troop “surge” from the outset, condemning it as “a tragic escalation” of the conflict. When the US began blaming Iran for the mess, Mitchell wrote a column entitled: “We’ve been through this movie before”.

Over and over Mitchell comes back to the fact that a huge percentage of Americans believe Saddam Hussein was behind the 9/11 attacks – a terrible condemnation of the US media. On the third anniversary of the invasion he wrote that pundits who agitated for an attack on Iraq should be “on their knees begging the American public for forgiveness”.

In one of his columns in April 2004 he made the first mentions of the deaths of US soldiers Casey Sheehan and Michael Mitchell – Casey’s mother and Michael’s father became prominent campaigners against the war. Another of Mitchell’s themes is suicides in the US army, the reasons for which he investigates to reveal the sheer awfulness confronting soldiers in Iraq. This has been largely ignored by the British media, although last year the Ministry of Defence disclosed that 17 serving personnel had killed themselves after witnessing the horrors of conflict in Iraq or Afghanistan.

Mitchell repeatedly castigates the refusal of newspaper editors to call for troops to be withdrawn, despite opinion polls showing this was a major, and even majority, opinion in the country. This changed fleetingly with a Los Angeles Times editorial in May 2007 entitled “Bring Them Home“, stating “The time has come to leave.” Two months later the New York Times stated boldly: “It is time for the United States to leave Iraq”.

Even the best of the British newspapers, however, evade the issue of getting the troops out. In leader columns to mark the fifth anniversary of invasion in March, only one British national newspaper talked about British and American troops leaving Iraq, but even then the Guardian said merely that it was “time to listen” to Iraqi opinion, calling on the next US president to “set a date” for withdrawal and talking about the “gains” made by presence of British troops. The Independent published a blistering attack on the war, but sadly evaded the question of troops. Otherwise:

• The Murdoch papers praised the troops’ presence;
• The FT said Iraq should be broken up;
• The Telegraph attacked Obama for being “dangerously naive” to talk about ending the occupation
• The Sunday Telegraph published an op-ed by Richard Perle (!);
• And the Observer in an extraordinary editorial called for more military intervention around the world.

It’s important to note, however, that Mitchell’s core argument is for better journalism, not “anti-war journalism”. He writes: “Most of those against the war did not ask for a media ‘crusade’ against invasion, merely that the press stick to the facts and provide a balanced assessment: in other words, that [journalists do their] minimum journalistic duty.”

Mitchell’s book is also hugely witty and entertaining: for a taste of this, see his recent column on an evening of satire at a White House dinner for journalists.

Remember, you read it here first – the British media have so far ignored the book.

Hilary Clinton’s shocking comment that the US would “obliterate” Iran if it should “foolishly consider” launching an attack on Israel is pandering to a broad constituency that wants to hear tough rhetoric about Iran. Clinton stood by her remarks this month: “I don’t think it’s time to equivocate. [Iran has] to know they would face massive retaliation. That is the only way to rein them in.”

Clinton has added to the chorus of neocon voices seeking an excuse to bomb Iran, including major media outlets. A disgraceful Washington Post editorial on April 13 talked of Iran as “a growing menace that the Bush administration, and its successor, cannot afford to ignore”. In Britain, the appropriately named Con Coughlin, the Telegraph’s political editor, is once again publishing British and US military reports on Iran’s “lethal meddling on the battlefields of the war on terror”, under the headline: “Why the West moves closer to bombing Iran“.

But it’s not all going the neo-cons’ way. In the first week of May the US faced major embarrassment when a cache of supposedly Iranian weapons seized in the Shiite holy city of Karbala turned out to be no such thing. The US military had just taken the word for it of local Karbala police. In fact, the US and Iran are on the same side in southern Iraq, both fearful of the Sadr resistance. Even the Iraqi government has distanced itself from the US talk of conflict with Iran.

The website Spinwatch has started an extremely useful blog by the retired US air force colonel Sam Gardiner which aims to follow the media’s twists and turns on Iran. Gardiner has performed extensive analysis of the media coverage before the war on Iraq, during the war and during the occupation as well as of the statements of Administration officials.

So don’t just watch this space for alerts on warmongering towards Iran – watch Gardiner’s too.

Evan Davis, Today’s new presenter, introduced a section on Basra on May 2 which opened with an resident of Basra describing Moqtada Sadr’s Mahdi Army as “very ill-educated, basically criminals” and welcoming the renewed invasion by western forces. Davis then turned to Major General Barney White-Spunner, the UK’s senior officer in Iraq: “So it sounds like fairly good news from Basra?”

“That’s certainly our view,” White-Spunner replied. Davis pressed for more good news: “Are the gains sustainable, I suppose is the question isn’t it? Or do you think if you don’t get to mend the sewers very well people are going to become discontented again and we’ll start getting back to more street disorder?”

White-Spunner took his cue and talked unchallenged about the “excellent work” UK troops were doing, about “development”, “aid distribution”, “humanitarian work”, “sensitivity” to local needs and so on. The interview was almost as cosy as editorial meetings of The Field magazine or Baily’s Hunting Directory, where White-Spunner works when not occupying foreign lands.

Meanwhile, Iraqi government troops were parading the bodies of dead Mahdi fighters like trophies and beating up prisoners. On the same day as White-Spunner’s Radio 4 interview a huge crowd of Shia Muslims protested against Iraq’s US-backed prime minister al-Maliki in Baghdad’s Sadr City, urging him to end the bloody confrontation with the Mahdi Army. Since late March, there has been a surge of air strikes in Iraq: the military has fired more than 200 Hellfire missiles in the capital, compared with just six fired in the previous three months.

The British media routinely portrays supporters of Moqtada Sadr as “militia”, “extremists”, “men in black”, “rogue gunmen” and “death squads”. Yet, up until last September, Moqtada Sadr’s group was part of the Iraqi government. The US offensive has relied heavily on the Iran-backed Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council, many members of the armed wing of which, the Badr Organisation, have been battling the Sadr-led resistance.

The US demonises the Mahdi Army because Sadr is resolutely opposed to the occupation. Moreover, many Shia view the Mahdi in part as a charitable organisation and are often grateful for the security it provides. Sadr’s organisation gives money to families of Shia dead and injured, resettles displaced families and offers funds for any victim of American weapons in Sadr City. Evoking comparisons with Hezbollah, Sadr’s movement “has established itself as the main service provider in the country,” says a recent report by Refugees International. Every month the Mahdi army distributes rations of rice, cooking oil, sugar, tea and other staples, much of it provided by the Iraqi Red Crescent, to thousands of Baghdad’s poorest families.

As the Financial Times put it last month, the clashes between the government and the Mahdi army reveal a class division at the heart of the Shia community. Sadr represents the angry, dispossessed Shia masses of Iraq who suffered under Saddam. “What we’ve seen over the past few weeks is a real class struggle open up with no political means for bridging the gap,” the International Crisis Group told the FT. “Sadr’s followers don’t care if he’s an ayatollah or not. They just want him to win for them the wealth and prosperity they feel should be theirs,” a US official told the paper.

The British media’s last line of attack is that British troops are defending women’s rights. But abuse of women was widespread in Basra before the British were driven out of the city last autumn. The US-backed government has brought right-wing Islamists to power, unleashing attacks against women.

The resistance in battling the occupation. But for the BBC’s flagship news programme our boys are just doing good, building sewers and helping reconstruction. This is far from the case – the British and US armies are building a sewer of bloodshed and sectarian hatred in Iraq.

But why the deafening silence in the British media? The release of Bilal Hussein, a member of the AP team that won a Pulitzer Prize for photography in 2005, held without charge in Iraq for two years, went almost entirely unnoticed. When the British journalist Richard Butler was mercifully freed after in Iraq for two months, his rescue was given widespread coverage.

When the BBC’s Alan Johnston was held in Gaza last year, there were calls from throughout the international press and political community for his release. One of those appeals came from Sami Al-Haj, who imprisoned without charge in Guantánamo since June 2002 after being seized on his way to Afghanistan the previous December to work on an assignment.

Johnston responded to Al-Haj’s plight by writing an open letter in support of a fair trial; the ex-BBC documentary journalist Rageh Omaar also spoke out about him. However, unlike Johnston, this Sudanese-born journalist, received little sustained support or coverage from his colleagues in the media. This is despite the fact that he is the only journalist in Guantánamo and he was offered no opportunity to refute the US government’s charge of being an “enemy combatant”. Rageh Omaar, speaking to Guardian journalists in January 2008, said: “If you look at the response to the kidnapping of Alan Johnston in Gaza and compare it to the over-whelming, deafening silence in Sami’s case, it’s completely shaken my confidence in the notion of journalistic solidarity.”

From January 7, 2007, until his release al-Haj was on a hunger strike to secure his liberty or a free and fair trial. He was force-fed through tubes into his stomach, his weight plummeted and health deteriorated, with reports of poor sight, heart and kidney problems. Al-Haj’s supporters also claimed he suffered physical and mental abuse, including the withdrawal of medication.

The evidence against al-Haj has never been presented in public. Some see his imprisonment as part of a wider US campaign against al-Jazeera itself. His brother Asim al-Haj, speaking to Democracy Now in January 2008, said: “Sami al-Haj is a victim of a political operation against al-Jazeera, which Washington does not approve of. And as evidence of this is the fact that he was interrogated 130 times. And during these times, the interrogations were all about al-Jazeera and alleged relations between al-Jazeera and al-Qaeda.”

Al-Haj’s British lawyer, Clive Stafford Smith, director of legal action charity Reprieve, also believed this to be the case and confirmed that virtually all Sami’s interrogations were an attempt to “prove” a link between al-Jazeera and al-Qaeda. He also said al-Haj told him he had been offered release if he was prepared to spy on his colleagues at al-Jazeera. On Sami’s release, his lawyer told the BBC: “We’ve disproved everything they threw at him.”

Reprieve also released two sketches by the political cartoonist Lewis Peake, based on drawings which al-Haj himself made of his experiences inside Guantánamo. The most recent showed a skeleton strapped to a gurney and indicates al-Haj’s own horrendous experience of the camp hospital.

Dozens of journalists – mostly Iraqis – have been detained by US troops over the last three years, according to the Committee for the Protection of Journalists. While most have been released after short periods, in at least eight cases documented by CPJ Iraqi journalists have been held by US forces for weeks or months without charge. Several of the detainees were photojournalists who initially drew the military’s attention because of what they had filmed or photographed.

Journalists continue to be targeted, by the US and by their puppet regimes in Iraq and Afghanistan.

In February, Afghan journalism student Pervez Kambaksh was arrested for distributing a pamphlet about women’s rights, tried and sentenced to death without a defence lawyer, in a closed court. The Independent’s defence and diplomatic correspondent Kim Sengupta wrote to MWAW this week about his plight:

“Pervez has been transferred from Mazar to a prison in Kabul where, according to the authorities, he is being kept in solitary confinement for his own safety. As far as prison conditions are concerned, he was better off in Mazar where he could mix with other prisoners and had the protection of the fairly enlightened head of prisons for northern Afghanistan, Gen Taj Mohammed. There are still no definite dates for his appeal.”

Add your name to the Independents petition to free Pervez Kambaksh here:
www.independent.co.uk/pervez

Maddy Ryle

Click here for high quality recording by Middle East Panorama

Dahr Jamail was an independent journalist in Iraq and is author of “Beyond the Green Zone“

Nick Davies is an award-winning Guardian journalist and author of “Flat Earth News“

Kim Sengupta is defence and diplomatic correspondent, the Independent

Lindsey German is national convenor, Stop the War Coalition

Full details of the event here

Alton was a crusader for the invasion of Iraq. As Johann Hari, who himself backed the invasion at the time, put it on the eve of the war: “There is now a considerable school of British centre-left thinkers and commentators who are lobbying hard for war, so that the Iraqi people can be freed: Christopher Hitchens, Nick Cohen, John Lloyd, Julie Burchill, Roger Alton and David Aaronovitch.”

In other words, Alton was up there with the worst of British journalists in terms of craven support of Bush and Blair and contempt for the anti-war case.

Hari’s observation is backed up by Nick Davies, who discovered that Alton had an intimate lunch with Blair in autumn 2002 “from which, according to colleagues, Alton returned full of determined support for the campaign against Saddam”. With the Observer’s home affairs correspondent David Rose being fed “sheer disinformation” by MI6, and its political editor Kamal Ahmed deep in Alastair Campbell’s pocket, readers of Alton’s newspaper were, as Davies catalogues in some detail, “slowly soaked in disinformation” about Iraq.

Yet Alton carried on with his support for the invasion. When columnist Richard Ingrams quit the paper in 2005, he insisted that the Observer’s stance on Iraq was damaging the paper: “It’s particularly noticeable on the whole Iraq issue. In the Indie, you had a very strong attack on the whole thing from the beginning. But The Observer’s got it wrong about Iraq, which goes on and on, and you’re clobbered by that unless you get up and say: ‘We got it wrong’.”

Ingrams was right that the gap between the Observer and the Independent was huge.

On the day after the Hutton report came out in January 2004, the Independent produced a totally white front page with a one-word headline: “WHITEWASH”. In Blair’s last major public speech as prime minister, he attacked the Independent, after which the paper splashed with: “Would you be saying this, Mr Blair, if we supported your war in Iraq?” Beneath that headline, the paper’s editor Simon Kelner hit back brilliantly at Blair:

“After 10 years of the Blair administration, a decade of spin and counter-spin, of dodgy dossiers, of 45-minute warnings, of burying bad news, of manipulation and misinformation, we feel that the need to interpret and comment upon the official version of events is more important than ever.”

Kelner saw it as a “badge of honour” to be singled out by Blair.

Will Alton take a similarly brave and principled stand against Gordon Brown and George Bush? It is enough just to ask the question to see what an absurd proposition that is. But if you need more proof, here it is from the horse’s mouth.

Alton on Blair: “Blair is fucking good.“

And again: “I think he’s a very good prime minister and an exceptional politician who will be much missed when he’s gone. Some of the hostility to him is quite baffling. I just can’t understand it. It doesn’t logically relate to things.”

Alton on editorial priorities: “Absolutely have your environmental horrors in Sudan, but you might put it on page four. On page three you might well have, as we did, inside Sven’s five-star England football World Cup love nest — just because it’s more visual.”

On the prosecution of BNP leader Nick Griffin: “ludicrous… should never have been brought”.

On Kamal Ahmed: “Kamal is one of the best journalists I have ever worked with and of the highest integrity, so if anybody impinges his integrity I’ll go and punch his fucking face in.”

What Alton’s editorship of the Independent means is this.

Every pro-war editor will feel safer in his or her job, and more confident in their editorial line. Piers Morgan and Greg Dyke, sacked over Iraq, are still in the news media wilderness. But Alton has taken over the Indie. The message couldn’t be clearer.

Every other editor will feel under even more pressure to give in to the dominant pro-war assumptions: our leaders’ intentions in the “war on terror” are noble; Iraq is yesterday’s story and our audience doesn’t want to hear about it; the anti-war movement is beyond the pale, an unrepresentative rump that is stuck in a rut.

Every journalist will feel it that more difficult to stand out against the notion that the Iraq WMD fiasco is behind us, we can carry on as if nothing had happened.

Alton’s appointment at the Indie is a disgrace. The anti-war movement should watch closely what happens to the paper and be ready to mobilise against Alton in support of the Indie journalists who have made their paper the conscience of the British media.

With speakers:

Dahr Jamail, independent journalist in Iraq and author of “Beyond the Green Zone“

Nick Davies, award-winning Guardian journalist and author of “Flat Earth News“

Kim Sengupta, defence and diplomatic correspondent, the Independent

Lindsey German, national convenor, Stop the War Coalition

Venue: The Old Lecture Theatre, University of Westminster, 309 Regent Street (2 mins from Oxford Circus)

Date and time: Thursday April 10, 7pm

Called by: Media Workers Against the War

Tickets: £5, £3 (concessions)

On April 9, 2003, Baghdad “fell” to US troops. The event was welcomed by a torrent of gushing media coverage. When Saddam’s statue was toppled that day in Firdoz Square, the British media unleashed a string of superlatives. But Robert Fisk called it “the most staged photo-opportunity since Iwo Jima“.
Five years on, we have to say: the media have hardly changed in the way they lap up propaganda from the military and the government. The collusion of senior media editors in the blackout on Prince Harry in Helmand last month gave the military a propaganda coup, boosting the notion that Britain is fighting a glamorous and just war.

This event will ask how this has happened and how we can change the situation.

Buy your ticket for this event now:

For more information, email info@mwaw.net

Background information on Dahr Jamail:

Chemical weapons in Fallujah: How he broke the story

“I have interviewed many refugees over the last week coming out of Fallujah at different times from different locations within the city. The consistent stories that I have been getting have been refugees describing phosphorus weapons, horribly burned bodies, fires that burn on people when they touch these weapons, and they are unable to extinguish the fires even after dumping large amounts of water on the people.”

Dahr Jamail on Democracy Now, Nov 29, 2004

His new book: What the reviewers said

Beyond the Green Zone:
Dispatches from an Unembedded Journalist in Occupied Iraq
www.beyondthegreenzone.org

“While so much reporting from Iraq has remained embedded and wrong, Dahr Jamail’s courageous truth-telling from the frontline has been a beacon.”
John Pilger

“Essential for anybody who wants to know what is really happening in Iraq. A book which reports what Iraqis endure and what has happened to them during the occupation.”
Patrick Cockburn, foreign correspondent, The Independent, author, The Occupation

“From the earliest days of the war, Jamail has been a human conduit for the voices of Iraqis living under U.S. occupation. In the face of tremendous personal risk, his commitment to the crucial, principled task of bearing witness has never wavered, and this extraordinary book is the result.”
Naomi Klein, author, The Shock Doctrine and No Logo

“What is chilling about Jamail’s accounts is the routine destructiveness of the US forces; how they demolish nearby homes after a roadside bomb, leave unexploded munitions in the fields of farmers who don’t give information, bulldoze orchards. Livelihoods destroyed, families displaced every day, incubating hatred. One of the worst episodes occurred when Jamail’s friend was caught by chance at prayer time in a mosque when worshippers were shot dead, with children trapped in the mayhem: a holy place desecrated in a US operation. We may know nothing of such routine details of the prosecution of this war, but these are the stories filling the Arabic media.”
Madeleine Bunting in the Guardian

The London demonstration on Saturday March 15 will surround Parliament to remind our political leaders that their continuing collaboration with George W. Bush and his illegal wars has not been forgotten.

There will be more than 300 demonstrations worldwide against the occupation of Iraq. These include a march in Basra. A full list can be found at www.worldagainstwar.org

David Crouch, chair of Media Workers Against the War, said:

“Every survey of public opinion has shown that the Stop the War Coalition has consistently represented majority opinion in this country on the vital issues of war and peace ever since the initial attack on Iraq.

“Despite politicians’ decision to ignore public opinion, including the extraordinary London demonstration of 1.5m people in February 2003, the Stop the War movement has continued to organise protests far bigger, more inclusive and representative than anything this country has ever seen.

“We therefore ask journalists in print, radio and TV that today’s demonstration be fully and fairly reported.

“If public opinion continues to be ignored the result will be measured in yet more death and destruction – and public cynicism about the media and politics.”

Press contact: 07801 789 297

Notes for editors:

Media Workers Against the War is a group of media professionals who campaign for fair reporting of the “war on terror”. More info: www.mwaw.net

For details of today’s (Saturday) London demonstration, go to www.stopwar.org.uk or call 07801 789 297

The collusion of senior media editors in the blackout on Prince Harry in Helmand reveals how specious this argument is. Rather than questioning the government’s war in Afghanistan, the media’s proprietors and controllers conspired to give the military a propaganda coup, boosting the notion that Britain is fighting a glamorous and just war.

As a result, more young men will join the army to fight: “They have just used Harry as propaganda to promote and glorify a war which, in the end, is going to be found to be a terrible mistake,” said Anthony Philippson, whose soldier son James died in Afghanistan.

As a result, thousands more Afghanis will die, blown to pieces by bombs from the same air strikes directed by the Prince on his “Kill TV”.

Eighteen months ago the MoD faced a potential revolt in the army. General Sir Richard Dannatt told the Mail that Britain faced losing the war in Afghanistan. The MoD lashed out Blair’s favourite scapegoat for the problems – the media – and launched a campaign to regain the media initiative.

First the MoD banned ITN from embedding reporters with troops. Then it allowed the 15 military personnel captured by Iran to sell their stories to the press. And it banned soldiers from blogging and speaking in public. By the end of last year the MoD had succeeded in re-imposing strict censorship on the media in Afghanistan.

Now senior editors have handed the military establishment a gem. As Peter Wilby has explained, the Prince Harry story “was a PR stunt, from beginning to end”. By lapping it up, editors “dealt another blow to genuinely independent journalism and to the long-term credibility of the media”.

It is a grim irony that, as the Harry story flooded through the media last week, the government gagged the former SAS soldier Ben Griffin, preventing him from speaking out about UK involvement in illegal renditions.

For some well-known journalists, this stuck in the craw. Jon Snow of Channel 4 News asked some probing and critical questions about the media’s collusion on Harry. As a result, however, Snow became the target of a concerted campaign of “flak” in the Mail, Telegraph, Telegraph again, Evening Standard, and the Times, including accusations that he is “left-wing” and “unpatriotic”.

If you haven’t done so already, please write to Channel 4 News – email news@channel4.com – to back Jon Snow’s independent and professional journalism.

digg it

The Sunday Times is preparing to sue Davies for libel, as reportedly is the Observer’s former political editor. One executive editor has threatened to punch him in the face, while another has promised to bankrupt him. Another has tried to smear him with a made-up story about his private life.

More importantly, the media’s big guns have been wheeled out to rubbish the book in the crudest terms. As Davies himself wrote to the Times last week: “I am discovering what it is like to be on the receiving end of the press.”

Editors, former editors, managing editors, media professors – a string of top media people have come out to attack the book’s central observation that that the modern media are churning out PR to make money, leaving them wide open to manipulation by the rich, the powerful and the warmongers.

Moreover, the more subtle commentators on the right are trying to claim the book as their own. So John Lloyd of the Financial Times says that Flat Earth News merely shows how cynical journalism has become, repeating his Blairite mantra that “comment” is “papering over the cracks down which facts and investigation have disappeared”. There is a whiff off this attempt to co-opt Davies for the right in the Spectator’s review of his book.

You can follow the story in detail on the Press Gazette’s excellent blog, where you will also find a few insightful and sympathetic reviews.

Davies has replied to some of the attacks here and here. He writes: “What’s wonderful, of course, is the irony of seeing senior journalists attacking the book by reproducing precisely the kind of falsehood and distortion which it attempts to expose.”

This campaign by the media elite is so obviously self-serving – no editor of a national newspaper or broadcaster is going to admit that his or her product is a sham. It is striking how none of the critiques of Flat Earth News take up Davies’ points about media ownership and the crucial role of Murdoch in crushing the media trade unions at Wapping in 1986.

But Davies has taken on a powerful and ruthless establishment. Anti-war media workers must give him every support. As Davies explains on page 1 of his book, his research “started with a single, notorious story – the long and twisted saga of the weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. … It’s about everything I found when I started trying to explain how we managed to do so badly in covering what is probably the biggest single story of our era.”

Disgust with the “war on terror” runs right through this book. The anti-war movement must get behind its author.

Email him here: www.flatearthnews.net/contact

Please copy your emails to Media Workers Against the War: info@mwaw.net, or post them in the comment section below.

What are the basic facts behind the Muslim-baiting?

1. Most British Muslims do not demand Sharia law.

• Muslim Council of Britain: “We do not wish to see a parallel system or a separate system of judiciary for Muslims.”
• Shaista Gohir, government adviser: “The majority of Muslims do not want it. Many Muslim commentators and the media are wrongly assuming that all Muslims want Sharia law in the UK.”

2. What British Muslims want is for the UK, US and Israel to end their bloody occupations of Muslim countries.

3. They want an end to the racism against British Muslims, who are overwhelmingly dark-skinned.

4. A 2004 ICM poll found 61% of British Muslims might support Sharia courts being introduced in Britain, but only to resolve civil cases within the Muslim community, and only so long as the penalties did not contravene British law.

5. Archbishop Rowan Williams argued for “a delegation of certain legal functions to the religious courts of a community”, not for an extensive parallel legal system. The aspects of Sharia being considered by Williams are restricted to matters of family and finance law, i.e. civil matters. No one is suggesting introducing an Islamic penal code.

6. Religious courts already operate in this country for Orthodox Jews. Why shouldn’t Muslims enjoy the same right?

7. Sharia courts also operate in the UK, although without official recognition and concentrating only on mundane issues such as inheritance and divorce. Many British Muslims are already married under Sharia law, eat meat slaughtered by it, and bank according to it.

8. The UK is already amending its finance laws to allow Sharia-compliant products such as halal mortgages and Islamic bonds, in part to attract billions of petro-dollars from the cash-rich Gulf.

9. Ontario, Canada, for 15 years had a system of “faith based arbitration” whereby family issues such as inheritance and property division could be adjudicated by religious authorities. In 2005 Ontario’s attorney general reviewed how the system worked for Muslims and “did not find any evidence to suggest that women are being systematically discriminated against as a result of arbitration of family law issues”.

10. Criticism of Islam segues effortlessly with prejudice against black immigrants. “Niggers out” no longer wins many votes, but Muslim-bashing presses the same political buttons. For our rulers, Islam is a doubly-convenient scapegoat for resistance to the West’s “war on terror”. Any discussion of Islam today is therefore a discussion about war and about racism. By ignoring this basic fact the media join hands with the racists and the warmongers.

For the latest, see the excellent resource islamophobia-watch.com

1. “We don’t want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud.”
In September 2002, Rice lies to the world about the Iraqi nuclear “threat”.

2. 9/11 – an “opportunity” for US imperialism
In the days after 9/11, between public displays of grief Rice rounded up senior staff of the National Security Council and asked them to think about “how do you capitalise on these opportunities” to fundamentally change American doctrine and the shape of the world.

3. Ignored 9/11 advanced warnings from CIA
July 2001: CIA director George Tenet knew of the increasing likelihood that al-Qaeda would soon attack the US. The case was so compelling he met Rice, then national security adviser, to demand action. Rice gave him the brush-off.

4. Bush’s closest adviser on the “war on terror”
“During the last four years I’ve relied on her counsel, benefited from her great experience, and appreciated her sound and steady judgment,” says Bush in November 2004.

5. Iraq “was worth it”
December 2006: Rice defends the invasion as eight US marines are charged with a massacre in Haditha.

6. “I know we’ve made tactical errors – thousands of them, I’m sure.”
March 2006: Rice drops her guard on Iraq.

7. The SS Condoleezza Rice
So close to the oil industry she had an oil tanker named after her.

8. Backs bloody crackdown in Uzbekistan
May 2005: Rice refused to censure Uzbekistan over the massacre of hundreds of protestors in Andijan. Uzbek dictator Karimov had allowed the US a military base on the Afghan border.

9. Rejects negotiations with Iran
2003: Iran puts everything was on the negotiating table, including full cooperation on nuclear programs, acceptance of Israel and the termination of Iranian support for Palestinian militant groups. But national security adviser Rice rejects the initiative.

10. Brings back Wolfowitz
January 2008: Rice appoints Paul Wolfowitz to head a State Department arms-control panel. Wolfowitz, the No. 2 official in the Pentagon under Rumsfeld and a key architect of the Iraq war, was ousted last summer as president of the World Bank for giving his lover a well-paid job.

I know we’re here to talk about other things, but all of you know how much the NUJ and many people in this room did with regard to the campaign to secure my freedom last year. I’ve tried to express my gratitude for that in many ways since I have been freed, but I’ll say once more time here that I am immensely grateful it was hugely important, and I am really in the debt of anyone who took part n that campaign in any way.

Moving on to the matters of today, I often think back to a perfect evening in Cairo in the months before 9/11. I remember being at a small gathering of journalists at a big old villa near the Nile and chatting on the lawn to two of my colleagues, Frank Gardner and the former Baghdad correspondent Caroline Horley. Of course all 3 of us were fascinated by the middle east and everything that happens there. That evening we couldn’t know that in the years ahead each of us would be touched very personally by the violence and the rising rage in the Arab world.

As many of you know in 2004 Frank Gardner was chased and gunned down by Islamist militants in the streets of Riyadh and suffered the most appalling injuries. Soon afterwards Caroline was having dinner in a hotel in Jordan when a suicide bomber walked in. In the room above here an entire Palestinian wedding party was devastated and Caroline saw things that I know will stay with her all her life on that night. And of course last year I was kidnapped in Gaza by the Army of Islam.

But at least we three survived. Frank’s cameraman Simon Cumbers lies buried in Ireland and my colleague Kate Peyton was shot dead in Mogadishu. If you look at each of those incidents you can begin to see a rather obvious pattern. Frank and Simon weren’t trying to make contact with Jihadis when they were attacked. They were on the edge of a rougher part of town but they were only filming in the street. Caroline of course was just having dinner. I was driving home when I was ambushed. None of us were looking for trouble at the time, we were targeted because we were westerners or we were in a place linked with westerners.

On the first night of my kidnap in the one face to face conversation I had with the leader of the gang that was holding me he asked me if I was, as he put it, a crusader like George Bush. I said I didn’t feel that I was, that the average crusader wouldn’t have chosen to spend the previous three years telling the stories of the refugee camps of Gaza. But I saw his remark like this. There are unfortunately some people in the west who regard all Arabs as terrorists or potential terrorists and the leader of my kidnapers was a kind of mirror image of that, he saw all westerners as crusaders or potential crusaders.

Those blanket, dehumanising assessments of the other camp are very much part of the current confrontation between the east and the west and perhaps those sorts of views are part of what accounts for the continued captivity of our colleague Sami al-Haj, the Al-Jazeera cameraman who has been held in Guantanamo Bay for some 5 years without trial.

Just the week before last we saw a bomb in the only decent hotel in Kabul killing a Norwegian colleague and afterwards the Taliban said all westerners would be targeted anywhere in the city and the country.

For a long time we have, rightly, put great faith in the argument that as journalists we ought somehow to be immune, that we are non-combatants, merely observers there to try to explain what’s happening and that our work will in the end be to the benefit of some sort of justice

Again and again journalists in the hands of dangerous men at checkpoints or on frontlines around the world have reached for that very reasonable defence. God knows it hasn’t always worked, and at times it has felt very tenuous indeed, I know that myself. But you feel that in recent years the power of our great argument has been eroding. And in some places now it means very little indeed. I can tell you that on the night of March 12, the first night of my captivity in that cell in Gaza, I made our argument for myself and it counted for nothing. The leader of the Army of Gaza said I had made a nice speech but it would not set me free.

All this has an impact on how and what and where we can report. The BBC was the only western media outfit to have a correspondent based permanently in Gaza. But what happened to me convulsed the organisation. For a while it looked like I was dead and gone. And in the real world the BBC is now much more wary about sending people into Gaza. Just as dangers of similar kinds have restricted the way that w e can report in Somalia and Iraq, when you translate that across the board you see that of course other organisations make similar choices and generally much less gets exposed or written about in the most important places than we would all like.

In some ways technology has come to our aid in recent years. It is much easier now via the internet, mobile phones, satellite phones and so on to tap into the work of bloggers, local journalists and others in places like Iraq. If the traditional work of journalists from outside a warzone is more difficult to carry out we still here more readily now from local people living and breathing the conflict, and you might well argue that those kinds of people can anyway bring far more feel and insight into the realities of life in Baghdad than the likes of me ever could, and I absolutely accept that.

But I would still say that there is very much a place for the reporter from outside trying to play the role of a more neutral observer. I know there are limits to anyone’s capacity to claim to be neutral. I am a middle class westerner from a Judeo-Christian society. We all have baggage of that kind from our past and some of it is sometimes difficult to set aside however hard we try. But I think that those on one side or the other in any conflict can have their limitations when it comes to reporting the drama around them. Whether the average journalist in 1945 in this country would have been able to provide the most nuanced, balanced account of the decision to firebomb Dresden say, with all its moral implications, you might have been better to go to a more neutral journalist for that.

And anyway local journalists are in many parts of the world are under the most appalling pressures, often very much worse than those experienced by visiting reporters. Just look at the number of Iraqi journalists who have been killed in recent years. And although Gaza might be less violent in that respect, local reporters there are very conscious indeed of the sensitivities of covering the fight between Hamas and Fatah. They walk a kind of tightrope and it is easy to make very dangerous enemies.

So on many fronts we see the people of our professions struggling to do their job in the places where their work is most needed. So what do we do about it? The one thing that we must do through our newspapers and broadcasting channels is focus attention on it. Since being freed in Gaza I’ve become more aware of the amount of work that organisations like the NUJ, RSF, the CPJ, Amnesty and other do to raise the general awareness of the centrality of the importance of freedom of speech and the work of the media. We’d certainly be in a worse position if it hadn’t been for decades of effort of that kind, and that effort must of course go on.

But it is always going to be hard to make an impact on the ground, I’m talking here about reaching down to the level of the kind of people who really do the damage, the people who threaten or abduct or kill journalists. The angry or drunk soldier on a checkpoint, the party hardman or the extremist kidnapper. These are people who aren’t easily persuaded by reason and the wider moral picture. They move to different rhythms, motivated by ideology or money or the pursuit of power, in their narrow, brutal world.

There are no quick fixes. Sometimes the dangers only really pass with the coming of a degree of order, the coming of some kind of peace or justice. There were times I’m sure when it was very hard to do the best kind of journalism in South Africa, say. I’m sure there are challenges there still, but it is a place that has moved on to something better. And what we must hope is that in many still troubled places policies will change and reason will gradually prevail, even if progress of that kind is almost always painfully slow.

But unless the world’s decision makers or their electorates have a flow of information from places like Gaza and Iraq and Afghanistan and Somalia they won’t know the realities of the situations there, they won’t be equipped with the facts and the understanding that are the basis on which wise choices are made. Of course supplying those facts, providing that understanding, locally and internationally, is the job of us journalists. Our work may be harder and harder to do but it certainly does remain profoundly worth doing.

Background

Pre colonial and colonial Before the 1880s colonial scramble for Africa, Somalia, Muslim since the 9C, consisted of feudal fiefdoms and city coastal states with a well documented history. Colonial occupation and borders, as elsewhere in Africa, created bloodshed which has not since been assuaged. In particular, the Somali-speaking Ogaden region on Somalia’s western border was ’signed away’ by the British to Ethiopia (Abyssinia) in 1957 after 70 years of wheeling and dealing with feudal (clan) leaders.

Independence from both Italian and British colonists was won in 1960. In 1991, Somaliland, the ex-British colony bordering ex-French colony Djibouti, declared independence from the Somali Republic.

Somali is the majority language throughout the country, as Amharic is in Ethiopia. Somali-speaking people live in Kenya, as well as in Djibouti and Ethiopia.

Siad Barre and the Cold War Siad Barre, a military officer trained in the USSR, came to power in a coup in 1969 after the assassination of the elected president. He ensured that Somali was ascribed an orthography (Roman rather than Arabic) and became the medium of education, as opposed to Italian and English. He also established a one party state along Soviet block lines and conducted wide-scale repression of opposition groups. He relied on Soviet aid and advisors.

However, when he invaded the Ogaden region of Ethiopia in 1977, the USSR for strategic reasons switched their support to the Ethiopian dictator Mengistu who in 1974 had overthrown Haile Selassie, a US client. Barre then expelled Soviet advisors, imprisoned former party members – in the process exacerbating clan fractiousness – and accepted US patronage. The USSR and US had effectively swapped sides. Civil war and extreme and brutal repression ensued. Famine turned starvation into a WMD.

Barre visited the US in 1982 and made a military deal with the South African apartheid regime in 1984. The IMF and World Bank insisted on neo-liberal structural adjustment and progressively turned the screws on the Somali state and economy, at the same time as the US made use of military bases built by the USSR.

In 1991, Barre was overthrown and expelled from Mogadishu by General Mohamed Farrah Aidid, a former intelligence chief in Barre’s regime whom he had imprisoned for 6 years on suspicion of coup plotting.

Advent of ‘warlordism’ After Barre switched his allegiance to the US in 1977, many prominent government and party members were imprisoned or sacked. From 1984, the degeneration of the Somali state accelerated. Aidid and other former government members, now without access to state machinery and turned overnight into the opposition, consolidated their clan power bases instead.

Furthermore, prior to 1977, a mass literacy campaign had doubled up as an indoctrination programme into Soviet-style socialism. People could not overnight switch to US allegiance. Left without political direction, they identified instead with their families and clans.

The civil war was precisely the competition between the clan leaders – now called ‘war lords’ by the western media – for control of the country. Multinational arms companies threw fuel, M16 machine guns mostly, on the fire. After 1991, many Somalis who could raise the money began emigrating to the west.

Black Hawk Down 1993 By the time Operation Restore Hope utilising 30,000 US troops was authorised by George Bush Snr in November 1992, food had begun to reach famine-stricken regions. What were the real reasons for US (later UN but US-led) intervention? Academics argue that first, post-cold war US foreign policy was pioneering its global policing stance, which ignored national sovereignty.

Second, the US was seeking to establish a pro-western coalition government in Somalia to safeguard its oil interests. A number of oil companies, including Amoco, Chevron and Conoco, had secured drilling concessions from Barre. A cable from the US embassy in Mogadishu to the State Department, 21 March 1990, reads: “The first prerequisite will be that Somalia achieve internal peace. [President of Conoco Somalia, Raymond] Marchand explains to [Somali government] officials that if there is no peace, then neither Conoco nor anyone else will be able to get the oil out.”

Many Somalis were hostile to the troops because they identified the US with the hated Barre.

Nairobi and Dar es Salam US embassies bombed In August 1998, within five minutes of each other, bombs exploded in the US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. At least 80 people were killed and 1,700 injured, the majority Africans. Osamar Bin Laden was held responsible, Islamist ‘extremism’ now a US foreign policy concern. Kenya and Somalia share a border.

Transitional National Government and the 4.5 formula In August 2000, in Arta, Djibouti, a national reconciliation conference formed the Transitional National Government on the basis of the 4.5 formula: equal power sharing between the four largest clans, and the other five clans collectively having a 0.5 stake in government. The 2004 conference in Eldoret, Kenya, created the current Transitional Federal Government (TFG). Neither conference brought peace. Abdullahi Yusuf is the president of the TFG.

Union of Islamic Courts (ICU) The ICU won control of Mogadishu in June 2006 after a two month battle against the US-backed Alliance for the Restoration of Peace and Counter-Terrorism, consisting of war lords and their allies in the TFG. After Mogadishu fell to the ICU, Ethiopian troops started crossing the border into Somalia.
While individuals and militias in the ICU belong to clans, as do all Somalis, their administration sought a non-clan-based modus operandi. They brought some peace and stability to Mogadishu and southern Somalia. Citizens of Mogadishu no longer had to pay clan militias ‘taxes’ at ‘checkpoints’ on street junctions because the warlords had been disarmed; legal processes for the restitution of disputed land and property began. The ICU also opened all Somalia’s major ports. Diasporan Somalis began planning to return home.

Ethiopian invasion Ethiopian troops, backed by US personnel, intelligence and financing, had already invaded Somalia in June 2006. The ICU did not have equal military strength. In December 2006, the Ethiopians took Mogadishu and installed the TFG government there. The TFG government is also backed by the US. Initially the ICU retreated to the south of Somalia near the Kenyan border. Their militias are now among those resisting the Ethiopian occupation and the TFG, largely in Mogadishu.

The UN UN Security Council resolution 1725, 6 Dec 2006, authorised an African Union force to protect the TFG. It prohibited troops from any neighbouring country from joining that force. Neighbouring countries’ military intervention would be compromised by the many conflicts of interest in the region. Ethiopia’s military presence in Somalia is thus illegal. Resolution 1725 also lifted the arms embargo imposed on Somalia in 1992.
Mandated by UN Security Council resolution 1772, 20 Aug 2007, 1,600 African Union troops from Uganda and 100 (1,700 planned) from Burundi are now in Somalia.

Judith Amanthis

The Sunday Telegraph splashed the story on December 9, but after that it was buried by the papers. As a result, the British public knows almost nothing about the sheer scale of this massive assault, and the extent of the inevitable civilian casualties.

The fighting was intense. None other than Jeremy Clarkson witnessed it for the Sun newspaper: “At Camp Bastion I watched the Apache gunships lifting off with Hellfire missiles and rockets slung under their bellies. And half an hour later, they’d be back – empty. … The numbers are astonishing. Our troops have fired 12,000 artillery shells since June. And to put that in perspective, only 6,000 were used in the shock-and-awe invasion of Iraq. What’s more, in the last 15 months, infantry troops have got through 2.7 million rounds of ammunition. That is 6,000 – a day.”

Clarkson’s conclusion? This is “a bloody, horrible and pointless war, in hell”. Well said, Jeremy.

The only two sources of information we have about Musa Qala are journalists embedded with NATO troops, and the intrepid locals employed by the Institute of War and Peace Reporting.

Some embeds have done an amazing job – Nick Meo for the Times and Stephen Grey stand out. Here is Grey’s description of the fighting: “Embedded with a team of British troops and a detachment / ‘A–team’ of U.S. special forces, I watched the Taliban being pounded these last few days with overwhelming force – vapor trails circled in the clear blue sky over the Helmand desert as B1 and B52 bombers backed by A10 tank busters, F16s, Apache helicopters and Specter gunships were used to kill hundreds of Taliban fighters.

Apart from this and Nick Meo’s reports, you will find no other mention of B1s and B52s, the tank-busters, F16s and similar killing machines in the mainstream British media’s coverage of the assault on Musa Qala – not forgetting the use of Mirage 2000 combat fighters.

Almost all other reports in the mainstream media have relied on correspondents in Kabul, Islamabad and London, who have simply repeated MoD press releases. The worst was Richard Norton-Taylor in the Guardian, who reported that “troops were met by cheering locals“. Norton-Taylor was the only journalist to make this observation. Meo’s reports make clear what shameful nonsense this was.

It was truly comical the extent to which the print and broadcast media reported MoD lies. In the first days of the fighting it was widely reported that two senior Taliban commanders had been captured. The Telegraph, BBC, Metro, Times and Guardian carried this news, taken from the Reuters, AFP and UPI news wires. A few days later the Afghan government admitted this was rubbish.

At least the Telegraph bothered to report the Taliban’s reaction to the claim: “I am almost crying, I am laughing so much,” the Taliban’s chief spokesman Qari Yousef Ahmadi told the paper. “This is just lies. Do you think these are people who are easy to capture?”

On Monday December 10 the wires and mainstream websites were buzzing with the news that Musa Qala had fallen. But as the Telegraph reported two days later, “There was some initial confusion as the Afghan Defence Ministry announced that Musa Qala had been ‘completely captured’, while a UK military spokesman later claimed there had been a misunderstanding in translation, and that forces remained on the outskirts of the town.”

These reports echo the “good news” reporting that accompanied the first days of the invasion of Iraq, much of which turned out to be false. Just as the announcement of an “uprising” in Basra in March 2003 in was timed for the main evening new bulletins, so was the good news from Musa Qala timed for Gordon Brown’s arrival in Helmand on December 10.

From the IWPR, however, we see a very different picture of what happened. Musa Qala is not likely to be a death blow to the resistance. The renewed fighting, with the attendant displacement of families and damage to property, may in fact further inflame local passions against the Afghan government and its foreign allies, in whim the locals’ trust seems to have reached an all-time low.

Thousands of families fled their homes in Musa Qala and are in need of help, especially given the cold winter weather, the IWPR reported. Interviews with people from the district reflected the terror caused by the battle. “I swear I will never forget my little daughter’s screams,” said Zmarai, from the village of Chenai. “She was scared to death of the bombs. There was blood coming out of my son’s ears. I just want one side or the other to control Musa Qala. The government or the Taleban – I don’t care.”

IWPR received several reports from Musa Qala of collapsed buildings, dead bodies that cannot be moved because of the fighting, and civilians caught in the crossfire. Many people mentioned a figure of 40 dead, but this has yet to be substantiated.

“Every single place has been bombed,” said Mohammad Gul, a resident of Toughi village. “I cannot go out, so I don’t know how many people are dead. But a missile landed on my neighbour’s house, killing his five-year-old daughter and his cow.”

“The past five days have been hell,” said another Musa Qala resident. “There has been bombing and more bombing. People are terrified.” The centre of town was closed down, he added, with people afraid to leave their homes, even to obtain basic necessities like food and water. “A neighbourhood called Nabo Aka near the main mosque in Musa Qala was bombed, and 28 civilians were killed just there,” he said. “But the bodies are still lying under the rubble. There were women and children among them, but no Taleban.”

Hajji Ghulam Mohammad, also from Musa Qala, told the IWPR, “The governor promised that he would take the district peacefully. Well, where is he now? The ANA and NATO are bombing us, they are pounding us with artillery. This is not the way to defeat the Taleban. Instead, everybody becomes a Taleb. Please, tell the government that if they want to capture Musa Qala, they have to stop killing innocent people. Otherwise, the civilians will just join forces with the Taleban.”

In the week after the Musa Qala assault, the Telegraph was alone of the UK media to report claims of an atrocity by western troops nearby in Helmand province. The British Army says it is “taking seriously” claims that children were shot and several adult villagers had their throats cut during a secret military operation by unidentified forces in Helmand province, the paper reported. The alleged Nov 18 mission in the village of Toube reportedly involved Afghans and unspecified foreign soldiers.

The IWPR confirms the story, which was echoed by dozens of villagers from Toube whom IWPR interviewed as they underwent treatment in Lashkar Gah or accompanied injured relatives there. All spoke consistently of soldiers breaking down doors, shooting children and cutting throats. They agreed that the raid began at two in the morning with the sound of helicopters bringing in dozens of armed men, both Afghan and foreign.

The question is, why has the huge operation at Musa Qala, and the events leading up to it, been so poorly covered by the media?

Martin Bell says that “now the political commissars appear to be in charge”. He notes that, when a reporter and cameraman for Panorama filmed a recent battle in Afghanistan, they were obliged to have with them a Ministry of Defence “minder” who acted as frontline censor. So in the heat of battle when the troops advanced under fire to a compound with a family of five in it, the censor forbade them to show these terrified people.

News from Afghanistan is tightly managed by the MoD. As a result, this is indeed Britain’s forgotten war.

Dave Crouch

This is, according to British officers quoted in the Sunday Times, one of the biggest British military operations since the invasion of Iraq in 2003, involving as many as 3,000 British troops – almost half the British forces in the country.

It has been five weeks in preparation, and yet the first we learned of it were BBC reports on Friday evening (Dec 7). The Saturday papers ignored the story. BBC news on Sunday night led on Gordon Brown in Iraq, reducing the assault on Musa Qala to a brief mention of the death of a British soldier.

This stunning delay in reporting such a major operation means that all the reports of what is happening appear to be strictly controlled by NATO.

The Sunday and Monday papers make it clear, nevertheless, that this is the biggest British-led operation staged so far in the Afghanistan war. British, Afghan and American forces were advancing all last week towards Musa Qala amid heavy fighting. Backed by several hundred vehicles and dozens of Apache attack helicopters and A-10 Thunderbolt jets, there were violent gun battles as the troops neared the town. British officers said the whole operation was so big that some aircraft were redeployed from combat in Iraq.

The movement began on Tuesday (Dec 4) at first light when Royal Marine commandos stormed across the Helmand river in amphibious vehicles near the town of Sangin. On Thursday, a big Afghan army column began an advance, backed by British and American special forces. The Taliban (the label universally used for the Afghan resistance) have spent months laying anti-personnel and minefields, preparing bunkers and digging trenches in preparation for the attack.

Estimates of the number of troops involved are vague, but the Observer said 4,500 NATO soldiers and Afghan National Army troops were involved, while the Guardian puts it at 6,000. In November 2004, Pentagon officials said 12,000 troops were involved in re-taking Fallujah – a city of 350,000 – from the Iraqi resistance. Given that Musa Qala has a population of about 20,000, you have some idea of the sheer scale of the NATO assault. House-to-house fighting is anticipated.

Like Fallujah, Musa Qala town has become a symbol of the Taliban’s ability to resist NATO and Afghan forces. After very fierce fighting British troops were forced to withdraw in the summer of 2006, after which Afghan forces moved in early this year. Now NATO wants revenge.

Like Fallujah, thousands of civilians are trapped in the town, as reported by embeds who also witnessed US troops open fire on and kill refugees trying to flee the town. Several children have been reported killed in fighting on Saturday. People are staying behind in Musa Qala because they fear their homes will be looted when the town falls. This, by the way, is what “precision” bombing looks like in Afghanistan. This year has been the deadliest in Afghanistan since the US-led invasion in 2001 with more than 6,200 people estimated to have been killed in insurgency-related violence.

British media reports so far have all been framed in terms of Afghan atrocities – right on cue, Afghan president Hamid Karzai accused the Taliban of suspending a 15-year-old boy from a ceiling and lighting a gas stove underneath him, burning him alive. The media are also faithfully reporting British troops’ claim to be fighting for “hearts and minds” (i.e. we’re the nice guys), and to cut heroin production, with no mention that it is the occupation that has abjectly failed to prevent an explosion in poppy cultivation as the only means of subsistence.

The retaking of Fallujah didn’t stop the Iraqi resistance – in fact it fuelled it. Have the British media learned any lessons from Iraq? Their coverage of Musa Qala in the next few days will be a test.

I’m quite pessimistic about the media. Although I’m a very optimistic person, when it comes to the media I’m afraid I get depressed and become quite pessimistic.

The main reason, apart from being constantly upset reading the press and how much off-beam they are, is that I feel very strongly that in general most of the media does what it does not because there is some sort of a conspiracy, or somebody is right behind a curtain telling these editors what to write (although I’m sure some of this does happen), but mainly because the editors and most of the writers they employ come from a political and ideological mould which is part of the establishment in general, at least in terms of the politics they believe in, in terms of the social connections they create, the political connections and so on.

So there is a myriad of reasons why the media cannot in a sense do better than it does. I’m not preaching that we should not do anything about it, or that there isn’t a very important role for alternative voices to come out and to fight our corner, to establish other pointers, other landmarks, use the internet, the press itself and so on. But we have to take on board that, in general, the media is part of the establishment.

To that extent, if most of the establishment decides to go to war, then most of the media will follow suit. And with the war on Iraq there was a division within the establishment, they weren’t all united, so there were a few more oppositional voices than usual appearing in the press.

Our press here is more widely read as a national press than, say, the press in the US. But television in the US is even more powerful than it is here. I don’t know who it was in the US who coined the phrase “Unless it’s on television then it doesn’t exist.” The media in the UK exercises much more influence on the political agenda, so there is a heavy responsibility on the newspapers to get some of their stories right.

On Iraq I think they have been seriously complicit in the war of aggression against the Iraqi people, seriously complicit over the naked lies that were told to the British people. And remember most of the British people were against this war. Imagine had it been the other way around what sort of headlines we would have had – they were bad enough with most people being against the war. But the media systematically failed to question the government and the establishment about its sources. And therefore when the war happened there was no serious opposition within the media against this war.

And once the war happened there was a new unity established, so that even if you were against the war, once it started your patriotic duty was to support it. No. Your patriotic duty, surely, is to the young men and women who go and kill and get killed in Iraq – British young men and women – in the service of a cause that doesn’t coincide with the interest of most British people. Their definition of patriotism itself is questionable anyway because it belongs the mainstream definition of these words. So when they talk about Iraq being a threat, it becomes unquestionable. If you question it then you are on the fringe, and the media will give you a little bit of a voice because you are on the fringe of that main argument.

The mainstream argument gets established, re-established, defined, redefined – it’s not always the same but changes according to the main tasks facing the establishment at any one point. So if Iran is the perceived threat, then everybody, including school children, within months would know who Ahmedinejad is. But talk about other contexts about Iran and then you become outside the mainstream.

You don’t obviously need to say that Hitler is bad, because we all know he is bad. This mainstream understanding has been established and maintained, and rightly so. But if somebody comes along and says Hitler is good then they are obviously and rightly on the fringe, because the facts speak for themselves.

But on many issues that concern our world today, voices that are critical of the so-called mainstream parameters are regarded as fringe voices and therefore given as little time as possible. For the sake of democracy and free speech, they should be allowed to have their say, but it has to be confined within certain limits. So we have Tony Benn appearing on Question Time once in a blue moon and this is regarded as the voice of the left being heard democratically. Well, I think we need people like Tony Benn to appear three, four hours – 10 hours – a day to even begin to combat the flood of information that we are bombarded with!

Take the jamboree yesterday to raise money for Children in Need – they raised, I think, £19 million. I’m not opposed to doing these things, but think about it. The mainstream tells us that there is a problem with children and we should raise money – £19 million. But imagine if the mainstream was different and we were all very upset, and the media has been pumping us and telling us day and night that the US is in the process of spending $1.6 trillion on the war in Iraq and Afghanistan. How much is $1.6 trillion?! I mean it took me 10 years to get used to a billion.

And these wars kill children. In Iraq, The Lancet estimates more than 1.2 million people have been killed since the invasion. This is not part of the mainstream figures. Once The Lancet started bringing out these periodic figures that correspond much more closely to reality and people’s experiences in Iraq, the media suddenly starts saying, oh, the Iraq Body Count figures might be more accurate.

Why is it the same statistical method used by The Lancet team – by the way, this is an American team of doctors and this is a well-known statistical procedure and type of research which applies not only to counting the dead but also to counting statistical populations, an established scientific method for estimating deaths and other statistical populations. The government in Britain and the US were happy to use this same team’s figures about Uganda, Rwanda, and other places in the world. But when it came to Iraq – no! This entire body of science – and scientists usually in our society and in the mainstream are godly figures, the people in white, surely you respect their word and so on. But when it came to these horrific figures about Iraq – no. The media would not use these figures, they would regard these figures as being beyond the pale, they belong to the fringe, you do not report them as the normal events that you would report in general.

The same companies that are keen to grab Iraq’s oil wealth are very similar to and are the same companies that are trying to grab and have been grabbing the wealth of Africa and much of the third world, where the main reasons of the hunger and starvation today are the wars of aggression and the excessive exploitation exercised by the transnational companies. And the children who are dying – more than 2 million a year die directly of hunger. This is not mainstream stuff, but when it comes to spending and figures then the charity figures become what soothes our consciences, we say “we raised money for charity”.

The mainstream media does not begin to tell us the story. If they did, then I am sure there would be millions on the streets tomorrow demanding immediate withdrawal from Iraq, demanding changing the priorities of public spending, demanding stopping all wars of aggression all over the world, because substantially the public in Britain are for peace, for justice, and they do not go quiet or become reserved unless they have been duped and convinced otherwise.

And I think the mainstream media’s attempts are generally successful in terms even of convincing people who, in this case on Iraq, are anti-war. A lot of anti-war people that I meet and talk with ask me: “Is it okay really to withdraw the troops? Wouldn’t there be even more bloodshed, enormous civil war in which millions of people could die?” And of course such concerns are genuine and you would respect such concern for the Iraqi people. But this type of concern has arisen and the anti-war voices have become more subdued in terms of demanding immediate withdrawal because the mainstream media has got to us, they have convinced us – even we who are anti-war – that once the troops withdraw Iraqis are waiting in their millions to kill each other, because they belong to different sects, different religions, different ethnicities.

Obviously the mainstream media doesn’t explain why it is that for over a thousand years that great Shia shrine in Samarra, that was blown up twice – in February 2006 and June 2007 – and is reputed by the media to be the cause of much of the so-called civil war, is bang in the middle of a Sunni city. Samarra is substantially Sunni and the Sunni clergymen of Samarra have been the custodians of that most sacred of Shia shrines for over a thousand years.

Why is that after the occupation of Iraq, a team of at least 12, with their four-wheel drives, parked in front of that mosque, under US curfew – the city was under US curfew in February 2006, US helicopters were roaming the skies, the city was completely cut off and surrounded by US forces. A team arrives, they go into the shrine, they stay there 12 hours, they plant one tonne of explosives, according to the Iraqi construction minister. And they blow up the place as soon as the curfew is lifted.

The people of Samarra went on demonstrations immediately – across Iraq hundreds of thousands demonstrated – blaming the US, saying they want to stir up civil war. OK, suppose the Iraqi people are wrong? I have no evidence to say who blew up the Samarra mosque. But why is it every editorial here after that event, immediately, within 24 hours, says that Sunni extremists have blown up the Samarra mosque? How do they know? When I, or others, or Tony Benn or whoever, wants to write a single accusation to say that US troops may be behind all this, we will be asked to produce the evidence – and that is rightly so. Otherwise this is speculation, or this is what the Iraqi people think.

They establish a mainstream argument so when they say it and repeat it we accept, it because this is the “logical” mainstream. If you go beyond it and say “maybe the US death squads are behind it, maybe that quarter is behind it, maybe Al-Qaeda’s terrorist operations in Iraq are being turned a blind eye to because they are helping the occupation, they are helping sow divisions in the country” – when you put an alternative scenario to what is going on in Iraq, and this is a scenario that I haven’t invented, this is the scenario that most Iraqis you talk to on the streets of Iraq strongly believe in. They say – every single explosion in the markets of Iraq, in the civilian areas – the US is behind it.

Now, there have been incidents where people came close to proving these things. I cannot state them with 100% categorical affirmation because I do not have the evidence.

But if you look at the politics of Iraq you will see that the US has failed to occupy and subdue the Iraqi people. They have occupied the country but they have failed in subduing the Iraqi people, they have failed in not only gaining their support, but also in gaining their acquiescence. They are opposed by most of the Iraqi people very, very strongly. There is not just armed resistance, there’s a deep social, political, in-depth opposition to the occupation, such that for another thousand years Iraqis will fight this occupation tooth and nail.

The US has realised this and because they don’t want to withdraw from Iraq they are sowing divisions, spending hundreds and thousands and millions of dollars on all sorts of organisations.

I don’t have time to tell you all these details. But I have one indicator of this. The US shipped the biggest shipment of cash in history, from the US to Iraq – 350 tonnes of $100 bills – totalling $12 billion. This is a fact, they shipped them to Iraq. And Paul Bremer, who ruled Iraq for three years, distributed that money, $12 billion. Where did that money go? Where are the accounts for it? So Bremer was brought before congress and passed by a congressional committee who asked him: “Could you tell us what you did with this $12 billion because only $3 billion have been accounted for?” All in cash, all in $100 bills. And Bremer snapped at them and he silenced them. He said: “This is not US taxpayers’ money, this is Iraqi money, therefore you have no right to question me about that.”

So $9 billion have been spent by Bremer on nobody knows what and where and how, what sort of political organisations they have spent this money on, the myriad of so-called civil society organisations. Iraqis call them “$100,000 organisations” because Bremer used to pay $100,000 for all these hundreds of so-called civil society or paper organisations – to buy consciences, as Iraqis say.

Coupled with that $9 billion disappearing and the fact that US congress was not allowed to know what happened to it because it is “not US taxpayers money”, there is another story. I call these “one-off” stories, they appear one day but they will never appear again, never get discussed. “US in secret gun deal” (Guardian headline, May 12, 2006). This is a report attributed to Amnesty International that says the US, the occupying power of Iraq, smuggled into Iraq 200,000 Kalashnikovs, using private companies in Bosnia. The private companies contracted secretly by the Pentagon smuggled into Iraq 200,000 weapons in one year, 2004-2005. And the US generals don’t want to say who they gave the weapons to.

Wouldn’t you think that this is worth pursuing? That this should become part of the mainstream daily reporting, questioning the US administration and the British government here, since they are in the so-called coalition forces ruling Iraq? And when you combine the $9 billion with these disappearing arms that they are distributing in Iraq, you get a much better idea of who is killing whom and why there is so much bloodshed in the country.

And the death squads themselves – there are two US generals on the record saying that US has sent death squads into Iraq (US forces, I’m not talking about Iraq mercenaries now): General Boykin and General Downing, both served in Iraq. And both are on the record as saying that the US trains death squad special forces at Fort Bragg in North Carolina. They train them there, they send them into Iraq and they have been sending them since immediately after the Iraqi invasion. Their last bit of training takes place in Israel, because Israel has fantastic expertise in the area of death squads and bumping off people across the world.

Why isn’t that part of the mainstream? What we get in terms of a generalised picture is a distorted picture that ultimately silences us. Silences us because we are faced with a dilemma – if we withdraw the troops the Iraqi people will suffer.

No – the troops are the problem, most of the problem. The troops are a poison in Iraq, they are a force for division. The occupation is not a force for reconciliation, it’s a force for social and political division. If as an Iraqi you come anywhere near the US, most of the population call you a traitor. That exasperates all the potential – all room for compromise, for getting together, is being undermined by the occupation.

So – the sooner they get out, the better.

Mounting political and commercial pressures are affecting the freedom to report as never before. Hear leading journalists, broadcasters and union campaigners on why an unfettered media is central to democracy, and how we can mobilise to defend freedom of information and expression

Saturday 26 January 2008
9.30am-4.30pm
National Union of Journalists
308 Gray’s Inn Road
London WC1X 8DP
(King’s Cross Underground)

Speakers include:
Alan Johnston, former BBC correspondent in Gaza, recently held hostage, on covering conflict
Martin Bright, New Statesman political editor, on the anti-terror laws
Peter Wilby, former editor, Independent on Sunday, on the Murdoch empire
Granville Williams, media commentator & CPBF, on media ownership
Victoria Brittan, freelance journalist and author, on the narrowing news spectrum
Jo Glanville, editor, Index on Censorship, on secrecy and censorship
Heather Brooke, freelance journalist and author, on the Freedom of Information Act
Joy Francis, managing director, the Creative Collective on reporting diversity
David Crouch, Media Workers Against the War, on bias in war reporting
Jeremy Dear, NUJ general secretary, on defending quality journalism
Chris Frost, NUJ ethics council, on fair reporting
Tony Lennon, BECTU president, on the crisis at the BBC and wider implications
Paul Mason, Newsnight correspondent, on how BBC journalists are organising
Aidan White, general secretary, International Federation of Journalists, on the fight for media freedom world-wide

Download the full conference programme here

Tickets: £10 / £7

Download a registration form here

Last week the US Military announced that they planned to seek a criminal complaint against Bilal before an Iraqi court this Sunday, December 8. The court is due to decide whether to drop the case or bring it to trial.

Despite the fact that the US Army had said to media outlets that they have “irrefutable evidence” that Bilal is “a terrorist media operative” who had “infiltrated the AP”, they won’t say what the charges are or what evidence will be presented. After holding Bilal for 19 months without charges, they still will not reveal to AP’s defence lawyer the accusation or the evidence they feel so strongly about. Further, the US Army says that if the Iraqi justice system acquits him they could still throw Bilal back in jail.

A nearly 50-page report by former federal prosecutor Paul Gardephe on behalf of the AP and recently disclosed by the news agency concludes that there is no hard evidence for any of the allegations that the US Military has so far unofficially made about Bilal.

Among the petition’s signatories are Pulitzer Prize winners Al Diaz, David Leeson, Judy Walgren, Anja Niedringhaus, Alexander Zemlianichenko, Oded Balilty, Lucian Perkins, John Moore and Charles J. Hanley. Agency VII photographers Gary Knight and John Stanmeyer, Noor agency photographer Philip Blenkinsop and Brazilian photographer Sebastiao Salgado have also signed the petition. The full list of signatures is available at www.freebilal.org, together with more on Bilal’s incarceration, and links to news coverage of efforts to free him.

Bilal Hussein is not alone. There are eight further cases of prolonged journalist detentions by US troops in Iraq since March 2003.

To contact the Free Bilal Committee:
Annika Engvall: annika.engvall@worldpicturenews.com
Tel +1 646-454-5953, Cell +1 (347) 582-1165
Tomas Van Houtryve: tomas.van.houtryve@gmail.com
Cell +33 (678) 53 03 16

I’m not an expert on Iran or Iraq. I think I’m here partly because I’ve been a hack, a reporter, not just a journalist but a guy running around with a notebook and a pen, for an extraordinarily, ridiculously long time, but also because in the last couple of years I’ve decided to do something rather weird which is to interrogate my colleagues, which has turned into a book to be published next year called Flat Earth News.

The reason it has that title is that for hundreds of years everyone knew the Earth was flat. Indeed it was a heresy to challenge that statement. Eventually someone, Galileo or Copernicus, bothered to check and discovered they were wrong. But if you look at the way the mass media functions today you’ll see we are riddled with “flat earth” statements.

The most notorious, deadly one of those, or collection of those, was everything we were told in the build up to the invasion of Iraq. It was that in particular which made me want to do this. What I want to try to convey is that we can’t understand what went wrong with the media in the build-up to Iraq unless we understand that what went wrong is part of a much bigger picture in which the media now routinely, consistently convey falsehood, distortion and propaganda. Although this has always happened to some extent, I want to argue that this is now happening on a far greater and destructive scale than it has done previously. Speakers in an earlier session talked about systemic weakness, and that’s what I want to try to explain to you – why we are delivering so much flat earth news.

Remember the Millennium bug story? That’s a classic piece of flat earth news. The global media just consuming falsehood and distortion, pumping out this stuff. It’s wonderful, to look back on the cuttings – utterly unreliable. Most of the scandal surrounding Bill Clinton was, to use the technical term, bollocks. Just pushed out on this huge scale.

And there’s flat earth policy. I’ve done loads of work over the years on criminal justice, drugs policy, education, digging deep down into government policy, looking at the factual foundations on which this policy is built, the evidence. And what do you find? Nothing. Just a black hole of populist misconception and self-serving politics. It’s terrifying. Routine, small stories flowing through the media. The scale of it is huge.

If you say that to people outside the media on the whole they’ll rapidly they’ll sign up to the idea that you can’t believe everything you read, but what worries me is that if you ask them why you tend to get flat earth stories back about the media itself. So for example there’s been quite a bit of talk today about proprietor interference. The likes of Rupert Murdoch do interfere, it’s part of the picture, it’s disgusting and immoral that they do, perhaps even more disgusting and immoral that it’s so easy for them to do so. You’ll hear people talking about corporate advertising influencing the content of the media. Maybe it happens. I’ve really tried to find evidence of them doing that successfully. You find it in local papers, you find it in specialist magazines like fashion mags, but in the national media that ain’t where it is.

Sami Ramadani was really interesting about ideology earlier today. But if you take proprietor influence, advertising and ideology and say those are factors that perniciously influence the media and then ask how much of the total picture are they responsible for I want to argue that it’s 5 or 10 per cent. That isn’t where the problem is. There’s a much, much bigger problem at work here.

Let me try to explain. I raised a lot of money from the Rowntree Foundation and gave it to some academics at Cardiff University. One of the things I got them to do was to go back through the annual reports of every Fleet Street company going back to 1985. 1985 is an important year because in January 1986 Rupert Murdoch moved his newspapers into Wapping and broke the print unions. He broke the resistance, such resistance as there was in Fleet Street, to the logic of commercialism, to what those big corporations which had taken all those newspapers over wanted to do.

The academics did two things. Year by year they looked at what happened to the editorial staffing levels of those Fleet Street papers over the next 20 years. The second thing they did was they measured the space which those editorial staff were filling, how many column inches of news. You crunch all those numbers for all these companies and you come up with something that is really important – essentially, your average Fleet Street reporter now is filling three times as much space as he or she was 20 years ago. Turn that round, look at it from the reporter’s point of view: we only have one third of the time to do our job. That’s terribly important.

If you take time away from some processes, like if you’re manufacturing cars and you take time out so you do it quicker you can argue that this improves the process, it makes it cheaper so you can sell more and put more money back into production. But if you take time away from reporters you take away our most important working asset. We cannot do our jobs properly if they won’t give us the time to do it. It’s as simple as that. We’ve been caught in this pincer movement where our staffing levels have been cut, our output has been increased – all the newspapers have extra supplements, you have 24-hour broadcasting – the whole nature of being a reporter and the back-up journalists involved has changed: instead of being active news gatherers we’ve become passive processors. Most reporters nowadays don’t have contacts, we don’t go out and find stories, we don’t check facts.

We did a huge analysis with these Cardiff researchers of the extent to which you can look at factual statements in Fleet Street stories and find evidence of whether or not they’ve been checked. The answer was that there is evidence in 12 per cent of those statements. 12 per cent. It’s pathetic. But that’s the reality. It’s not because the journalists are dishonest. It’s not because they’re being told to do so by advertisers or Rupert Murdoch. It’s because we’re not allowed to do our job. I call this “churnalism”. That’s the first part of the picture.

Nevertheless we’ve got to fill all these supplements, all these 24 hours of broadcasting. Where are we going to get our material from? While we’ve been losing our jobs, somebody else has been getting more and more jobs. Which is the PR industry. There was an invisible moment at some point in the last decade when the number of PR people in this country finally exceeded the number of journalists.

When we’re talking about PR, first it’s the whole magical world of Alastair Campbell in central government, which has flowed down into every local authority in the country, and the police and the health service, every limb of the state now has press officers working for it. Even when I started, 30-odd years ago, it wasn’t like that. When I started on local papers, if you wanted to write a story about a hospital you phoned the hospital you talked to the hospital manager or a doctor. Now you deal with a PR. Across the public sector – and across the private sector. All corporations now defend themselves. And charities and even terrorist groups! Everybody has PR people.

Whereas you should have a system where journalists, working honestly and independently, make what used to be called news judgments and say this story is important, this angle needs to be expressed, this research needs to be done, instead now we sit there passively and those decisions are made by Alastair Campbell and the whole magic world of PR and the public and private and the charity sector and the terrorist groups. They write the press releases and we bung ‘em in.

And it isn’t just about press releases. It’s about deeply manipulative behaviour. So for example, PR companies work very assiduously to set up front groups. These are phony grass-roots groups. There are so many phony grass-roots groups in the US that they have a nice little term for them, they call them Astroturf, because they’re not real grass.

A classic example of an Astroturf group is the Iraqi National Congress, the INC. The INC didn’t just emerge out of nowhere, it was invented and created by a man called John Rendon, a PR guy who used to work for the Democrats, he ran Jimmy Carter’s PR campaign. And since the American invasion of Panama in 1987 has been working on contract for American intelligence, the State Department and the Pentagon, running PR campaigns to change the way we think and feel about the world. And it’s very easy. Once you’ve reduced journalists to churnalism, all they have to do is feed us stories. So John Rendon says okay, we’re going to change the way the world looks at Iraq, I need a story, I’ve got a huge budget from the State Department, I’ll create the INC, I’ll hire Ahmed Chalabi and all these other guys, we’ll hold conferences in Vienna and London, we’ll invite the hacks, the hacks will write the story, we get them to put it across. It’s easy.

While PR has become so huge and so sophisticated and so successful in effectively writing our stories for us and doing our work for us, alongside that, almost unnoticed since September 11, 2001, there has been a significant increase in old-fashioned propaganda activities. PR on the whole doesn’t deal in fiction. Alastair Campbell and his ilk will lie to you if you put them in a corner, but they don’t really want to lie. Really what it’s about is making our judgments for us, picking which story, which angle, which quote, but often it’s in the realm of truth. Propaganda is about fiction.

There’s always been a threat of propaganda, for years and years going back to Elizabethan times, certainly it was active during the Cold War. That’s got much bigger and institutionalised. The problem with propaganda is that it doesn’t tell the truth about itself. The expression it uses is “strategic communication”, so you find that military, foreign affairs and intelligence agencies, particularly in the United States but also in Britain, France and all the NATO countries, are grouped together in order to manipulate us vulnerable hacks into running stories that are fiction.

There are marvellous examples of it. You can see them running on Iran now. I love the Zarqawi story. Remember Zarqawi, the leader of al-Qaeda in Iraq? Huge chunks of the Zarqawi story were produced by this strategic communications machine. Absolute bollocks, to use that technical term again. Remember when he first surfaced Zarqawi only had one leg? Then later on when he was on video cutting people’s heads off miraculously he had sprouted a second one. They’d lost their own story line!

If you’re trying to understand what needs to be done to get the media to tell the truth, it’s not just about the traditional explanations about advertising, owners and ideology. They are there, I’m not denying that, and they are pernicious and wrong. But it’s to do with the structural weakness of our profession. Our jobs are being taken away, our output has been increased, we are now almost infinitely vulnerable to being manipulated – and so we are. And that’s why we are seeing the same thing happening about Iran as you earlier saw with Iraq.

In this book that I have written I did a chapter on the Observer. It’s fascinating and scary. It’ was a model of manipulation of a newspaper in the build-up to Iraq where all of this was at work. The PR people, particular from Downing Street, Alastair Campbell’s people working on Kamal Ahmed, the political editor. He resigned a few weeks ago because of the book, he doesn’t want to tell the truth about it. The intelligence agencies producing the anthrax story were working through David Rose. Very interesting. David Rose is actually a very good, experienced reporter, he was completely flipped over on his head, writing absolute crap because he was being manipulated by MI6 and the CIA. And I’ve traced it all. That’s the propaganda element. It’s just scary.

The impact of that was huge, because that’s the paper that’s read by backbench Labour MPs who had to vote in the House of Commons on the Blair resolution. It really mattered. It’s the sickening ease with which it now happens.

If you want to understand what’s going wrong it’s fascinatingly complex.
The internal procedural workings, the operational pressures that incline us towards more falsehood and distortion – it really is interesting how you look at it and find how rotten it is at its core.

The other thing that concerns this meeting is what we can do to improve it. I’m very pessimistic. I think we’ve lost it, I’m afraid we’ve lost the idea of the mass media are anything like a reliable source of information. In an imaginary world I’d like the media to be put through the same sort of regulation as foodstuffs, so that you have to label the content of a newspaper, so you would need some institution to be funded and set up to test the extent to which a particular media outlet produces falsehood and distortion. So the Guardian would have to run its running average – over say the preceding six months, for example, and say, 56 per cent of this newspaper’s output turned out to be not true.

The trouble is that this is an imaginary world. There is no way that I can see that there is anywhere in this country the political power to engineer that kind of change. The question is whether that’s politically possible. I think everyone who has been critical of the Press Complaints Commission is entirely right. I did a huge analysis of their last 10 years of operation and it’s embarrassing to be told as a professional that this organisation is responsible for holding you to standards. It does absolutely nothing. It is an outrage.

This book brilliantly captures the horrors of being caught up in conflict. Scorning the compromising position of an embedded journalist, Dahr Jamail travelled Iraq to report on a subject often neglected by the mainstream media: daily life in Iraq.

Discovering a country occupied by unwanted foreign powers, Beyond The Green Zone depicts Iraqis such as Khali Ahmed, who lost three of his family after American soldiers raided the wrong house and were forced to cover up, and Hassan Mehdi Mohammed, who told Jamail that eight out of 10 people in his village were unemployed.

The inclusion of photos at the beginning of each chapter provides a visual reminder of the dangers. For me the most poignant photo was of an ambulance with its door open and bullet holes in the windscreen, after American snipers shot at it. Clearly, the occupation is not fixing Iraq, despite the purring words of Gordon Brown and the brash phrasing of George Bush.

One of the reasons why his book is so important is the sheer breadth of interviews. As Jamail is not in the presence of the US Military, Iraqis are free to speak their mind. Every time he visits a house, he manages to interview four or five people within it, not just one spokesperson. Beyond The Green Zone is forensic in its detail when describing the injuries of citizens and the destruction of houses. In today’s world, forensic detail is far too often overlooked.

The second half of the book focuses on Fallujah. Unable to enter the city because of the military cordon, Jamail interviews refugees from the shattered city. The hellish nightmare for the thousands of residents who remained was made worse by the Iraqi Red Crescent convoys being unable to enter the city, despite an appeal to the UN.

Dahr Jamail is very critical of the United Nations, describing them as “prov[ing] its impotence in all matters”. I would disagree with him here, although there is plenty of evidence that the UN is becoming corrupted, given the revelations about UN aid workers in Liberia donating food in exchange for sexual favours.

As Jamail reminds us at the end of his introduction, each of the 27 million or so people in Iraq has their own story. Although no book could hope to document all of them, Beyond The Green Zone goes some way to explaining how it feels to be occupied by the gung-ho US military after years of Saddam Hussein’s despotic regime.

Richard Brennan

I want to talk about the systemic failures of journalism that led to the problems of the coverage of the Iraq war, which in my view will lead to similar problems with the coverage of the Iran war – which I am sure is going to come sooner or later.

I wrote a leader in the New Statesman (Sep 30, 2002) in the week of Alastair Campbell’s notorious dossier. It came out on a Wednesday so I didn’t have very much time to read it and I didn’t at that stage know how it was going to relate to the press:

“Most people, if they are honest, will confess that the technicalities of the debate on Saddam Hussein’s weapons capabilities are beyond them. Tony Blair’s dossier provides little enlightenment and was never likely to, as most of the new assertions depend on intelligence that is necessarily vague. Ministers are no better equipped than the rest of us to judge whether a grainy photograph actually shows a missile site, much less whether it is a threatening one. Equally, the journalists now touring factories in Iraq wouldn’t know a phial of Sarin from a thimble of finest malt.

“A few things stand out. Saddam wants uranium (we knew that; that’s why we have sanctions), but, even if he got it, he would need a factory to make nuclear bombs. He would also need the means to deliver them and other weapons of mass destruction. The dossier’s claim that he can ‘deploy’ them within 45 minutes produces the dramatic headlines that Alastair Campbell no doubt demanded. But what does it mean? Deployed how, where, against whom? According to Scott Ritter, ex-head of the UN inspection team, the designs of ‘enthusiastic amateurs’ which the team saw up to 1998 would produce rockets ‘that would spin and cartwheel . . . go north instead of south . . . blow up’. Iraq would have to test missiles. The tests would be detectable and presumably the sites could be bombed. So where lies the argument for all-out war?”

I think that one thing I’d like to note about that, which I think stands the test of time pretty well, is that I quote Scott Ritter, and you can’t get much more authoritative than the former head of the UN inspection team. Yet Ritter was an example – there are other examples – of someone who was treated as a complete non-person by the media at the time. He was hardly ever interviewed on television or radio and was hardly ever quoted in the newspapers.

If you look back at the Daily Telegraph through the whole of 2002-2003 Scott Ritter was only ever quoted on 16 occasions. And there was nearly always an adjective in front of the name Scott Ritter – he was nearly always described as “controversial” or “irascible” and reports of his remarks were almost always followed by American claims that he was an apologist for Saddam Hussein. And many of the occasions when he was mentioned in the Daily or Sunday Telegraph it was when there were attempts to smear him as a corrupt sex maniac.

I could give a lot of examples from our own trade of journalism. John Pilger, in my view one of the most able and objective critics of the war and the media. He appears fortnightly in the New Statesman. But again he is somebody who as far as the mainstream newspapers are concerned is very much marginalised. I noticed recently that the Daily and Sunday Telegraphs gave details of the 100 most influential people on the left, including all sorts of people I’d never heard of, but at number 100 there was John Pilger, with the comment that he was still somebody who appealed to gullible young people, he had a small but visible following. This is only a man who gets hour-long documentaries on ITV that attract audiences into the millions.

As to the core of the systemic failure, the way in which what has been called the “public relations state” operates, the way in which the government tries to establish a narrative and thus control the news agenda. Of course the opposition tries to do the same. And essentially politics in this country is a competition between the government and the opposition to establish a narrative of events. Sometimes the government has the upper hand, sometimes the opposition. What is very difficult, even for a backbench MP, is for anybody outside that system to establish an alternative narrative. That’s what we saw in the case of the Iraq war. There was no serious division between government and opposition on policy.

The second problem was that there was a shortage of credible alternative sources on the facts. Intelligence is necessarily a shadowy area of nudges, winks and disinformation. Almost nothing from intelligence sources is ever said on the record, so readers can’t judge the reliability of the source. Journalists are grateful for what can be presented as secret information so they are rarely willing to treat it sceptically. Suppose you are a journalist and you are told that 1,000 terrorists are plotting to blow up railway stations. Well that’s probably going to make a splash, so the journalist isn’t going to write a second paragraph saying this is a load of hyped-up rubbish. That I think is one of the problems.

The war on terror is a perfect example of a narrative that is controlled entirely by official sources. Nobody from outside can say how it is going. Nobody can say how big the threat is or where the enemy is or anything. When Singapore fell during the Second World War, nobody could very easily deny that it had fallen. During the Cold War nobody could say that the Soviets had marched into West Germany when nobody had actually seen them do so. But when you hear of victories, defeats and threats in the war on terror they are by their nature uncheckable – except I suppose when bombs go off, but perhaps not even then. When lots of bombs were going off in Iraq we were told we were winning, because the terrorists were obviously getting very desperate!

What always gives official sources the upper hand in this war on terror is that they can tell a simple dramatic narrative: good against evil, us against them. Introducing complications into that narrative, introducing doubts, is very difficult. Maybe Saddam doesn’t have WMDs, maybe Iran just wants civil nuclear power. Maybe there are only 20 or so really serious terrorists, or maybe a thousand, and maybe they aren’t very good at what they do. But that doesn’t make good stories. “Saddam/Iran/al-Qaeda not much of a threat” – that’s not a good headline. “They might be but we’re not sure” – that’s an even worse headline.

So what can journalists do? I think there are three things.

First, instead of dismissing non-government, non-official or Iranian sources as marginal, we should be cultivating, trying to build up alternative sources of authority. Right now we should be seeking out sources who know something about how the Iranian government operates and about the relevance of nuclear technology. Almost the only detailed discussion I have read in the newspapers about how countries might go about making an operational nuclear bomb has been in the London Review of Books.

I am not appealing at all for one narrative to take priority over another. It may be true that Iran can and will become a nuclear armed power within a very short space of time and that it can credibly threaten Israel and other countries with annihilation. But I would like the alternative narrative, which does exist, to be presented and given the same airing as the official one.

Second, I would like every American or British government statement on Iraq, including the alleged Iranian arming of militias in Iraq, to be scrutinised rigorously. Where does the evidence for it come from? What is the evidence? Is it disputed and if so by whom? If somebody said that the British government was full of warmongering lunatics nobody would just accept it, people would scrutinise this statement and ask if it’s true. So why are we so willing to accept it when it’s said about another country’s government?

We’re always being told, for example, that we should read what Osama Bin Laden has written, the Iranian president’s speeches, so see what they say about destroying Israel and destroying the west and so on. Neither are ever mentioned – the Iranian president particularly – in the press without reference to their blood-curdling views. So why are we not reminded every time there is a reporting of the US administration’s stance on Iran, the preparations it is making to confront Iran, why are we not reminded of the Project for the New American Century? It sets out in black and white, in very great detail, the Neo-Cons view of their aims and how America should proceed in the future. Why are we not reminded of that every time we read about the US administration?

[Third, there is the language we use.] What does “extraordinary rendition” mean? Is it by any chance kidnapping? What are “abuses” in Abu Ghraib or Guantanamo? Are they by any chance torture? Torture is nearly always used in continental newspapers, but hardly ever in British or American newspapers.

Have the British media learned anything from Iraq? I don’t think so. I’m afraid even the Guardian recently led on a story that came from unnamed US sources on the wicked things Iran was up to in Iraq. It may be true, I don’t know. But it was without a word from other sources.

If they are going to do a better job, media outlets are going to have to change the way they operate and the way they deal with sources of information.

Jane Shallice opened the workshop, describing some of the particular challenges the Stop the War Coalition faces in opposing the “War on Terror” and how and why journalists might portray the perspective of the anti-war campaign more effectively.

Shallice emphasised that activists in the anti-war movement come from various backgrounds but with great experience. She strongly rejected the notion famously expressed by Andrew Marr that the opposition to the Iraq war reflected the “petulant mewlings of amateurs.” She pointed out that such “amateurs” are usually motivated by deep concern and have “studied and fought and argued and expressed ideas in a way that ‘mere’ journalists, as professionals, may not.”

Describing her own direct experience campaigning against the Vietnam war in the 1960s, Shallice highlighted that many campaigners also have a grasp of the way the media operate and how this has changed in recent years. For example, coverage of the current conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan lacks the visual representation that brought the truth of Vietnam into the mainstream.

Shallice briefly summarised the Stop the War Coalition’s three main founding aims, namely:
1. To stop the war;
2. To prevent the erosion of civil liberties;
3. To prevent the growth of Islamophobia.

Despite huge support, she said, the anti-war movement ultimately failed to prevent war, while the erosion of civil liberties and growth of Islamophobia continue.

Clearly there were sections of the media that supported the Stop the War Coalition and there is no doubt that The Mirror’s backing contributed massively in recruiting protestors to the March 2003 demonstration. But too often editorial decisions were taken in other papers to dampen anti-war sentiment and elevate the pro-war argument, Shallice said.

And the role of New Labour’s communications advisors – specifically Alastair Campbell – and the capitulation of the BBC in the wake of the Hutton enquiry undermined the anti-war message. On this issue Shallice lamented that, while there were understandable reasons for the BBC’s concern, “there is huge support for the BBC that was never really tapped.”

As a result, the anti-war movement developed largely out of “old methods” of organising, i.e. public meetings – and the support it received says much about the government’s arguments. “Whatever the ‘best’ journalists were saying to promote their views, people didn’t believe them,” Shallice remarked.

Acknowledging that there are – and always have been – good journalists, Shallice stressed that strong, remarkable editorial decisions to give space to unpopular stories are few and far between.

Finally, Shallice discussed an emerging theme – the “asymmetry” of the mainstream narrative, which overwhelmingly represents those in power.

Somewhat ironically, she pointed out, the US military’s use of the term “asymmetrical warfare” for suicide bombing and IEDs has been widely adopted by the media, yet the use of air force against people without any air power is never described as such.

“In a sense you feel that about the way the world is expressed. The asymmetry is very clear – those in power have their message given, those without and who are critical of it are still attempting to find ways of having at least a little bit of their argument presented,” Shallice said.

To redress these imbalances, she urged journalists to recognise these fundamental arguments are among citizens and views should not be valued according to whether they are those of amateurs and professionals. She called on all to observe the mantra “doubt everything” when interpreting any line of information.

Peter Wilby continued by making some further observations about how the media influenced the anti-war movement’s impact, aside from its failure to develop an “alternative narrative” which he described in his plenary session talk.

Wilby noted that the movement changed the political course, even if it did not ultimately succeed in preventing war in Iraq. The fact that Tony Blair only won the vote in the House of Commons very narrowly was in that sense a victory, he said.

One “unfortunate” reason the protests did not have a higher profile in the media was that there was not enough drama – there was no violence, no direct action. Wilby recalled that newspapers described the successful anti-Vietnam war demonstration in the spring of 1968 a flop, because alarmist ideas that there were plots to attack Whitehall and the BBC failed to materialise.

He added that the media had marginalised the alternative, anti-war message by focusing on different groups within the Stop the War Coalition and speculating that it was being used as a “front” by the Socialist Workers Party, by Muslim organisations, or by “various undesirables.” Wilby noted that this is a familiar tactic that was used in coverage of anti-Vietnam war protests.

Discussion
Reporting demonstrations

A number of points were raised about the low profile or misrepresentation of anti-war demonstrations in the media. Becky (journalist) said that a poorly attended demonstration about BBC cuts received worldwide media attention, and that although turn-out alone is not the only marker of a movement’s importance, a more proportionate response to anti-war protests is needed.

Sheila (anti-war activist) asked why a Countryside Alliance demonstration one weekend received far greater media coverage, both during the build-up and afterwards, than a Stop the War demonstration of similar size the following week.

Daniel (freelance journalist) noted that the Guardian’s coverage of the 2000 May Day demonstration was no different to that in the Daily Mail – he asked why would this be the case if journalists on the ground are truly “free” to report the facts, as Sami Ramadani proposed? Daniel queried whether journalists should be covering anti-war demonstrations if, from a news editing perspective, the events in themselves are not necessarily newsworthy without something dramatic taking place. Should there be coverage of a movement, its ideas, or the facts on which the various arguments are structured?

He suggested that a bridge between journalists and activists could operate outside of the realm of “who’s in the SWP, or have you done something exciting on the streets today” and instead focus on building up a subcontext that cannot be ignored in the same way the government does.

Maintaining the movement’s profile – countering ‘Iraq fatigue’

People picked up on Peter Wilby’s recent commentary about “Iraq fatigue” in The Guardian. It was suggested this fatigue is due to the constant nature of the events, so despite extremely high level of atrocities there is no element of surprise or a change warranting greater coverage. This may also elevate or somehow legitimise any story about improvements in the situation, for example recent reports suggesting that the US “surge” has worked.

Trish said a similar problem arose in reporting atrocities in Northern Ireland but did not necessarily reflect public disinterest – would somehow changing the way news is delivered generate more interest in stories?

There was some discussion about the continuing interest in other stories about, e.g. Madeleine McCann and Amy Winehouse, and whether in fact this is therefore rather a “selective” fatigue.

Wilby commented that fatigue arises because newspapers feel that their readers cannot identity with Iraqis and their situation, partly because of the massive scale and horror of their problem, but also because they are of another ethnic background, religion, and culture.

Control of the media and how to resist it

The relationship between power and the means to control the narrative was seen as central to the problem. Sue (journalist) highlighted that effective “propaganda machines” from, for example, the US state department and Israel, monitor sensitive issues extremely closely, leading to a kind of censorship. The opposition does not have the necessary resources to counter this kind of media scrutiny.

NGOs, governmental and other institutions have enormous resources of information and it was suggested that there could be an equivalent resource to help journalists substantiate and explore alternative narratives on the war. Briefings to inform journalists about specific issues, e.g. political use of the UN Charter to legitimise wars of aggression, were suggested.

However, it was pointed out that journalists have the power to avoid inaccurate euphemisms such as “friendly fire” and “met the target” in their language. And a number of alternative sources of information were touched on, such as Arab media outlets, citizen journalism and the internet in general.

Daniel described a need to recreate the framing conditions in the newsroom and to think about how this can be influenced.

Jane Shallice stressed the need to follow trusted activists who read systematically and write investigative pieces for alternative publications. She praised an article in the Financial Times about US bases in Iraq, which followed up a more extensive article in the London Review of Books. She suggested that perhaps more analysis is needed rather than straightforward news briefings.

Peter Wilby noted that a serious limitation to setting up a major resource is the left’s lack of funds and inability to raise revenue the way that right-wing institutes and centres can. The rise of the “PR state” has compounded this problem.

By Caroline Price

A winner. Congratulations. Great conference. I only wished I could have divided myself, several times, to have been able to attend more than one workshop. The whole afternoon was excellent. Thought provoking, informative, enjoyable and you had a really good turn out. With at least two thirds from the media or students of media, you should be very pleased.
Shade

I attended the conference on Saturday and firstly wanted to say thank you for a hugely informative and eye opening day. It’s a topic I’m really interested in (actually doing my dissertation on) and think it’s great that more and more well known journalists and politicians are moving into the spotlight to confront this…
Craig

I was at LSE yesterday and congratulate you and all the contributors on a great event. How could I get hold of a copy of ‘The First Casualty? War, Truth & the Media’ shown during the plenaries? I run an Access to Journalism course for Truro College in Cornwall and would like to show the video to my students.
Jane

I hope you don’t mind me taking this opportunity to say firstly thank you for organising the MWAW Conference I attended at LSE yesterday. The range of speakers was excellent.
Helen

That was one of the best political events I have been to. All credit to you. I aim to be at the meeting on Nov 29
Ian

Fantastic day! It was amazing
Caroline

Congratulations to you and the organising committee on a great conference and a sense of a solid grouping of media folk + others wanting to create Peter Wilby’s famous alternative narrative. Hope further discussion of how to do that on 29 Nov. My feeling is that some will try to ignore the resources MWAW has built up already – briefings and website. I think they should be built on.
Judith

Thanks for organising yesterday’s conference, which I found both thought-provoking and inspiring, especially on account of how many people turned up.
Daniel

Just thought I’d drop a line to say well done for such a great event yesterday – an unequivocal success!
Tim

I thought Saturday’s conference was great. I didn’t stay for the last plenary session so can’t comment on that – but the opening session, and the workshop on Iran, were really useful and informative. A great audience, and some really good speakers.
Margaret

Thanks to everyone for working so hard to make Saturday’s conference at the London School of Comics a success. It was particularly pleasing to see so many new faces. Even I was shocked at the amount of information from Iraq and Afghanistan which is not getting into the media. This is the equivalent on D-Day only reporting Allied landings in Normandy but not reporting Allied landings in the South of France or the 8th Army liberating Italy.
Chris

Just to say many congratulations on a brilliant and really useful day on Saturday. I think the issues you were dealing with are absolutely vital because I believe we now have a military-industrial-media complex. I’m a non-media person & for me the day made explicit lots of things about the way modern media operates that I had half realised but not fully taken on board. I am sure that will be helpful in peace campaigning & general activism. Thanks a lot & best wishes for all you are doing,
Mary

London School of Economics

Saturday November 17 2pm-6.30pm
Hosted by Media Workers Against the War

Contributors:

Andrew Gilligan, Peter Wilby, Michelle Stanistreet, Nick Davies, Sean Langan, Catherine Mayer, Sami Ramadani, Phillip Knightley, Moazzam Begg, Andrew Murray, Rachel Morarjee, Amir Amirani, Piers Robinson and others

Tickets: £10 / £7 – buy securely online: http://mwaw.net/conference

Major media outlets are becoming markedly less questioning and critical in their coverage of Iraq and Afghanistan. Independent studies show an overwhelming pro-war bias after 9/11.

The drums of a new war, this time with Iran, are beating. Will we allow the media to be used to sex up the Iranian “threat”? Sometimes it seems like the Iraqi WMD fiasco never happened.

With the recent breast-beating about media integrity, now is the time to look again at reporting the “war on terror”. This conference will set out the issues and debate how best to campaign to improve standards. It will seek to identify the main sources of pro-war bias as a first step to providing media workers with tools and resources for combating it.

* Have the media learned the lessons of Iraq?
* What are the pitfalls in reporting Iran?
* What can the BBC do to stand up to government bullying?
* What should accurate coverage of modern war look like?
* Are Muslims being unfairly targeted in the media?

Come and debate these key issues for our industry.

Tickets: £10 / £7 – buy securely online: http://mwaw.net/conference

“I am very critical of the way in which the media failed to ask the proper questions in the run-up to war, and the way in which much of the British media, if not the US, seems now to have put reporting from Iraq in the “too difficult” category. This is the most important story in the world and it’s amazing how little coverage it gets in the British press. “
Andrew Gilligan, sacked by the BBC
September 2007

“The press has apparently learnt nothing from the dodgy dossiers and phantom WMDs that preceded the Iraq war.”
Peter Wilby, Media Guardian
April 2007

For more information and conference updates email thefirstcasualty@mwaw.net or call 07801 789 297

Aegis in September won the largest single security contract yet in Iraq, awarded by the Pentagon to co-ordinate the 20,000 private armed guards working in Iraq, and worth up to $475m (£234m). (Financial Times, Sep 15)

A US military inquiry into the videotapes has been closed, with no further action expected.

Since 2004 Aegis says it has travelled more than 3m miles throughout Iraq and completed more than 20,000 missions. Aegis is run by former army officer Tim Spicer, former chief executive of Sandline International, which was involved in the 1998 “arms to Africa” scandal during the Sierra Leone civil war.

WASHINGTON, Oct 25, 2007 (AFP) – While the US administration insists it is pursuing diplomacy in its disputes with Iran, critics of President George W. Bush see worrying parallels between recent statements on Tehran and the run-up to the war in Iraq. The Bush administration announced new sanctions against Iran on Thursday, accusing the regime of backing terrorists, supporting insurgents in Iraq and working to build an atomic arsenal. The following are recent comments by Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney on Iran’s nuclear program and statements on Iraq made prior to the 2003 US-led invasion.

IRAN “The Iranian regime needs to know that if it stays on its present course, the international community is prepared to impose serious consequences.” — Vice President Dick Cheney speaking to the Washington Institute for Near East Policy on October 21, 2007.

IRAQ “The Council has repeatedly warned Iraq that it will face serious consequences as a result of its continued violations of its obligations.” — UN Security Council Resolution 1441, adopted in 2002, which the Bush administration says authorized the March 2003 invasion of Iraq.

IRAN “Iran’s active pursuit of technology that could lead to nuclear weapons threatens to put a region already known for instability and violence under the shadow of a nuclear holocaust. Iran’s actions threaten the security of nations everywhere. And that is why the United States is rallying friends and allies around the world to isolate the regime, to impose economic sanctions. We will confront this danger before it is too late.” — US President George W. Bush in a speech to the annual American Legion convention on August 28, 2007.

IRAQ “Facing clear evidence of peril, we cannot wait for the final proof — the smoking gun — that could come in the form of a mushroom cloud.” — Bush in a speech on Iraq in Cincinnati on October 7, 2002.

IRAN “Our intelligence community assesses that, with continued foreign assistance, Iran could develop an intercontinental ballistic missile capable of reaching the United States and all of Europe before 2015. If it chooses to do so, and the international community does not take steps to prevent it, it is possible Iran could have this capability. And we need to take it seriously — now.” — Bush said in a speech to the National Defense University on October 23, 2007.

IRAQ “If the Iraqi regime is able to produce, buy, or steal an amount of highly enriched uranium a little larger than a single softball, it could have a nuclear weapon in less than a year. And if we allow that to happen, a terrible line would be crossed. Saddam Hussein would be in a position to blackmail anyone who opposes his aggression. He would be in a position to dominate the Middle East. He would be in a position to threaten America. And Saddam Hussein would be in a position to pass nuclear technology to terrorists.” — Bush in the speech on Iraq in Cincinnati on October 7, 2002.

IRAN “Our struggle is not with the Iranian people. As a matter of fact, we want them to flourish, and we want their economy to be strong. And we want their mothers to be able to raise their children in a hopeful society. My problem is with a government that takes actions that end up isolating their people and ends up denying the Iranian people their true place in the world.” — Bush congratulating General David Petraeus on his confirmation as commander of forces in Iraq on January 26, 2007.

IRAQ “The Iraqi people cannot flourish under a dictator that oppresses them and threatens them. Gifted people of Iraq will flourish if and when oppression is lifted.” — Bush signing the authorization to use military force in Iraq on October 16, 2002.

IRAN “All options are on the table. I would hope that we could solve this diplomatically.” — Bush, meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert on June 19, 2007.

“The United States joins other nations in sending a clear message: We will not allow Iran to have a nuclear weapon.” — Cheney in the October 21, 2007 speech.

IRAQ “All options are on the table, and — but one thing I will not allow is a nation such as Iraq to threaten our very future by developing weapons of mass destruction.” — Bush speaking at a press conference on March 13, 2003, less than a week before military action against Iraq.

This is a real problem for the anti-war movement – the notion among senior editors and managers that “we’ve done Iraq” and that it’s time to move on. Here they are just mimicking Blair’s oft-stated desire to “draw a line” under Iraq.

It means reporters and documentary makers can’t get important investigative work published or broadcast.

Of course, the public’s interest in Iraq isn’t constant: the Financial Times noted recently (Oct 23) that “the war in Iraq has ceased to be the US’s hot political issue”

But that is partly because politicians drop the issue in a concerted attempt to divert attention away from the war, and also because the corporate media takes their lead and gets “bored” with the subject.

In fact, Piers’ decision to publish the photos was totally justified. The photos represented what actually took place, even though they were faked.

Stuart MacKenzie, a private in the Territorial Army who served with the Queen’s Lancashire Regiment in Iraq, orchestrated the photos. A court martial against him was dropped, however, and he was cleared of all criminal charges in 2005.

Also, Mackenzie kept a diary where he boasted about the violence meted out to Iraqi civilians during his tour of duty in Iraq in 2003. Last year he appeared as a prosecution witness at the court martial of seven soldiers from the Queen’s Lancashire Regiment. The seven soldiers were accused of abusing of 11 Iraqi civilians in Basra, one of whom, Baha Musa, died. Baha Mousa was found to have had 93 separate injuries to his body, including fractured ribs, a broken nose and kidney failure.

The soldiers were acquitted on insufficient evidence, although one of them, Corporal Donald Payne, became Britain’s first convicted war criminal when he admitted that he had treated Iraqis inhumanely and “enjoyed” hearing Iraqis cry out during torture, referring to their screams as a “choir”. He was jailed for a year.

Mackenzie’s diary contained detailed accounts of abuse of Iraqis. Moreover, at the trial Iraqi civilian Muhanned Thaher Abdullah al-Mansouri said that – among other things — he had been urinated on by his captors.

So Piers Morgan published photos of abuse that really happened. He was sacked for depicting the truth of British abuse of Iraqi prisoners.

Those editors of British media who repeated the governments’ lies about the “Iraqi threat”, however, are still in their jobs.

If that wasn’t enough, Philip Stephen’s extraordinary article (Oct 5) demonstrates another theme of this blog – namely, the connection between Islamophobia in the media and pro-war reporting.

Stephens launches a scathing attack on CBBC, the BBC’s TV service for 6-12 year olds, accusing it of a politically correct “pseudo-liberalism”, a “perverse and dangerous mindset” that leads it to be biased in favour of al-Qaeda. He singles out a page on the CBBC website which discusses the events of 9/11 and offers it as proof that the BBC is soft on terrorism:

“The BBC’s omissions, the careful juxtaposition of alleged cause and effect, and the choice of language invite the conclusion that there is moral equivalence between a US presence in the Middle East and the random slaughter of innocents.”

This is Stephens’ cue for a lot of self-righteous guff about al-Qaeda, wheeling out the tired canard of neo-cons the world over – that Bin Laden is the new Hitler and al-Qaeda the new Nazism. You can see what’s coming next… Because the BBC doesn’t support the USA (Stephens would have us believe), it is on the side of the terrorists:

“From a studiously neutral standpoint, it becomes entirely logical to condemn abuses perpetrated by the US, while glossing over the bestial violence of its enemies. … The most the BBC will offer by way of judgment on al-Qaeda-inspired jihadis seems to be as follows: ‘Although they claim to be on a holy war, many Muslims say what they are doing is very wrong.’ That is just not good enough. Impartiality cannot throw out universal values.”

Stephens’ argument is fairly easy to tackle at a factual level.

The page on the CBBC website that gives him such offence is part of a package on 9/11. The previous page of the package describes al-Qaeda as “a militant Islamic group” and points out that Bin Laden laughed and boasted about the attacks – which the package makes clear killed 3000 people – and spoke of his joy. Twice the package makes it clear that al-Qaeda is a terrorist organisation.

The implication seems really quite abundantly clear that al-Qaeda is a dreadful organisation that takes pleasure from mass killing. It is hard to detect any “moral equivalence” at work. CBBC is aimed at young children, after all. Is that really the place for red-faced, table-thumping outrage? Moreover, there is certainly no trace of moral equivalence in CBBC’s treatment of the Iraq war (here and here), while the BBC’s adult package on al-Qaeda is completely different.

So Stephens has taken a children’s website and used it, out of all context, to pin all the crudest right-wing slurs on the BBC ’s coverage of war and Islam. Perhaps this was an original piece of research on his part? Sadly, no. It was taken from The Sun on September 11, 2007.

So the Financial Times, the country’s most serious liberal organ, is reduced to taking crumbs from Murdoch’s table and regurgitating them as pseudo-intellectual outrage. How are the mighty fallen.

The only reason the FT could get away with publishing such an article is because of the prevailing climate in politics and the media which screams at every opportunity that the BBC is “left wing” and a sucker for liberal causes. We need to fight back. The conference on November 17 at the London School of Economics must become the beginning of a real campaign to defend the BBC, and to silence those who use the media to make excuses for war.

“Scribbler”

P.S. I have just watched the stunning documentary “Taxi from the Dark Dide” broadcast on BBC 2 late on Monday (Oct 8th). There could be no better rejoinder to Philip Stephens.

Watch the clip here and read background here.

And here are some recent headlines that demonstrate the reality of this threat:

Britain ‘on board’ for US strikes on Iran
Sunday Telegraph. October 7

Secret US air force team to perfect plan for Iran strike
The Sunday Times, September 23

Bush setting America up for war with Iran
The Daily Telegraph, September 17

Israel bombed Syria, Netanyahu admits
Haaretz, September 24

Was Israeli raid a dry run for attack on Iran?
The Observer, September 16

The article starts here: In a series of public statements in recent months, President Bush and members of his Administration have redefined the war in Iraq, to an increasing degree, as a strategic battle between the United States and Iran. “Shia extremists, backed by Iran, are training Iraqis to carry out attacks on our forces and the Iraqi people,” Bush told the national convention of the American Legion in August. “The attacks on our bases and our troops by Iranian-supplied munitions have increased. . . . The Iranian regime must halt these actions. And, until it does, I will take actions necessary to protect our troops.” He then concluded, to applause, “I have authorized our military commanders in Iraq to confront Tehran’s murderous activities.”

The President’s position, and its corollary—that, if many of America’s problems in Iraq are the responsibility of Tehran, then the solution to them is to confront the Iranians—have taken firm hold in the Administration. This summer, the White House, pushed by the office of Vice-President Dick Cheney, requested that the Joint Chiefs of Staff redraw long-standing plans for a possible attack on Iran, according to former officials and government consultants. The focus of the plans had been a broad bombing attack, with targets including Iran’s known and suspected nuclear facilities and other military and infrastructure sites. Now the emphasis is on “surgical” strikes on Revolutionary Guard Corps facilities in Tehran and elsewhere, which, the Administration claims, have been the source of attacks on Americans in Iraq. What had been presented primarily as a counter-proliferation mission has been reconceived as counterterrorism.

The shift in targeting reflects three developments. First, the President and his senior advisers have concluded that their campaign to convince the American public that Iran poses an imminent nuclear threat has failed (unlike a similar campaign before the Iraq war), and that as a result there is not enough popular support for a major bombing campaign. The second development is that the White House has come to terms, in private, with the general consensus of the American intelligence community that Iran is at least five years away from obtaining a bomb. And, finally, there has been a growing recognition in Washington and throughout the Middle East that Iran is emerging as the geopolitical winner of the war in Iraq.

During a secure videoconference that took place early this summer, the President told Ryan Crocker, the U.S. Ambassador to Iraq, that he was thinking of hitting Iranian targets across the border and that the British “were on board.” At that point, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice interjected that there was a need to proceed carefully, because of the ongoing diplomatic track. Bush ended by instructing Crocker to tell Iran to stop interfering in Iraq or it would face American retribution.

At a White House meeting with Cheney this summer, according to a former senior intelligence official, it was agreed that, if limited strikes on Iran were carried out, the Administration could fend off criticism by arguing that they were a defensive action to save soldiers in Iraq. If Democrats objected, the Administration could say, “Bill Clinton did the same thing; he conducted limited strikes in Afghanistan, the Sudan, and in Baghdad to protect American lives.” The former intelligence official added, “There is a desperate effort by Cheney et al. to bring military action to Iran as soon as possible. Meanwhile, the politicians are saying, ‘You can’t do it, because every Republican is going to be defeated, and we’re only one fact from going over the cliff in Iraq.’ But Cheney doesn’t give a rat’s ass about the Republican worries, and neither does the President.”

Bryan Whitman, a Pentagon spokesman, said, “The President has made it clear that the United States government remains committed to a diplomatic solution with respect to Iran. The State Department is working diligently along with the international community to address our broad range of concerns.” (The White House declined to comment.)

I was repeatedly cautioned, in interviews, that the President has yet to issue the “execute order” that would be required for a military operation inside Iran, and such an order may never be issued. But there has been a significant increase in the tempo of attack planning. In mid-August, senior officials told reporters that the Administration intended to declare Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps a foreign terrorist organization. And two former senior officials of the C.I.A. told me that, by late summer, the agency had increased the size and the authority of the Iranian Operations Group. (A spokesman for the agency said, “The C.I.A. does not, as a rule, publicly discuss the relative size of its operational components.”)

“They’re moving everybody to the Iran desk,” one recently retired C.I.A. official said. “They’re dragging in a lot of analysts and ramping up everything. It’s just like the fall of 2002”—the months before the invasion of Iraq, when the Iraqi Operations Group became the most important in the agency. He added, “The guys now running the Iranian program have limited direct experience with Iran. In the event of an attack, how will the Iranians react? They will react, and the Administration has not thought it all the way through.”

That theme was echoed by Zbigniew Brzezinski, the former national-security adviser, who said that he had heard discussions of the White House’s more limited bombing plans for Iran. Brzezinski said that Iran would likely react to an American attack “by intensifying the conflict in Iraq and also in Afghanistan, their neighbors, and that could draw in Pakistan. We will be stuck in a regional war for twenty years.”

In a speech at the United Nations last week, Iran’s President, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, was defiant. He referred to America as an “aggressor” state, and said, “How can the incompetents who cannot even manage and control themselves rule humanity and arrange its affairs? Unfortunately, they have put themselves in the position of God.” (The day before, at Columbia, he suggested that the facts of the Holocaust still needed to be determined.)

“A lot depends on how stupid the Iranians will be,” Brzezinski told me. “Will they cool off Ahmadinejad and tone down their language?” The Bush Administration, by charging that Iran was interfering in Iraq, was aiming “to paint it as ‘We’re responding to what is an intolerable situation,’ ” Brzezinski said. “This time, unlike the attack in Iraq, we’re going to play the victim. The name of our game seems to be to get the Iranians to overplay their hand.”

General David Petraeus, the commander of the multinational forces in Iraq, in his report to Congress in September, buttressed the Administration’s case against Iran. “None of us, earlier this year, appreciated the extent of Iranian involvement in Iraq, something about which we and Iraq’s leaders all now have greater concern,” he said. Iran, Petraeus said, was fighting “a proxy war against the Iraqi state and coalition forces in Iraq.”

Iran has had a presence in Iraq for decades; the extent and the purpose of its current activities there are in dispute, however. During Saddam Hussein’s rule, when the Sunni-dominated Baath Party brutally oppressed the majority Shiites, Iran supported them. Many in the present Iraqi Shiite leadership, including prominent members of the government of Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki, spent years in exile in Iran; last week, at the Council on Foreign Relations, Maliki said, according to the Washington Post, that Iraq’s relations with the Iranians had “improved to the point that they are not interfering in our internal affairs.” Iran is so entrenched in Iraqi Shiite circles that any “proxy war” could be as much through the Iraqi state as against it. The crux of the Bush Administration’s strategic dilemma is that its decision to back a Shiite-led government after the fall of Saddam has empowered Iran, and made it impossible to exclude Iran from the Iraqi political scene.

Vali Nasr, a professor of international politics at Tufts University, who is an expert on Iran and Shiism, told me, “Between 2003 and 2006, the Iranians thought they were closest to the United States on the issue of Iraq.” The Iraqi Shia religious leadership encouraged Shiites to avoid confrontation with American soldiers and to participate in elections—believing that a one-man, one-vote election process could only result in a Shia-dominated government. Initially, the insurgency was mainly Sunni, especially Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia. Nasr told me that Iran’s policy since 2003 has been to provide funding, arms, and aid to several Shiite factions—including some in Maliki’s coalition. The problem, Nasr said, is that “once you put the arms on the ground you cannot control how they’re used later.”

In the Shiite view, the White House “only looks at Iran’s ties to Iraq in terms of security,” Nasr said. “Last year, over one million Iranians travelled to Iraq on pilgrimages, and there is more than a billion dollars a year in trading between the two countries. But the Americans act as if every Iranian inside Iraq were there to import weapons.”

Many of those who support the President’s policy argue that Iran poses an imminent threat. In a recent essay in Commentary, Norman Podhoretz depicted President Ahmadinejad as a revolutionary, “like Hitler . . . whose objective is to overturn the going international system and to replace it . . . with a new order dominated by Iran. . . . [T]he plain and brutal truth is that if Iran is to be prevented from developing a nuclear arsenal, there is no alternative to the actual use of military force.” Podhoretz concluded, “I pray with all my heart” that President Bush “will find it possible to take the only action that can stop Iran from following through on its evil intentions both toward us and toward Israel.” Podhoretz recently told politico.com that he had met with the President for about forty-five minutes to urge him to take military action against Iran, and believed that “Bush is going to hit” Iran before leaving office. (Podhoretz, one of the founders of neoconservatism, is a strong backer of Rudolph Giuliani’s Presidential campaign, and his son-in-law, Elliott Abrams, is a senior adviser to President Bush on national security.)

In early August, Army Lieutenant General Raymond Odierno, the second-ranking U.S. commander in Iraq, told the Times about an increase in attacks involving explosively formed penetrators, a type of lethal bomb that discharges a semi-molten copper slug that can rip through the armor of Humvees. The Times reported that U.S. intelligence and technical analyses indicated that Shiite militias had obtained the bombs from Iran. Odierno said that Iranians had been “surging support” over the past three or four months.

Questions remain, however, about the provenance of weapons in Iraq, especially given the rampant black market in arms. David Kay, a former C.I.A. adviser and the chief weapons inspector in Iraq for the United Nations, told me that his inspection team was astonished, in the aftermath of both Iraq wars, by “the huge amounts of arms” it found circulating among civilians and military personnel throughout the country. He recalled seeing stockpiles of explosively formed penetrators, as well as charges that had been recovered from unexploded American cluster bombs. Arms had also been supplied years ago by the Iranians to their Shiite allies in southern Iraq who had been persecuted by the Baath Party.

“I thought Petraeus went way beyond what Iran is doing inside Iraq today,” Kay said. “When the White House started its anti-Iran campaign, six months ago, I thought it was all craziness. Now it does look like there is some selective smuggling by Iran, but much of it has been in response to American pressure and American threats—more a ‘shot across the bow’ sort of thing, to let Washington know that it was not going to get away with its threats so freely. Iran is not giving the Iraqis the good stuff—the anti-aircraft missiles that can shoot down American planes and its advanced anti-tank weapons.”

Another element of the Administration’s case against Iran is the presence of Iranian agents in Iraq. General Petraeus, testifying before Congress, said that a commando faction of the Revolutionary Guards was seeking to turn its allies inside Iraq into a “Hezbollah-like force to serve its interests.” In August, Army Major General Rick Lynch, the commander of the 3rd Infantry Division, told reporters in Baghdad that his troops were tracking some fifty Iranian men sent by the Revolutionary Guards who were training Shiite insurgents south of Baghdad. “We know they’re here and we target them as well,” he said.

Patrick Clawson, an expert on Iran at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, told me that “there are a lot of Iranians at any time inside Iraq, including those doing intelligence work and those doing humanitarian missions. It would be prudent for the Administration to produce more evidence of direct military training—or produce fighters captured in Iraq who had been trained in Iran.” He added, “It will be important for the Iraqi government to be able to state that they were unaware of this activity”; otherwise, given the intense relationship between the Iraqi Shiite leadership and Tehran, the Iranians could say that “they had been asked by the Iraqi government to train these people.” (In late August, American troops raided a Baghdad hotel and arrested a group of Iranians. They were a delegation from Iran’s energy ministry, and had been invited to Iraq by the Maliki government; they were later released.)

“If you want to attack, you have to prepare the groundwork, and you have to be prepared to show the evidence,” Clawson said. Adding to the complexity, he said, is a question that seems almost counterintuitive: “What is the attitude of Iraq going to be if we hit Iran? Such an attack could put a strain on the Iraqi government.”

A senior European diplomat, who works closely with American intelligence, told me that there is evidence that Iran has been making extensive preparation for an American bombing attack. “We know that the Iranians are strengthening their air-defense capabilities,” he said, “and we believe they will react asymmetrically—hitting targets in Europe and in Latin America.” There is also specific intelligence suggesting that Iran will be aided in these attacks by Hezbollah. “Hezbollah is capable, and they can do it,” the diplomat said.

In interviews with current and former officials, there were repeated complaints about the paucity of reliable information. A former high-level C.I.A. official said that the intelligence about who is doing what inside Iran “is so thin that nobody even wants his name on it. This is the problem.”

The difficulty of determining who is responsible for the chaos in Iraq can be seen in Basra, in the Shiite south, where British forces had earlier presided over a relatively secure area. Over the course of this year, however, the region became increasingly ungovernable, and by fall the British had retreated to fixed bases. A European official who has access to current intelligence told me that “there is a firm belief inside the American and U.K. intelligence community that Iran is supporting many of the groups in southern Iraq that are responsible for the deaths of British and American soldiers. Weapons and money are getting in from Iran. They have been able to penetrate many groups”—primarily the Mahdi Army and other Shiite militias.

A June, 2007, report by the International Crisis Group found, however, that Basra’s renewed instability was mainly the result of “the systematic abuse of official institutions, political assassinations, tribal vendettas, neighborhood vigilantism and enforcement of social mores, together with the rise of criminal mafias.” The report added that leading Iraqi politicians and officials “routinely invoke the threat of outside interference”—from bordering Iran—“to justify their behavior or evade responsibility for their failures.”

Earlier this year, before the surge in U.S. troops, the American command in Baghdad changed what had been a confrontational policy in western Iraq, the Sunni heartland (and the base of the Baathist regime), and began working with the Sunni tribes, including some tied to the insurgency. Tribal leaders are now getting combat support as well as money, intelligence, and arms, ostensibly to fight Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia. Empowering Sunni forces may undermine efforts toward national reconciliation, however. Already, tens of thousands of Shiites have fled Anbar Province, many to Shiite neighborhoods in Baghdad, while Sunnis have been forced from their homes in Shiite communities. Vali Nasr, of Tufts, called the internal displacement of communities in Iraq a form of “ethnic cleansing.”

“The American policy of supporting the Sunnis in western Iraq is making the Shia leadership very nervous,” Nasr said. “The White House makes it seem as if the Shia were afraid only of Al Qaeda—but they are afraid of the Sunni tribesmen we are arming. The Shia attitude is ‘So what if you’re getting rid of Al Qaeda?’ The problem of Sunni resistance is still there. The Americans believe they can distinguish between good and bad insurgents, but the Shia don’t share that distinction. For the Shia, they are all one adversary.”

Nasr went on, “The United States is trying to fight on all sides—Sunni and Shia—and be friends with all sides.” In the Shiite view, “It’s clear that the United States cannot bring security to Iraq, because it is not doing everything necessary to bring stability. If they did, they would talk to anybody to achieve it—even Iran and Syria,” Nasr said. (Such engagement was a major recommendation of the Iraq Study Group.) “America cannot bring stability in Iraq by fighting Iran in Iraq.”

The revised bombing plan for a possible attack, with its tightened focus on counterterrorism, is gathering support among generals and admirals in the Pentagon. The strategy calls for the use of sea-launched cruise missiles and more precisely targeted ground attacks and bombing strikes, including plans to destroy the most important Revolutionary Guard training camps, supply depots, and command and control facilities.

“Cheney’s option is now for a fast in and out—for surgical strikes,” the former senior American intelligence official told me. The Joint Chiefs have turned to the Navy, he said, which had been chafing over its role in the Air Force-dominated air war in Iraq. “The Navy’s planes, ships, and cruise missiles are in place in the Gulf and operating daily. They’ve got everything they need—even AWACS are in place and the targets in Iran have been programmed. The Navy is flying FA-18 missions every day in the Gulf.” There are also plans to hit Iran’s anti-aircraft surface-to-air missile sites. “We’ve got to get a path in and a path out,” the former official said.

A Pentagon consultant on counterterrorism told me that, if the bombing campaign took place, it would be accompanied by a series of what he called “short, sharp incursions” by American Special Forces units into suspected Iranian training sites. He said, “Cheney is devoted to this, no question.”

A limited bombing attack of this sort “only makes sense if the intelligence is good,” the consultant said. If the targets are not clearly defined, the bombing “will start as limited, but then there will be an ‘escalation special.’ Planners will say that we have to deal with Hezbollah here and Syria there. The goal will be to hit the cue ball one time and have all the balls go in the pocket. But add-ons are always there in strike planning.”

The surgical-strike plan has been shared with some of America’s allies, who have had mixed reactions to it. Israel’s military and political leaders were alarmed, believing, the consultant said, that it didn’t sufficiently target Iran’s nuclear facilities. The White House has been reassuring the Israeli government, the former senior official told me, that the more limited target list would still serve the goal of counter-proliferation by decapitating the leadership of the Revolutionary Guards, who are believed to have direct control over the nuclear-research program. “Our theory is that if we do the attacks as planned it will accomplish two things,” the former senior official said.

An Israeli official said, “Our main focus has been the Iranian nuclear facilities, not because other things aren’t important. We’ve worked on missile technology and terrorism, but we see the Iranian nuclear issue as one that cuts across everything.” Iran, he added, does not need to develop an actual warhead to be a threat. “Our problems begin when they learn and master the nuclear fuel cycle and when they have the nuclear materials,” he said. There was, for example, the possibility of a “dirty bomb,” or of Iran’s passing materials to terrorist groups. “There is still time for diplomacy to have an impact, but not a lot,” the Israeli official said. “We believe the technological timetable is moving faster than the diplomatic timetable. And if diplomacy doesn’t work, as they say, all options are on the table.”

The bombing plan has had its most positive reception from the newly elected government of Britain’s Prime Minister, Gordon Brown. A senior European official told me, “The British perception is that the Iranians are not making the progress they want to see in their nuclear-enrichment processing. All the intelligence community agree that Iran is providing critical assistance, training, and technology to a surprising number of terrorist groups in Iraq and Afghanistan, and, through Hezbollah, in Lebanon, and Israel/Palestine, too.”

There were four possible responses to this Iranian activity, the European official said: to do nothing (“There would be no retaliation to the Iranians for their attacks; this would be sending the wrong signal”); to publicize the Iranian actions (“There is one great difficulty with this option—the widespread lack of faith in American intelligence assessments”); to attack the Iranians operating inside Iraq (“We’ve been taking action since last December, and it does have an effect”); or, finally, to attack inside Iran.

The European official continued, “A major air strike against Iran could well lead to a rallying around the flag there, but a very careful targeting of terrorist training camps might not.” His view, he said, was that “once the Iranians get a bloody nose they rethink things.” For example, Ali Akbar Rafsanjani and Ali Larijani, two of Iran’s most influential political figures, “might go to the Supreme Leader and say, ‘The hard-line policies have got us into this mess. We must change our approach for the sake of the regime.’ ”

A retired American four-star general with close ties to the British military told me that there was another reason for Britain’s interest—shame over the failure of the Royal Navy to protect the sailors and Royal Marines who were seized by Iran on March 23rd, in the Persian Gulf. “The professional guys are saying that British honor is at stake, and if there’s another event like that in the water off Iran the British will hit back,” he said.

The revised bombing plan “could work—if it’s in response to an Iranian attack,” the retired four-star general said. “The British may want to do it to get even, but the more reasonable people are saying, ‘Let’s do it if the Iranians stage a cross-border attack inside Iraq.’ It’s got to be ten dead American soldiers and four burned trucks.” There is, he added, “a widespread belief in London that Tony Blair’s government was sold a bill of goods by the White House in the buildup to the war against Iraq. So if somebody comes into Gordon Brown’s office and says, ‘We have this intelligence from America,’ Brown will ask, ‘Where did it come from? Have we verified it?’ The burden of proof is high.”

The French government shares the Administration’s sense of urgency about Iran’s nuclear program, and believes that Iran will be able to produce a warhead within two years. France’s newly elected President, Nicolas Sarkozy, created a stir in late August when he warned that Iran could be attacked if it did not halt is nuclear program. Nonetheless, France has indicated to the White House that it has doubts about a limited strike, the former senior intelligence official told me. Many in the French government have concluded that the Bush Administration has exaggerated the extent of Iranian meddling inside Iraq; they believe, according to a European diplomat, that “the American problems in Iraq are due to their own mistakes, and now the Americans are trying to show some teeth. An American bombing will show only that the Bush Administration has its own agenda toward Iran.”

A European intelligence official made a similar point. “If you attack Iran,” he told me, “and do not label it as being against Iran’s nuclear facilities, it will strengthen the regime, and help to make the Islamic air in the Middle East thicker.”

Ahmadinejad, in his speech at the United Nations, said that Iran considered the dispute over its nuclear program “closed.” Iran would deal with it only through the International Atomic Energy Agency, he said, and had decided to “disregard unlawful and political impositions of the arrogant powers.” He added, in a press conference after the speech, “the decisions of the United States and France are not important.”

The director general of the I.A.E.A., Mohamed ElBaradei, has for years been in an often bitter public dispute with the Bush Administration; the agency’s most recent report found that Iran was far less proficient in enriching uranium than expected. A diplomat in Vienna, where the I.A.E.A. is based, said, “The Iranians are years away from making a bomb, as ElBaradei has said all along. Running three thousand centrifuges does not make a bomb.” The diplomat added, referring to hawks in the Bush Administration, “They don’t like ElBaradei, because they are in a state of denial. And now their negotiating policy has failed, and Iran is still enriching uranium and still making progress.”

The diplomat expressed the bitterness that has marked the I.A.E.A.’s dealings with the Bush Administration since the buildup to the 2003 invasion of Iraq. “The White House’s claims were all a pack of lies, and Mohamed is dismissive of those lies,” the diplomat said.

Hans Blix, a former head of the I.A.E.A., questioned the Bush Administration’s commitment to diplomacy. “There are important cards that Washington could play; instead, they have three aircraft carriers sitting in the Persian Gulf,” he said. Speaking of Iran’s role in Iraq, Blix added, “My impression is that the United States has been trying to push up the accusations against Iran as a basis for a possible attack—as an excuse for jumping on them.”

The Iranian leadership is feeling the pressure. In the press conference after his U.N. speech, Ahmadinejad was asked about a possible attack. “They want to hurt us,” he said, “but, with the will of God, they won’t be able to do it.” According to a former State Department adviser on Iran, the Iranians complained, in diplomatic meetings in Baghdad with Ambassador Crocker, about a refusal by the Bush Administration to take advantage of their knowledge of the Iraqi political scene. The former adviser said, “They’ve been trying to convey to the United States that ‘We can help you in Iraq. Nobody knows Iraq better than us.’ ” Instead, the Iranians are preparing for an American attack.

The adviser said that he had heard from a source in Iran that the Revolutionary Guards have been telling religious leaders that they can stand up to an American attack. “The Guards are claiming that they can infiltrate American security,” the adviser said. “They are bragging that they have spray-painted an American warship—to signal the Americans that they can get close to them.” (I was told by the former senior intelligence official that there was an unexplained incident, this spring, in which an American warship was spray-painted with a bull’s-eye while docked in Qatar, which may have been the source of the boasts.)

“Do you think those crazies in Tehran are going to say, ‘Uncle Sam is here! We’d better stand down’? ” the former senior intelligence official said. “The reality is an attack will make things ten times warmer.”

Another recent incident, in Afghanistan, reflects the tension over intelligence. In July, the London Telegraph reported that what appeared to be an SA-7 shoulder-launched missile was fired at an American C-130 Hercules aircraft. The missile missed its mark. Months earlier, British commandos had intercepted a few truckloads of weapons, including one containing a working SA-7 missile, coming across the Iranian border. But there was no way of determining whether the missile fired at the C-130 had come from Iran—especially since SA-7s are available through black-market arms dealers.

Vincent Cannistraro, a retired C.I.A. officer who has worked closely with his counterparts in Britain, added to the story: “The Brits told me that they were afraid at first to tell us about the incident—in fear that Cheney would use it as a reason to attack Iran.” The intelligence subsequently was forwarded, he said.

The retired four-star general confirmed that British intelligence “was worried” about passing the information along. “The Brits don’t trust the Iranians,” the retired general said, “but they also don’t trust Bush and Cheney.”

I was in Riyadh reporting for British Satellite News, a government-funded news agency. We were covering an official visit by Bill Rammell, the minister for lifelong learning. Saudi Arabia is keen to educate and train its own teenagers in order to reduce the country’s dependence on imported labour and skills. The visit was designed to establish potentially lucrative educational ties between the two countries.

In line with UK policy Bill Rammell asked the Saudi ministers about democratic and social reform. Sipping mint tea in the sumptuous majlis, or parliament, the minister’s first attempt to tackle the Saudis on human rights was ignored. Instead, the Saudi ministers emphasised their country’s need for welders. The minister took the stonewalling well, seamlessly praising his hosts for limited reforms in local elections, while coaxing them again: when would women get equal opportunity? And when would the Saudi people get the vote?

At this point, the UK Ambassador, Sir Sherard Cowper-Coles, who’d been whispering in the minister’s ear throughout, intervened. The Saudi translator, he said, wasn’t up to the mark, and had made several mistakes. The ambassador, a fluent Arabic speaker, announced that he would take over as the minister’s personal translator, whispering in his ear. Fine for the minister, but impossible for anyone else to hear.

I protested quietly that I wouldn’t know what the Saudis were saying, but I was ignored. Later I was told the Saudis had explained that women were being allowed equal employment and education, but would remain segregated for their own good. They would not be allowed into politics or given the vote.

Nor would anyone else get the vote: the Saudi people had shown that they were perfectly happy with the House of Saud in charge, so why on earth would the House of Saud want to impose democracy?

If this was what Bill Rammell heard he was unable to debate it. The meeting was over, we were off to film at the medina and the minister was off to inspect oilwells in Eastern Province.

Returning to London, I wrote my report, including what I had been able to glean from the exchanges at the Saudi parliament. The report was doctored by the editor, Mike Nolan, to remove the Saudi government’s views on democracy and women’s rights.

We now know, what I did not know then, that Sir Sherard Cowper-Coles is the man who warned the UK government that the Saudis would end security co-operation if the police investigation into allegations of £60 million worth of hospitality for the Saudis in connection with British Aerospace’s “Al Yamamah” arms deal went ahead. The inquiry of course was duly dropped.

For me as a journalist the Foreign Office’s editorial influence at BSN was making it more and more difficult to do my job. I reported remarks by Dennis McNamara, the UN’s highly respected adviser on displacement, denouncing the west for flooding Africa with arms. Mike Nolan called me in for a little chat. Did I realise who our client was? Why did I persist in writing critical reports?

I tried to argue that our job was not to report professionally, so that the clients – in my view overseas broadcasters, and not the FCO – would trust us. Mike Nolan told me the UN adviser’s words were “too close to the bone” and they were removed from my report._I no longer work at BSN, but its biased and flawed material is being used by hundreds of TV stations in the Middle East and Asia. All this is funded by the Foreign and Diplomatic Service, courtesy of the British taxpayer, to the tune of some £3 million per year.

Another tale that ran into trouble was when I reported perfectly friendly remarks by Tony Blair about Islam, the war on terror and other contentious issues, made on the record to a world audience. Even these were removed by BSN on FCO orders. If the Foreign Office can censor its own Prime Minister to feed distorted news to the Arab world, how can Britain be trusted there?

Mike Nolan told the Journalist: “Unlike Bruce, I have no intention of breaking my confidentiality on what went on between the two of us. I completely refute his version of events. “It is wrong to suggest I doctor scripts. Bruce was certainly not alone in having his material subbed. When material was reduced I nearly always took the time to explain why. Bruce’s claim he ran into trouble when he reported friendly remarks made by PM Blair about Islam is untrue. I am not censored by the Foreign Office; I did not censor Bruce. BSN prides itself on providing accurate and balanced information on news and developments in the UK.”

The survey, by Opinion Research Business (ORB), asked a representative sample of 1,461 Iraqis how many members of their household had died as a result of the conflict. The survey showed that over 1.2 million Iraqis had died, with the death rate now exceeding the Rwanda genocide of 1994. Almost one in two households in Baghdad have lost a family member.

ORB is about as mainstream as you can get. It has been commissioned by the Tory Party, by the BBC (most recently by Newsnight), and its work is cited frequently in the British media.

When an ORB opinion poll in Iraq earlier this year provided statistics that were supportive of the occupation, it was splashed all over the Sunday Times (here and here) and other newspapers internationally.

So far only the Los Angeles Times has carried this story, although this weekend’s Observer mentioned it prominently within another article.

Why hasn’t the story been picked up elsewhere? If this isn’t double standards, what is?

Media Workers Against the War contacted ORB and spoke to managing director Johnny Heald. Mr Heald said that, although the press release had been on ORB’s website since Friday, the results of the survey will be formally launched on Tuesday (September 18).

He said that ORB has no ideological position: after publishing previous poll results on Iraq it was accused of being right-wing, but now he expects that left-wing media will pick up on the new research.

Mr Heald said that an objection to ORB’s latest findings might be that, with so many deaths, where are all the bodies? He said the organsation’s interviewers in Iraq, led by the respected pollster Munqeth Daghir, say people don’t report many murders for fear of reprisal. Four ORB interviews have themselves been murdered, he said.

Mr Heald also pointed out that the survey showed 48% had died from gunshot wounds, which is significant because car bombs and aerial bombardments usually make the news – gunshots rarely get into the headlines.

This figure tallies with the Lancet research, which found that 56% of violent deaths were a result of gunfire.

1. 70% of Iraqis believe security is now worse than before the surge.
2. There has been no reduction in civilian deaths.
3. Food rations have been cut by 35%.
4. There are fewer doctors and nurses.
5. There has been a sharp rise in Iraqis fleeing Iraq.
   
6. The US is partitioning Baghdad along sectarian lines.
7. The US is arming future militias.
8. The country is awash with US-supplied weapons.
9. The UN says Iraq’s crisis is worse than Darfur.
10. The situation is a bloody stalemate.

The week began with a letter from a Guantánamo Bay officer suggesting that I might have smuggled some Speedo swimming trunks and “Under Armour briefs” to my client, British resident Shaker Aamer. Shaker was apparently caught wearing both “contraband” items in his prison cell.

I was unsure whether to be amused or annoyed. These are serious allegations, yet the notion that I was going to slip a prisoner some Speedos was pretty silly. So I composed a reply that contained every euphemism for underwear that I could conjure up, and relished reminding the officer that I am more concerned with legal briefs than the Under Armour variety.

Surely it would be clear even to the Guantánamo authorities that their own guards must have supplied the offending lingerie. My internet research disclosed that Under Armour does a line of “tactical” underwear for the military. They’re camouflaged, presumably in case a soldier gets caught with his trousers down somewhere in the jungle. Meanwhile, the only pool of water where Shaker could employ his Speedos would be his lavatory, putting me in mind of the hackneyed admonition at the public baths: “We don’t swim in your toilet, so please don’t pee in our pool.”

I had imagined spending the week on something rather more pressing. Sami al-Haj, the Al Jazeera cameraman held in Guantánamo, has been on a hungerstrike for more than 230 days, more than three times as long as the IRA strikers in 1980. Sami was seized when on assignment to Afghanistan, apparently because the US thought he had filmed Al Jazeera’s famous Bin Laden interview. As has so often been the case of late, the US was wrong (though name me a journalist who would turn down a Bin Laden scoop).

Now Sami is being force-fed with a 110cm tube shoved down his nose. The military is doing it in a way that is calculated to be painful – or, to borrow General Craddock’s offensive euphemism, to make it “inconvenient” for Sami and others to continue their peaceful protest. Instead of leaving the tube in – which would be bad enough – they insert it and pull it out again with each feeding. I tried experimenting with this on myself one time and it is excruciating.

Sami began his strike when his patience finally ran out on 7 January of this year, the fifth anniversary of his incarceration without trial. I have just received the unclassified portions of my notes from a recent visit – every word he tells me has to go through the censors, so there is a lot I cannot pass on.

I am very worried about him. His memory has been going, along with his grip on the English language. He has developed a paranoid fear that he will be the next prisoner to die at the island gulag. “My prison number is 3, 4, 5,” he told me, his face serious. “First, in June 2006, there were three prisoners who died. Then, this May, there was a fourth to die. Three, four… five, I am afraid I am going to be the fifth.”

I administered a psychological screening test on Sami when I saw him. I cannot write what he said as (for reasons that are beyond me) that part was not cleared for public consumption. I’ve consulted with various mental health professionals about him. One doctor reminded me not to refer to Sami as paranoid: “His fears of mistreatment at the hands of the Americans are not, unfortunately, paranoid. They are very worrying, but he has more than five years’ experience proving that they are very real.”

Doctors from the US, UK and Middle East all agree that there are urgent concerns about Sami’s health, and that he needs independent medical intervention. He won’t get it, no matter what I do. Sami has already told me what I have to say to his seven-year-old son, Mohammed, if he does not make it out of his prison cell alive. I hope I never have to deliver the message.

When BBC correspondent Alan Johnston was being held hostage by the Palestinian Army of Islam, Sami issued a plea asking them to let his fellow journalist go without conditions. It was broadcast by Sami’s Al Jazeera employers, in the hope that the kidnappers would be watching the Arabic news channel. I wonder how to contact Alan Johnston now, to see if he can return the favour.

The western media has been too slow to come to Sami’s aid. I am not sure why.
Clive Stafford Smith is the legal director of Reprieve, a UK charity which provides investigation and legal representation to prisoners denied justice by powerful governments across the world, from death row to Guantánamo Bay. He has just published a book about his work, Bad Men – Guantánamo Bay and the Secret Prisons (Weidenfeld & Nicolson). Contact him at info@reprieve.org.uk, or Reprieve, PO Box 52742, London EC4P 4WS, or telephone 020 7353 4640

The plight facing Iraqis “is as significant (as Darfur),” says Margarette Wahlstrom, deputy head of the UN’s aid coordination arm Ocha.

Comparisons between emergencies are difficult but in terms of displaced people alone, Iraq’s crisis, with 4m displaced people, is double that of Darfur. For Iraq to be described in similar terms as Sudan – whose plight has mobilised a new generation of human rights activists – is striking testament to how bad the situation has become.

In early 2003, before US forces crossed the border from Kuwait, Iraqis may have thought things could not get much worse. A crippling conflict with Iran, followed by the first Gulf war and a decade of sanctions, had crippled the economy and left many millions dependent on food handouts.

But, anecdotally at least, the situation in mid-2007 is now even more dire than in 2003. “As far as children’s living conditions go, they are worse now than immediately prior to the war,” says Claire Hajaj, who works for Unicef, the children’s agency, in Amman.

Oxfam, the international aid agency, said in a recent report that 8m Iraqis were in urgent need of emergency aid, while “many more are living in poverty, without basic services, and increasingly threatened by disease and malnutrition. If people’s basic needs are left unattended, this will only serve to further destabilise the country.”

Iraqis are fleeing their homes in their millions, in the largest Middle East population movement since the creation of Israel. Jennifer Pagonis, spokesperson for the UN refugee agency, says the monthly rate of displacement has reached more than 60,000 people.

More than 2m Iraqis are displaced inside Iraq, and struggling to survive. Syria estimates that it now hosts more than 1.4m Iraqis, while Jordan has between 500,000 and 750,000. Both countries’ social services are overwhelmed, and even those Iraqi refugees who once had resources say their money is running out.

Unfortunately, what may now be the world’s biggest humanitarian emergency is – by comparison with the global angst over Darfur – relatively unnoticed. A serious problem, aid workers say, is that rampant insecurity means international relief officials cannot go in, and accurate numbers are almost impossible to find.

Based in Amman, the UN’s humanitarian operation relies mainly on local actors, who have reasons to massage the figures, and most official statistics date from 2005 and early 2006, before the bombing of a major Shia shrine in Samarra precipitated a new surge in sectarian violence.

At that point, indicators broadly did not suggest that Iraqis were faring as badly as before the war. Nevertheless, even then a comprehensive survey published in May 2006 by the World Food Programme revealed that more than 4m people (15.4 per cent of the surveyed population) were food insecure, and in dire need of different types of humanitarian assistance – 11 per cent higher than two years earlier.

The WFP is currently supporting a nationwide Food Security Survey; which should be ready by the first half of January 2008. “Figures are hard to come by. We know that things have got worse particularly in the latter half of 2006 and first quarter of 2007, but we haven’t got the stats to prove it,” says Ms Hajaj.

“All we have is qualitative data from our field people, who report drug shortages in hospitals, long queues at the ante-natal centres, curfews forbidding travel to hospital after dark, closed schools, frightened students and exhausted teachers.”

What can be said is that Iraq’s indicators are almost universally worse than those of its neighbours. Iraq’s maternal mortality rates in 2004 were 1 in 65 deaths, compared to 1 in 130 for Syria and 1 in 450 for Jordan. Immunisation rates were 55 per cent, compared to 68 per cent in 2000 and 95 per cent and 99 per cent in Jordan and Syria respectively.

The UN estimates that only 30 per cent of the population has access to safe water, and with only 17 per cent of Iraq’s sewage treated before release, the majority of Iraqis are living in unsanitary conditions – evidenced by a recent cholera outbreak in northern Iraq.

According to Oxfam, only 60 per cent of 4m Iraqis reliant on food aid have access to rations through the government-run Public Distribution System (PDS), down from 96 per cent in 2004. Forty-three per cent of Iraqis suffer from ‘absolute poverty’, with over half the population out of work.

It also claims child malnutrition rates have risen from 19 per cent before the US-led invasion in 2003 to 28 per cent now; while the number of Iraqis without access to adequate water supplies has risen from 50 per cent to 70 per cent since 2003.

Education is also in crisis. During the last year, the UN warns that many schools in the Baghdad, Anbar and Diyala areas were closed, and at least one in five children did not attend classes nationwide. In the south and north, teachers are struggling to accommodate displaced pupils who were able to re-enroll; many others were not because of bureaucratic hurdles.

“The people of Iraq have a right, enshrined in international law, to material assistance that meets their humanitarian needs, but this right is being neglected,” says Oxfam.

”The government of Iraq, international donors, and the United Nations (UN) system… have a responsibility to find ways to secure the right conditions for the delivery of assistance, both where conflict is intense and in less insecure parts of the country to which many people have fled.”

• That the Deobandi current of Islam “gave birth to the Taliban” and runs half of Britain’s mosques
• A bloke in the Deobandi leadership “loathes the British”, Jews and Christians;
• And of course, he wants Muslims to “shed blood”.

These allegations were generalised into a vituperative Times leader attacking “this virulent, exclusionary, uncompromising extremism”. And then, the icing on the cake – columnist Rod Liddle spelt out what all this is getting at, namely, you can’t make any distinction between moderate and extremist Muslims:

“The terms moderate and extremist are not much use to us when considering Islam; they sort of merge with one another.”

Monday’s Times followed all this up by giving a new twist to the hoary old row about the “mega-mosque” in East London also being controlled by extremists. This in turn was nothing but a re-hash of Friday afternoon’s Evening Standard’s re-hash of the original piece in the Times!

This is all textbook Islamophobic reporting, and it can be pulled apart quite easily.

The accusation that Deobandis are the British wing of the Taleban is laughable; it’s like saying the co-operative movement is responsible for Stalin’s Gulag, or that Cambridge University fosters fascism because BNP leader Nick Griffin got a degree there. As one Deobandi leader put it, it’s just “a load of rubbish“.

Ahmed Rashid, the Telegraph’s Central Asia correspondent, in his masterful book on the Taliban, spells out at some length that “The Deobandis, a branch of Sunni Hanafi Islam, have had a history in Afghanistan, but the Taliban’s interpretation of the creed has no parallel anywhere in the Muslim world.” Taliban madrassas “were run by semi-educated mullahs who were far removed from the original reformist agenda of the Deobandi school”. A clear and detailed exposition of the same position is also to be found in an essay by the historian of the Deobandis, Professor Barbara Metcalf.

The Times bends over backwards to make the bloke at the centre of the allegations, Rihadh ul Haq, look like a new Abu Hamza, but flinging lots of mud doesn’t guarantee it will stick. The quotes taken from his speeches are tendentious in the extreme. Ul Haq is certainly no Malcolm X, but Alex Haley’s autobiography of the great black Muslim anti-racist brings out some of the same themes bitterly expressed in Ul Haq’s sermons – namely, a hatred for the surrounding society that hates black people and persecutes Muslims.

As for “seperationism”, in London there are communities of Jews who still dress the same way they did in Lithuania a century or more ago and do not mix much with outsiders. They receive no great criticism for this. The same is true of the Jehovah’s Witnesses and various Christian sects in the USA. With Muslims, however, the media grab any stick they can to beat them with.

The Times’ reporter, Andrew Norfolk, has a pedigree of Islamophobic reporting – he is a neo-con journalist with an agenda. But he is just a cog in the machine. As even the conservative Wall Street Journal writer Paul Craig Roberts has recently pointed out: “An entire industry has been created that is devoted to demonising Islam”.

In a remarkable article, Roberts continues: “In the US it is acceptable, even obligatory in many circles, to hate Muslims and to support violence against them. … Blind ignorant hate against Muslims has been brought to a boiling point.”

Roberts points out how this Islamophobia is laying the basis for an attack on Iran. It goes without saying that Murdoch’s Fox News is a chief proponent of military action on Iran.

The UK has its own industry demonising Muslims. Its techniques are crude but effective – and a shameful comment on British journalism.
By Dave Crouch

The Mail, after all, had the same story from the same sources on August 31, and the Telegraph on the very next day, as did the Mirror.

In fact the story has been floating around for most of this decade and regularly resurfaces in one form or another.

So why should the Indy run with it now? Could it be that the anniversary of 9/11 found the paper without the obligatory story reminding middle England that those uppity Muslims are still making our lives difficult for us six years on? The other papers had “controversial expansion” of Muslim schools, while Newsnight is banging on about books in libraries.

The Independent quoted the author of the research on Leicester, known for his anti-racist views, saying that discussion of “minority white cities” is a “a crude expression of fear”.

But the fine traditions of Fleet Street have never allowed rationality to get in the way of a good headline.

Sitting in a High Court conference room one cold January day in 2004, little did we foresee the implications for Britain’s last well-loved national institution of what we were hearing. Of course we didn’t. We were too busy fighting to suppress the laughter to find the energy for clairvoyance.

For me, ever the professional, it proved a losing battle. Lord Hutton had weakened resistance by repeatedly pronouncing the word mass, as in WMD, to rhyme with arse, indeed farce. When he then revealed that the furthest he could go, in judging whether Alastair Campbell pressured John Scarlett to spice up the intelligence, was that just maybe, Scarlett had sensed some unspoken desire of Campbell’s that the reports be less equivocal and subliminally reacted to it, that was it. The giggling erupted, and I scurried from the room before His Lordship had me removed. This high point of judicial buffoonery soon lost its comic edge.

Within a day, a flawlessly executed establishment fix had removed chairman Gavyn Davies and director general Greg Dyke, and set the template for the cowardice under fire we now see from the BBC almost daily. Today, thanks to a monumentally clueless retired Law Lord, we look on helplessly as the BBC commits a lingering form of professional suicide.

It was snowing in the Strand that January day, and from memory I’m pretty sure that was the last time any snow settled in London. It should go without saying that one can draw no conclusion about climate change from the meteorological observation that that snowfall in one part of one country has all but vanished, where 30 years ago it was plentiful. It should do, but it doesn’t.

The central reason for the BBC’s abandonment of its climate change telethon Planet Relief is that those who dismiss global warming as a leftie conspiracy to purloin more taxes do not play by the same rules. To them, much as for Messrs Scarlett and Campbell, anything may be adduced as decisive proof.

Almost every paper has its resident climate change gainsayer… a hack with at most a chemistry O-level who, through some mystical process of scholarly osmosis has come to understand this complex subject better than all those hundreds of scientists, armed with powerful computer simulations, who have devoted their working lives to it. There are countless examples of their work, but one will suffice to give a flavour. A while ago, the Daily Mail’s Tom Utley assuaged worries about water levels rising as a result of melting glaciers on this single ground: when the ice in his gin and tonic melts, explained Mr Utley (and one presumes this won him a fellowship of the Royal Society), the liquid doesn’t come spilling over the top of his glass.

There are at least a dozen equally gifted amateurs in the national press, along with a small but vocal band of politicians and even the odd scientist, whose views dissent sharply from the mainstream. Somehow this elite corps has created a weather system of its own to freeze the well-meaning but enfeebled heart of the BBC.

I yield to no one in my disdain for TV marathons in which soap actors and comics brandish their empathy like AK47s, spraying bullets of misplaced moral superiority at the viewer. But I also accept that the likes of Bob Geldof and Richard Curtis are heroes for the barely calculable good they do in raising not merely money but awareness of the gravest global problems.

It isn’t easy to picture Lord Reith sitting in his armchair revelling in the sight of Davina McCall prancing across a stage in a £16,000 designer outfit hectoring the viewership to cough up for the starving of Somalia. But if there is a more effective modern translation of his mission statement about the need to “inform, educate and entertain” than a climate change telethon, I can’t imagine what it might be.

There is plenty of room too, of course, for more rigorous scientific documentaries for those who prefer them, and such a series will apparently replace Planet Relief. But when it comes to engaging a young audience with the perceived attention span of a goldfish in early stage Alzheimer’s, what you need is Ricky Gervais reprising his well-worn parody of the faux-altruistic celeb.

Trailing this latest act of BBC cravenness at the Edinburgh TV Festival, Newsnight editor Peter Barron declared that it isn’t the Beeb’s job to save the world. This brings to mind a politician whom few of you will remember. Long ago, it was the rhetorical gambit of a Mr Tony Blair to address only those arguments that had never been made.

No one to my knowledge has ever said that the BBC exists to save the world, or that this was Planet Relief’s intent. To conflate the desire to inform and educate about what may or may not be a danger to humanity with a megalomaniacal Messiah complex is the cheapest form of intellectual chicanery. If Mr Barron cannot trust his employer to include, in an entire day of programming, sufficient caveats about the reliability of scientific opinion, he might think about working for a less irresponsible broadcaster.

The truth is that this climbdown has nothing to do with the desire to avoid preachiness or partiality; and everything to do with the blind fear of being attacked that is the residue of Hutton and those recent, foolish but trivial misjudgments over that Queen documentary and those “live” TV phone in competitions.

Thirty years ago, when the snow fell freely over London, our elders and betters routinely referred to British institutions with stereotypical English smugness. The Royal Family, the NHS, the police, the judicial system, Lloyds of London and the BBC … each and every one was, to the ever nostalgic inhabitants of a fading post-imperial power, “the best in the world”.

Of the above, only the BBC deserved that reputation then, and only the BBC retains it now. Quite suddenly it is in jeopardy, however, not because there is another broadcaster on this planet fit to lick the boots of a corporation which, for all its foibles and errors, remains peerlessly trustworthy in the facet of public service broadcasting that matters most – the reporting and interpretation of fact. The BBC’s reputation is imperilled because those who run it, still paralysed by post-Hutton traumatic stress, lack the balls to eschew grovelling for every trivial cock-up in favour of telling its critics that they won’t take lectures on ethics and bias from tabloid newspapers and disgraced government propagandists.

The one memorable thing widely known about Mark Thompson, Mr Dyke’s successor as director general, is that one day in 1988, for reasons that remain opaque, he bit a newsroom colleague on the arm. How the Beeb needs him to relocate his incisors and that latent attack dog instinct now.

It was 3 pm on a Thursday afternoon in the small town of Bughni, located in the Baghran district of Helmand province. Hundreds of people has gathered for the traditional weekly market, or “mela,” where locals trade and haggle over everything from cows to carpets.

Suddenly the bombs came, causing panic and reportedly killing upwards of 200 civilians and injuring many more. If the reports are confirmed, it would be the highest single casualty figure in Afghanistan this year.

That is the residents’ version of events in Bughni on 2 August. Eyewitnesses tell gruesome tales of headless bodies piled high waiting for identification. Many say they lost children, brothers, fathers.

“The bombing by foreign forces started when all the villagers were gathered for the traditional mela, where they buy all their requirements for the week,” said Sultan Mohammad, a local man. “This mela is close to a holy shrine. At three in the afternoon, the planes came and dropped bombs on the people, killing more than 200 and injuring 150.

“There were children and old people there. How are we at fault? Why are we being killed?”

But Combined Joint Task Force-82, the US-led Coalition force which carried out the bombing, told a very different story.

“Coalition forces conducted a precision air strike against two notorious Taliban commanders conducting a leadership meeting in a remote area of the Baghran district,” read the press release. “Coalition forces employed precision guided munitions… after ensuring there were no innocent Afghans in the surrounding area.”

The gulf between the two accounts is a telling reflection of the situation in Helmand, where local people and the foreign forces often seem to be inhabit alternate universes.

One problem is lack of local knowledge. While there were reports that the Taliban were carrying out public executions of people they deemed spies that Thursday afternoon, it seems certain that the bulk of the people gathered there had come for the weekly market.

In the absence of normal shops, most communities mount a weekly trade fair, bringing handicrafts, livestock, farm produce and clothing along to barter or sell. In Bughni, market day falls on a Thursday, the start of Afghanistan’s weekend.

NATO has made much of the fact that those assembled were all, or mostly, fighting-age males. But the absence of women in public places is simply a fact of life in the Pashtun-dominated south, particularly in areas under Taliban control. Women are closeted at home while their men go out to do the shopping.

There were, however, children and old men among the dead and injured, as photographs taken at the hospital in the provincial capital Lashgar Gah attest.

But amid the barrage of accusations and counterclaims, the truth remains elusive.

As an obviously frustrated Defense Ministry spokesman told reporters, “They do not carry ID cards to show who they are. While they are fighting they are Taliban, but when they are killed they are suddenly civilians.”

Mohammad Hussein Andiwal, chief of police in Helmand province, confirmed that some two dozen injured had been brought to the Bost Hospital in Lashkar Gah.

“I can’t say whether they are civilians or not,” he told IWPR. “As for those who were killed, they might have been civilians or they might have been Taliban.”

The injured were taken to various hospitals in the area. Some were transferred to Musa Qala, a Taliban stronghold about 100 kilometers from Bughni. Others were taken to Kandahar, about 150 kilometers away, and more still went to Lashkar Gah, over 200 kilometers from the scene of the bombing.

“Many died on the way,” said Abdul Karim, a resident of Baghran. “One of my sons is in Bost Hospital. I don’t think he will survive. Two other sons are in Musa Qala. Two of my cousins were killed, and two more were injured.”

There were so many dead, he added, that the survivors were just stacking the bodies.

“We piled about 50 bodies up for relatives to come and identify,” he said. “Most were missing their heads or other body parts. We hoped their relatives would know them by their clothes, tattoos, shoes or something.”

The scenes he described were horrific. “It was a day of blackness,” he said. “Almost everyone had lost someone. People did not know where their family members were. I saw people just sitting on the ground, staring at nothing. There was mourning everywhere.” “We grew tired of collecting the dead,” said Hafizullah, another resident. “In the hospital in Musa Qala, there was not a single empty bed.”

One young man in hospital in Lashkar Gah was so badly injured he could barely speak. Through burned and swollen lips, he said, “We were at the mela and suddenly the bombs came. They brought us here because there was no space in Musa Qala.”

Gul Wali, 18, was also among the injured. “Bombs were falling from the sky into the trees, and I saw pieces of flesh and bone,” he said. “These were our villagers, they were innocent people. They had just come to the mela to buy food for their families. Instead, they ended up looking for their loved ones among piles of bodies.”

According to Major Chris Belcher, a spokesman for Combined Joint Task Force-82, the strike was an unqualified success.

“This operation shows that there is no safe haven for insurgents,” he said, in an official press release.

An officer with the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF), speaking on condition of anonymity, agreed that the strike had been justified.

“We are confident that we hit a high-level meeting of the Taliban,” he told IWPR.

Afghanistan’s Defense Ministry also issued a press release claiming victory.

“At 4:23 in the afternoon of 12th Asad [2 August], terrorists who spread panic among the people wanted to hang six civilians on charges of collaboration with the government. This happened at Bagh-e-Nahi, near the Shah Ibrahim Baba shrine.

“In that meeting were Mullah Dadullah Mansoor, Mullah Abdurahim Akhund, Mullah Bulbul Kajaki, and other high-ranking Taleban warlords as well as some foreign terrorists. They were targeted from the air. According to initial reports, dozens of terrorists were killed or injured.”

Afghan forces, the US-led Coalition and ISAF all claim that several Taliban commanders were among the dead. One of the main targets was Mullah Mansoor Dadullah, brother of commander Mullah Dadullah Akhund, who was killed by foreign forces in May. Others listed among the slain were Mullah Rahim Akhund, the Taleban “governor” of Helmand, his brother Mullah Majid, and Mullah Bulbul Kajaki.

Mansoor Dadullah has, however, given several media interviews since he was declared dead, and insists that the others are also alive and well. According to one report, he claimed to be drinking tea with Mullah Bulbul and Mullah Majid as he spoke to reporters.

Taliban spokesman Qari Yusuf echoed Dadullah’s statements in a telephone interview with IWPR.

“There was not a single Talib in that area,” he said. “There was no hanging, and no big meeting. The Taliban are not so stupid as to gather in such a vulnerable place. It was a Thursday mela, and all of those killed and injured were civilians.”

Despite this, locals said there had been executions under way. “Armed Taliban were hanging three people on charges of spying for foreign forces,” said one man, Khan Mohammad. “Then the planes came, so I ran away.”

Another man, who had come to Lashkar Gah with an injured relative, also told of the executions. Dressed in long traditional Afghan clothes, with eyes red from rage and grief, he was only too eager to open his heart to a reporter.

“We went to watch the execution at the mela place. The Taliban were hanging people. There were seven spies to be hanged, but after the first two, the bombing started.”

It is almost impossible to unravel the contradictory claims of the various sides in the conflict.

ISAF, with the British in the lead, generally get most of the blame when air strikes kill civilians. Its spokespersons insist that ISAF does all it can to minimize civilian casualties. But the peacekeeping force has little control over the American troops in the area.

Coalition troops and US Special Forces, which are not under NATO command, are mentoring the Afghan National Army during what are termed “kinetic” operations in Helmand. Time after time, the air strikes attributed to ISAF have been carried out by American forces.

Over the past few months, in Sarwan Qala, Hyderabad and now Baghran, hundreds of people have been killed or injured in American-led air strikes. Precise figures are hard to obtain, not least because most families bury their dead immediately as custom requires.

All parties – foreign forces, the Taleban, and civilians too – have an interest in advancing their point of view, leading to wildly conflicting claims of casualties.

In this latest incident, the Taliban claim that not a single insurgent was killed or injured, which, given the degree of control they claim to exert over Baghran, seems unlikely. As Qari Yusuf put it, “There are no Afghan forces there. The entire district is controlled by the Taliban.”

But, if the dozens of eyewitnesses are to be believed, it cannot be true that the strike was as precise and clinical as the Coalition claims.

The dispute over basic facts is unlikely to be resolved, and all sides remain entrenched in their positions.

“[The Taliban] are sore that we hit them, which is why they are putting out these claims of civilian casualties,” said the ISAF officer. “But we know what we did there was right.”

De Palma, who is best known for movies like Carrie, Scarface and The Untouchables, has clearly produced a stunning anti-war work. In a detailed and sympathetic review, Time magazine calls it “a cry of national shame“.

Redacted is inspired by a real event, the March 2006 rape and murder of a 14-year-old Iraqi girl and the killing of her family and torching of their bodies and their home, by four American soldiers. It is constructed of seemingly real snippets of media: YouTube-like blogs, video posts, picture-phone emails and a daily video record kept by one of the soldiers.

The reaction of the British press to this film reveals much about the corporate media’s attitude to war.

So far, the Guardian’s response has been sadly typical of the newspaper’s overall approach to Iraq, just hoping the war will somehow go away so we can get on with the important news, such as Amy Winehouse’s drug problem and the price of organic food: “Yes, this is a stupid war. Yes, there are lots of media outlets. And people are dying on both sides.”

The Times is even more explicit: “Is the public really ready to pay to see films about nasty, bloody, complicated wars that most wish would simply go away?” All the Mirror can say about it is to pick on the film’s depiction of an Al-Qaeda execution of a US soldier.

But the Telegraph devoted half a page to the film, including this from its reviewer: “There are several references to the shortcomings of the mainstream media in reporting the real horrors of the Iraq war; de Palma makes a telling point with these alternative narrative devices.”

Nigel Andrews in the Financial Times raves about it: “Crafted not just for a new conflict but also for a new age of multiform, open-access image technology, this is a brilliant film with a passionate payload of political conviction.”

See this film if you can, and better still, write us a review.

The programme, “Immigration – How we Lost Count“, was transmitted on July 23 and purported be an impartial look at how the government has lost count of the number of migrants arriving in places like Slough.

However, the programme merely reinforced racist myths about migrants.

It repeatedly claimed that over-stretched council services are the result of immigration, rather than under-funding. The program did not acknowledge that migrants actually contribute more to the economy than they ever take in benefits.

It also featured a number of alleged examples of anti-social behaviour by immigrants – including locals accusing Roma gypsies of defecating on the street – and then invited the audience to generalise to all immigrants.

It stated crime had been rising in Slough and implied that this is linked to the presence of Roma gypsies. The police, as the program reports, actually blame rising population, not any single racial group.

The programme was broadcast after months of racist hysteria in the media about immigration to Slough, much of it led by the BBC. A headline on the BBC website read: “Roma children flood into Slough“.

By Tom Wall

The programme can be viewed in full here.
Here is the BBC’s response to viewers’ complaints. The length of the reply point to the weight of criticism levelled against the Corporation:

Thank you for your email regarding ‘Panorama: Immigration: How We Lost Count’.

Please accept our apologies for the delay in replying. We know our correspondents appreciate a quick response and we are sorry you have had to wait on this occasion.

The programme has responded to concerns raised by some viewers about this edition of Panorama which transmitted on 23 July regarding immigration, the response is below:

“However we look at it, immigration is always a controversial topic which arouses strong feelings from individuals of every political persuasion.

This was a programme about how the government have lost count of the number of people living in our towns and cities and how that impacts on the local authorities who have to provide services to their residents. Obviously the pressure on services is greater in areas of high migration such as Slough.

This was NOT a programme about Asylum seekers or illegal immigrants. It was made quite clear throughout the programme that the majority of people who have come to Slough to work have done so legally. Slough has a long history of attracting migrants from all over the world. It is an extremely diverse town (more than 128 nationalities have registered for work) and it has a strong sense of social cohesion and integration. All these points were made in the programme.

However, since the European Union widened its borders in 2004, many more legal migrants have arrived, and while Slough has welcomed them, they have contributed to the pressure on the town’s infrastructure. As a nation we have encouraged immigration for the economic benefits it brings and the taxes paid by migrant workers boost our governments’ coffers. Buy most of this money stays with central government and does not help the councils who must provide local services. Slough Borough Council are so concerned that they commissioned 3 independent research projects to assess the scale of the problem and have been lobbying Parliament for a solution.

Our aim in this programme was to report the story as we found it and that meant in part reflecting the most commonly held opinions by people who actually live in Slough (many of whom are former migrants themselves).

Inevitably, some of these opinions are unpalatable to many people, but that does not mean that these voices do not also have a right to be heard. Indeed, one could argue that it is possibly more important in a democracy to hear the opinions of those we don’t agree with, than simply hearing the opinions of those we do.

It is a fact that more people create more rubbish and the impact this is having on Slough’s refuse collection service has been well documented. More rubbish in the streets makes people disgruntled and is one of the issues which increases negative feelings towards newcomers. This is an unpleasant reality we would do well not to ignore.

Sometimes, hearing people voicing negative beliefs enables us to dispel myths, such as the notion, commonly held, that migrants are given access to local authority housing on arrival in the country – not true. In fact, our programme tried to dispel that myth and point up both the need for housing and the pressure on Slough’s housing department as well as how some migrants are being exploited by unscrupulous landlords.

Our job as journalists is to report the facts of the situation on the ground. If we presented a report which did not acknowledge the stresses and strains on the town and how these are making normally reasonable people feel, we would not be doing our job. Some viewers have suggested that our reporting may have encouraged racism, we have tried our best for this not to be the case, but just as a programme about obesity may result in some people expressing prejudice, it should not mean issues of major importance are to be avoided.

Some viewers have made comments about the way both the Somali and the Roma residents in Slough were portrayed in the programme. Most of the Somali groups in Slough are legal migrants with Dutch passports, who have come voluntarily direct from Holland. They chose to leave Holland for their own reasons and come to live in Britain instead. This is their right as European citizens to do so. But it is still a fact that they now need housing and other services like any other local residents. As with the other residents of Slough, including the vast majority of Poles, those that work, pay taxes which go back to central government, not to the local council which must provide their services.

While Roma gypsies are indigenous to Europe and are not necessarily from Romania, The Roma featured in this programme were mainly Roma gypsies from Romania. Like the other European citizens, they have chosen to come to live in Slough of their own free will. The pressure put upon the local councils’ resources from some of this community is proportionally far greater than their numbers suggest.

There are also a very large number of residents who have complained to both the council and the police about anti-social behaviour from some of this group. The allegation that some of the Roma have been defecating in public was raised by no less than 50-70 local residents in a meeting which we attended but were not allowed to film. As a result we felt it was appropriate and representative to have 2 locals mentioning a problem felt by so many. While both the council and the police are trying to address these issues, it is indicative of the problem that not one member of the Roma community could be persuaded to attend a wider community meeting. Richard Bilton’s attempt to talk to some of the Roma on the street needed to be seen and their polite refusal on the grounds that people had already judged them was, we felt, very powerful.

Some viewers have taken issue with Slough’s efficiency and suggested that their problems may be more one of inefficiency than dispute over population statistics and under funding. It could be argued that councils can always “do better” and there will always be debate around how funding is distributed particularly as resources become scarce. We have to deal with facts, and critics should note that this year’s independent Audit Commission report on Slough describes it as “performing well – consistently above minimum requirements” and notes that while resources are constrained, the council have secured significant savings without reducing service delivery.

It is likely that the issues raised by this programme will continue to provoke debate for some time to come. This we hope will be a positive thing as it raises legitimate questions about the long term impact of population movement across Europe and how our country is run. We hope it will not be used to further ignorance or prejudice.”

Nevertheless, I would like to take this opportunity to assure you that your comments, concerns and misgivings have been recorded for the attention of senior management and the relevant programme makers.

Thank you once again for taking the time to contact us.

Regards

Colin Thomson

BBC Information

The three soldiers’ deaths, by contrast, warranted two days of front page stories (among them the Evening Standard, Guardian, Telegraph, Observer, Sunday Telegraph) and huge spreads inside about the men who died, the loss felt by their families, and agonised speculation about how further deaths could be avoided.

Comparison with the scale of civilian deaths warranted one line in articles in the Independent, the Scotsman, the Guardian, and right at the end of stories in the Herald and the Daily Record.

A day after the incident, Afghan elders said that airstrikes had killed 12 civilians in Helmand. This incident went unreported in the British press.

Even the Afghan government says some 1,000 civilians were killed in Afghanistan during the conflict in 2006 alone. In June, the Agency Coordinating Body for Afghan Relief, a coalition of more than 90 aid agencies, said at least 230 Afghan civilians had been killed by western troops this year. The rate has been increasing. Aid agencies say that in 2006 the number of civilians killed by both sides was 700-1,000, the highest figure since the Taliban were ousted from power in 2001.

There is a word for the enormous disparity between the media’s concern for “our” troops and Afghan civilians. It’s called racism.

P.S. The Financial Times covered the friendly fire story as a 60-word brief on page 6 (Aug 25).

Walsh writes: “For a chilling display of the awesome power of American air strikes, look no further than the internet.

“A nine-minute clip on YouTube offers a terrifying glimpse of the way the war is being won and lost in southern Afghanistan. The video, filmed from the belly of a Spectre AC-130 gunship, shows an attack on an alleged insurgent camp, rendered through a quivering black and white screen and the pilot’s mechanical monotone.

“The crosshairs wander across a cluster of buildings, seeking out targets and shredding them to pieces. The bombs blitz mud dwellings, turn vehicles into fireballs, and mow down dozens of small white figures – people – as they sprint hopeless for their lives. ‘You are clear to level the building,’ says the voice. The only sop to local sensitivities is that the Americans avoid hitting a mosque.

“This is the death-dealing air power that has allowed Nato and US troops to spread deep into Afghanistan’s most remote and hostile territory.”

Walsh also notes that “Human rights groups estimate that 230 civilians were killed in combat in southern Afghanistan last year; another 300 have died in Helmand this year, according to one estimate. The majority perished in air strikes. Last December Hamid Karzai, the Afghan president, wept as he spoke of his frustration to stop coalition forces ‘killing our children’.”

Bush on Iran, Aug 28 2007: Iran has long been a source of trouble in the region. It is the world’s leading state sponsor of terrorism. … Iran funds terrorist groups like Hamas and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, which murder the innocent… Iran is sending arms to the Taliban in Afghanistan, which could be used to attack American and NATO troops. …

Iran’s active pursuit of technology that could lead to nuclear weapons threatens to put a region already known for instability and violence under the shadow of a nuclear holocaust. … Iran’s actions threaten the security of nations everywhere. …

Shia extremists, backed by Iran, are training Iraqis to carry out attacks on our forces and the Iraqi people. Members of the Qods Force of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps are supplying extremist groups with funding and weapons, including sophisticated IEDs. And with the assistance of Hezbollah, they’ve provided training for these violent forces inside of Iraq. Recently, coalition forces seized 240-millimeter rockets that had been manufactured in Iran this year and that had been provided to Iraqi extremist groups by Iranian agents. The attacks on our bases and our troops by Iranian-supplied munitions have increased in the last few months — despite pledges by Iran to help stabilize the security situation in Iraq. …

I want our fellow citizens to consider what would happen if these forces of radicalism and extremism are allowed to drive us out of the Middle East. The region would be dramatically transformed in a way that could imperil the civilized world. Extremists of all strains would be emboldened by the knowledge that they forced America to retreat. Terrorists could have more safe havens to conduct attacks on Americans and our friends and allies. Iran could conclude that we were weak — and could not stop them from gaining nuclear weapons. And once Iran had nuclear weapons, it would set off a nuclear arms race in the region. …

The most important and immediate way to counter the ambitions of al Qaeda and Iran and other forces of instability and terror is to win the fight in Iraq.

At least 112 editors, reporters and photographers, and a further 40 media support staff such as translators and drivers, have been killed on duty in Iraq since the war began in March 2003, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists.

By contrast, the CPJ estimates, 38 journalists died covering Algeria’s conflict between 1993 and 1996, 66-71 died covering Vietnam, and 68 died while reporting on the second world war.

Last year’s death toll in Iraq was the highest the CPJ had recorded in a single country since its foundation in 1981.

The CPJ’s estimate counts only those deaths that its researchers can verify as having been caused by hostile action – such as deliberately targeting a journalist or when a reporter is caught in cross-fire – and excludes accidents such as car and aircraft crashes.

Other estimates put the death toll even higher. Reporters Without Borders, which campaigns for press freedom, calculates that at least 198 journalists and media assistants have been killed in the conflict and scores more have been kidnapped.

The International Federation of Journalists puts the number above 200.
Media workers’ deaths in conflict:
Iraq (since Mar 2003)    112
Vietnam (1955-1975)    66
Korean War    17
World War II    68
World War I    2
Deaths in Iraq 
By nationality
Iraqi    90
European    13
Other Arab countries    3
US    2
All other countries    5
Note: one journalist had dual Iraqi-Swedish citizenship and he is listed in each nationality
By circumstances  

Murdered    73
Crossfire or other acts of war    39
By embedded status  
Embedded    7
Non embedded or ‘unilateral’    105
By job   
Nationality    Deaths
Photojournalists*    28
Reporters and editors    70
Producers    7
Technicians    7
*Includes still photographers and camera operators
Source: Committee to Protect Journalists, Freedom Forum 

The organisations agree, however, that the loss of life has been heaviest among Iraqi journalists. Security fears have prompted many US and European news organisations to restrict their reporters’ travel, leaving them heavily reliant on Iraqi reporting about events outside Baghdad.

According to the CPJ, 90 Iraqi journalists have died covering the conflict, compared with 13 Europeans and two US citizens. Many worked for Iraqi news organisations such as Aswat al-Iraq, a news agency, and Radio Free Iraq, but others appear to have been targeted for working for western news outlets.

Hundreds of foreign reporters, often embedded with US and UK military units, were covering Iraq at the beginning of the war. The spiralling violence has since forced many international broadcasters and newspapers to scale back their operations and rely on Iraqi journalists, says Joel Campagna, Middle East senior programme co-ordinator for the CPJ.

“Over the last three years Iraqi journalists have assumed an indispensable role in reporting this conflict and making local and international news-gathering possible,” he says. “Their increased role has translated into increased risk.”

The violence, coupled with the cost of providing security, has deterred all but Iraq’s own media and the largest international news organisations from maintaining a presence in Iraq. “One thing you don’t see much of is freelancers,” Mr Campagna notes.

The CPJ estimates 84 of the journalists killed in Iraq were victims of insurgent action, either murdered or caught up in suicide bombings or crossfire.

It attributes 15 deaths to US fire, but says its investigations have found no evidence of deliberate targeting of journalists by US troops.

Reuters has lost six journalists in conflict, all killed by US troops.The news agency has asked the US military to investigate last month’s deaths of Namir Noor-Eldeen and Saeed Chmagh, a photographer and driver, after its inquiries challenged the US account that they had died in a firefight with insurgents.

“Our preliminary investigation raises real questions about whether there was fighting at the time the two men were killed,” says David Schlesinger, Reuters editor-in-chief.

In a blog entry after the event, Mr Schlesinger commented: “There aren’t many news organisations left in Iraq. The ones that are there take a terrible calculated risk.”

Iraqi journalists such as Khalid Hassan, a reporter and interpreter shot while driving to work for the New York Times in Baghdad last month, run additional risks because the war has invaded the neighbourhoods in which they live, Mr Campagna says. “For Iraqi journalists living in the conflict it is very difficult to escape.”

The threats to Iraq’s journalists have come just as the country is trying to build up its media, he notes.

“Since the invasion, more Iraqis than ever have joined the profession of journalism. [But] many have been forced to leave the profession or seek refuge in other countries because of threats they have received because of their journalism.”

The cameraman, Imad Ghanem, was filming for Hamas’s al-Aqsa television channel when he was fired upon. Ghanem was one of the leaders of demonstrations in Gaza calling for the release of the BBC reporter Alan Johnston. Read John Pilger’s article on the atrocity here.

In video filmed by a colleague he can be seen lying on the ground with his camera by his side. Eyewitnesses said moments before he’d been with a group which included militant gunmen, though he appeared to be unarmed.

Ghanem was later treated in hospital where both of his legs were amputated.

An Israeli army spokeswoman said journalists were at risk if they entered a combat zone but soldiers did not deliberately target them.

West Midlands’ finest set out to investigate Muslim “preachers of hate” after Birmingham Labour MP Roger Godsiff complained that Muslims shown in the documentary were “racist”. The BNP’s Nick Griffin demanded the mosques shown on the programme be shut down as a precaution against the “psychological virus” of Islam.

But the boys in blue feel Channel 4 has cheated them. They have complained to the broadcasting watchdog Ofcom, after the Crown Prosecution Service examined the documentary and found that: “The splicing together of extracts from longer speeches appears to have completely distorted what the speakers were saying.” To reach their conclusion, the CPS looked at 56 hours of footage on which the hour-long programme was based.

The managing director of Hard Cash [surely "Facts"? ed.] productions, which made Undercover Mosque, says it was “one of the programmes I’m most proud of“. Which aspect of the programme, and the reaction to it, was most worthy of pride, one wonders?

Was it the BNP’s gleeful response? Or was it that the judge at the trial of the July 21 bomb plotters told the jury that they should “ignore it completely” because “It’s a very good example of why you should close your mind completely to the media and concentrate on what is said in this courtroom”?

Was it that the programme invited Muslim organisations to respond just two weeks before it was broadcast? Or perhaps that it visited just four out of the UK’s 1,200 mosques, using just two DVDs to smear London’s largest Islamic centre?

Maybe he is proud of sexing up the programme with crude techniques, such as a sound track like “a cheap Fox News report“, as the Press Gazette put it? Is he proud of showing no audience reaction to what preachers had said, implying that Muslims are passive, unthinking dupes?

Is he proud of making dramatic cuts to footage of women in hijabs and burkhas whenever ignorant mullahs spouted off about male supremacy, as if the two were in some way related?

The programme was a textbook example of Islamophobic reporting, repeating the message that, however “moderate” Muslims claim to be, it is the fundamentalists who are really pulling the strings.

Undercover Mosque is part of an established genre, including John Ware’s Panorama programmes and Richard Watson’s reports for Newsnight and File on 4 – both singled out for fulsome praise last week by Helen Boaden, the BBC’s director of news (Talking Politics, BBC Radio 4, August 4, 2007. Listen to it here).

That the police were forced to complain to Ofcom is a staggering, stunning victory for the Muslim campaigners and their friends who have pursued their critique of “Undercover Mosque”. But it is also a call to action.

It is pointless arguing with the Nick Cohens, the Melanie Phillips’s and the army of media commentators who have never missed an opportunity to attack Muslim’s “culture of victimhood” and dismiss the very notion of Islamophobia. But the scandal of “Undercover Mosque” will have made many journalists look again at some of their methods and assumptions.

This is an opportunity to go on the offensive against those in the media who have made Islamophobia the last respectable form of racism against Asian and black people.

Dave Crouch
Chair, MWAW

Let’s look back at some recent history. In 1988 the leader of the Palestine Liberation Organisation, Yasser Arafat, decided to recognise the state of Israel, in other words, he decided to choose the “two state solution”. The Americans accepted this idea, the ambassador in Tunis opened talks and met Arafat. There were still, of course, lots of arguments among the Palestinians.

Arafat made a big error by appearing to support Saddam Hussein in 1990-1991. But as a politician he knew that his constituency was in favour of Saddam.

In September 1993 Yasser Arafat and Yitzak Rabin met with Clinton on the White House lawn, shook hands and signed up to a system, the “Oslo accords”. On paper it looked quite good, and many Palestinians hoped it would offer a way out. But two basic things were wrong with this.

Firstly, the Israelis kept on building settlements on the occupied territories. 1993 passed, then 94, 95, 96 and still they kept building in a way that divided up the remaining territory, it changed the entire geography and was very intrusive.

Secondly, Arafat realised that he had forgotten about the other Palestinians, those living outside the borders of Israel: some 400,000 in Lebanon, 1 million in Jordan, 300,000 in Syria. These were people who had lost their lands inside pre-1967 Israel. At the Camp David summit in 2000, Clinton and Ehud Barack tried to humble Arafat into making a “final status” agreement, but Arafat decided that even if he signed it would be rejected by his constituency.

The talks broke down. The result was another Palestinian uprising, or the “Al-Aqsa” Intifada.

The West tried to institute elections in the occupied territories. But the “wrong” people got elected – the Palestinians were fed up with Fatah (Yasser Arafat’s political party, the dominant organisation in the PLO). In that part of the world you vote for whoever is going to defend you, and Hamas – like Hezbollah in Lebanon – were doing just that. Since Arafat’s death in 2004, Fatah has been led by Mahmoud Abbas, whom I describe as a Petainist figure, like Marshall Petain (whom the Germans allowed to rule an authoritarian regime in the Vichy region of France during World War II).

I was in Beirut recently. I couldn’t understand why the BBC kept going on about “factional fighting”. Any decent reporter or sub knows that the US has been sending finance and arms to Fata for the past year – you can read all about it in Ha’aretz. But this fact was never part of the mainstream reporting. Yet this was why the fighting was taking place – to get rid of Hamas. [For example, see here, here and here]

None of this was reported properly. One or two BBC reporters try their best, such as Jeremy Bowen [and Alan Johnston?]. But we’re getting the wrong information. The Israeli/western case is being put, but not the Palestinian case.

Q. Are Fatah really corrupt? They are constantly accused of it, but is it true?

A. I don’t think that’s the main reason people voted for Hamas, though that was an element of it. Arafat was an ageing leader of a liberation organisation, he was never in charge of a state. So he had debts to repay, emotionally and politically.

The main reason people voted for Hamas was that they were fed up with the system. Fatah was playing games with the Israelis, arresting people and so on. It’s like Hezbollah – a well-run, efficient set-up, none of the thuggery you might expect in the circumstances. The people on the ground adore it because it is looking after them.

Q. Did you yourself ever experience censorship?

A. Just once. An editor called me up and said would I alter a report I had made to include an Israeli denial of an attack on Palestinians. I refused – the Israelis had been firing into a mosque. I said if they want to deny it they can do it in a separate part of the bulletin. And that is what eventually happened: the Israeli denial ran separately from my report, not inside it, as my line-editor had requested. By the way, he told me he was getting a lot of pressure from the Israelis in London.

Things have changed a lot. The Israelis got a shock in 1982 – they got a very bad press when they invaded Lebanon, they realised that their PR was awful. So during the al-Aqsa Intifada they changed their approach, they put a lot more money and organisation into ringing up editors, reporters and so on.

Moreover, I think the BBC has lost its nerve in recent years, it’s afraid. The government funds the BBC, and of course the government is very close to the Americans and the Israelis.

Q. Why did the Palestinians support Saddam in 1990?

A. That’s a very good question. It was a difficult moment. Many Palestinians had family members working in Kuwait, where they were treated like dirt. Saddam was also seen to be standing up to the west. By the way, if you tried to get that across on the BBC it was very difficult. I was in Baghdad then; the Arab governments were backing the coalition against Saddam, but the people didn’t like it.

Q. Who is pulling Fatah’s strings?

A. There are many Fatahs. Their only respected leader, Marwan Barghouti, is in an Israeli jail. There is a long history of Israelis taking out the leaders, for example the time they blew Hamas leader Sheikh Yassin out of his wheelchair.

Q. Wasn’t Hamas at one point funded by the Israelis?

A. In the early 1980s the Israelis built up Hamas. They saw the PLO and Fatah as the main threat, and so they built up alternative leaderships such as the venal “Village Leagues”. But that all blew up with the Intifada. That’s why Hamas became an independent force.

Q. Is it right for the media to use terms such as “the Gaza takeover” by Hamas?

A. This is one of the things that really outrages me. I was sitting in Beirut listening to the BBC, and they kept saying that Hamas had taken over. But it was the other people who were trying to take over, and they got clobbered.

A lot of this was drowned out by the kidnapping of Alan Johnston. Ordinary Palestinian journalists showed the way in terms of campaigning for his release. But the BBC tried to turn him into a kind of Mother Theresa! He’s very embarrassed by it now.

And it was Hamas who freed him. It’s typical of the arrogance of the west that they won’t allow Hamas any credit.

Q. Why are the media so supine?

There’s an acceptance in the British media that our involvement in the Middle East is “helping people to behave better”. But we are not – we are supporting a country that is behaving like a gangster state. It’s not doing us any good.

I’d like to refer you to an excellent article in the New York Review of Books, entitled “Goodbye to newspapers?”

Let’s we look back now at what was said when they went to war in Afghanistan, what were the war aims? They were very basic. If we look back at the speeches by Bush and the pronouncements of the US military, the aim was to destroy Al Qaeda as a force and capture Bin Laden and Mullah Omar (the leader of the Taliban faction that supported al-Qaeda), dead or alive. That was all. Nothing else was said.

In terms of war aims this was (a) extremely limited and (b) very foolish. If you’re going to announce that this is your main aim, then you wait three weeks, then you go into the country and imagine that the people, you want to capture are going to be waiting for you, and then you’re surprised that these people have actually left the country and found new hiding places – it’s slightly bizarre.

In any event, if we accept that these were the war aims, they failed. Far form destroying al-Qaeda they strengthened it. Bin Laden, Mullah Omar and Zawahri – the key people on their list – are still at large. But I think there was another reason. I remember 3 weeks after 9/11 I was debating on TV one of Bush’s most fervent supporters in the American media, Charles Krauthammer. The compere asked me what do you think is the real reason for the war in Afghanistan? I said it as a war of revenge, simple as that, they’ve been hit, there’s no basic war aims, they want to strike back, and it’s just revenge. She then turned to Krauthammer to rebut this but he said I agree, what’s wrong with revenge? The compere was absolutely astonished.

That was the aim for a large chunk of the American military establishment, they had to hit back, and they were backed in this by the entire world. Not a single country opposed it because of the position the USA occupies in the world today. Other countries have been victims of terrorist attacks, before and after 9/11, but no one reacts in the same way. And that in itself is a fact worth understanding. The USA is a very special country because of its strength, it is the only imperial power in the world today, and most governments at the time caved into it, there was no criticism.

Ironically enough there was more criticism in the American media in the first few weeks after 9/11 than in the British media, which became totally servile, just shaken by what had happened. The Los Angeles Times published in the first week a 4-page supplement on US foreign policy in the 20th century, looking at everything the US had done to other parts of the world. But this was not permissible here, the atmosphere was fear, you weren’t allowed to open your mouth. I remember a Cambridge academic in ancient history wrote a piece in the London Review of Books saying what’s the fuss about, all the people I meet in academic circles say they had it coming. She was apolitical, just being honest. All hell broke loose in the liberal media, how dare you even publish it? You can think it but don’t publish it. An atmosphere of fear was created.

And within this atmosphere of fear Afghanistan was invaded and occupied without any big battles being fought. Why? Because the Taliban government basically decided not to fight. Why? Because the Pakistan military told it not to fight. It was very dependent on that army, it was armed by them, in fact the Pakistani general inn charge of the ISI, told them: I have been told by the president of Pakistan and the government don’t fight, withdraw, let them take the country, then we’ll see, don’t lose lives. But my advice to you is to fight back.” He was sacked within 24 hours. I make this point to show the links between these two outfits. Without the support of the Pakistani military the Taliban could not have seized power in the first place. It’s not that they didn’t develop their autonomy – they did. But those three crucial weeks the Americans didn’t attack was to give their Pakistani ally time to withdraw its equipment, air force and officers from inside Afghanistan. They were given Pakistani military bases to use, they couldn’t use these bases to hit Pakistani personnel.

So they took Afghanistan with the Northern Alliance, with the approval of the Pakistani and Iranian governments – the Iranians hated the Taliban. If you look at what these people in Pakistan and Iran are saying now, they say we thought it would be different, we thought that it would be a more democratic dispensation, that the occupying powers would institute power sharing very sharply and transform the country. This last bit is not unimportant. One of the reasons they haven’t been able to get any grip on the country, because they have completely failed to build any social infrastructure. Here it is worth comparing with what the Russians did when they occupied Afghanistan in 1979 for 10 years. Their bad luck was that the Afghan communists were tiny, without a real mass base outside Kabul and consisting of largely of squabbling factions. But what they did do was build an infrastructure. However weak, they built schools, hospitals, they educated women, women teachers and doctors, they did succeed in doing that for a while. Which is why even the Russian troops lasted, that government didn’t fall to the offensive against it. They had some element of support because people could seen what they had done.

Corrupt, iniquitous elite

This occupation has done nothing. It costs less than $5000 to build a cheap home in which an ordinary family can live. Ask anyone in Afghanistan how many have been built, virtually none. Most of the money that has gone into the country has been used by the tiny clique around Karzai to build luxury homes and villas, in the face of the most poverty-stricken people in the world, and all this corruption is being defended by NATO troops, and they are seen now as being defenders of this extremely corrupt, iniquitous elite, a tiny ruling elite that runs the country. Without the backing of foreign troops this little group would collapse.

There is constant confusion of Taliban with Pashtun and Taliban with Afghan. This doesn’t exist only on the level of ignorant journalists. I was told by a senior Pakistani government minister that soon after they took Afghanistan Colin Powell, the US secretary of state, in a meeting with high officials in Pakistan actually said the problem is the Pashtun Taliban, we have to wipe them out. How can we do this? The Pakistani foreign minister said: “Why don’t you ask two members of the Taliban sitting at this table? They are Pashtun. Please try to understand, not every Pashtun is Taliban, it’s very divided. But the way you are operating you are going to antagonise them.”

In February this year there was a senate committee in the US on national security and defence that said the following:

“Afghans have over centuries proven themselves to be fierce fighters, particularly when confronting invaders from outside cultures. They repeatedly defeated the British during the 19th century Afghan wars when Britain was the world’s dominant military power. They routed the Soviets during the 1980s when the Soviet Union was the world’s second most dominant military power. Superior military technology does not always win the day, particularly in an era when suicide bombing and improvised explosive devices have proven themselves to be very effective tools in this kind of war. Afghans are used to killing and being killed. Their society has been in a state of war for most of the last two centuries.”

Now, this is pretty accurate. Seventy per cent of Afghans know how to use weapons. That is part of the culture, they’ve been doing it from a very young age, the men mainly. This means it’s not dificult for them when they join a resistance group to start fighting immediately, they know how to do it.

Secondly, the Taliban now is becoming an umbrella organisation for fighting the occupation. Many people who hate it are fighting underneath its umbrella and that is extremely dangerous for the occupying armies because they are isolated, there is no way they can win the war.

The only way they could have done if they wanted to create a slightly different social infrastructure was to spend billions on completely transforming the country, finding an alternative to poppy production. The sales of heroin have shot right up since the occupation. Ironically the Taliban had put a stop to it in the bulk of the country. Afghanistan is supplying 60-70 per cent of the world’s heroin. And you can’t tell the farmers don’t do it because they have nothing else to do. If you read the surveys conducted by the occupying armies when asked what is the biggest problem you confront, 70 per cent of the population say feeding our families twice a day, and we’re prepared to do anything to do so. This the occupation has been completely incapable of doing. How could they? Many people who initially supported the occupation said the Taliban is a horrible government, anything else is better – including many liberal journalists, not just in Britain but in neighbouring countries such as Pakistan, said that. They are now saying it was a very big mistake, we thought the Americans could do some good in the region. But how can you expect an imperial power and a NATO force that operates in today’s world, a neo-liberal world where they are deregulating and privatising everything in their own countries, to go and build a strong state in Afghanistan and make that state a sort of social-democratic one? It’s just unthinkable! And they are not doing it and it is completely isolating them.

Propaganda and news management

Every single day you read reports: 100 militants dead, 50 dead, 30 – don’t believe it, it is pure propaganda, wartime propaganda that goes back to every war waged by imperial powers, that’s how they report it, they assume everyone they kill is an enemy. Which they may or may not be, but by killing them they are making sure that the bulk of the country now is moving to a stage where they want the occupying forces out.

There’s no doubt about that, because they have failed, they have succeeded in destabilising their ally Pakistan where two provinces are in quite a delicate state. And who knows how this is going to end? One reason we don’t know how this is going to end is precisely because of the way the media have plaid it, Iraq was the bad war Afghanistan was the good war. But it wasn’t a good war ever, and it’s become worse as time goes on. So it has to be seriously analysed, there are very few serious journalists who spend time there and report.

One of the ways in which journalism functions today is as a pillar of the system, not just in times of war. There has been a fundamental shift in journalism in the west, largely in television but also to a certain extent in the print media. Serious coverage of the rest of the world is missing in most newspapers and certainly on the TV. You are given sound bites, there is very little regular reporting from important countries in the world so that when something happens you are surprised, people are deliberately encouraged to have short memories, so you forget, you can’t remember. And now we have this category of embedded journalists, who go in with the army and see what the army wants them to see, and then they report on that, which in itself affects the way they write.

Of course there are exceptions, Robert and Fisk and Patrick Cockburn break these rules. But they are few and far between. When a few journalists on British TV did it during the Balkan wars they were denounced. When John Simpson said he was watching the television station in Belgrade being bombed and he was appalled by it, he was denounced.

News management in all the western countries, but especially in Britain, is reaching the levels of an art form. There is a crisis of this news management thanks to the Iraq war. The fact that you have a majority of the population opposing a war and the majority of politicians in parliament supporting it created a crisis for the system of news management. When the BBC tried to balance it, it wasn’t permitted, even though it was a very strange kind of balancing there was an attempt. But Blair sacked his own placemen at the BBC, Gavin Davies and Greg Dyke, after the bogus Hutton report. As Dyke revealed in his memoirs, the real reason was not Hutton but the constant pressure from 10 Downing Street during the coverage of the demonstrations, the reporting of the war.

University departments teaching journalism have to teach what is the power of journalism. Students have to decide what sort of journalists they want to be, either it’s like selling goods in a shop – that’s one sort of journalism. Or the other sort of journalism is, I’m not saying a biased journalism, but a critical, independent-minded, aware journalism which at least tries to seek the truth.

In Afghanistan this has not existed, with rare exceptions. By and large that country has been written off as a small, poor country. It’s not that small – 29 million people, bigger than many members of the EU, and Scotland. So it’s a country that’s ignored because it’s not covered, and it’s not covered because covering it won’t benefit those who are occupying it. And this is not just a problem with the British media, it’s a European media. The press releases – you can see them in virtually every mainstream European newspaper, the reports are often the same.

I’ll give you another example of how PR dominates journalism. I was travelling two or three weeks ago and could read most of the European papers. There was a story coming out of Saudi Arabia, obviously a PR story, saying we’ve visited a school where those terrorists who supported al-Qaeda are now sitting in a class being re-educated. A total fantasy. Published in the Guardian, the Independent, the Financial Times, Le Monde, El Pais, The Herald tribune. Exactly the same story.

What happens from the Saudi government’s PR agency happens generally because they’ve down-graded serious coverage of the world. Take Somalia – no one knows what’s gong on, it’s just not covered. Afghanistan is not so bad because British troops are being killed, and British politicians go there for a photo-op with the brave boys. But that’s about it.

This is a big, big problem confronting us. We have the problem of Afghanistan and we have the problem of what is happening to journalism. Both have to be fought against because they are both related.

In the index to Alastair Campbell’s The Blair Years, you will find entries for Kosovo and Afghanistan, but not for Iraq. So if you want to search for the inside story of how Campbell spun the war, you will have to plough through the press supremo’s staccato prose. You will be disappointed. Campbell tells us little about what was, after all, supposed to be his main job: keeping journalists onside. Even the Sun’s Trevor Kavanagh puts in only four appearances, while distinguished commentators such as the Independent’s Steve Richards or editors such as the Guardian’s Alan Rusbridger don’t feature at all.

There are, however, a few revealing passages. One, for September 10 2002, reads: “Alex F called, really worried about Iraq . . . really on the rampage about the press as well, said we had to do something, they were out of control.” It took me a while to work out that Alex F was Alex Ferguson, the Manchester United manager. Somehow, I find his role as a government adviser even more alarming than that of Rupert Murdoch, who also crops up more frequently than almost any working hack.

But what struck me most was the assumption, when the powerful speak to the powerful, that the press should normally be under “control”. The extent to which sports pages are controlled – so that football’s corruption went unremarked until it was investigated by BBC Panorama – is a subject for another day. What concerns me here is control of political news.

From 2002, New Labour got a hard time from newspapers, particularly over Iraq, and in his diaries Campbell never stops whining. Yet the press largely supported the Iraq invasion, and presented it as a success until growing anarchy made such a panglossian interpretation impossible. Even most of the war’s opponents didn’t question the main premise: that Saddam possessed WMDs which would soon include nuclear weapons. To this day, it is said experts were unanimous in believing Saddam posed a serious threat.

That simply isn’t true. Many well-informed people, including former UN weapons inspectors, were saying WMDs had most likely been destroyed (with only battlefield weapons possibly remaining) and Saddam was nowhere near a nuclear capability. The press mostly ignored them, both here and in the US. Why?

As American academics argue in When the Press Fails, a book published by the University of Chicago Press this year, newspapers favour “simple, dramatic narratives”. Governments are best placed to provide these, particularly on foreign policy where secret intelligence material and diplomatic manoeuvring are crucial.

When a body of opinion inside government – or inside the mainstream political process – challenges the official version of events, journalists will present competing analyses. But dissidents from outside the establishment lack the standing and resources to sustain an alternative narrative. Unless they have a leading position in a significant opposition party, anyone who is out of office, even if they were once in office, can be depicted as out-of-touch, deranged and embittered. American journalism’s greatest triumph, Watergate, merely proves the point. Deep Throat, without whom the story would have died, turned out to be No 2 at the FBI.

The US press, which critics such as John Lloyd of the Reuters Institute would like our papers to emulate, has the bigger problem. It propagated bigger lies – for example, that Saddam was linked to 9/11 – with greater success and, because it lacks the competitive spur of the UK market, presents a more homogeneous view. To some extent, the US press is a victim of its virtuous insistence on rigour. American journalists have it drummed into them from youth that everything they write must be properly sourced. Whatever the evidence to the contrary, newspapers tend to assume, on most subjects, that official sources are the most “proper” ones.

Even the best British papers have no cause for complacency, however, and unlike the New York Times and Washington Post, they haven’t apologised for misleading readers. What was going on at Abu Ghraib, for example? Most Iraqis – and they should know – would call it torture. So would most continental newspapers. But analysis by American academics shows the term was used far less frequently by the British press (including the Guardian) and hardly at all by the US press. In both countries, official sources insisted incidents at Abu Ghraib were “abuses”, committed by “rogue elements”.

None of this would matter so much if the press showed signs of learning lessons. But the official narrative on Iran – that it is striving to acquire nuclear weapons while arming terrorists in Iraq – is as unchallenged now as the narrative about WMDs before the Iraq war. So is the narrative that all violence in Iraq is caused by a combination of al-Qaida, Iranian meddling, sectarian fanaticism and Saddamite fascism. The possibility that much of it involves an authentic nationalist uprising, which just wants a united Iraq with the Americans out, is ruled inadmissible. Seumas Milne’s report in the Guardian last week was a rare exception.

I do not know enough about Iraq to be sure the official narratives are untrue, any more than I could be sure the WMD claims were untrue – though, on the latter, my instincts proved correct. What I do know is that I would like to read the rival narratives more often. Whatever Campbell and Ferguson think, the more the press is out of control, the better.

The Guardian’s recent report on armed resistance organisations in Iraq and their plans to form a political front was a fresh and illuminating snapshot of the most dangerous and far-reaching conflict of our times. By eschewing the usual cliches and bundles of distortions about any Muslims bearing arms, the report enriches our understanding of the best organised of the resistance groups active in parts of Baghdad and the areas up to and including Mosul, north of the capital. What they say indicates a major shift in tactics and strategy, but also reveals these groups’ achilles heels.

Politically, one of the most telling statements was from the spokesperson of a faction of the Ansar al-Sunna resistance group:

“Resistance isn’t just about killing Americans without any aims or goals … Our people have come to hate al-Qaida, which gives the impression to the outside world that the resistance in Iraq are terrorists. Suicide bombing is not the best way to fight because it kills innocent civilians. We are against indiscriminate killing – fighting should be concentrated only on the enemy. They [al-Qaida] believe that all Shia are kuffar [unbelievers] – and most of the Sunnis as well … The Americans magnify their role, even though they are responsible for a minority of resistance operations – remember that the Americans brought al-Qaida to Iraq.”

The statement is significant in two respects. One is the fact that al-Qaida is being denounced openly, and the second is that the man making the statement is from Ansar al-Sunna, one the organisations that gained notoriety in its indiscriminate methods of fighting and sectarian ideology. Equally significant is the fact that the other faction of Ansar al-Sunna is being accused of working with al-Qaida.

One of the least sectarian of the seven groups forming the new alliance is the 1920 Revolution Brigades, whose leader, Harith al-Dhari, was assassinated recently by al-Qaida, according to Muthanna al-Thari, spokesperson of the very influential Association of Muslim Scholars. The leader of the AMS, Sheikh Harith al-Dhari, is the assassinated leader’s uncle and the most influential of the anti-occupation Sunni cleric. Reversing earlier statements, Sheikh Dhari, has also become very critical of al-Qaida. His and other recent anti al-Qaida statements are fuelled by the enormous loathing that Iraqis of all sects and ethnicities have for al-Qaida and all sectarian attacks. Indeed, popular opinion in the streets of Iraq habitually accuse the occupation of backing al-Qaida to spread sectarian divisions and split the struggle against the occupation.

The seven groups are not only anti al-Qaida but also keen to distance themselves from the Saddamist wing of the Ba’ath party, led by Izz’at al-Douri, Saddam Hussein’s deputy until the 2003 invasion.

Such political credentials should in theory make the task of unity with Muqtada Sadr’s movement less difficult. However, the resistance leaders who talked to the Guardian accuse Sadr’s Mahdi army of sectarian killings while ignoring the fact that most of the sectarian attacks have been aimed at Sadr City, Najaf, Kufa and Karbala. For his part, Sadr has conceded that his movement has been infiltrated by its enemies, including the occupation authorities. Referring to the climate of chaos and occupation presence, Sadrist spokesmen have often referred to “the ease with which sectarian crimes could be committed by anyone wearing black and claiming to be from the Mahdi army.”

Following the second attack on the Samarra Shia shrine, Sadr accused the occupation of being behind the attack – a position echoed by Sunni clergy and secular forces – and stressed unity with Sunnis. He later accused the US of sabotaging his attempts to unite with Sunnis. While it obviously suits the US to divide the opposition to its occupation of the country, Sadr’s own tactics are attacked for being one of the biggest obstacles to greater anti-occupation unity. These tactics include on-off participation in the government and the Sadrists’ presence in parliament (in the sect-based Coalition List that won most of the seats in the January 2006 occupation-controlled elections).

Though some of the criticisms of Iranian policies by the resistance leaders interviewed by the Guardian are based in fact, the seven groups’ hostility to Iran is still trapped within the old Saddamist-style anti-Iranian chauvinism that fuelled his eight-year war against Iran following the 1979 overthrow of the US-backed Shah regime. Racist propaganda against the Iranian people lasted for a quarter of a century and permeated Iraqi society and its educational system. The US-led propaganda campaign against Iran has thus fallen on receptive ears. The US is happy to see Iraqis directing their wrath against the fictitious “presence of hundreds of thousands of Iranians fighting alongside the US forces to evict Sunnis from Baghdad and replace them with Shia” – in the words of one Iraqi victim of the occupation who, with her daughter, was forced to leave Iraq after the murder of her brother.

The seven resistance groups don’t appear to be facing up to the fact that effectively by far the biggest organised armed resistance group in Iraq is Sadr’s Mahdi army, estimated to be well over 100,000 strong – or that, in the absence of strong non-religious anti-occupation organisations, millions of people across Iraq are supporters of Muqtada Sadr’s anti-occupation message. US jets and helicopters are daily bombarding Sadr City in Baghdad and towns south of Baghdad. Thousands of Sadrists are in jail and the US is acutely aware that the Sadrists remain one of the biggest obstacles to controlling Iraq.

Last but not least, when talking about the resistance in Iraq it’s important to remember that most of the thousands of military operations that the Pentagon reports are carried out monthly against the occupation forces go unclaimed by any organisation. This confirms the impression that I and many Iraqis have that most of the armed resistance to the occupation is conducted by localised groups in the villages and cities of Iraq. Armed resistance to the occupation has much deeper and more popular roots than the politicians in Washington and London dare to admit. For admitting it, at least in public, means abandoning their much trumpeted “exit strategy”, otherwise known as having your cake and eating it. Having a pro-US government in Baghdad, withdrawing most of the troops but keeping military bases in Iraq is not what Iraqis mean by ending the military and economic occupation of Iraq. Such an exit strategy will not stop the resistance and the sea of popular support that feeds and protects it.

For even those who are engaged in anti-occupation political and trade union activities in Iraq do not hide their support for the “al-muqawama al-sharifa” (”the honourable resistance” as distinct from terrorism). And it is these deep Iraqi roots which are likely, sooner or later, to produce the united front that rises above the differences based on religion or ethnicity. A slogan gaining momentum in the streets of Iraq reflects this popular mood:”La lil ihtilal; la lil ta’iffia; la lil irhab”: “No to the occupation; no to sectarianism; no to terrorism.”

The clip — an all too rare honest look at the war from a reporter embedded with the Second Infantry Division’s Apache Company in Baghdad — shows tired and overwrought US troops who are into their 14th month of continuous battle, as they respond to a variety of battle situations.

In one case, after watching six of their comrades burn to death trapped inside a Bradley Armored Vehicle that a roadside bomb has flipped over and ignited, the soldiers break into a house, looking for weapons, only to find themselves terrorising an old woman with a zimmer frame, who dissolves into hysterical tears.

In another scene, the men open fire on a car cruising the neighborhood, which they fear might be a terrorist looking for a target. After killing the driver, they learn from a local woman that it was just a taxi driver she had called, who was trying to locate her address.

An angry GI says: “I challenge anybody in Congress to do my rotation… Because we have people up there in Congress with the brain of a two-year-old who don’t know what they’re doing I challenge the president to ride along with me for 15 months. I’ll do another 15 months if he comes out her and rides along with meThey won’t even have to pay me!”

If the above link doesn’t take you direct to the sclip, try clicking here and scroll down to “Exclusive look at soldiers on the front line”.

The row has raised doubts over the rampant commercialisation of the BBC. But it is also also deflecting attention from the fact that far more important issues threaten to undermine audience trust in the Corporation.

The BBC has been shown in academic research to have followed the government’s line on the invasion of Iraq; since the Hutton report there has been a significant shift to the right in the BBC, including its coverage of many aspects the “war on terror” and opposition to it.

Every staff member at the BBC has received the following email from the BBC’s Director General, Mark Thompson (see below), asking them to help identify “incidents of serious intentional or unintentional deception of the audience” which may “threaten the precious relationship of trust between the BBC and our audiences”.

Given the enormous pressure on BBC staff from senior management and the government to keep quiet about pro-war bias at the Corporation, Media Workers Against the War invites you (whether or not you work at the BBC) to post your criticisms of the BBC’s war coverage in the comment section below – we shall formally forward them to Mark Thompson.
Thompson’s email is as follows:

——– Forwarded Message ——–
From: Mark Thompson
Subject: Recent editorial incidents
Date: Fri, 13 Jul 2007 15:02:23 +0100

This email is going to everyone
————————————————–

Dear colleagues,

This is an email which is particularly addressed to everyone who works in programme and content parts of the BBC, but I thought it was important that everyone who works in the organisation should see it.

As you will know, there have been a number of incidents – recent problems related to phone use including the controversy over Blue Peter and, in the last few days, the incorrect and misleading edit of Her Majesty the Queen in the BBC One seasonal launch tape – which defy our values and threaten the precious relationship of trust between the BBC and our audiences. We cannot take that trust for granted.

The vast majority of you ensure our TV, radio and interactive content is accurate, fair and complies with our own clear editorial guidelines and Ofcom’s code. We cannot allow even a small number of lapses, whether intentional or as a result of sloppiness, to undermine our reputation and the confidence of the public.

Even before the most recent issue involving the Queen, I had asked the Directors of Vision, Journalism and Audio & Music to work with their senior editorial and creative teams to identify any further issues or incidents of serious intentional or unintentional deception of the audience.

I am writing to you today to ask you to help and support this process in any way you can. If you know of any further incident, please let us know.

Next Wednesday I will be delivering a full report to the BBC Trust. After that, I will write to you again to set out the action that I and the Executive Board intend to take to minimise the risk of anything like these totally unacceptable incidents ever happening again. The vital first step is to ensure that we know about every problem that’s out there.

Nothing matters more for us than honesty, accuracy and fair dealing with the audience. We must now put our house in order. We need your help to enable us to do that as swiftly and as comprehensively as possible. I know I can count on your support.

Mark Thompson

Director-General

Dear Sir,

In the context of the widely-reported ambitions of US neo-conservatives to mount a military attack on Iran, we, Iranian/British academics, are disappointed to note that your article (”Al-Qaeda linked to operations from Iran“, by Stephen Fidler, dated 8th July 2007) adds the Financial Times to the list of “reputable” newspapers prepared to engage in amplifying the drum beats of a new and bloody war in the Middle East.

Would you, for example, have led with the headline: “Al-Qaeda linked to operations from Pakistan”? This would have been far closer to the truth, but no one in the White House is seeking war with Pakistan.

Your report is hardly “news”. The Guardian splashed precisely the same story – also citing anonymous officials – on May 22, alleging that “Iran is secretly forging ties with al-Qaeda elements and Sunni Arab militias in Iraq”.

Indeed, the FT is but the last of the British “quality” newspapers, with the exception of the Independent, to run recent front-page stories claiming that Iran is a major factor in the Iraqi insurgency.

However, any Middle-East expert would have told you that the likelihood that the Shia Iranian regime is backing Sunni extremists in Al-Qaeda is slim in the extreme. Of course Iran has its clients in Iraq, as everyone knows, they are members of the Iraqi government. Why should Iran back the mortal enemies of SCIRI and the Da’wa?

Only this weekend, the Associated Press reported that the leader of an al-Qaeda umbrella group in Iraq threatened to wage war against Iran unless it stops supporting Shiites in Iraq. Abu Omar al-Baghdadi, leader of the group Islamic State in Iraq, said on a website commonly used by insurgent groups that his Sunni fighters have been preparing for four years to wage a battle against Shiite-dominated Iran, the agency reported.

In the run-up to the disastrous invasion of Iraq, Pentagon and MoD officials manipulated a credulous media to plant “news” stories bolstering the case for war. We are witnessing in the same process in the British press once more, this time pushing for military action against Iran.

Briefings with unnamed officials are a classic means by which governments and the military place their propaganda in the media. It is the ABC of journalism to treat such sources with scepticism.

When the New York Times on February 10 splashed with “Deadliest Bomb in Iraq is Made By Iran”, sourced from those same unnamed officials again, the newspaper was widely condemned for resurrecting the “Judith Miller school” of journalism. It is a sad day indeed if the Financial Times has also failed to learn the lessons of the Iraq WMD fiasco and is adding its voice and reputation, wittingly or unwittingly, to those of the Pentagon hawks.

Signatures:

Dr. Mehri Honarbin-Holliday, Canterbury Christ Church University

Dr. Elaheh Rostami-Povey, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London

Dr. Ziba Mir-Hosseini, London Middle East Institute

Professor Haleh Afshar, OBE, University of York

Professor Abbas Edalat, Imperial College, University of London

Of course not. Yet this is just what the UK media – backed by police and politicians — appears to be doing in response to the terror scares in London and Glasgow.

The London Evening Standard led the way: “Bid to Kill 1,700 in West End” (Friday’s headline, June 29). The Mirror on Saturday followed this up: “The Baghdad-style bomb could have killed and injured hundreds, laying waste to people and property in a 300-yard radius.” The Sun: “London’s worst ever bomb carnage was foiled yesterday…”

Things hardly cooled over the weekend. In breathless tones, Monday’s Independent talked of the bombs “exploding compressed gas in the cylinders at 20,000 feet per second” and “spewing out nails for a hundred feet“, had they exploded. The Times had: ” [The terrorists] intended to cause mass casualties.”

But buried away were other reports painting a very different picture.

The Independent on Sunday: “The London car bombers could not have destroyed the Tiger Tiger club and killed people in it, experts said last night. … It emerged that the Haymarket gas and nail bomb was almost certainly not big enough to have brought down the building, as previously reported. It would have killed and maimed within 100 meters.

“Although deadly – the ambulance crew and any revellers on the pavement would have been killed – it would not have caused serious damage to the club or brought down the building.”

A report headlined “Gas canister bomb ‘an amateur job’” published on the Guardian’s website, but not in the newspaper, quoted an explosives expert: “Putting [nails] on the floor is an incompetent way of building a bomb. They would go straight into the ground. … The main impact of the device would be in the economic disruption caused by closing off the normally bustling shops, restaurants and businesses of central London.”

Friday’s Newsnight was even more guarded about the threat posed by these bombs, pointing out how difficult it was to make a car bomb like this actually work. The programme emphasised that the police said that the bombs were only “potentially viable”, as opposed to actually “viable”.

Newsnight: “There was no explosive in this car”

“In this case it is an important distinction,” Newsnight’s diplomatic editor Mark Urban explained. “My understanding is there was no explosive in this car. To have a fireball effect with propane gas cylinders you really need to break them immediately at very high speed with a military or commercial type high explosive. That was not there.

“It seems that the technique that was going to be used was simply to turn on the tap, let the car fill with gas and then try and ignite it using a flammable material that was also found in the car. So one has to question whether some of this analysis of Iraq-type bombs is really appropriate at all because in Iraq insurgents have access to hundreds of shells, large quantities of military grade high explosive, with which of course these similar ingredients, gas bottles, nails, can be turned into extremely lethal devices. In this case I don’t believe that was right.

“Instead I think there was an intention to hurt people. Clearly that’s obvious. … But equally perhaps there was a realisation that if it didn’t work, politicians, the media, would go through the motions as they usually do after an incident like this and amplify any effect that just placing those devices there might have had.”

Adding to this analysis, ex-CIA agent Larry Johnson told Keith Olbermann on MSNBC cable television: “This is not one of the truck bombs or car bombs we see going off in Iraq – what’s really striking about this is that you had two non-bombs in London when we had at least five bombs in Baghdad in which U.S. soldiers were killed in one of those, so I think it’s just out of proportion – this was an incendiary, this was not a high explosive.”

Johnson said that had the gas been ignited properly, there would have been a loud boom that would have split the tank but that no projectiles would have even escaped the car: “If someone was within 20, 30 feet of it they would have ear damage but not much more.”

We have been here before

The media should strive to balance the need to present accurate information to warn the public of a genuine risk, while dampening the terrorists’ goal of producing widespread panic. In this instance, the UK media have failed yet again to provide a pubic service, instead serving the needs of those who want to manipulate public opinion in favour of more wars, more clampdowns and more limits on civil liberties. By doing so, they have also played into the hands of the jihadist murderers.

We have been here before. In the aftermath of the 7/7 London bombings, columnist Simon Jenkins issued a stinging attack on the panic-mongering of the police and press: “Apart from the gratuitous damage to public confidence and business, why stoke the very fears, hatreds and antagonisms which the bombers want stoked?”

He continued: “The truth is that those who want to subvert freedom can always rely on “useful idiots,” a phrase Lenin is said to have used of liberal apologists for extremists (but never did). Modern terrorism neatly inverts this attribution. It relies on “useful idiots” of the right to exploit any terrorist incident to foment xenophobia, suspend civil liberties and seek revenge on any ethnic group vaguely linked to the incident. …

“The useful idiots demand new powers, new restrictions and new measures against the Muslim community. Above all they declare ‘war on terror,’ turn murdered into warriors and incite Islam to proclaim jihad in response.”

And finally, if we really want to get events into perspective: “‘Up to 80 civilians dead’ after US air strikes in Afghanistan“

P.S. The new government appears to be showing admirable constraint in refusing to blame Muslims for the bomb attempts and avoiding “war on terror” rhetoric. But the media are already ratcheting up the pressure for another bout of Muslim-baiting. Is Hassan Butt another useful idiot?
By Dave C

Mainstream media discussions of media balance are limited to a single question: is the media too critical of powerful interests?

Earlier this month, the press described how an internal BBC report had revealed that the organisation was guilty of “institutional left-wing bias” and “being anti American”.

Senior BBC managers and journalists were happy to agree. Broadcaster Andrew Marr responded by noting that the BBC is a publicly funded organisation with an abnormally large proportion of younger people, people of ethnic minorities and almost certainly of gay people, compared with the population at large”. All this, he said, “creates an innate liberal bias inside the BBC”.

Of course words like “liberal” and Left-wing” can mean pretty much what you want them to mean. But the fact is that the BBC consistently presents the perspective of government and business as commonsensical, and rarely feels the need to offer any kind of balance.

Blair shares Marr’s views on journalism. In a recent speech at Reuters’ headquarters in London, Blair condemned “the increasingly shrill tenor of the traditional media”. The problem, he observed, is that it is not enough for journalists to expose the errors of public figures: “It has to be venal. Conspiratorial.” Blair claimed: “The damage saps the country’s confidence and self-belief; it undermines its assessment of itself, its institutions; and above all, it reduces our capacity to take the right decision, in the right spirit for our future.”

This analysis of journalism surfaces every three or four years and always focuses on the alleged aggressive nature of the media.

Writing in The Guardian in April 1996, James Fallows, then Washington editor of the Atlantic Monthly, described “how the media undermines American democracy”. The problem, Fallows argued, was that the media forever portrayed public life in America “as a race to the bottom”. The emphasis was forever on “what is going wrong”.

In 2004, former New Statesman political editor John Lloyd condemned constant journalistic “aggression” and “suspicion”. And senior Guardian journalist Martin Kettle agreed, lamenting the “strident and confrontational press becoming yet more strident and confrontational”.

Mainstream taboo

But in fact, there is a second question: is the corporate media biased in favour of big business of which it is a part? This is one of the great mainstream taboos and is essentially never discussed.

Last year, John Pilger presented a more sobering picture to an audience at Columbia University in New York. He said: “If we journalists are ever to reclaim the honour of our craft, we need to understand, at least, the historic task that great power assigns us. This is to ’soften-up’ the public for rapacious attack on countries that are no threat to us.”

This is the true role journalists so often perform, Pilger explained, and it is achieved by their dehumanising the official enemy by talking of “regime change” in Iran “as if that country were an abstraction, not a society”; by legitimising the invasion of Iraq; by erasing Palestine’s historic injustice.

On June 18, Newsnight journalist Gavin Esler observed on the BBC website: “the schism between Gaza and the West Bank leaves Israel with the unpalatable possibility of a kind of ‘three state’ solution – two hostile Palestinian entities on its borders.”

A regular poster on the Medialens message board exposed this outrageous distortion. The message read: “At this very moment, irrespective of imaginary scenarios, Israel is actually in Palestinian borders, occupying it illegally and creating facts on the ground in its ever expanding illegal settlement building! Isn’t it Palestine that has a hostile Israeli entity on and in its borders?”

Edited by Larry Herman

What are the war lies that you will remember Blair for? Here are a few of them:

Please add you own by posting a comment below

1. 1998: US bombs Sudan

On Aug 20, 1998, the US bombed the al-Shifa chemicals plant in Sudan, claiming it was a “terrorist base”. The plant turned out to provide 50 percent of Sudan’s medicines; its destruction left the country with no supplies of chloroquine, the standard treatment for malaria.

Tony Blair and the then defence minister, George Robertson, rallied to the cause, claiming that America was justified and defending the apparently unassailable evidence. They were, however, alone in supporting the action and rejecting accusations that Clinton had ordered the attacks as a distraction from the unfolding Monica Lewinsky saga.

Noam Chomsky was one of many who pointed out: “One can scarcely try to estimate the colossal toll of the Sudan bombing, even apart from the probable tens of thousands of immediate Sudanese victims.”

2. 1998: US/UK bomb Iraq

In December 1998 the US and Britain bombed Iraq for four days as part of a new strategy of “regime change”. The attacks took place during Clinton’s impeachment hearings. Britain was the only ally to join the US, setting it at odds with almost all its European partners – even Kuwait refused to support the attacks.

Blair said war was necessary because Hussein never intended to abide by his pledge to give unconditional access to UN inspectors trying to determine if Iraq had dismantled its biological, chemical and nuclear weapons programs.

But UN weapons inspector Scott Ritter said the inspectors were sent in to carry out sensitive inspections that “had nothing to do with disarmament but had everything to do with provoking the Iraqis. This was designed to generate a conflict that would justify a bombing.” They were then withdrawn on instructions from Washington.

3. 1999: NATO bombs Serbia

NATO, led by the US and Britain, launched military action knowing that it would provoke a brutal ethnic cleansing campaign by Milosevic. This indeed occurred in stark fashion, with immense consequences, which then enabled NATO leaders to claim they were acting to prevent the humanitarian catastrophe that they had provoked.

With bombing under way, NATO military figures publicly refuted political leaders’ whole justification for the war by saying that the military strategy could not prevent the humanitarian disaster.

Human Rights Watch said: “We are concerned that NATO bombed the civilian infrastructure not because it was making a significant contribution to the Yugoslav military effort but because its destruction would squeeze Serb civilians to put pressure on Milosevic to withdraw from Serbia”

The war was undertaken without UN authorisation and complete with the targeting of civilian infrastructure and the use of cluster bombs. “We will carry on pounding day after day after day, until our objectives are secured”, Tony Blair said two weeks into the bombing in April 1999, revealing the brutal reality of NATO’s supposedly “humanitarian war” over Kosovo.

4. 2001: US/UK invade Afghanistan

Tony Blair, Oct 2, 2001: “To the Afghan people we make this commitment. The conflict will not be the end. We will not walk away, as the outside world has so many times before.”

Cherie Blair, Nov 19 2001: “The women in Afghanistan are as entitled as the women in any country are to have the same hopes and aspirations for ourselves and for our daughters. … We need to help them free that spirit and give them their voice back, so they can create the better Afghanistan we all want to see.”

The reality today: “Without a huge injection of foreign aid – and there is no evidence that anyone wants to provide it – it may not be long before British commanders start saying: ‘Let’s get out of Afghanistan as well as Iraq.’” Richard Norton-Taylor in The Guardian, June 21 2007

The reality today: “In a filthy corner of a clinic in Lashkar Gah, a heavily pregnant 12-year-old lies wailing at a curt, dismissive doctor. Down the road some of the thousands of widows in the area beg in the mud. In the local hospital, women lie recovering from the horrific burns of failed suicide attempts. The brave new world promised by Tony Blair, President George Bush and Afghanistan’s President, Hamid Karzai, appears not to have reached the women of Helmand.

“When asked whether life was better now than under the Taliban, Fowzea Olomi, 40, the director of the women’s centre [in Helmand], laughs: ‘The Taliban have gone?’ Life now, she says, is worse.” Terri Judd in the Independent, June 13 2007

5. 2003: US/UK invade Iraq

Over to you…

Impartiality is a good thing to aspire to, but almost impossible to achieve, not least because philosophers don’t agree on what it is. According to a BBC Trust report published last week, it “involves a mixture of accuracy, balance, context, distance, even-handedness, fairness, objectivity, open-mindedness, rigour, self-awareness, transparency and truth”. The trust assessed the BBC’s programmes – drama, comedy, even the weather, as well as news and current affairs – against these criteria and found them sometimes wanting. Which, given the severity of the test and the quantity of the BBC’s output (408,415 hours a year), is hardly surprising.

It is impossible to imagine any newspaper conducting a similar self-examination, still less publishing it. Even achieving accuracy, etc, in covering the report proved beyond the press. “BBC report damns its ‘culture of bias’”, shouted a Sunday Times headline. The phrase “culture of bias” does not appear in the report. The papers reply that the BBC is different because everyone is compelled to pay for it. This is true as far as it goes, but it does not absolve mass circulation newspapers from responsibilities to be, for example, truthful, rigorous and transparent, particularly in news reports. With rare exceptions, their response to any lapse – such as the News of the World phone-tapping affair – is to sweep it rapidly under the carpet.

An even more egregious example of press hypocrisy followed the offensive anti-Muslim cartoons published in Denmark last year. The BBC, frequently accused of cravenly appeasing Muslim sensitivities, reproduced them on Newsnight. No paper would touch them. Again, several British papers have portrayed the Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez as a Soviet-style dictator because he withdrew a licence to broadcast on public airwaves from a channel that supported an attempted coup. (It can still transmit on satellite and cable.) Yet columnists demand the BBC be similarly punished for non-violent promulgation of “political correctness”.

The British right, vociferously supported by the Mail, the Telegraph and the Murdoch press, is trying to pull off the same trick as the American right: to convince the public that key sections of the media are gripped by a leftwing conspiracy. The BBC Trust shows the campaign is succeeding. Its report, though nuanced and thoughtful, is itself biased. Its examples of possible lapses from impartiality include the failure to feature more about Ukip in the 2005 election campaign, lack of airtime given to “socially authoritarian” views, uncritical support for the Make Poverty History campaign, general prevalence of “politically correct” views, and over-representation of ethnic minorities. Even support for “saving the planet” is apparently thought controversial. There is brief mention of the generous airtime given to religion but that is treated as unproblematic. The report focuses on a supposed “liberal” bias.

Yet different complaints against the BBC are made by, for example, John Pilger, the Medialens website and the Glasgow Media Group. These allege a bias towards a western, free market view of the world, so that, for example, the corporation fails to tell the whole truth about US and British military interventions. If ever there was an example of a lapse from balance, open-mindedness and rigour, it occurred in the run-up to the Iraq war, when the BBC accepted Saddam had WMDs, despite former UN inspectors saying he had been fully disarmed. None of this is mentioned in the BBC Trust report. Nor is Top Gear which, many would say, glorifies reckless driving and carries anti-green messages.

The report, however, is correct to say that achieving impartiality (or rather the appearance of it) is more complex than it was. Once, it was enough to give the major political parties equal airtime. Now, the parties cluster on a consensual centre ground and the big divisions in public opinion are as much cultural as political: religion, ethnicity, sexuality, abortion, for example. The report argues the BBC should not “close down debate”. It should achieve “a balance of opinion across the intellectual spectrum”, and should not exclude unfashionable views.

This is surely right, but it is tricky territory. According to a poll last year, more than a third of Britons believe in creationism or intelligent design. Do they count as part of the “intellectual spectrum”? Do the climate change deniers? The Daily Mail editor Paul Dacre has accused the BBC of disenfranchising “countless millions” of Britons who don’t subscribe to its world view. But the BBC addresses a worldwide audience, in which countless millions would agree with Pilger on most issues rather than with Dacre. Should their views get more airtime?

Impartiality is of its nature elusive. The BBC is one of the few British brands that still commands worldwide admiration, it is a significant export earner and we should all be proud of it. The supposedly patriotic rightwing press is doing it incalculable damage and the journalists and editors responsible should, if I may borrow their own language, hang their heads in shame.

As if any proof were needed, Downing Street actually banned broadcasters from screening the questions Blair answered at the end of the speech after ITV News asked him whether he regretted the way intelligence was used in the run-up to Iraq.

Amid the blizzard of comment on the speech, however, only one newspaper understood that this was all about Iraq – the paper singled out by Blair in his assault. The Independent’s front-page headline was spot on: “Would you be saying this, Mr Blair, if we supported your war in Iraq?”

In contrast, in the words of Simon Jenkins in the Sunday Times, “a stage army of sycophantic columnists leapt forward to hug Blair and say how right he was”. Most sickening among these was the Guardian, whose leader drooled over the speech and talked of the prime minister’s “courage” to say what he said. Courage?! Blair might have displayed some courage if he had stood up to Murdoch and Rothermere, but not by whingeing about the Independent.

On Iraq, Blair speaks in code aimed at senior editors of the “liberal” media. This is much more effective than stating outright his real opinions, namely that those who question the war are anti-American, appeasers of terrorism and soft on Saddam.

He is not always so coded. In January he said the public are “constantly bombarded by the propaganda of the enemy, often quite sympathetically treated” by the media. A year earlier Blair denounced the BBC’s coverage of Hurricane Katrina as “full of hatred of America” and “gloating” at the country’s plight.

As the American journalist Jeff Cohen notes in his recent book on his time as a presenter at Fox news, Fox’s pretence of impartiality appeals to its reactionary viewers because, “like voters who want to support a candidate who appeals to their biases (say, against blacks or gays), many are happier supporting a candidate who communicates in code, rather than one who is overtly prejudiced.” Blair’s code has the same effect on editors.

The fact that he could devote an entire speech to the media without mentioning Iraq is already a massive clue as to how this code works. So Blair talked about the “radically altered” media environment being to blame for “sensationalism” – read, don’t you dare call me a liar, warmonger or criminal.

He said “the real reason for cynicism” is “how politics are reported” – read, stop talking about why millions hate me because of Iraq.

He said “attacking motive is far more potent than attacking judgment” – read, stop questioning why we went to war and what we are really doing in Iraq and Afghanistan (for a classic example from the BBC, click here).

He said “opinion and fact should be clearly divisible” and singled out the Independent as a “metaphor” for opinionated journalism – read, cut out anti-war opinion from the media. This has long been a bee in Blair’s bonnet. According to Greg Dyke’s memoirs, on March 19, 2003 – on the eve of the invasion – Blair wrote a letter to the BBC complaining about its coverage of Iraq and alleging “a real breakdown of the separation of news and comment”.

Nothing Blair said in his speech was remotely new – another point missed in the coverage. He merely repeated the line long pushed by a bevy of Blairite commentators led by John Lloyd of the Financial Times. They maintain that “contempt” shown for politicians by the media is undermining democracy. Indeed, the tone, targets and tactics of Blair’s speech seemed to have been lifted from some of John Lloyd’s writings on the subject.

But this is little more than pseudo-sophisticated, faux-academic cover for the Blairite assault on the media’s coverage of the “war on terror”, which started in earnest with the Hutton Report and is taking the mainstream media further and further to the right. Where this is leading is demonstrated by Lloyd’s piece in the Guardian (June 20). If you can fight your way past the mumbo-jumbo, Lloyd’s argument boils down to an allegation that the BBC is too liberal and a call to give Daily Mail readers a louder voice.

Perhaps the most astonishing part of Blair’s speech has been overlooked – his reference to the Watergate scandal, which was exposed by the dogged investigative reporting of Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein. Blair said: “Watergate was a great piece of journalism but there is a PhD thesis all on its own to examine the consequences for journalism of standing one conspiracy up.”

This is a revealing comment. The right have long insisted that it was the media that lost the Vietnam war (despite plenty of evidence to the contrary). Watergate severely weakened the White House at a crucial period in Vietnam, revealing to millions of Americans that Nixon’s war was not worth the price in terms of domestic abuse of power.

Blair clearly sees himself wronged by the media. But now we know just how deep is the grudge he bears against it: he sides with Nixon and Kissinger against Woodward, Bernstein and the anti-Vietnam war movement.

Nixon resigned in disgrace. Blair has survived, but his disgrace is none the less for it.

By Dave Crouch

The best contemporary example of dominant media taboos at work has to do with the Iraq War. Certain sections of “mainstream” media may have apologized for their power-serving role in propagating the big weapons of mass destruction (WMD) lie (and related deceptions about Saddam Hussein’s alleged connections to al Qaeda and 9/11) that the Bush administration cooked up to justify their invasion of Iraq. But so what? The apology came far too late to matter and dominant U.S. media has subsequently continued to disseminate numerous other administration deceptions, such as the preposterous claim (elevated by the White House public relations machine once the WMD fraud began to be exposed) that the real reason for the occupation of Iraq was the United States’ desire to export “democracy” and to create a free and sovereign Iraq.

Never mind that the preponderant majority of Iraqis have wanted U.S. troops to leave their nation from the start. Never mind that just 1 percent of Iraqis think the U.S. invaded to export democracy or that the great majority of Iraqis think Uncle Sam came to (imagine) grab their oil. Or that a recent poll conducted by “our own” State Department reports that almost three-fourths of Baghdad’s  residents would “feel safer” if U.S. forces left their country. Or that one of the first actions of the U.S. occupation authorities was to open up much of Iraq ’s economy to multinational corporate ownership – an action that would never have been supported by the Iraqi majority and which violated core principles of national independence.

Never mind that 72 percent of Americans surveyed by the mainstream Chicago Council on Foreign Relations in 2004 said that the U.S. should remove its military from Iraq if that’s what a clear majority of Iraqis want. Or that the United States ‘ own regressive, hyper-plutocratic domestic policy is highly unpopular with the U.S. majority.  Or that America ’s “dollar democracy” has long been something of an open corporate plutocracy, raising critical questions about the United States ‘ qualifications to implant something “democracy” abroad.

Never mind that the U.S. is a close ally and sponsor of the feudal, arch-repressive Saudi Arabian regime along with numerous other authoritarian state and political forces (including the Israeli occupation state) in the region and around the world. U.S. policymakers have long been willing to collaborate with the Saudis for one very simple and obvious reason: American access to, and control of, that regime’s unparalleled petroleum reserves.

Never mind that “most U.S. [occupation] soldiers interviewed by NEWSWEEK have long since stopped insisting that their greatest mission is to bring peace and democracy to Iraq .  More and more,” Newsweek reported last month, “they talk about their desire to simply protect their buddies, and to get everyone home alive” (”Manhunt in Mesopotamia,” Newsweek,  May 28. 2007. p.37).

And never mind that the notion of the Iraqi people doing whatever they wish with their own state’s critical petroleum resources – second or third only to those of Saudi Arabia – is completely unacceptable to U.S. foreign policy makers from either of the nation’s dominant two imperial business parties.  The oil and related world-economic and strategic geopolitical stakes in Iraq and the region are simply too high for that. As James M. Lindsay, a vice president at the Council on Foreign Relations proclaimed last year, “it was always hard to sustain the argument that if the United States withdrew from Vietnam there would be immense geopolitical consequences. As we look at Iraq, it’s a very different issue. It’s a country in one of the most volatile parts of the world, which has a very precious resource that modern economies rely on, namely oil.”

As the leading left critic of U.S. foreign policy Noam Chomsky rightly observes, “the U.S. invaded Iraq because it has enormous oil resources, mostly untapped, and it’s right in the heart of the world’s energy system.”  If the U.S. succeeds in controlling Iraq, Chomsky notes, “it extends enormously its strategic power, what Zbigniew Brzezinski calls its ‘critical leverage’ over Europe and Asia . That’s a major reason for controlling the oil resources – it gives you strategic power. Even if you’re on renewable energy you want to do that. That’s the reason for invading Iraq, the fundamental reason,” readily understood, Chomsky adds, by anybody who has “three gray cells functioning.”

Even if the U.S. overcame its gasoline addiction and became fully energy- self-reliant (it currently receives just 20 percent of its oil from the Middle East), something else would still make U.S. officials positively obsessed with Middle Eastern petroleum: the ongoing and ever-worsening loss of America’s onetime supremacy in basic global-capitalist realms of production, trade, international finance, and currency and the related emergence of the rapidly expanding giant China as a new strategic military (as well as economic) competitor.  As the noted Left geographer and world-systems analyst David Harvey argues, the United States’ long decline, reflecting predictable (and predicted) shifts in the spatial patterns of capitalist investment and social infrastructure gives special urgency for the U.S to deepen its control of Middle Eastern oil and use it as a bargaining chip with even more oil-dependent regions like Western Europe and East Asia, homes to the leading challengers to U.S. economic power. That core objective would hardly be attained helping Iraq act in accord with the principles of democracy and national independence.

Dominant (”mainstream”) U.S. media coverage and commentary on Iraq continues to be hopelessly crippled by doctrinal observance of taboos against discussing five basic and intimately interrelated aspects of so-called “Operation Iraqi Freedom”:

1. The monumentally criminal nature of the invasion, which involved (in the words of the 2005 Istanbul Declaration) “planning, preparing, and waging the supreme crime of a war of aggression in contravention of the United Nations Charter and the Nuremberg Principles.”

2. The brazenly imperialist and colonial nature of the occupation, which is richly continuous with earlier U.S. behavior within the beyond the Middle East and provides critical context for understanding why U.S. soldiers die on a regular basis in Iraq (where Americans are understandably seen as unlawful invaders).

3. The racist nature of the occupation, expressed in the false conflation between al Qaeda and a small group of predominantly Saudi hijackers on one hand and the broad Arab and Muslim worlds on the other hand.  This racism has found expression also in U.S. ground forces’ recurrent description of Iraqi civilians and resistance fighters as “hajis” and “towel heads”(among other terrible designations) and in many Americans’ insistence on describing the entire Middle East as a den of primitive, barbarian and enemies of modern “civilization.”

4. The full and overwhelming extent of Iraqi civilian casualties, including more than 700,000 dead by now.  The Iraqi body count dwarfs the U.S. death toll in Iraq, but dominant U.S. media remains primarily and narcissistically obsessed with U.S. fatalities in Mesopotamia . The mostly civilian Arab victims of U.S. imperial violence (a lovely expression of America ’s noble commitment to “civilization”) are unworthy victims of the Iraq War as far as dominant U.S. media is concerned.

5. The critical role of Middle Eastern oil in shaping the decision to invade Iraq and in ensuring that the U.S. will not completely or truly withdraw from that illegally occupied nation or indeed the region anytime soon, whichever corporate-imperial party happens to hold power in Washington.

These basic and unpleasant realities are essentially unmentionable in “mainstream” coverage and commentary of the Iraq War. At the “left” margin of dominant U.S. media’s narrow parameters of acceptable discourse (defined by the likes of the New York Times and militant centrists Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama), the war is at worst a  terrible “mistake” – a “strategic blunder” driven by a sincere but naïve drive to advance noble and democratic ideals and institutions.

It’s simply beyond the pale to note that the occupation is a racist and petro-imperialist crime against the Iraqi people, civilized norms and international law and that this crime is consistent with a long and bipartisan record of U.S. imperial violence.

As a result, dominant coverage and commentary on the war is childish, chaotic and nonsensical.  Reading the leading papers and watching the corporate talking heads speak about “Operation Iraqi Freedom” is like listening to a deranged psychotic talking gibberish. The assumption of benevolent intention, the denial of criminal and imperial intent, the inability to grasp the role of petroleum, and the denial of racist and mass-murderous realities makes taking in “mainstream” war/occupation coverage and commentary like hearing a baseball game being called by a blind man.

According to a Washington Post “news” story (not an editorial) in January 2005, “spreading democracy around the world” was “one of  [the Bush administration's] top foreign policy goals for the new term.”

Right and a strike out is a home run. Two plus two equals five. And the linebacker just stole home.

The Post has joined the Times in claiming to be sorry for its bad call on Iraqi’s WMD.  When will it apologize for claiming to believe that Bush invaded Iraq in accord with U.S. goals to “spread democracy around the world”?

“The American empire is fighting to advance democracy, advance peace and quell violence in the Middle East ?” Sure – and the Chicago Cubs have the best record in baseball.

Since its launch just over a decade ago, the al-Jazeera satellite TV station has transformed the politics of the Middle East. For the first time, people in the region had access to a genuinely free and independent source of news and comment that was neither under the control of dictatorial regimes nor western states or corporations. Under its slogan of “The opinion … and the other opinion”, al-Jazeera gave an Arab world hungry for information and debate the means to talk to itself and shape its future. It spawned imitators across the region and has launched an English language station that is beginning to challenge the western monopoly of international news as a “voice of the global south”. And the station also put Qatar, which sponsors it, on the political map and gave it unprecedented prestige throughout the Arab world and beyond.

But now that achievement is being put at risk. The evidence is clear that the US government is using its influence in Qatar to try to neuter the station’s independence, bring it to heel and shift its coverage in a pro-western direction. If it succeeds, it would be a disaster for the Arab world and its chance to shape an independent and democratic future.

When al-Jazeera was launched in 1996, it was hailed by the US as a brave step towards liberalisation of the Middle Eastern media. But that all changed after September 2001 and the US invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq. The US administration could not tolerate a TV station that was popular and trusted in the Arab and Muslim world broadcasting about the reality of western and Israeli policies on the ground – and giving airtime to their enemies. Although US and Israeli viewpoints have always been given plenty of airtime, the freedom enjoyed by al-Jazeera’s editorial staff has clearly been too liberal and democratic for the world’s “leading democracy”. Meanwhile, dictatorial regimes in the region pressed Washington to do something about this “turbulent priest” they believed was stirring their peoples against their despotic rule.

Initially, al-Jazeera had forced other channels in the Arab world to open up their coverage. But the new freedoms were not tolerated for long. And although the US government launched its own Arabic news channel al-Hurra, and Saudi Arabia al-Arabiya, neither succeeded in denting al-Jazeera’s popularity.

But the station has had to pay a high price for its independence and professionalism. Its offices in Kabul and Baghdad were bombed by the US; its Baghdad correspondent Tariq Ayyub was killed; its Kabul correspondent Taysir Alluni was arrested in Spain and charged with terrorism; and its cameraman Sami Alhajj was kidnapped in Kabul and continues to be held in Guantánamo Bay. Most notoriously of all, George Bush even suggested to Tony Blair that they bomb al-Jazeera’s Doha headquarters.

Now the US, which maintains a large military base in Qatar, has adopted a more subtle approach to breaking the Arabs’ voice of independence and diversity. And the signs are that some elements in the Qatari government have yielded to the relentless US pressure. As one source close to al-Jazeera has put it: “You don’t need to bomb a TV station to change its direction.” A recent reshuffle has brought outspokenly pro-US directors on to the board, including a former Qatari ambassador to Washington. Another has boasted publicly that the tone and content of al-Jazeera’s coverage is going to be changed. But these moves have already backfired and caused huge controversy not only in Qatar but throughout the Middle East, and there is every chance that what is in effect an attempted coup at the station will be reversed. It would be a huge loss for independence and freedom in the Arab world if it succeeded.

The war on Iraq won’t be remembered for how it was waged so much as for how it was sold. It was a propaganda war, a war of perception management, where loaded phrases, such as “weapons of mass destruction” and “rogue state” were hurled like precision weapons at the target audience: us.

To understand the Iraq war you don’t need to consult generals, but the spin doctors and PR flacks who stage-managed the countdown to war from the murky corridors of Washington where politics, corporate spin and psy-ops spooks cohabit.

Consider the picaresque journey of Tony Blair’s plagiarized dossier on Iraq, from a grad student’s website to a cut-and-paste job in the prime minister’s bombastic speech to the House of Commons. Blair, stubborn and verbose, paid a price for his grandiose puffery. Bush, who looted whole passages from Blair’s speech for his own clumsy presentations, has skated freely through the tempest. Why?

Unlike Blair, the Bush team never wanted to present a legal case for war. They had no interest in making any of their allegations about Iraq hold up to a standard of proof. The real effort was aimed at amping up the mood for war by using the psychology of fear.

Facts were never important to the Bush team. They were disposable nuggets that could be discarded at will and replaced by whatever new rationale that played favorably with their polls and focus groups. The war was about weapons of mass destruction one week, al-Qaeda the next. When neither allegation could be substantiated on the ground, the fall back position became the mass graves (many from the Iran/Iraq war where the U.S.A. backed Iraq) proving that Saddam was an evil thug who deserved to be toppled. The motto of the Bush PR machine was: Move on. Don’t explain. Say anything to conceal the perfidy behind the real motives for war. Never look back. Accuse the questioners of harboring unpatriotic sensibilities. Eventually, even the cagey Wolfowitz admitted that the official case for war was made mainly to make the invasion palatable, not to justify it.

The Bush claque of neocon hawks viewed the Iraq war as a product and, just like a new pair of Nikes, it required a roll-out campaign to soften up the consumers. The same techniques (and often the same PR gurus) that have been used to hawk cigarettes, SUVs and nuclear waste dumps were deployed to retail the Iraq war. To peddle the invasion, Donald Rumsfeld and Colin Powell and company recruited public relations gurus into top-level jobs at the Pentagon and the State Department. These spinmeisters soon had more say over how the rationale for war on Iraq should be presented than intelligence agencies and career diplomats. If the intelligence didn’t fit the script, it was shaded, retooled or junked.

Take Charlotte Beers whom Powell picked as undersecretary of state in the post-9/11 world. Beers wasn’t a diplomat. She wasn’t even a politician. She was a grand diva of spin, known on the business and gossip pages as “the queen of Madison Avenue.” On the strength of two advertising campaigns, one for Uncle Ben’s Rice and another for Head and Shoulder’s dandruff shampoo, Beers rocketed to the top of the heap in the PR world, heading two giant PR houses: Ogilvy and Mathers as well as J. Walter Thompson.

At the state department Beers, who had met Powell in 1995 when they both served on the board of Gulf Airstream, worked at, in Powell’s words, “the branding of U.S. foreign policy.” She extracted more than $500 million from Congress for her Brand America campaign, which largely focused on beaming U.S. propaganda into the Muslim world, much of it directed at teens.

“Public diplomacy is a vital new arm in what will combat terrorism over time,” said Beers. “All of a sudden we are in this position of redefining who America is, not only for ourselves, but for the outside world.” Note the rapt attention Beers pays to the manipulation of perception, as opposed, say, to alterations of U.S. policy.

Old-fashioned diplomacy involves direct communication between

representatives of nations, a conversational give and take, often fraught with deception (see April Glaspie), but an exchange nonetheless. Public diplomacy, as defined by Beers, is something else entirely. It’s a one-way street, a unilateral broadcast of American propaganda directly to the public, domestic and international, a kind of informational carpet-bombing.

The themes of her campaigns were as simplistic and flimsy as a Bush press conference. The American incursions into Afghanistan and Iraq were all about bringing the balm of “freedom” to oppressed peoples. Hence, the title of the U.S. war: Operation Iraqi Freedom, where cruise missiles were depicted as instruments of liberation. Bush himself distilled the Beers equation to its bizarre essence: “This war is about peace.”

Beers quietly resigned her post a few weeks before the first volley of tomahawk missiles battered Baghdad. From her point of view, the war itself was already won, the fireworks of shock and awe were all after play.

Over at the Pentagon, Donald Rumsfeld drafted Victoria “Torie” Clarke as his director of public affairs. Clarke knew the ropes inside the Beltway. Before becoming Rumsfeld’s mouthpiece, she had commanded one of the world’s great parlors for powerbrokers: Hill and Knowlton’s D.C. office.

Almost immediately upon taking up her new gig, Clarke convened regular meetings with a select group of Washington’s top private PR specialists and lobbyists to develop a marketing plan for the Pentagon’s forthcoming terror wars. The group was filled with heavy-hitters and was strikingly bipartisan in composition. She called it the Rumsfeld Group and it included PR executive Sheila Tate, columnist Rich Lowry, and Republican political consultant Rich Galen.

The brain trust also boasted top Democratic fixer Tommy Boggs, brother of NPR’s Cokie Roberts and son of the late Congressman Hale Boggs of Louisiana. At the very time Boggs was conferring with top Pentagon brass on how to frame the war on terror, he was also working feverishly for the royal family of Saudi Arabia. In 2002 alone, the Saudis paid his Qorvis PR firm $20.2 million to protect its interests in Washington. In the wake of hostile press coverage following the exposure of Saudi links to the 9/11 hijackers, the royal family needed all the well-placed help it could buy. They seem to have gotten their money’s worth. Boggs’ felicitous influence-peddling may help to explain why the references to Saudi funding of al-Qaeda were dropped from the recent congressional report on the investigation into intelligence failures and 9/11.

According to the trade publication PR Week, the Rumsfeld Group sent “messaging advice” to the Pentagon. The group told Clarke and Rumsfeld that in order to get the American public to buy into the war on terrorism, they needed to suggest a link to nation states, not just nebulous groups such as al-Qaeda. In other words, there needed to be a fixed target for the military campaigns, some distant place to drop cruise missiles and cluster bombs. They suggested the notion (already embedded in Rumsfeld’s mind) of playing up the notion of so-called rogue states as the real masters of terrorism. Thus was born the Axis of Evil, which, of course, wasn’t an “axis” at all, since two of the states, Iran and Iraq, hated each other, and neither had anything at all to do with the third, North Korea.

Tens of millions in federal money were poured into private public relations and media firms working to craft and broadcast the Bush dictat that Saddam had to be taken out before the Iraqi dictator blew up the world by dropping chemical and nuclear bombs from long-range drones. Many of these PR executives and image consultants were old friends of the high priests in the Bush inner sanctum. Indeed, they were veterans, like Cheney and Powell, of the previous war against Iraq, another engagement that was more spin than combat .

At the top of the list was John Rendon, head of the D.C. firm, the Rendon Group. Rendon is one of Washington’s heaviest hitters, a Beltway fixer who never let political affiliation stand in the way of an assignment. Rendon served as a media consultant for Michael Dukakis and Jimmy Carter, as well as Reagan and George H.W. Bush. Whenever the Pentagon wanted to go to war, he offered his services at a price. During Desert Storm, Rendon pulled in $100,000 a month from the Kuwaiti royal family. He followed this up with a $23 million contract from the CIA to produce anti-Saddam propaganda in the region.

As part of this CIA project, Rendon created and named the Iraqi National Congress and tapped his friend Ahmed Chalabi, the shady financier, to head the organization.

Shortly after 9/11, the Pentagon handed the Rendon Group another big assignment: public relations for the U.S. bombing of Afghanistan. Rendon was also deeply involved in the planning and public relations for the pre-emptive war on Iraq, though both Rendon and the Pentagon refuse to disclose the details of the group’s work there.

But it’s not hard to detect the manipulative hand of Rendon behind many of the Iraq war’s signature events, including the toppling of the Saddam statue (by U.S. troops and Chalabi associates) and videotape of jubilant Iraqis waving American flags as the Third Infantry rolled by them. Rendon had pulled off the same stunt in the first Gulf War, handing out American flags to Kuwaitis and herding the media to the orchestrated demonstration. “Where do you think they got those American flags?” clucked Rendon in 1991. “That was my assignment.”

The Rendon Group may also have had played a role in pushing the phony intelligence that has now come back to haunt the Bush administration. In December of 2002, Robert Dreyfuss reported that the inner circle of the Bush White House preferred the intelligence coming from Chalabi and his associates to that being proffered by analysts at the CIA.

So Rendon and his circle represented a new kind of off-the-shelf PSYOPs , the privatization of official propaganda. “I am not a national security strategist or a military tactician,” said Rendon. “I am a politician, and a person who uses communication to meet public policy or corporate policy objectives. In fact, I am an information warrior and a perception manager.”

What exactly, is perception management? The Pentagon defines it this way: “actions to convey and/or deny selected information and indicators to foreign audiences to influence their emotions, motives and objective reasoning.” In other words, lying about the intentions of the U.S. government. In a rare display of public frankness, the Pentagon actually let slip its plan (developed by Rendon) to establish a high-level den inside the Department Defense for perception management. They called it the Office of Strategic Influence and among its many missions was to plant false stories in the press.

Nothing stirs the corporate media into outbursts of pious outrage like an official government memo bragging about how the media are manipulated for political objectives. So the New York Times and Washington Post threw indignant fits about the Office of Strategic Influence; the Pentagon shut down the operation, and the press gloated with satisfaction on its victory. Yet, Rumsfeld told the Pentagon press corps that while he was killing the office, the same devious work would continue. “You can have the corpse,” said Rumsfeld. “You can have the name. But I’m going to keep doing every single thing that needs to be done. And I have.”

At a diplomatic level, despite the hired guns and the planted stories, this image war was lost. It failed to convince even America’s most fervent allies and dependent client states that Iraq posed much of a threat. It failed to win the blessing of the U.N. and even NATO, a wholly owned subsidiary of Washington. At the end of the day, the vaunted coalition of the willing consisted of Britain, Spain, Italy, Australia, and a cohort of former Soviet bloc nations. Even so, the citizens of the nations that cast their lot with the U.S.A. overwhelmingly opposed the war.

Domestically, it was a different story. A population traumatized by terror threats and shattered economy became easy prey for the saturation bombing of the Bush message that Iraq was a terrorist state linked to al-Qaeda that was only minutes away from launching attacks on America with weapons of mass destruction._Americans were the victims of an elaborate con job, pelted with a daily barrage of threat inflation, distortions, deceptions and lies, not about tactics or strategy or war plans, but about justifications for war. The lies were aimed not at confusing Saddam’s regime, but the American people. By the start of the war, 66 per cent of Americans thought Saddam Hussein was behind 9/11 and 79 per cent thought he was close to having a nuclear weapon.

Of course, the closest Saddam came to possessing a nuke was a rusting gas centrifuge buried for 13 years in the garden of Mahdi Obeidi, a retired Iraqi scientist. Iraq didn’t have any functional chemical or biological weapons. In fact, it didn’t even possess any SCUD missiles, despite erroneous reports fed by Pentagon PR flacks alleging that it had fired SCUDs into Kuwait.

This charade wouldn’t have worked without a gullible or a complicit press corps. Victoria Clarke, who developed the Pentagon plan for embedded reports, put it succinctly a few weeks before the war began: “Media coverage of any future operation will to a large extent shape public perception.”

During the Vietnam War, TV images of maimed GIs and napalmed villages suburbanized opposition to the war and helped hasten the U.S. withdrawal. The Bush gang meant to turn the Vietnam phenomenon on its head by using TV as a force to propel the U.S.A. into a war that no one really wanted.

What the Pentagon sought was a new kind of living room war, where instead of photos of mangled soldiers and dead Iraqi kids, they could control the images Americans viewed and to a large extent the content of the stories. By embedding reporters inside selected divisions, Clarke believed the Pentagon could count on the reporters to build relationships with the troops and to feel dependent on them for their own safety. It worked, naturally. One reporter for a national network trembled on camera that the U.S. Army functioned as “our protectors.” The late David Bloom of NBC confessed on the air that he was willing to do “anything and everything they can ask of us.”

When the Pentagon needed a heroic story, the press obliged. Jessica Lynch became the war’s first instant celebrity. Here was a neo-gothic tale of a steely young woman wounded in a fierce battle, captured and tortured by ruthless enemies, and dramatically saved from certain death by a team of selfless rescuers, knights in camo and night-vision goggles. Of course, nearly every detail of her heroic adventure proved to be as fictive and maudlin as any made-for-TV-movie. But the ordeal of Private Lynch, which dominated the news for more than a week, served its purpose: to distract attention from a stalled campaign that was beginning to look at lot riskier than the American public had been hoodwinked into believing.

The Lynch story was fed to the eager press by a Pentagon operation called Combat Camera, the Army network of photographers, videographers and editors that sends 800 photos and 25 video clips a day to the media. The editors at Combat Camera carefully culled the footage to present the Pentagon’s montage of the war, eliding such unsettling images as collateral damage, cluster bombs, dead children and U.S. soldiers, napalm strikes and disgruntled troops.

“A lot of our imagery will have a big impact on world opinion,” predicted Lt. Jane Larogue, director of Combat Camera in Iraq. She was right. But as the hot war turned into an even hotter occupation, the Pentagon, despite airy rhetoric from occupation supremo Paul Bremer about installing democratic institutions such as a free press, moved to tighten its monopoly on the flow images out of Iraq. First, it tried to shut down Al Jazeera, the Arab news channel. Then the Pentagon intimated that it would like to see all foreign TV news crews banished from Baghdad.

Few newspapers fanned the hysteria about the threat posed by Saddam’s weapons of mass destruction as sedulously as did the Washington Post. In the months leading up to the war, the Post’s pro-war op-eds outnumbered the anti-war columns by a 3-to-1 margin.

Back in 1988, the Post felt much differently about Saddam and his weapons of mass destruction. When reports trickled out about the gassing of Iranian troops, the Washington Post’s editorial page shrugged off the massacres, calling the mass poisonings “a quirk of war.”

The Bush team displayed a similar amnesia. When Iraq used chemical weapons in grisly attacks on Iran, the U.S. government not only didn’t object, it encouraged Saddam. Anything to punish Iran was the message coming from the White House. Donald Rumsfeld himself was sent as President Ronald Reagan’s personal envoy to Baghdad. Rumsfeld conveyed the bold message than an Iraq defeat would be viewed as a “strategic setback for the United States.” This sleazy alliance was sealed with a handshake caught on videotape. When CNN reporter Jamie McIntyre replayed the footage for Rumsfeld in the spring of 2003, the secretary of defense snapped, “Where’d you get that? Iraqi television?”

The current crop of Iraq hawks also saw Saddam much differently then. Take the writer Laura Mylroie, sometime colleague of the New York Times’ Judy Miller, who persists in peddling the ludicrous conspiracy that Iraq was behind the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center.

How times have changed! In 1987, Mylroie felt downright cuddly toward Saddam. She wrote an article for the New Republic titled “Back Iraq: Time for a U.S. Tilt in the Mideast,” arguing that the U.S. should publicly embrace Saddam’s secular regime as a bulwark against the Islamic fundamentalists in Iran. The co-author of this mesmerizing weave of wonkery was none other than Daniel Pipes, perhaps the nation’s most bellicose Islamophobe. “The American weapons that Iraq could make good use of include remotely scatterable and anti-personnel mines and counterartillery radar,” wrote Mylroie and Pipes. “The United States might also consider upgrading intelligence it is supplying Baghdad.”

In the rollout for the war, Mylroie seemed to be everywhere hawking the invasion of Iraq. She would often appear on two or three different networks in the same day. How did the reporter manage this feat? She had help in the form of Eleana Benador, the media placement guru who runs Benador Associates. Born in Peru, Benador parlayed her skills as a linguist into a lucrative career as media relations whiz for the Washington foreign policy elite. She also oversees the Middle East Forum, a fanatically pro-Zionist white paper mill. Her clients include some of the nation’s most fervid hawks, including Michael Ledeen, Charles Krauthammer, Al Haig, Max Boot, Daniel Pipes, Richard Perle, and Judy Miller. During the Iraq war, Benador’s assignment was to embed this squadron of pro-war zealots into the national media, on talk shows, and op-ed pages.

Benador not only got them the gigs, she also crafted the theme and made sure they all stayed on message. “There are some things, you just have to state them in a different way, in a slightly different way,” said Benador. “If not, people get scared.” Scared of intentions of their own government.

It could have been different. All of the holes in the Bush administration’s gossamer case for war were right there for the mainstream press to expose. Instead, the U.S. press, just like the oil companies, sought to commercialize the Iraq war and profit from the invasions. They didn’t want to deal with uncomfortable facts or present voices of dissent.

Nothing sums up this unctuous approach more brazenly than MSNBC’s firing of liberal talk show host Phil Donahue on the eve of the war. The network replaced the Donahue Show with a running segment called Countdown: Iraq, featuring the usual nightly coterie of retired generals, security flacks, and other cheerleaders for invasion. The network’s executives blamed the cancellation on sagging ratings. In fact, during its run Donahue’s show attracted more viewers than any other program on the network. The real reason for the pre-emptive strike on Donahue was spelled out in an internal memo from anxious executives at NBC. Donahue, the memo said, offered “a difficult face for NBC in a time of war. He seems to delight in presenting guests who are anti-war, anti-Bush and skeptical of the administration’s motives.”

The memo warned that Donahue’s show risked tarring MSNBC as an unpatriotic network, “a home for liberal anti-war agenda at the same time that our competitors are waving the flag at every opportunity.” So, with scarcely a second thought, the honchos at MSNBC gave Donahue the boot and hoisted the battle flag.

It’s war that sells.

There’s a helluva caveat, of course. Once you buy it, the merchants of war accept no returns.

Jeffrey St. Clair is the author of Been Brown So Long It Looked Like Green to Me: the Politics of Nature and Grand Theft Pentagon. His newest book is End Times: the Death of the Fourth Estate, co-written with Alexander Cockburn.

An experienced British officer serving in Iraq has written to the BBC describing the invasion as “illegal, immoral and unwinnable” which, he says, is “the overwhelming feeling of many of my peers”. In a letter to the BBC’s Newsnight and Medialens.org he accuses the media’s “embedded coverage with the US Army” of failing to question “the intentions and continuing effects of the US-led invasion and occupation”.

He says most British soldiers regard their tours as “loathsome”, during which they “reluctantly [provide] target practice for insurgents, senselessly haemorrhaging casualties and squandering soldiers’ lives, as part of Bush’s vain attempt to delay the inevitable Anglo-US rout until after the next US election.” He appeals to journalists not to swallow “the official line/ White House propaganda”.

In 1970, I made a film in Vietnam called The Quiet Mutiny in which GIs spoke out about their hatred of that war and its “official line/White House propaganda”. The experiences in Iraq and Vietnam are both very different and strikingly similar. There was much less “embedded coverage” in Vietnam, although there was censorship by omission, which is standard practice today.

What is different about Iraq is the willingness of usually obedient British soldiers to speak their minds, from General Richard Dannatt, Britain’s current military chief, who said that the presence of his troops in Iraq “exacerbates the security problem”, to General Michael Rose who has called for Tony Blair to be impeached for taking Britain to war “on false grounds” – remarks that are mild compared with the blogs of squaddies.

What is also different is the growing awareness in the British forces and the public of how “the official line” is played through the media. This can be quite crude: for example when a BBC defence correspondent in Iraq described the aim of the Anglo-American invasion as “bring[ing] democracy and human rights” to Iraq. The Director of BBC Television, Helen Boaden, backed him up with a sheaf of quotations from Blair that this was indeed the aim, implying that Blair’s notorious word was enough.

More often than not, censorship by omission is employed: for example, by omitting the fact that almost 80 per cent of attacks are directed against the occupation forces (source: the Pentagon) so as to give the impression that the occupiers are doing their best to separate “warring tribes” and are crisis managers rather than the cause of the crisis.

There is a last-ditch sense about this kind of propaganda. Seymour Hersh said recently, “[In April, the Bush administration] made a decision that because of the totally dwindling support for the war in Iraq, they would go back to the al-Qaeda card, although there’s no empirical basis. Most of the pros will tell you the foreign fighters are a couple of per cent and they’re sort of leaderless… there’s no attempt to suggest there’s any significant co-ordination of these groups, but the press keeps going ga-ga about al-Qaeda… it’s just amazing to me.”

Ga-ga day at the London Guardian was 22 May. “Iran’s secret plan for summer offensive to force US out of Iraq”, said the front-page banner headline. “Iran is secretly forging ties with al Qaeda elements and Sunni Arab militias in Iraq,” wrote Simon Tisdall from Washington, “in preparation for a summer showdown with coalition int- ended to tip a wavering US Congress into voting for full military withdrawal, US officials say.” The entire tale was based on anonymous US official sources. No attempt was made to substantiate their “firm evidence” or explain the illogic of their claims. No journalistic scepticism was even hinted, which is amazing considering the web of proven lies spun from Washington over Iraq.

Moreover, it had a curious tone of something-must-be-done insistence, reminiscent of Judith Miller’s scandalous reports in the New York Times claiming that Saddam was about to launch his weapons of mass destruction and beckoning Bush to invade. Tisdall in effect offered the same invitation; I can remember few more irresponsible pieces of journalism. The British public and the people of Iran, deserve better.

Somalia consists of five territories where people of the same language and religion live. During the colonial period it was partitioned into territories claimed by the British, French, Italians, Kenyans and Ethiopians.

In 1960 the former British and Italian territories were united to form the independent Somali Republic. The French territory of Djibouti won independence in 1977. Other territories remain under Ethiopian and Kenyan control.

In 1969, General Mohammed Siad Barre led a coup and created a military government. For 21 years Somalia was under a dictatorship. In 1991 President Barre was overthrown. The Hawiye clan led the uprising. But the opposing clans failed to agree and there was a power struggle for 16 years.

In 1993 the United Nations intervened. Actually it was US interventions with UN helmets on. They said they would confiscate the guns. But they clashed with the factional leader Aidid. It ended with 18 US servicemen being killed in a battle for Mogadishu, including the famous “Black Hawk down incident”. The US troops pulled out.

After that neither the US nor the UN cared about Somalia. The warlords ruled, and there was chaos. Some Somalis called for EU intervention, but no one was interested. Women were raped and children died. The situation grew worse.

Religion – Islam – began to unite people and overcome the factional infighting between the clans. People said: If the clan system is causing chaos, we should unite around our religion. The “Islamic Courts” that took power in 2006 stood for Islam – bringing people together and overcoming tribal loyalties – and for bringing killers to justice.

For a brief period there was relative peace. The warlords fled to Ethiopia. The Islamic Courts ensured that no one could carry a gun, no one could rape a woman. So the Islamic Courts spread.

US supported the invasion

That’s when the warlords turned to the CIA and accused the Islamic Courts of harbouring Islamic terrorists, including the people who planted bombs in the US embassy in Kenya in 1998, in which hundreds were killed.

The US backed the Ethiopian invasion of Somalia in January 2007. Ethiopian forces killed thousands, raping women. US helicopters and C130 gunships bombarded the south.

They did not capture or kill anyone involved in the Kenyan embassy bombings. And in any case, why launch a hunt for these people now, 9 years after the bombings? For 16 years they weren’t bothered about catching the bombers. The Ethiopian ambassador to London himself says the invasion was about clan interests, not terrorists.

In March and April there were clashes between the occupying Ethiopians and the Hawiye. Ethiopian tanks shelled Mogadishu, a city of 2.5 million people. The UN says 1,380 people did in two days. The bodies were left to rot in the street. It was genocide. The Somali resistance say the Ethiopians have used chemical weapons.

The Red Cross said it was the worst situation in Somalia for 16 years. 400,000 have fled Mogadishu.

The occupying government and the warlords have closed Al-Jazeera and three radio stations. Women have no rights, they can’t take part in society. The government banned a women’s conference on June 13 called by the Italians, saying that Somalia is a Muslim country so women can’t take part!

Addis Ababa is now a new Guantanamo: anyone they aren’t happy with is taken there, imprisoned and tortured. People trying to flee to Kenya have been forced back.

We appeal to the UK government, to the media, to see what is happening, to broadcast what is happening. We need human and democratic rights. But no one is paying attention.

During the discussion part of the meeting, the following points were raised:

The US currently relies on Africa for 10% of its oil imports; by 2020 Africa will supply 25% of US oil.

The “war on terror” is active in Africa, and Somalia is the main front. Somalia reveals so clearly that the “war on terror” has nothing to do with fighting terrorism. The are no “terrorists” in Somalia, although the US-backed intervention could well attract Al-Qaeda, just as in Iraq. The US and its allies label any resistance “terrorist”.

During the Cold War the US and Russia fought proxy wars in Africa. The same thing is going to happen with the US and China as they battle for resources. Somalia is strategic. It is also the weakest country in Africa, and therefore the easiest to control.

The Ethiopian dictator Mengistu now lives on a luxury mansion in Zimbabwe. Yet we don’t hear about US demands for him to be extradited!

Every conflict in Africa has something to do with imperialist intervention.

A chance to see some of John Pilger’s classic documentaries has been provided with the release of a set of 12 dvds – John Pilger: In the Name of Justice. Although his more recent programmes are more immediate, these DVDs each uncover ugly realities that our rulers would prefer to have hidden.

One in particular – The Truth Game – has a terrible relevance to today. Made in 1983, it uncovers the US, UK and the then USSR’s lies surrounding the build up of nuclear weapons.

It follows the classic Pilger format: present a lie – that the nuclear bombing of Hiroshima was a military necessity, that the Russians have “massive nuclear capacity”, and vice versa, that cruise missiles are “an insurance policy for the west” – and then demolish it. Gripping interviews, devastating facts, followed by shamefaced justifications from those supposedly in control, are all part of the powerful mix.

Two other classics in the set are about Vietnam – the country which Pilger covered as a war reporter for around 10 years. In one, made in 1978, Pilger revisits the country three years after the US was finally booted out to see how the Vietnamese were recovering from the devastation their country had suffered.

In Vietnam: the last battle, made on the 20th anniversary of the US defeat, Pilger presents a brief, bitter history of the war and the dreadful weapons the Americans deployed, and attacks relentlessly the claim, then being broadcast by the US administration, that the war had been a “noble cause”.

Three documentaries uncover the scandals, lies and corruption in Pilger’s homeland, Australia, with one focussing on the history of successive governments “sending people off to fight other people’s wars”, and another delving into its immigration policies.

Into the mainstream

John Pilger’s massive body of work, most of it for TV, shows that, despite their built-in bias towards the establishment, the mainstream media can sometimes be forced to broadcast programmes that challenge ruling class propaganda. Opportunities to air alternative viewpoints have to be fought for, however.

This is an important point. The alternative media, such as Indymedia and ZNet, are important operations. But the mainstream media is still the place where most people get their news and information, and must therefore remain the arena within which media workers who want to follow in Pilger’s footsteps fight for space.

Of course, it’s important to see how Pilger and (until his tragic death in July 2004) Paul Foot both won their credentials as great journalists during a brief period when independent channels made efforts to make an impact and distinguish themselves from the BBC with hard-hitting programs.

As Pilger has recalled: “Almost all of the more than 50 films I have made (mainly for the ITV and some for Channel 4) have had to navigate a system that rarely declares its intention to create and shape public opinion. The BBC exemplifies this, with its specious neutrality, mythically balancing contending extremes while turning out a flow of official assumptions and deceptions as ‘news’. In its youth, British commercial television was different.”

Since then, media workers have suffered massive attacks on their unions which have not only damaged their capacity to maintain conditions, but also their capacity to challenge the editors and broadcasters over what and how to present the news, both in casts and documentaries.

The intervening period has also seen the rise of neo-liberal policies which have themselves brought greater restrictions on the ability of journalists to buck the system – the “embedding” of war reporters being one clear example.

That said, however, even BBC2 was prepared to show one of the most hard-hitting documentaries about the build up to the war on terror – Adam Curtis’s three-part The power of nightmares – and that was after Lord Hutton had panicked the corporation’s executives. Nor have such programs been unique.

Of course, it is more difficult for journalists to “navigate” the system today, and particularly in the post-Hutton BBC. And requirements for “balance”, cast-iron facts, no hint of bias, and certainly no chance that people will sue, are greater than ever. But that does not mean the doors are completely barred to hard-hitting programs.

As Tariq Ali said at a recent Media Workers Against the War public meeting, media workers who want to present programs that uncover the truths our rulers want to hide will have to fight for space in the media. That space can be attained, but only through a campaign that brings together media workers sickened by the increasing contempt that their employers have for the truth.

Apart from those already named, films featured in this DVD set are: The Mexicans, Street of Joy, Pyramid Lake is dying. A faraway country, Do you remember Vietnam?, Japan behind the mask, Apartheid did not die, and the three one from Australia – Heroes unsung, Secrets and other people’s wars.

By Alan Gibson

The Lebanese government accuses Fatah al-Islam of having ties with al-Qaeda and the Syrian government. Investigative journalist Seymour Hersh joins us to talk about another theory of who is backing the militant group – the Lebanese government itself, along with the United States.

Last March, Hersh reported the U.S. and Saudi governments are covertly backing militant Sunni groups like Fatah al-Islam as part of an overarching foreign policy against Iran and growing Shia influence. [includes rush transcript] Lebanon’s defense minister has said Islamist militants entrenched in a Palestinian refugee camp must surrender or face further military action. The ultimatum followed three days of fierce fighting between the army and the Fatah al-Islam group. The army has laid siege to the Nahr al-Bared camp since the fighting erupted on Sunday, bombarding it with tank fire and artillery shells. At least eighty people have died with dozens more wounded.

On Wednesday, an informal ceasefire enabled thousands of residents to flee the camp. Some headed for another Palestinian refugee camp nearby, while others traveled to the neighboring city of Tripoli. The International Committee of the Red Cross estimates between thirteen and fifteen thousand refugees have left Nahr al-Bared. The camp is home to thirty thousand people. The internal conflict is the bloodiest in Lebanon since the civil war ended 17 years ago.

The Lebanese government accuses Fatah al-Islam of having ties with al-Qaeda and the Syrian government. But there’s another theory of who is backing the militant group – the Lebanese government itself, along with the United States. Last March, investigative journalist Seymour Hersh reported in the New Yorker that the U.S. and Saudi governments are covertly backing militant Sunni groups like Fatah al-Islam as part of an overarching foreign policy against Iran and growing Shia influence. Seymour Hersh joins us now on the line from Washington DC.

JUAN GONZALEZ: Lebanon’s defense minister has said Islamist militants entrenched in a Palestinian refugee camp must surrender or face further military action. The ultimatum followed three days of fierce fighting between the army and the Fatah al-Islam group. The army has laid siege to the Nahr al-Bared camp since the fighting erupted on Sunday, bombarding it with tank fire and artillery shells. At least eighty people have died, with dozens more wounded.

On Wednesday, an informal ceasefire enabled thousands of residents to flee the camp. Some headed for another Palestinian refugee camp nearby, while others traveled to the neighboring city of Tripoli. The International Committee of the Red Cross estimates between 13,000 and 15,000 refugees have left Nahr al-Bared. The camp is home to 30,000 people. The internal conflict is the bloodiest in Lebanon since the civil war ended seventeen years ago.

AMY GOODMAN: The Lebanese government accuses Fatah al-Islam of having ties with al-Qaeda and the Syrian government. But there’s another theory of who’s backing the militant group: the Lebanese government itself, along with the United States. Last March, investigative journalist Seymour Hersh reported in The New Yorker magazine that the US and Saudi governments are covertly backing militant Sunni groups like Fatah al-Islam as part of an overarching foreign policy against Iran and growing Shia influence.

Seymour Hersh joins us now on the phone from his home in Washington, D.C. Welcome to Democracy Now!, Sy.

SEYMOUR HERSH: Good morning.

AMY GOODMAN: Can you explain what you learned?

SEYMOUR HERSH: Well, very simply — this is over the winter — the government made — I think the article is called “The Redirection.” There was a major change of policy by the United States government, essentially, which was that we were going to — the American government would join with the Brits and other Western allies and with what we call the moderate Sunni governments — that is, the governments of Jordan, Saudi Arabia and Egypt — and join with them and with Israel to fight the Shia.

One of the major goals for America, of course, was the obsession the Bush White House has with Iran, and the other obsession they have is, of course — is in fear — is of Hezbollah, the Party of God, that is so dominant in — the Shia Party of God that’s so dominant in southern Lebanon that once — and whose leader Hassan Nasrallah wants to play a bigger political role and is doing quite a bit to get there and is in direct confrontation with Siniora.

And so, you have a situation where the Sunni government, pretty much in control now, the American-supported Sunni government headed by Fouad Siniora, who was a deputy or an aide to Rafik Hariri, the slain leader of Lebanon, that government has — we know, the International Crisis Group reported a couple years ago that the son Saad Hariri, the son of Rafik Hariri, who’s now a major player in the parliament of Lebanon, he put up $40,000 bail to free four Sunni fundamentalists, Jihadist-Salafists — which you will — who were tied directly to — you know, this word “al-Qaeda” is sort of ridiculous — they were tied to jihadist groups. And God knows, al-Qaeda, in terms of Osama bin Laden, doesn’t have much to do with what we’re talking about. These are independently, more or less, you can call them, fanatical jihadists.

And so, the goal — part of the goal in Lebanon, part of the way this policy played out, was, with Saudi help, Prince Bandar — if you remember him — we remember Prince Bandar, the Saudi prince, as a major player in Iran-Contra and also in the American effort two decades ago — if you remember, we supported Osama bin Laden and other jihadists in Afghanistan against the Russians, and that didn’t work out so well. Well, we run right back to the well again, and we began supporting some of these jihadist groups, and particularly — in the article, I did name Fatah al-Islam.

The idea was to provide them with some arms and some money and some basic equipment so — these are small units, a couple hundred people. There were three or four around the country given the same help covertly, the goal being they would be potential enemies of Hezbollah in case of warfare; in case Nasrallah decided to do something physical, get kinetic, in Lebanon, the Sunni Siniora government would have some very tough guys on its side, period. That’s the policy.

JUAN GONZALEZ: Well, Sy Hersh, if that is true, then what has led to the current fighting now? If the Lebanese government had been backing the group, why is it now attacking it?

SEYMOUR HERSH: Well, first of all, the Lebanese army is very distinct. Let me begin by saying nobody really knows anything right now. I mean, there’s a lot — one of the things about crises is you learn that you really get to play much later. But based on common sense and what I’m reading, the Lebanese army has maintained an amazing sort of neutrality, which is surprising. The army has not been a pawn of the Siniora government.

As you know, the American government — the American position right now — there’s a stand-off politically. You cannot discuss what’s going on without discussing the overall politics. There’s a stand-off politically right now, a very serious one, in Lebanon. The government is polarized. The government in power really has no legal basis to make any changes in cabinet positions, etc., because it’s not a constitutional government, because Hezbollah, which had five members of the parliament — five members of the cabinet and a dozen or so members in the parliament, Hezbollah pulled out months ago. And there were street protests, protests against Siniora. And right now, you have Hezbollah in league with a Christian leader named Aoun, a former chief of staff for the army. Aoun and Nasrallah are in an amazing partnership against the Siniora government. And where this breaks down and who’s going to win this stand-off — it’s been going on since last December — isn’t clear. America clearly supports Siniora. But there’s a big brutal fight going. And the Lebanese army stayed out of it and was pretty much, very much, independent, in the sense that when there were street demonstrations, they did not beat up on the Nasrallah people. They were very impartial.

So I think the story that we have is that there was a crime, and they were chasing people into one of the Palestinian camps, which are always hotbeds. God knows the Palestinians are the end of the stick, not only for the West, but also for the Arab world. Nobody pays much attention to them and those places. I’ve been to Tripoli and been into the camps, and they are seething, as they should be. You know, rational people don’t like being mistreated. And in any case, so what you have is, what seems to me, just a series — the word you could use is “unintended consequences.” I don’t think anybody in the Siniora government anticipated that the people they were covertly supporting to some degree — I got an email the other day, and I have not checked this out, from somebody who was in the community, in the intelligence community and still consults with the community, he says, “Why don’t we ask more about the American arms that the fighters of Fatah al-Islam have, are brandishing?” I don’t know if that’s true or not, but I did get that email. And so, that could be true. Both Saudi money and American money, not directly, but indirectly, was fed into these groups.

And what is the laugh riot and the reason I’m actually talking to you guys about this — I usually don’t like to do interviews unless I have a story in The New Yorker — the reason I’m talking about it is because the American government keeps on putting out this story that Syria is behind the Fatah group, which is just beyond belief. There’s no way — it may be possible, but the chances of it are very slight, simply because Syria is a very big supporter, obviously, of Nasrallah, and Bashar al-Assad has told me that he’s in awe of Nasrallah, that he worships at his feet and has great respect for him. The idea that the Syrians would be sponsoring Sunni jihadist groups whose sole mission are to kill the apostates — that is, anybody who doesn’t support their view, the Wahhabi or Salafist view of Sunni religion — that includes the Shia — anybody who doesn’t believe — support these guys’ religions are apostates and are killable, that’s basically one of the crazy aspects of all this, and it’s just inconceivable. Nothing can be ruled out, but that doesn’t make much case, and I noticed that in the papers today there’s fewer and fewer references to this. The newspapers in America are beginning to wise up, that this can’t be — this isn’t very logical. The White House is putting it out hot and heavy as part of the anti-Syria campaign, but it’s not flying, because it doesn’t make sense. So there we are. It’s another mess.

You might think that one of the reasons — I think I wrote about this in The New Yorker — one of the things that the Saudi Bandar had promised us was that we can control the jihadists. We can control them, he assured us. Don’t worry about getting in bed with these bad guys, because, as we remember, the same kind of assurances were given to us in the late 1980s, when we supported, as I said, bin Laden and others in the war against Russia, the Mujahideen war, and that, of course, bit us on the ass. And this is, too. So there we are.

AMY GOODMAN: Seymour Hersh, what about the role of Vice President Dick Cheney, the Deputy National Security Advisor Elliott Abrams?

SEYMOUR HERSH: Well, you always — any time you have violent anti-Iran policy and anti-Shia policy, you have to start looking there. Look, clearly this president is deeply involved in this, too, but what I hear from my people, of course, the players — it’s always Cheney, Cheney. Cheney meets with Bush at least once a week. They have a lunch. They usually have a scheduled lunch. And out of that comes a lot of big decisions. We don’t know what’s ever said at that meeting. And this is — talk about being opaque, this is a government that is so hidden from us.

So I can’t — I can tell you that — you know, the thing that’s amazing about this government, the thing that’s really spectacular, is even now how they can get their way mostly with a lot of the American press. For example, I do know — and, you know, you have to take it on face value. If you’ve been reading me for a long time, you know a lot of the things I write are true or come out to be more or less true. I do know that within the last month, maybe four, four-and-a-half weeks ago, they made a decision that because of the totally dwindling support for the war in Iraq, we go back to the al-Qaeda card, and we start talking about al-Qaeda. And the next thing you know, right after that, Bush went to the Southern Command — this was a month ago — and talked, mentioned al-Qaeda twenty-seven times in his speech. He did so just the other day this week — al-Qaeda this, al-Qaeda that. All of a sudden, the poor Iraqi Sunnis, I mean, they can’t do anything without al-Qaeda. It’s only al-Qaeda that’s dropping the bombs and causing mayhem. It’s not the Sunni and Shia insurgents or militias. And this policy just gets picked up, although there’s absolutely no empirical basis. Most of the pros will tell you the foreign fighters are a couple percent, and then they’re sort of leaderless in the sense that there’s no overall direction of the various foreign fighters. You could call them al-Qaeda. You can also call them jihadists and Salafists that want to die fighting the Americans or the occupiers in Iraq and they come across the border. Whether this is — there’s no attempt to suggest there’s any significant coordination of these groups by bin Laden or anybody else, and the press just goes gaga. And so, they went gaga a little bit over the Syrian connection to the activities in Tripoli. It’s just amazing to me, you guys.

AMY GOODMAN: Seymour Hersh, I want to thank you very much for being with us, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, writes for The New Yorker magazine, speaking to us from Washington, D.C.

The article claimed to present evidence that Iran was uniting with al-Qaeda to attack US and UK forces in Iraq. But the 3-page article making this claim, all 1,200 words of it, cited just one single, unnamed source throughout (”a senior US official in Baghdad”), and there was not a single quote from any expert who would question the allegations – although there are many who would.

How could crude and dangerous PR like this take up the first three pages of the Guardian? When the New York Times ran a similarly credulous front page in February headlined ‘Deadliest Bomb in Iraq is Made by Iran, US Says’, the newspaper was widely accused of having learned nothing from the Iraq WMD debacle. How could the Guardian fall into the same trap?

David Edwards’ email to the Guardian’s editor, Alan Rusbridger, was forwarded to us. It reads:

“Dear Alan

“I’ve been reading the Guardian for many years now. I have to say that Simon Tisdall’s front cover piece today is the single worst piece of journalism I can recall reading in your paper. I base the judgment on the lack of even the tiniest scrap of evidence in support of the anonymous official claims, the unwillingness to subject these claims to any journalistic scrutiny, the potentially lethal nature of the claims for millions of people in the region, and the extremely high-profile coverage afforded what is actually crude propaganda masquerading as a news report.

“We’ve disagreed with you on many occasions, but I’m just aghast that you could put this on the front page. I’m assuming you’re not away and that you did actually see it.

“Yours in amazement and dismay…”

The Guardian’s senior editors appear to have realised early on that something might be amiss. The paper’s website carried a defensive report on the discussion at the morning news conference on Tuesday. An indication of its weakness, however, is that it cites the Telegraph in its support, apparently unaware that the Telegraph’s reporting of Iran is no model of good journalism.

Media Workers Against the War also wrote to the Guardian on Tuesday, pointing out that the paper was vulnerable to the accusation of having learned nothing from the Iraq WMD debacle. The Guardian’s associate editor Elisabeth Ribbans replied a few hours later. She wrote:

“Thank you for your email to the letters desk, which has been forwarded to me for a personal response. For the record, Simon Tisdall requested the interviews with US officials in Baghdad and not the other way around. The article should be viewed in the light of Simon’s extensive and well-sourced reporting from and about the region, as well as the record of the paper, which certainly cannot be accused of being a mouthpiece for the US administration. Today’s front-page story is just one more part of a jigsaw of the growing power struggle in the region and our editors thought it in the public interest to publish the story.”

Two points can be made in response. First, it is not immediately clear which is worse, publishing PR that is sent to you or actively soliciting it.

Second, MWAW did not accuse the paper of being a “mouthpiece for the US administration”. This suggestion is a straw man. We proposed that the paper had forgotten how the WMD nonsense was used to whip up pro-war sentiment against Iraq. This same accusation was leveled at the entire British media by the Guardian’s own columnist, Peter Wilby, in a recent piece on Iran.

How has it come to this? How could the Guardian stoop so low?

First, the British media have shifted noticeably to the right. Yasmin Alibhai-Brown and Johann Hari have recently made this point in relation to the BBC (see the article on this website), but it applies more widely. Since the sacking of Piers Morgan from the Mirror and Greg Dyke from the BBC, the media have been bullied and browbeaten by the government, resulting in a climate of timidity and submission at senior levels.

A consequence is that editors tend to forget Harold Evans’ legendary warning to reporters at the Sunday Times: “Always ask yourself when interviewing a politician, why is this bastard lying to me?”

A further consequence is that only the powerful are now considered credible sources. “Balance” is reduced to quoting officials of one government (in this case the US) against officials of another (in this case Iran).

Further, It means that senior editors move in a rarified environment where they have no contact with arguments generated by social forces outside the narrow circle of government. The mass anti-war movement and its leaders are dismissed with a disdainful sneer.

Finally, the Guardian’s senior editors have been inconsistent friends of peace. The paper calls for more troops for Afghanistan, and on Iraq it joins the chorus of hand-wringing in the British media but pointedly refrains from calling for any timetable for troop withdrawal.

Nevertheless, Tuesday’s front page marks a qualitative shift for the paper. People who have read the Guardian in recent years frequently complain that the paper has lost its way, but often find it hard to put their finger on just what is going on. Now we know.

Please read the article in question and write to the Guardian with your opinions. Please also post them as comments to this blog.

And lastly, here is Juan Cole’s essential blog on Tuesday subjecting the front page to whithering scorn:

“I suppose I have to link to this silly article by poor Simon Tisdall in of all places, The Guardian, whom someone is using to push a sinister agenda. Yes, its sources are looney in positing a coming offensive jointly sponsored by Iran, the Mahdi Army and al-Qaeda. Anyone who reads IC [i.e. Juan Cole's blog] regularly will see immediately holes in this story.

“At a time when Sunni Arab guerrillas are said to be opposing “al-Qaeda in Mesopotamia” for its indiscriminate violence against Iraqis, including Shiites, we are now expected to believe that Shiite Iran is allying with it. And, it claims that the Iranian Revolutionary Guards are shelling the Green Zone. The parliament building that was hit today by such shelling is dominated by the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council and its paramilitary, the Badr Organization. Who trained Badr? The Iranian Revolutionary Guards. And they are trying to hit their own guys . . . why? By the way, the US has 16,000 suspected insurgents in custody. Tisdall should ask how many of them are Iranian. (Hint: close to none. What, do they just run faster than the others?)

“The article even traffics in the ridiculous assertion that Iran is backing hyper-Sunni, Shiite-killing Taliban in Afghanistan. Why not just cut to the quick and openly say that Supreme Jurisprudent Ali Khamenei is in reality . . . Satan! It really is discouraging that Tisdall didn’t report instead on what crazy things the US military spokesmen in Iraq told him.

“US military spokesmen have been trying to push implausible articles about Shiite Iran supporting Sunni insurgents for a couple of years now, and with virtually the sole exception of the New York Times, no one in the journalistic community has taken these wild charges seriously. But The Guardian?”

Dave Crouch

The BBC that helped keep this immigrant in Britain has sold out to ‘right wing populism’ and allows extreme, angry voices too much airtime.

There have been two moments in my life in England as an immigrant when I have made serious plans to quit and move to Canada. The first was in 1975 when I had finished my M.Phil at Oxford. Relatives and friends who had moved to Canada from Uganda (where I came from in 1972, the year Asians were expelled) had settled better, were welcomed more warmly than we who had ended up here. Remember we were not refugees but ultra-loyal British subjects. Enoch Powell was the hero then and we had entered a bitter place.

In 1975, a Canadian friend I’d made in Oxford contacted his local MP and together they persuaded my ex-husband and myself to migrate. We didn’t. One reason was that I couldn’t part from the BBC and Call My Bluff and Just a Minute and the trademark sombre, planetary voices delivering the news that sounded truer than any other truth. (That was back then, when I was not a sceptical journalist).

The second time was in 1996 when I had a newspaper job lined up in Toronto and just as we made final moves, I got a column to write in the Independent, a dream I had had for years. Again, when assessing whether it was the right decision, the BBC floated right up, joining the top reasons why Britain still had a hold on my heart.

So I have stayed, unable to wean myself off the BBC, which played into my ears as a child in Africa, like perennial soothing sounds of an ocean washing in imagined worlds. My dad, a news junkie and anglophile, never went out in the evenings before listening to the World Service news. He missed birthdays, funeral prayers, weddings all for his BBC.

I picked up his passion. Even now, in order for the broadcasts to sound as authentic and dependable as they did in the 50s, 60s and 70s, I need crackles to disturb the reception. It gives the impression that the powerful are trying to stop us listening.

When Idi Amin came to power, I was at Makerere University, then one of the finest in the world. Radio Uganda was playing My Boy Lollipop all day long interspersed with ominous warnings from military men. The crackling, valiant BBC told us what we needed desperately to know, though I now realise it was never the whole truth. It passed over the fact that Idi Amin was supported by Britain, the US and Israel, chosen to be their placed man in the Cold War playing out in Africa. Still, that trust and devotion would not be shaken.

Defenders of the Blairite onslaught

Of course a love like that sometimes hurts and disappoints. For too many years I have moaned about the lack of black and Asian reporters, editors, managers, controllers, and brand names. That wilful neglect continues to wound. As one of the two political columnists of colour in the national press (Gary Younge being the other) I expect to be seen as equal to my white peers. I am not. My colour and now culture limits what the Beeb believes I can or should do. Ah well. At least I have what is patronisingly called ‘access’.

However, I always, always defended the corporation and licence fee because it projected universal, good, liberal values – decency, justice, fairness, democracy, civil rights, national confidence, a common humanity, freedom, civilised conduct and the belief, if not the practice, of equality.

Thatcherism arrived and with it an onslaught on these principles denounced as ‘leftie’ or ‘politically correct’. The decade of Blairism produced further pressures, this time by the new right disguised as the new left. More alarmingly, the big boys and some girls too who lead the BBC were now sympathetic to these New Labour state controllers. In the aftermath of the Gilligan affair, I was truly shocked by how many journalists and editors privately told me they agreed with the Blairite onslaught and that Dyke was out of order.

Gilligan was proven right but the centre of gravity at the BBC is now to the right of where it was under Dyke. As my colleague Johann Hari wrote recently in the Independent: ‘The BBC’s most famous and high profile presenters today are figures on the right and make increasingly little effort to hide it.’ They chase each other for copies of the Daily Mail; they ceaselessly rail against feminism, equality campaigns, state interventions to promote health and safety and of course immigration. All progressive action these days gets stamped with the words ‘politically correct’ and the consensus at the BBC is that PC is always mad, bad and highly dangerous.

And still they cry foul, the right wing tabloids and parliamentarians.

Enigma of ‘radical impartiality’

This new century brought the extraordinary force of people power to radio, the web and new technology. It is shaking up all media outlets. The BBC, already too open to right wing populism and charged up to fight political correctness, is set for a further lurch away from its old values. BBC ‘shock jock’ presenters and producers know their fortunes can only get better. Vocal people use phone in programmes and the web to incessantly complain they are not being heard.

The trick is now used by experts too. Andrew Green, the anti-immigration prophet of Migration Watch, is never off the BBC but claims he is not allowed to present his views. The perpetually angry are also more than likely to be anti-immigration, anti-Europe, anti-equalities provision, anti-Muslim, nationalistic, pro-punishment, fearful and bursting with self pity and self righteousness.

I was recently asked to chair an internal BBC debate – part of the Audio and Music Festival. The subject was the enigmatic term ‘radical impartiality’, a new brand, potentially a bold new direction for the massive ship that is the BBC. It was floated by Peter Horrocks, head of television news, a man who from his demeanour is powerful, intellectual and an impeccable trend spotter.

Simply put (and he describes it in more complex terms) Horrocks believes the BBC needs to bring in voices and campaigners hitherto kept out of the corporation’s respectable broadcasting studios. This means, he says, a move away from the ‘no-platform’ posturings of student politics. On this I agree with him. But when he argues the BNP or extremist Muslim campaigners can be allowed to make their case, with robust interviewers ensuring ‘balance’ my blood freezes. The BBC was never a coliseum, a bloody arena for a fight to the death. That is already what I feel it sees itself as. And it wants more extreme action.

For the first time ever, I resent paying the licence fee because the BBC is not fulfilling its public service role with the integrity it always had.

Broadcasts impact on lives, on perceptions, on the sense of security of vulnerable citizens. Take one example. Day after day, the BBC arranges for an anti-immigration and anti-asylum mood to grow, which it has done over three years. Named asylum seekers are not put up to make their cases – they are always numbers; no equivalence exists between pro and anti immigration views.

A profoundly illiberal agenda is presented by respected presenters. And people like me get more afraid of the future. Some years ago Norman Tebbit, on the Today programme, told me I could never be British. Maybe he was right and I should have emigrated when I could have, before I had to witness the fall from grace of my BBC.

Yasmin Alibhai-Brown is a columnist, author and broadcaster

• Tariq Ali Tariq Ali
• Lindsay German Lindsay German

The audio has been recorded and edited by Julian Bohne.

The Guardian’s recent leader on the NUJ’s boycott vote is typical of the No position on this issue, accusing the NUJ of sacrificing journalists’ “general integrity” and “casting doubts on whether they can truly approach their work in a spirit of fairness and distinterested inquiry”. If we put to one side the condescending tone of this editorial, what are the serious issues at stake?

If we are concerned about our credibility being undermined, let’s first remember why it’s not particularly high in the first place. Journalists usually rank just above MPs and estate agents in BBC polls on respect for the professions. Going along with the Iraqi WMD farce didn’t do journalism’s credibility any favours — which suggests that the NUJ’s yearly conference votes against the war and for immediate troop withdrawal from Iraq have been a credit to the profession, rather than undermining it.

Moreover, the Guardian’s notion that British journalists “approach their work in a spirit of fairness and distinterested inquiry” might soothe a few senior editorial egos, but it is hardly convincing. Since when was the British media fair to anybody (let alone the Palestinians)? Much political activism in the British media masquerades as balanced reporting. It would be more honest for journalists to be open about their views than to hide behind the myth of professional impartiality – a central theme of Phillip Knightley’s classic book on war reporting, The First Casualty.The British media are well known for their robust editorial positions on all sorts of political issues, yet there is no suggestion that journalists might be compromised by working for these media. So why should we be compromised by taking political positions ourselves? Peter Wilby put this point very well in his column in the MediaGuardian, commenting on the NUJ’s boycott vote (which he opposed):

“Many newspapers take strong positions in their leader columns. These positions are determined by the bosses. Mere hacks – most of whom don’t have columns – should be allowed their say too. If individual correspondents can distance themselves from their paper’s opinions, they can easily do so from their union’s.”

Moreover, journalists’ politics inform all sorts of judgments we make about news and coverage, how we select and investigate our subject matter. Vigorous politics – of both right and left – therefore often stimulate the best reporting. Paul Foot was named journalist of the decade at the What the Papers Say awards in 2000 – no one could accuse him of being politically “neutral”.

So it is a myth that journalists leave our political views at the door when we come into work. Any professional understands how to excise their opinions from the work they produce, we apply standards and methods to make what we write stand above mere opinion. But it is simplistic to suggest that journalists should jettison their personal views. Worse, it is a recipe for stifling dissent in the newsroom.

If it becomes taboo for journalists to hold political views, the right-wing consensus among senior editors and managers will simply go unquestioned and unchallenged. A demand that journalists and their organisations cease to be political hands control of our copy to our employers. We cannot allow governments, the Richard Desmonds and Rupert Murdochs to become the arbiters of editorial standards.

In short, being political is a necessary (though not sufficient) condition of being a good journalist. On the question of the “war on terror”, being actively anti-war clearly means standing up for better journalism. Just look at what has happened to the British media since the invasion of Iraq. Had the peace movement been successful in preventing the war, there would have been:

• No shadow cast over much of the British media for swallowing the government’s lies;

• No Hutton report and no Alastair Campbell gloating over bullying the BBC into submission;

• No Mark Thompson introducing swingeing job cuts across the BBC;

• The Mirror would still be a serious newspaper, rather than a pale imitation of the Sun.

Media Workers Against the War is about trying to strengthen the tradition of political activism among journalists. Journalists need to be inspired, supported and encouraged to fearlessly report the big issues of our time, rather than go along with the preferences of governments and proprietors. We have much work to do to achieve this aim.

MWAW committee

Regarding the NUJ’s boycott vote, much bluster in the media might have been avoided had commentators acquainted themselves more fully with the motion itself, the speech moving the motion, and the NUJ’s statement on the matter. Media Workers Against the War is not directly engaged in this issue, however. Our primary concern is to develop the broad anti-war movement among media workers to bring into it all those who are appalled by the “war on terror” and the way it is reported.

Clashes in recent weeks at opposite ends of the country signal a widening of the conflict and increasing confusion among western military officials over the enemy they are confronting.

The worst fighting to strike Afghanistan this year erupted in the western province of Herat leaving 136 people dead after two days of clashes which culminated in a 14-hour-long battle on Sunday, the US military said.

The US military initially said all of the dead were militants but a UN investigative team who visited the battle site “found credible reports of 49 civilian deaths” including unconfirmed numbers of women and children, spokesman Adrian Edwards said.

A US soldier was also killed in the operation by US special forces and Afghan troops in Herat against what a US military statement described as ground operations and air strikes targeting Taliban positions.

President Hamid Karzai warned US and Nato generals and other senior western officials in a meeting on Wednesday that “the patience of the Afghan people was wearing thin”, with heavy-handed army tactics.

Mr Karzai’s warning came after four days of protests in the eastern city of Jalalabad over what locals claim were the deaths of six civilians in a raid on a compound suspected of housing a suicide bomber. The US military said a woman and a teenager were killed in clash that erupted when US forces raided the compound.

The Jalalabad protest coincided with similar demonstrations in western Herat’s Shindand district in which scores of locals chanted “Death to America” in the wake of Sunday’s airstrikes.

Violence in Afghanistan has sharply increased in recent weeks with pitched battles between insurgents and government troops in areas of the country far away from the traditional Taliban strongholds in the south and east.

A western diplomat estimated that some 2,250 insurgents, foreign troops and civilians had been killed in the first four months of this year compared with under 5,000 casualties for the whole of 2006. Yesterday, the UK defence ministry said a British soldier was killed in fighting with militants in southern Afghanistan.

Nato spokesman Nicholas Lunt said that as the Afghan army and Nato troops moved into areas where there had been no government presence they were clashing with anti-government militias.

These clashes could easily be exploited by the Taliban, Joanna Nathan, Kabul-based analyst with the International Crisis Group, said. “The Taliban are very clever about using local rivalries and conflict and appealing to the side that feels disenfranchised,” she said.

In one of their boldest moves, Taliban militants seized control of a highway just 70km outside the capital Kabul in the Tagab district of central Kapisa province on April 18. Government forces retook the road in 24 hours but the clash marked a new frontier for the Taliban – who were able to stage the heaviest battle in the region of the capital since 2001.

Nato troops have launched a string of offensives around the country with the heaviest fighting continuing in the southern province of Helmand where British troops are based. More than 2,000 Nato and Afghan troops were deployed over the weekend in the Helmand’s Sangin valley aimed at driving the Taliban from the heart of the opium-producing province. Officials said the effort involved some 1,100 British troops, 600 US soldiers and more from the Netherlands, Denmark, Estonia and Canada as well as more than 1,000 Afghan government troops.

His beheading was the culmination of a harrowing month in captivity for Ajmal, a 24-year old journalist from Kabul. He was taken hostage in Helmand province on March 4, together with La Repubblica reporter Daniele Mastrogiacomo, and their driver Sayed Agha. They had travelled there for a rendezvous with the Taliban; Ajmal was working as the Italian’s fixer, as he had done for other foreign reporters in the past.

But the meeting that had been arranged for them was a trap. Instead of granting Mastrogiacomo an interview, the Taliban took him and his companions hostage, and proceeded to use them as expendable pawns in a horrifying game of death. Sayed Agha, the young driver, was the first to die. He was beheaded by the Taliban shortly after the group was abducted. The Taliban posted a video on the internet showing the three blindfolded men seated on the ground at the feet of their captors.

Then one of the Taliban spoke to the camera, condemning Sayed Agha to death for being a spy. He then slit Sayed Agha’s throat, and cut off his head. A weeping Mastrogiacomo was shown pleading for his life and begging for his captors’ demands to be met. And they were. A few days later, on March 19, the Italian was freed in exchange for five senior Taliban prisoners held by the Afghan government.

Afterwards, President Hamid Karzai haplessly explained that he was pressured by the Italian government – which has 1,800 troops in Afghanistan – to make the exchange. After Mastrogiacomo’s release, however, Ajmal remained in Taliban hands. Supposedly, he was being held until the government handed over two more Taliban prisoners.

But then, two days before the expiration date they executed him. Government officials gave unconvincing explanations as to what had gone wrong, but the damage was done. To Afghans, it appeared that their own government cared more about an Italian than one of its own citizens.

There are several theories floating around as to why Ajmal was really killed, but, whatever the truth, it was a watershed event in Afghanistan. On the one hand, it was a sign that the Taliban were prepared to take their terror tactics to a new level, and that the Afghan government was weak and indecisive. Most importantly, for journalists, it meant that henceforth, similar rendezvous with Taliban fighters in the field might be fatal.

It also means that the handful of savvy, experienced and reliable “fixers” like Ajmal no longer want to risk death by arranging such meetings for foreign reporters.The bottom line: Since the Taliban got what they wanted by kidnapping Mastrogiacomo, it now means that all Westerners, including journalists, have become potentially valuable commodities in the Afghan war – just as they have become in Iraq.

Understandably, the episode has raised the tension levels in Afghanistan to a new high, and raises serious questions about how journalists can accurately report the war here. The killing of Ajmal, above all, highlights the vital and sensitive role local fixers play for all of us who report here and elsewhere. It raises the question of what our responsibility is towards such people when they are victimized for assisting us.

Most reporters who come to Afghanistan do not speak Dari or Pashto, the country’s principal languages, and do not possess the contacts to move around and report unassisted. Whether our published stories reflect it or not, most of us are dependent on fixers, translators, and drivers here in order to do our work -people like Sayed Agha and Ajmal Naqshbandi.

A couple of weeks ago, I visited Ajmal’s family in Kabul and his father told me that, so far, he’d received no offer of help or compensation from either the Afghan or the Italian governments.He is a former aviation mechanic for Ariana airlines, but lost his job after losing a leg in a land mine explosion back in the Nineties.

He was very proud of Ajmal and the work he had been doing, he told me. He pointed to his two surviving sons, both teenagers, who were sitting in the room with us. He said: “Ajmal was the sole breadwinner of our family; he wanted them to go to college. Now I don’t know what we are gong to do for them.”

Ajmal’s father wasn’t insinuating anything, he didn’t have his hand out, he was merely stating the facts, and he uttered his words with great dignity. After a time, I got up to leave. He thanked me for coming and I said goodbye, leaving him to his grief. His two sons saw me to the door and smiled and waved as I left.

In the past several weeks, journalists in New York and London have been trying to raise funds for Ajmal’s and Sayed’s families. Hopefully they will raise enough to show both families that we – all of us – really do care about them.

It will not only provide real help to their families; it will also send proof of our compassion throughout Afghan society. We could go even further. There can be no better moment than this one to establish a special compensation fund for the indispensable, underpaid and often unnamed Ajmals and Sayeds who pull us through and help us get our stories around the world, and who, increasingly, are paying the ultimate price for doing so. It could be called The Ajmal Fund.

The omens were bad: Mastrogiacomo’s driver, Sayed Agha, had already been beheaded, and a week later 25-year-old Nakshbandi was also dead, his throat slit and his body dumped in the desert.

The brutal slaying last month shook Afghanistan’s fledgling media, sparked recriminations and highlighted how young local reporters were becoming caught in the crossfire of an increasingly vicious conflict.

All sides consider news as a weapon of war, even those professing to defend press freedom. On March 4 American soldiers ripped cameras from local reporters in Nangarhar and deleted their pictures after a convoy of marines shot at least 10 people and wounded 33 in the aftermath of a suicide attack.

A US commander later justified the deletions on the basis that “untrained” Afghans might “capture visual details that are not as they originally were”. A preliminary military inquiry, publicised last week, suggested what those sensitive details could have been: contrary to the soldiers’ earlier claims, investigators found that all of the killed civilians had been unarmed.

Faced with a swelling insurgency and mounting criticism, Afghanistan’s government has also taken a tougher line with the media. Last week three journalists with Tolo, a popular television station, and four from the Associated Press, were detained on orders from the attorney general, Abdul Jabar Sabet, who claimed he had been misrepresented by a reporter.

“We are coming under fire from all sides,” said Rahimullah Samander, president of the Afghan Independent Journalists’ Association. “Before everyone wanted to be a journalist. Not any more.”

The Afghan media has altered beyond recognition since the Taliban regime, when there was one state-controlled radio station and a handful of religion-obsessed newspapers. Now there are eight TV stations, 400 publications and more than 2,000 journalists, according to Mr Samander.

The media explosion is fuelling social change and a spirit of accountability. Editorials harshly criticise the government of the president, Hamid Karzai, and TV stations feature women presenters, foreign films and racy music videos.

Foreign donors encouraged the local media with a flood of funding before the elections in 2004 and 2005. But over the past year the foreign money has started to dry up. Six daily newspapers have folded, journalists have been laid off and wages have plummeted.

There has been a three-fold increase in suicide attacks this year alone. As the Taliban stepped up its attacks, the government’s commitment waned. Last year the state intelligence agency tried to curtail reporting of the insurgency by issuing a list of restrictions to local journalists. A public outcry caused the directive to be withdrawn, but public anger was again stoked over the handling of Mastrogiacomo’s release.

Mastrogiacomo, a correspondent for La Repubblica, was freed in exchange for five “high-value” Taliban prisoners and $2m (£1m), said an Afghan official. President Karzai agreed to the controversial deal because he feared Italy would withdraw 1,800 troops from Afghanistan if the journalist died. The Taliban expedited negotiations by beheading his driver then making the panicked Italian record a video plea for help.

But Afghans say that once Mastrogiacomo was safe, Mr Karzai had allowed the Afghan, Nakshbandi, to die in the desert. “Why didn’t the government strike a deal for both of them? It didn’t take Ajmal seriously,” said Farida Nekzad, managing editor of Pajhwok news agency. “In this country we have two policies – one for the internationals, the other for locals.”

But the Afghan official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the story was more complicated, and that the Taliban had never made demands for the release of Nakshbandi, who was killed to “humiliate Mr Karzai”. He added: “It was political, just to make the government’s name bad.”

Journalists also directed their ire at the Italian journalist and La Repubblica for failing to save Nakshbandi. The Union of Italian journalists has offered money to his family, said Mr Samander.

This week the media debate has focused on the Tolo TV controversy. Mr Sabet, a strident conservative, told the Guardian he had been offended by a television report that took his words out of context. “They are not journalists, they are liars,” he said. He insisted he was within his rights to detain whoever he wished. “These laws give me the power to summon any person in this country, even the president,” he said, waving a book of legislation.

Since being appointed last year as attorney general Mr Sabet has cultivated a reputation as a crusader against corruption and vice, arresting crooked officials and shutting down brothels. But critics say that he sometimes breaks the law or applies it selectively and can be unpredictable.

On Monday a government commission adjudicating on the Tolo dispute ordered the station to apologise to Mr Sabet. Its management refused to back down. “We come under illegal attack and they demand we apologise – how ridiculous is that?” said its director, Saad Mohseni.

There is greater peril in the provinces. Young and poorly paid reporters are vulnerable to intimidation and bribery from local strongmen, usually governors and warlords wanting to stop unfavourable coverage of corruption, human rights abuses and drug trafficking.

But the most potent danger remains the Taliban.

“They want to control our words. They say ‘if we kill one person, you should write [that it was] two’,” said Ms Nekzad, of Pajhwok, who likened the worsening situation to Iraq.

Refusal to comply can lead to an early grave. Mr Samander pulled out a “night letter” that a colleague in Nangarhar had received last week accusing him of working for the CIA. Several journalists had already left, he said.

He sighed. “It is not our job to take sides but this is very difficult. We will surely lose other Ajmals.”

Backstory

Fighting continues in southern Afghanistan but elsewhere the struggle to control the country’s cultural future is being played out on the small screen. TV stations showing Bollywood movies and looking at previously taboo subjects such as child sex abuse are highly popular with young, urban Afghans. Tolo TV is at the vanguard of this wave, but the fledgling media is staunchly resisted by many older Afghans who are sceptical about western influences. A media law now in parliament will give the government greater control. But the freedom that has been acquired might not be readily surrendered. Last week disabled athletes blocked protesters from reaching the Tolo building, in an upmarket area of Kabul. One disabled man said the athletes were involved because it was “good TV”.

Thursday May 10, 7pm

Speakers:
TARIQ ALI, author
A BBC JOURNALIST

City University (map)
Lecture theatre CM507
via main entrance, Northampton Square
London EC1

Angel/Old Street/Farringdon/Barbican tube stations

All welcome!

Organised by Media Workers Against the war
www.mwaw.net
tel 07801 789 297

We are journalists, media staff, academics and campaigners who are concerned that sections of the media seem not to have learned lessons from the Iraq conflict, and are making the same mistakes in coverage of war policy towards Iran, Afghanistan and North Korea.

We now have dozens of members in Scotland and want to continue the momentum with a series of briefings, campaigns and protests to draw attention to media bias, flawed reporting and the failure of journalists adequately to challenge and question government and military statements on the various conflicts into which we are being drawn.

At the meeting in Glasgow, Professor John Eldridge of Glasgow Media Unit talked about the modern history of media war coverage, its errors and omissions. One particularly revealing statistic he gave was that only 9 per cent of people in a recent survey were aware that the Israelis were the occupiers of the occupied territories; John called this a classic example of the “social construction of ignorance”.

Dave Crouch from MWAW in London talked about the need for political action in the media, arguing that this neither compromised journalists’ integrity nor undermined their professionalism. He reported that NUJ conference a week earlier saw 30 delegates attend a MWAW fringe meeting; there was strong support at the conference for action to call the media to account on war coverage.

After the meeting we met Craig Murray, the British former ambassador to Uzbekistan who is now rector of Dundee University. Murray was sacked for opposing extraordinary rendition, where suspects are brought to foreign countries to be tortured to extract intelligence for use in the war on terror. He agreed to address the next meeting of MWAW Scotland and to speak about his experiences with the media and the recent detention of British naval personnel by Iran.

We need your support! Any help you can give with venues, speakers, leaflets and flyers, and contacts with journalists and politicians who might support us, will be greatly appreciated. If anyone knows of MSPs (elections nothwithstanding) MEPs and MPs who are interested in media issues, please let me know. In addition, authors, writers and broadcasters who support a fairer media are essential for our campaign.

Bruce Whitehead, brucek3@aol.com

It doesn’t matter what kind of journalist you are; we all want to report the facts truthfully and comprehensively. That means explaining context, including alternative views, questioning and challenging official statements and policies, and above all, opposing what’s morally wrong and illegal.

The issue of flawed and biased coverage is becoming ever-more problematic. The media was prone to supine and lazy journalism in the build up to both wars in the Gulf. Politicians and lobbyists must no longer be allowed to bully a weakened and pliable media to sell a misguided war on terror by perpetuating armed aggression in Iran and Afghanistan.

That is why we are organising Media Workers Against the War Scotland to oppose the Iraq and Afghanistan wars and to warn against attacking Iran, through fair reporting and better scrutiny of government policy and military conduct. If we can organise in workplaces to give media staff confidence in standing up to their editors and managers to insist on ethical standards of fair and balanced reporting, then we have made a start in telling the unvarnished truth.

DEBATE THE ISSUES ON APRIL 21

With speakers:

ON NEWS, TRUTH AND POWER

Professor John Eldridge, a member of the Glasgow University Media Group, the foremost centre for media research and analysis in the UK. Professor Eldridge will talk about the issues which war reporting raises, particularly the way the media is used in war coverage to build support for, and to normalise, state aggression.

ON ANTI-WAR ACTIVISM INSIDE THE MEDIA

Dave Crouch is the chair of Media Workers Against War and has been instrumental in organising its successful campaign. MWAW has protested, leafleted and debated with the major media organisations including the BBC, ITN, BSkyB, CNN and other broadcasters and with newspaper editors and politicians. Recent speakers at MWAW meetings included Yasmin Alibhai Brown, Gary Younge, Craig Murray, Yvonne Ridley and NUJ president Jeremy Dear.

Media Workers Against the War Scotland’s launch meeting is being held at the annual conference of Scotland Against Criminalising Communities, in the STUC, 333 Woodlands Road, Glasgow G3, Saturday 21 April at 1230-1400.

Contact: Bruce Whitehead Email: brucek3@aol.com Mobile: 07944 928 702 www.mwaw.net

Media Workers Against the War in believes not is the time for journalists to campaign against the waste of Scotland’s young people, press-ganged by poverty into fighting Blair’s wars.

For me, MWAW is a very simple issue for journalists. It’s an issue of health and safety. Over 170 media workers have died in Iraq, and the toll continues to rise. In many cases – like that of Terry Lloyd – the killings were the direct action of American troops.
MWAW began by campaigning to save Farzad Bazoft, the observer journalist hanged by Saddam Hussein.

Calling for the war to end is directly related to the freedom of journalists to do their job in safety. MWAW can help give journalists the confidence to stand up and speak out.

By Pete Murray, member of the NUJ national executive committee (personal capacity)

Nor was about the views of colleagues, many of whom defended the cartoons publication as a right in a free society. A motion even appeared on an internal BBC message board with a considerable number of signatories subscribing to this message: ”Bush House journalists express their solidarity with the newspapers and editors involved in the publication or re-publication of the Danish cartoons depicting Prophet Mohammed. Criticising or satirising religion in general and any religion in particular is a non-negotiable right in a free society and a vital prerogative of the media in Liberal democracies. We are appalled by the threats to European journalists and other citizens in parts of the Arab or Muslim world and unreservedly condemn political pandering to religious bigotry.”

What forced me to bow my head in disappointment was the NUJ’s statement in support of the BBC’s decision to broadcast the cartoons on Newsnight.

The NUJ applauded what they called “BBC journalists’ impartial and responsible reporting of the issues surrounding the publication of the cartoons” and “supported the decision to show the cartoons”, saying “they gave a legitimate news story proper context” – basically rolling out the perennial sacred cow of the right to free speech.

Over the years I thought I had developed a thick skin to the anti-Muslim bias in the media, but something stirred in my heart when I read the NUJ statement. To me it was like my best friend was not understanding me. And if your best friend doesn’t know you, then who does?

The cartoons debate provides a perfect example of how the treatment of Islam has become so neglectful and sloppy that it’s confusing and dividing even friends. Justifying this as ‘freedom of speech’ and the right to publish are lazy and convenient arguments. What happened to creative writing? What happened to respect? Why couldn’t journalists have described the pictures using words?

What is going on in the press these days is good old-fashioned racism. Muslim-baiting is not an expression of press freedom, its racism.

Those who want to fight for media freedom should ask what role the press played when the government put forward its arguments for invading Iraq, or during the Iran hostage crisis that never was? Or they should look at how a handful of businessmen own the British press.

You don’t need a background in religious affairs to understand Muslims, you don’t have to be religious – the criteria are better understanding and respect for others of different cultures and faiths.

Many journalists know this already but basically they just don’t care – they deliberately treat stories to do with Islam in a certain way.

For example, I produced an item for BBC2 about how some Muslim activists were trying to turn the turn the tide of bad press coverage and reclaim Islam from extremist elements. The activists said the press didn’t have time for their grass roots work and community projects. So we carried out a stunt: we invited the broadsheets to a “Muslim” charity event. The response? Journalists seemed only interested if there was going to be violence or flag burning afterwards. Shameless.

The use of the word Islamaphobia is doing us no favours. Having a ‘phobia’ is acceptable, but nobody wants to be a racist.

So how can we counter this bigotry? During my training at the Beeb I was told there are six principal questions to ask when writing a story; who, what, when, where, why and how. To encourage conscientious story telling, I’d like to add a seventh question to the list: ‘Am I being racist?’

Finally, I’d like to quote one of my colleagues who responded to those who supported publishing or broadcasting the Danish cartoons.

“People like Ghandi and Martin Luther King will give up their lives to uphold the basic values of respect and understanding, not because they’re cowards and not because they want to appease the extremists but because they know that nothing can replace understanding and respect.

“It is this which will prevail in history and not the Bin Ladens and Abu Hamzas, or the editors and weak journalists who want to provoke unnecessary reaction by inflicting insults on more than a billion-and-a-half people with a particular faith.”

You can’t argue with that. If you do then it’s like arguing with a drunk. Make mine a lime soda – I’m a Muslim.

By Uzma Hussain, a BBC staff member who has worked in a variety of journalism and other roles at the organisation for nearly 10 years. She gave this speech at an MWAW fringe meeting at NUJ national conference

Perhaps the most memorable is the use of the word “kidnap” last summer when we were reporting on the Israeli soldier being held by the Palestinians.

In our newsroom we ruled that the word “kidnapped” implies an unlawful abduction. And if a man is armed, in military uniform, and taking part in a military operation, his capture by the enemy doesn’t amount to an “unlawful” act.

Corporal Gilad Shalit was taken by fighters from Palestinian resistance groups, including Hamas, during “Operation Summer Rain”, an Israeli invasion of the Gaza Strip. Given that Hamas is – let’s not forget – democratically elected and hence representative of the Palestinian people, the capture is as lawful as any other capture of a prisoner of war.

Let’s remind ourselves of what a prisoner of war is: a combatant who is imprisoned by an enemy power during or immediately after an armed conflict. To be a POW the service member must have conducted operations according to the laws and customs of war, be part of a chain of command, wear a uniform and bear arms openly. In short, there is no doubt that Corporal Shalit fits the criteria; and so to call him a hostage, or a kidnapped soldier, is simply wrong and misleading.

But what was surprising to see is that it wasn’t just the right-wing, pro-Israeli, Zionist news organizations using the word “kidnap”, but also those who are supposedly giving an Arab perspective; a sign perhaps that we journalists don’t care to question and challenge anymore. We’re beginning to sound more and more like politicians.

And when a Palestinian is taken from his home and imprisoned by Israel, before being tried in a military court, there’s no question over whether it’s a justified detention or not, no debate over whether it’s unlawful or lawful. There are thousands of children in Israeli jails, some as young as nine.

We’ll never see the word “kidnap” used when referring to Taliban fighters (who, incidentally don’t wear uniforms) or members of Al Qaida (no rules of engagement in their fights) being held in Guantanamo Bay. But perhaps that’s just another case of “George Bush says, journalists do”.

Sadiya Chowdhury, reporter, Islam Channel News

The general conclusion we reached was that using the term “hostages” was wrong, and we opted for “detainees” instead – apart from a few slips. We even carried an article about how UK diplomats were desperate to avoid using the word.
According to the Collins Dictionary – not the Oxford one, I know, but it’s just as thick – a hostage is “a person given to or held by a person, organisation, etc. as a security or pledge or for ransom, release, exchange for prisoners”; while to detain means “to delay; hold back; stop; to confine or hold in custody – detainee is a person kept in custody”.

The difference might seem subtle, but it is very important.

For example, the Daily Mail’s headline on March 13, the day after the crisis began, was “Marines taken hostage by Iran”, while the Daily Telegraph went with “Marines seized by Iranian guards”. What do these headlines tell the reader?

The Mail’s suggests that 15 UK citizens have been withheld for a ransom, i.e. The Iranians want something in return for the release of the sailors.
The Telegraph’s tells us that 15 UK citizens have been withheld, but the reason remains unclear and therefore is more balanced — i.e. the Iranians have captured 15 UK citizens, but we cannot tell you (the reader) exactly why because we don’t know.

Later on, the Iranians claimed that 15 British navy personnel entered their waters; the British government flatly denied it. What emerged in this case was an international dispute.

We as reporters and subs – unless we have compelling evidence – can’t take sides in our work. So if there is a dispute we must attempt to use the most neutral and least inflammatory term possible.

The MoD’s “GPS evidence” was as reliable as the coordinates given by the Iranians. This meant that no journalist was in a position to determine if the 15 marines had committed a crime or not, just as we couldn’t confirm whether the British marines had trespassed into Iranian waters or not.

Therefore the correct term to define the 15 UK citizens held in Iran had to be detainees, captives or prisoners, as the Iranians did not capture them to blackmail Britain, but opted to hold them for having allegedly committed an incursion.

If someone is accused of killing another person, the police will arrest a suspect as a precautionary measure. That does not mean that the police have abducted them or taken them hostage — they have arrested them for a suspected crime. The person arrested might dispute that, but will have to prove their innocence.

In the UK the red tops and the mid-market papers didn’t bother with any of this: for them the main issue was to sensationalise. However, this is hardly news. What was more worrying in the whole affair was to see how the broadsheets switched from “detainees/captives” to “hostages”.

The shift clearly occurred after George W. Bush demanded on March 31 that “The Iranians must give back the hostages.” This, in some way, permitted the “responsible press” to change the tone of their reporting. The Guardian, The Independent, The Telegraph and The Times all switched to “hostages”.

However, the appearance of “Iran” and “hostages” in the same headline is highly inflammatory. It takes us back to the 1979-80 crisis when Iran stormed the US embassy in Tehran to take over 50 US citizens hostage, after making a revolution that ended US power in the country and kicked out a regime backed by the CIA.

The Americans have never forgiven Iran for that. Equating the recent crisis with that of 1979-1980 is a gift to the hawks and fuels the drive for war on Iran.

In 1979 Iran wanted the US to hand over the former Shah of Iran, who had fled to America, to face justice in Iran. The exchange was clear in the 1979-81 crisis, not in 2007.

Of course, during the crisis the US allowed Iran access to five of its citizens held in Iraq, while the Iranian diplomat Jalal Sharafi, who went missing in Iraq in February, was released by his captors. There were suggestions that these moves were made as part of a bargain for the British sailors’ release.

Does that make them “hostages”? If so, you have to be consistent and draw the necessary conclusion that the five Iranians held in Iraq are also hostages held by the Americans, that Jalal Shafari was taken hostage by the Americans, and indeed that all prisoners of the United States held in Iraq, in Guantanamo or under “rendition” schemes in Middle East dictatorships are hostages kidnapped by the US in order to pursue its political goals.

Now that “our” marines are back home, newspapers have taken an even more lax approach to the issue and the word hostage seems “prettier” than “captives” or “detainees”.

If you are an editor or sub-editor and you are reading this, make sure that you try your best to change things in your newsroom.

Financial Times journalist

Was Iran’s release of the 15 British sailors last Wednesday an occasion for relief and rejoicing? Not as far as the press was concerned.

The storyline had been mapped out. There would be blindfolded captives, torture and show trials. Britain would respond with Churchillian rhetoric, gunboats, SAS raids and stiff upper lips and, if it didn’t, Tony Blair, along with Margaret Beckett’s caravan, could be given one last kicking. Instead, we had an Easter “gift” from President Ahmadinejad. The newspapers’ disappointment at the peaceful end to a story that had been boiling up nicely was palpable.

“Humiliated: Iran’s evil president has made Britain look weak and foolish,” stormed the Express. The sailors, noted Stephen Glover in the Mail, offered “supine effusions of gratitude”. In no previous era, Glover asserted confidently, “would British servicemen have behaved in such a manner”. We were now an “unmartial” people, sadly diminished from the halcyon days of Good Queen Maggie. Worst of all were the suits the Iranians provided for the released sailors. They were “shiny”, declared the Mail, and the “denial” of ties was thought to be particularly insulting by the Sun.

The Iranians’ actions were explicable only in terms of Oriental wiliness. The sailors’ release, according to the Telegraph’s Middle East correspondent, Tim Butcher, was “a cynical ploy” to “buy time for its nuclear programme”. The plan, he reasoned, must be to convince gullible Europeans that diplomacy could work, thus protecting Iran against a US-led attack. Iran, a Times leader concluded, was “an enigmatic mixture of fanaticism and pragmatism”.

In other words, what the hell was that all about? From the moment the sailors were seized last month, press coverage discounted the two most obvious explanations. First, it was possible the British service personnel had indeed strayed into Iranian waters. Given threats of a western military strike or even invasion, Iran might be justified in feeling jumpy about British inflatables in the Gulf. It might also suspect deliberate provocation by wily Occidentals, determined to provide further evidence of an aggressive and capricious regime ripe for Washington-imposed change.

But the press has apparently learnt nothing from the dodgy dossiers and phantom WMDs that preceded the Iraq war. British governments may be capable of all manner of dissembling over pensions, NHS waiting lists and school exam results but, when they are laying down the law to foreigners, they are still assumed to be as honest as the day is long. So a Ministry of Defence map purporting to show the sailors were well inside Iraqi waters was accepted by most papers without question.

Only Craig Murray, the former British ambassador to Uzbekistan who headed the Foreign Office’s maritime section from 1989 to 1992, pointed out that no maritime border between Iran and Iraq has ever been agreed and that the MoD’s map was, to all intents and purposes, a fake. His revelation was buried on page 59 of the Mail on Sunday and largely ignored by other papers. Since Murray was sacked by the Foreign Office and later stood for election against Jack Straw in his Blackburn constituency, it may be thought he has an axe to grind. But the press’s refusal to take him seriously recalls its similar treatment of Scott Ritter, the former UN weapons inspector who insisted before the Iraq war that Saddam had been “fundamentally disarmed”.

The second obvious explanation was that Iran had retaliated for the seizure of its own citizens by western forces in Iraq. These include five alleged “intelligence agents” taken during a US raid on a long-established Iranian liaison office in the Kurdish city of Arbil. But they, as the press told it, were “detained” – just like the people in Guantanamo Bay, I suppose – while our sailors were “kidnapped” and automatically became “hostages”.

Most early accounts of the sailors’ detention – sorry, illegal capture – mentioned the Arbil incident only in passing. Not until last Tuesday did the Independent’s Patrick Cockburn reveal the real targets of the US raid: two senior Iranian security officers on an official visit. Cockburn compared it to a hypothetical attempt by Iran to kidnap the heads of the CIA and MI6 during a visit to Pakistan or Afghanistan. If newspapers were so minded, they could make other interesting comparisons – for example, between the Iranian Revolutionary Guard’s fairly open seizure of British sailors and the American CIA’s secret seizures of Muslims for “extraordinary rendition” to countries that use torture.

But sections of the British press have been suckered into portraying the Iranian regime as bent on making nuclear weapons and wiping Israel off the map, while arming and largely controlling militias in Iraq. The evidence for all these allegations deserves more scepticism than it gets in most papers. For example, when a bomb killed four British soldiers near Basra last Thursday, the Mail’s front page hailed it as “Iran’s real Easter gift”, though army sources told the Guardian there was no hard evidence of this. As Cockburn wrote in February, it seems odd that a country which, four years ago, could supposedly produce long-range missiles is now unable to make a roadside bomb without Iranian help.

The press is always willing, as it was over the capture of the sailors, to criticise a British government for putting its service personnel in harm’s way and for not responding with sufficient resolve when they get into trouble. But it treats foreigners, particularly Muslims, as always in the wrong. The Iranian regime may be as evil, aggressive and oppressive as the US and British governments want us to believe, though I find the case that it poses a signifi cant threat to anybody even less convincing than the case made in 2003 against Saddam (remind me when Iran last invaded another country). All I ask from the press is a little scepticism, a bit of inquiring journalism and an occasional attempt to test out the idea that Iran’s rulers are just normal, blundering politicians making it up as they go along. It’s not much to ask. Is it?

There have been almost daily protests and rallies by journalists across the Palestinian territories demanding his release, including a 24-hour journalists’ strike on March 20.

A week ago an advert placed in the Media Guardian was signed by 300 leading journalists. The NUJ has written to the Palestinian government, which has condemned the abduction as an “unacceptable criminal act”.

As one of the few Western journalists still based in Gaza, Johnston brought much-needed attention to the deteriorating situation in the territory.

Yet he is a victim of the Western/Israeli boycott of the Hamas government, the consequences of which have been almost totally overlooked by the media.

Last year the US and the European Union imposed an economic blockade of the Hamas government, elected in January 2006, accusing it of being a “terrorist” organisation and demanding it recognise the state of Israel. Last week’s meeting of a senior British diplomat with Hamas prime minister Ismail Haniyeh was therefore the first between Haniyeh and a western diplomat since the new government was formed.

The boycott has tipped the Palestinian territories into chaos, bringing about a wave of kidnapping and lawlessness amid appalling poverty – poverty that Johnston himself documented.

A UN human rights envoy recently said Israel is imposing a policy of “controlled strangulation” that is helping to give rise to a failed state on its doorstep. Some 75 percent of Palestinians live in poverty; there is a 65 percent unemployment rate.

Meanwhile Israel has kept up its military assaults and assassinations inside the Palestinian territories. Two Israeli offensives last summer saw four hundred Palestinians killed and some 1,500 injured; three Israeli soldiers were killed. Israel continues to hold between 8,000 and 10,000 Palestinians in its jails.

The turmoil in Gaza has to be seen in this context. The kidnapping and lawlessness are a direct result of criminal western policy to smash Palestinian independence and crush the national movement (just as Russia provoked a similar crisis in Chechnya in 1996-1999 to help justify a new invasion).

Alan Johnston must be freed to carry on his valuable work. And The Palestinian territories must be freed from the boycott, freed from Israeli attacks, and helped to rebuild after the years of occupation, repression and neglect.

Dave Crouch

It is extremely rare for such views to be published in a newspaper that is traditionally staunchly pro-Israel, so please let the Telegraph know that publishing Smith’s commentary is welcome and necessary, and encourage them to publish such views more often.

AMW can confirm that the newspaper is receiving many complaints from the pro-Israel lobby, so we should counter this straight away. When AMW called the Telegraph’s comment section to express a desire to thank Smith, the response was very positive.

The commentary, which should be read in full, is available here.

Write to dtletters@telegraph.co.uk, dtcomment@telegraph.co.uk, and/or post your comments in the “have your say” section at the end of the commentary, which is inundated with negative and abusive comments.

Please be concise and polite, and BCC letters to info@arabmediawatch.com. If you want your letter to be published in the newspaper, indicate this in the subject line of your email (do not copy and paste the subject or contents of this Action Alert) and provide your full name, address and contact details. Letter-writing tips can be found here.

April 5 saw the brutal assassination of Khamaail Mohsin, a mother of three and journalist with Radio Free Iraq, the US funded Radio station in Arabic, and the bombing of the Iraqi satellite channel Baghdad TV, killing the station’s Deputy Director, Thaer Ahmad Jaber, himself the father of seven daughters, and trainee journalist Husain Nizaer. The television station blast – a suicide bombing involving a garbage truck packed with explosives – also injured 11 staff, three of whom remain in a critical situation.

Further news emerged on April 6 of the killing of a fourth journalist, Othman al-Mashhadani, a reporter for the Saudi newspaper Al Watan, who had been kidnapped on Wednesday. His body was found in Baghdad. These deaths bring to 23 the number of Iraqi media killed in 2007 alone. At least 196 journalists and media workers have died in Iraq since the US invasion four years ago.

The deaths cast a shadow over celebrations organised by Iraqi Journalists Syndicate in solidarity with the victims of violence. The syndicate handed over more than 80,000 US$ to 120 families of media victims. The government donated 40,000 US$, matching 33,000 US$ raised by member unions of the International Federation of Journalists through a special Iraqi Humanitarian Fund set up last year. A further 8,000 US$ contribution came from the Oil Ministry.

Prime Minister Maliki paid tribute to the sacrifices made by Iraqi journalists. He said: “National media outlets that are committed to serve the truth have turned into a spearhead against terrorists.”

Meanwhile, the IFJ and its national journalists unions around the world renewed calls for the United States to provide credible reports over a number of media deaths at the hands of US soldiers in Iraq and, in particular, the killing of three journalists on April 8th 2003.

Sunday marks the fourth anniversary of the attack by US troops on the Palestine Hotel, which housed scores of media personnel, killing Taras Protsyuk of Reuters and Jose Cuoso, of the Telecinco network in Spain. On the same morning, journalist Tareq Ayyoub was killed when the Baghdad offices of the Arab satellite channel Al Jazeera were attacked by US fighter planes.

“Four years on still no credible reports have been produced to explain these attacks and no one has been held to account for the killings,” said IFJ General Secretary Aidan White. “The United States must answer questions that are still asked over these deaths and many others at the hands of their troops in Iraq. With the number of media casualties growing daily, impunity becomes intolerable, particularly when it concerns the actions of those who speak in the name of democracy and human rights.”

In December 2006, the United Nations Security Council passed Resolution 1738, a measure championed by the IFJ and its member unions that protects journalists in conflict zones and says killing them can be considered a war crime.

The IFJ has also demanded action over the deaths of British ITN reporter Terry Lloyd and his colleagues Fred Nérac and Hussein Osman, whose bodies are still missing, in a fire fight between US and Iraqi troops near Basra, in March 2003 as the invasion of Iraq gathered pace and has raised questions over the shooting by US soldiers of Reuters cameramen Mazen Dana.

In October last year the IFJ demanded the United States “tell the whole truth” media deaths in Iraq at the hands of US troops after a British coroner ruled that the death of ITN reporter Terry Lloyd in the Basra fire-fight was an “unlawful killing.”

“The US military has never owned up to its responsibilities in Iraq,” White said. “We hope the UN resolution will help stop this trend of attacks on journalists but we must continue to fight to make sure that all past cases are investigated and the killers brought to justice. If not, we not only run the risk of more journalists being killed, but that these people will kill journalism as well.”

The IFJ’s support for its two affiliates in Iraq – the Kurdistan Syndicate of Journalists in Irbil and the Iraqi Syndicate of Journalists based in Baghdad – will continue next month with a visit to the country by the Federation’s General Secretary to attend a safety training event and to meet with government officials over the media crisis in the country.

For more information contact the IFJ at 32 2 235 2207
The IFJ represents over 500,000 journalists in more than 100 countries worldwide

The drop mirrors public perceptions about how the war is going overall. In 2003, days after the invasion began, 90 percent said it was going well. Now just 40 percent believe its is going at least fairly well.

In March 2003, 40 percent of the public had a great deal of confidence that the U.S. military was giving it an accurate picture about how the war was going in Iraq. Another 45 percent said they felt a fair amount of confidence the miltary gave an accurate picture, according to the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press.

That number dropped to 15 percent and 31 percent respectively. About 52 percent said they have little to no confidence in information provided by the military.

The press has experienced a similar drop. In March 2003, 30 percent said they had a “great deal of confidence” in the media’s information about how the Iraq war was going. Fifty-one percent had a “fair amount of confidence.” Those numbers have dropped to 7 percent and 31 percent, respectively.

The most dramatic jump occurred in those who report no confidence in press information about the war. In 2003, 1 percent said they had no confidence. That number is now 27 percent. The number of those with “not too much” confidence in press information jumped from 14 percent in 2003 to 31 percent in March 2007.

The drop in confidence follows a partisan divide. In 2003, 94 percent of Republicans believed the military. That has dropped 21 points. The drop among Democrats and independents is much more stark, with 46 and 44 percent losing confidence in the military’s information.

Republicans report a much higher drop in confidence in the media’s depiction of the war. More than 80 percent of all Americans trusted the media on the war in 2003. Now just 29 percent of Republicans have confidence in the media, compared with 51 percent of Democrats.

NUJ ADM fringe meeting, Birmingham

Islamophobia, the media and the “war on terror”

Thursday April 12, 6.30pm

Speakers:
Michelle Stanistreet/Steve Usher, Express and Star
Andrew Murray, chair, Stop the War Coalition
Pete Murray, NEC member
Somaye Zadeh, BBC World Service BECTU activist
Venue: Carrs Lane Church Centre, Birmingham
(200m from conference)

Directions: Turn left out of the hotel, go past New Street station on your left, through the underpass, left along Moor Street to Carrs Lane (on your left).
All welcome! More details: tel 07801 789 297

Emergency, an Italian humanitarian organisation, played a key role in the liberation of the Italian journalist Daniele Mastrogiacomo, who was kidnapped in Afghanistan on March 6th and released on the 18th. Three days later, Emergency says, Rahmatullah Hanefi, one of their staff was arrested by the Afghan security service and may be being tortured.

The Italian media always react strongly against kidnapping of Italian citizens, but this time the reaction was enormous. First, Mastrogiacomo was a reporter of the second most important Italian newspaper, La Repubblica. The newspaper waged a strong campaign to free him, supported across the media.

Second, Prodi’s government collapsed some weeks ago because the upper chamber couldn’t agree to back Italy’s military presence in Afghanistan. (The government was eventually re-established and the mission approved a few days ago).

Last but not least, the Taliban was convinced that Mastrogiacomo had been collaborating with western intelligence services. The Taliban said they found a satellite mobile phone and a laser hidden in a shampoo bottle, both provided by western intelligence services. That was enough for them to execute Mastrogiacomo’s driver — and for Italians to fear that Mastrogiacomo was the next on the list.

Mr Matrogiacomo was released in exchange for five Taliban prisoners, including the brother of the top Taliban military commander Mullah Dadullah. NATO allies raised concerns about the deal, but it is hard to believe that Taliban prisoners could be released without the authorization of NATO forces.

However, there was friction between Emergency and the NATO/Afghan forces, and on March 20 the Afghan government decided to arrest Mr Hanefi, the Afghan manager of Emergency’s hospital in Lashkargah. (Emergency has run hospitals in Afghanistan since before the NATO forces arrived.)

Indeed, Emergency played an important role, through its contacts, in freeing Mr Mastrogiacomo, who was eventually handed over to the organisation. Emergency says it has information that Mr Hanefi is being tortured.

Please read the petition and sign the petition for Hanefi’s release here. It can be signed by clicking at the end of this page, under “subscribe”.

Jackie Chase cannot understand why Britain’s foreign policy has failed to reflect the anti-war sentiment swelling around her during a peace rally in Trafalgar Square recently. The music teacher is one of tens of thousands of protesters who poured into the square, holding placards demanding everything from Blair’s resignation, a withdrawal of troops from Iraq and Afghanistan, to an end to Britain’s nuclear weapons program. They also voiced fears over a possible confrontation with Iran.
Whatever their gripe with the government, most protesters agreed on two things: They want Blair to stop war mongering, and they want the people of the Middle East to know they care.

Chase walked through the march in an orange jumpsuit with a black hood over her head chained to several campaigners, to protest the illegal detention of prisoners at Guantanamo Bay.

She started the “Save Omar Deghayes” campaign in the hope that British authorities would not condemn an innocent man to the torture and abuse Deghayes has allegedly been subjected to during his time in prison.

Deghayes was a Brighton resident who went to Afghanistan hoping to export dry fruit to wholesalers in the United Kingdom. By the time the Americans began to bomb the country, Deghayes had settled in, and married an Afghani girl. When the situation worsened, he tried to flee across the border to Pakistan to get a British visa for his bride. He was captured in Lahore, taken back to Afghanistan, held at Bagram airbase, and labeled an “Enemy Combatant.”

Five years later, he is one of many “suspects” being held by US authorities at Guantanamo Bay on secret evidence that is presented only to “Combatant Status Review Tribunals.” That evidence is not subject to legal, public or independent scrutiny and is often based only on speculation.

Chase and several Brighton residents said they were there to “put a stop to the atrocities committed in the name of keeping us safe.”

Deghayes’ family believes his predicament may be a case of mistaken identity. A photograph of a man named Omar Deghayes from a Chechen training camp, bearing no resemblance to the dry-fruit vendor Deghayes, was aired on Spanish television on the FBI’s most wanted list. Experts have testified since then that the only thing dry fruit vendor Deghayes shares with the man in the photograph is his name.

“But Omar is still in prison and we know he has been beaten, blinded, his arm broken. We are very concerned for his mental well being and frankly I don’t think the British government can handle the embarrassment of bringing him home now after five years of this abuse, what’s left of him?” said Chase, whose 17-year-old son Sam was also marching to protest illegal military action in Iraq and in Afghanistan.

“What frightens me is our ability to switch off from suffering,” said Chase, “I know people will watch us on the news and say, ‘they look annoyed about something,’ change the channel, and go back to enjoying their warm meal and Ikea furniture.”

According to him, anti-terror legislation, introduced after 9/11 to help the West combat an abstract enemy, has turned a system of representation into a system of top-down government.

“(George Orwell’s) 1984 scenario is not far when you can send a man to prison without evidence, we are completely controlled and all of us in Britain are complicit in making a democracy into a system where we no longer have representation. The government does what it wants,” said Sam, who is outraged that Blair took his country to war and that Blair will let innocent men remain in Guantanamo Bay.

Redoune Zghizhe, a friend of the Deghayes family who works in the food and beverage department of a hotel, is still bemused over his friend’s detention.

“He was just a business man. It is illegal, it is wrong to imprison a man who saw a business opportunity for export and sent to find work abroad, he was just in the wrong place at the wrong time, but this is the world today,” Zghizhe said.

As they walked through cordoned-off streets, tourists snapped photos, while onlookers sometimes clapped, sometimes gawked and jeered at them. They walked on, unconcerned. The campaigners are determined that if they fail to find justice in a court of law, they will continue to seek redress in a court of public opinion.

Keegan, who works for website www.onegreenearth.com said, “We are against this illegal war, all war is unjust, we want it to stop.”

They came out because they find “the mainstream media is not doing its job so it’s up to every individual to draw attention to the injustice of war.”

On the outskirts of the congregation, twenty young demonstrators danced incessantly to music coming from a makeshift sound system.

Ben Gray, who works in the music industry, thinks he has found the ultimate way to get that very message across.

He decided to “sidestep mainstream media and give all these protesters a concrete way to have their voice heard,” by releasing a single called “War what is it good for.” Gray hopes Tony Blair will find it humiliating and is appealing for residents of Britain to text peace1 to 78789 to get it into the charts.

Gray is one of a growing number of Britons enraged that Blair took his country to war over “a pack of lies.” And he is annoyed with the media for not exposing those lies.

“I saw masses of people march in 2003, they were against the war then, and they are against it now, but the government doesn’t listen,” he said. “But if the single makes it into the charts everyone will have to listen. Otherwise we are just preaching to the converted.”

Gray realized that new legislation allowing downloaded songs to enter the charts without having to physically release a single meant they could pull off “a musical referendum.”

“From January downloads can propel singles into the charts and the media, the police, the government can distort the numbers of protesters who show up – when you attend you know there were a lot more than gets reported the next day – but no one can deny the numbers when people are buying the single, and getting Tony Blair into the charts,” he said.

Gray finds delicious irony in the fact that “Blair called his college band “Ugly Rumors,” and now he’s known for spreading ugly rumors,” which is why the music video is available on a site called – you guessed it – www.uglyrumours.com.

“We have been duped and we must resist, and we will not be fooled into an act of aggression with Iran,” said Gray. “I was never an activist, but we all have to speak up now. We have all been betrayed.”

[Written for http://www.arabnews.com]

For America’s fighting forces, this is their darkest hour. The U.S. military, the most powerful fighting force on Earth, is facing a collapse in morale far more devastating even than that experienced in the toughest days of the Vietnam War.

The troops are bogged down in the occupation of Iraq, where they are trapped on a murderous front line in an urban guerilla war for which they had little preparation, and for which support at home has all but disappeared.

Faced with hostility abroad and indifference to the war at home, the soldiers are fast degenerating into an out-of-control force consumed by drink, drugs, sex crimes and mental collapse.

An appalling picture emerges from the daily headlines – the latest revealing that nearly one third of the injured coming home are suffering from the mental scars of war.

New figures show that of 104,000 who had sought medical help by the end of 2005, some 32,010 were suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder, depression, drug addiction or alcoholism – three times as many, proportionally, as those who returned from Vietnam.

At home in Fort Campbell, Kentucky, the latest military murder trial into an Iraqi atrocity has opened with the prosecution alleging that Staff Sgt Ray Girourd, of the legendary 101st Airborne Division, ordered soldiers to slaughter male prisoners.

The incident took place last May during a raid on a suspected camp of insurgents outside Samarra. Two soldiers have already admitted to the killings. They have been sentenced to 18 years in a military jail and will testify for the prosecution.

Specialist William Hunsaker and Private Corey Clagett say Girourd, 24, ordered them to cut the prisoners free, let them run and then shoot them down, covering up the crime by making it look as if the prisoners were attacking and died in a firefight.

In his defence, Girourd’s lawyers claim he was obeying orders from a senior officer, Colonel Michael Steele, commander of 3rd Brigade, to “kill all military-age men”. If that proves to be true, President Bush’s Iraqi adventure has brought America to an unprecedented new low of atrocity. So how has it come to this?

Perhaps part of the answer lies in the ‘haji hooch’ or ‘haji juice’, a locally-made, 90 per cent proof moonshine whisky regularly sold to American troops by Iraqi merchants and often smuggled into their bases by colleagues from the newly-formed Iraqi army.

It is swilled along with prescription drugs such as amphetamines, distributed by medics ordered to keep troops sharp for extended patrols and flight missions, and tranquilisers meant to calm nerves.

The American military, on ships as well as in army camps, has long been ‘dry’, with an official ban on all alcohol. But this has not stopped an Apocalypse Now-style dependency on drugs and booze in a crazed ’self-medication’ that gets only worse with worsening fighting conditions, tightening an already depressing downward spiral.

Figures forced from the Pentagon by the New York Times under the Freedom of Information Act make shocking reading: 240 of the 665 cases of military indiscipline in Iraq and Afghanistan involved drugs and alcohol.

Seventy-three of those 240 cases were the most serious yet known from these two wars: murder, rape, robbery and assault.

To get an idea of how deep into depravity some of these men have sunk, here is just one of the sex offences: in March, 2006, a group of men – again from the 101st Airborne Division – gang-raped a 14-year-old girl, and then murdered her and her family.

They had been manning a road block in Mahmudiya, south of Baghdad, and drinking ‘hajji juice’ supplied by Iraqi soldiers for most of the day.

According to the prosecution evidence presented when he was charged with murder in a civilian court, Private Steven Green planned and led the attack.

He and at least three others broke into the house after changing into civilian clothes. They forced two adult women and a man into a separate room, and then took turns in raping the girl, and were still violating her when Green went into the other room and began shooting.

He returned to the rape scene saying that he had “shot them all”, and then raped the girl himself before killing her with two bullets to the head. For all the murders, he used a Russian AK-47 rifle he had found in the house, and then casually dumped it in a canal.

Private Green, who was discharged from the army with a ‘personality disorder’, faces the death penalty.

In one case as long ago as May 2004, when President Bush was declaring ‘victory’ and the vast majority of Americans were still cheering him on, Private Justin Lillis got drunk on illicit whisky on his base in Balad, stole a Humvee and went on a rampage, shooting up a residential neighbourhood with his M16 rifle, before taking pot shots at the guards on the entrance to his own base.

Six months later, Private Chris Rolan of the Third Brigade got into a drink-fuelled argument with a fellow soldier and shot him dead with his 9mm service pistol.

Another remarkable statistic can be no co-incidence: a record number of women soldiers – as many as one-third of the total returning from tours in Iraq – are coming home pregnant.

Lyndie England, for example, the private who became the disgraceful face of torture at Abu Ghraib prison, photographed making sexual taunts at naked Iraqi prisoners, gave birth to the child of the ringleader of those disgraced torturers as she was about to be led off to a military jail.

There was already controversy over the role of women in combat as America marched to war in the Middle East. These figures suggest that the critics were right when they said that putting women soldiers on the front line would be a mistake.

But the women were never there on the front line because the Pentagon and White House believed in women’s equality; they were there because President Bush launched this most irresponsible war when America was chronically short of combat troops.

The draft ended with the Vietnam War, too loathed by American voters for any politician to maintain, and so did a great many of the attractions of life in the armed forces. America switched to the kind of lean ‘professional’ army long before adopted by Britain, but it did so with much less success.

By 2000, America was enlisting pretty much anyone its recruiters could drag in off the streets. First they filled the vacancies with women, promising ‘pride’ and education for jobs which would last a lifetime.

Then they dropped the academic standards. Then they even lowered the standards for physical stature and fitness.

The idea was that smart-bombs and technological superiority would win wars on the ground anyway. Small, fast forces of overwhelming technological might would secure the world for American freedom and commerce. Boots on the ground, whether worn by male or female soldiers, belonged to the past.

This policy failed, of course, to be replaced by the ’surge’ in extra troops, not to mention the everextended tours of duty by soldiers, thousands of them from the parttime National Guard, who never really expected to have to leave home at all.

But the worst aspect of all this is the scandal about the Bush administration’s treatment of its dead, wounded and suffering.

As any soldier will tell you, there is nothing so crucial as the treatment of casualties and traditions of honouring the dead.

This is sacred turf to fighting men: you are rescued from the battlefield at any price, you are mended if possible, you are honoured in death, and you take comfort from knowing that your loved ones will be cared for, come what may.

Did no one at the White House bother to read a little history?  History tells us why the Royal Navy built the first of Britain’s hospitals at Greenwich and why Lloyd George promised ‘homes fit for heroes’. America has just been waking up to the scandal of the Walter Reed military hospital, where returning wounded were left unattended in rooms while rats scurried below their cots and doctors cut down on pain killers to save money.

For years, the Pentagon has banned the taking of photographs of returning coffins, while President Bush has refused to attend funerals because honouring the dead was deemed bad for public relations. Already, there is a new crop of veterans joining the old lags from Vietnam on the streets of American cities, begging, robbing to support their drug addictions and lining-up outside the overnight shelters and the charity soup-kitchens.

It all points to another shocking statistic: almost one in three of troops returning from the Iraq and Afghan fronts in need of health care are wounded not in the body, but in the mind.

The younger the soldiers, the greater the incidence of post traumatic stress disorder, depression, anxiety, alcoholism and drug addiction. This third compares with 10 per cent of Vietnam veterans – survivors of a war so far considered to have produced an unprecedented number of mental casualties.

The upshot of all this? If President Bush wants to know the full cost of his adventure in the Middle East, he must look beyond the bloody carnage in Iraq every day, to his own cities in America.

There he will see the shattered remains of many of the men – and women – he sent off to war and perhaps, just perhaps, realise what a dreadful mistake he has made.

The first catastrophe relates to the political and moral consequences of the war in the US and UK, and its resolution is the urgent task facing the American and British peoples. The second concerns the devastation wrought by the war and subsequent occupation, and the lack of a unified political movement within Iraq that might overcome it.

Bush and Blair are in a state of denial, only offering us more of the same. They allegedly launched the war at first to save the world from Saddam’s WMD, then to establish democracy, then to fight al-Qaida’s terrorism, and now to prevent civil war and Iranian or Syrian intervention.

Four years after declaring “mission accomplished”, the US government is sending more combat troops to add to the bloodbath – all in an effort to impose its imperial will on the Iraqi people, and in the process plunging its own country into its deepest political-moral crisis since Vietnam. Under heavier pressures, Blair, the master of tactical subterfuge, is redeploying Britain’s forces within Iraq and Afghanistan, under the guise of withdrawal. He has long known that British bases in Basra and the south were defenceless against attacks by the Sadr movement and others.

Bush, on the other hand, is escalating Iraq’s conflict and threatening to launch a new war, this time against Iran. It is hard not to presume that what he means by an exit strategy is to install a client regime in Baghdad, backed by US bases. The Iraqi people will not accept this, and the west should be alerted to the fact that US policy objectives will only lead to wider regional conflicts, rather than to full withdrawal.

In attempting to achieve their objective, the occupation forces will escalate their war with the resistance forces within and north of Baghdad, as well as clashing with the popular Sadr movement in the capital and the south. The latter is, despite the ceasefires and political manoeuvrings, Iraq’s biggest organised opposition force to the occupation.

Meanwhile, the destruction of Iraq continues apace and its people are subjected to levels of sustained violence unknown in their history. Overwhelmingly, the violence is a direct or indirect product of the occupation, and the bulk of sectarian violence is widely known in Iraq to be linked to the parties favoured by Washington. For example, forces in control of the various ministries, including the interior ministry, clash regularly.

It is not difficult to see how this violence is linked to the occupation, for it has spawned a multitude of violence-makers: 150,000 occupation forces; 50,000 and rising contracted foreign “mercenaries“; 150,000 Iraqi Facilities Protection forces, paid by the Iraqi regime, controlled by the occupation and engaged in death-squad activities, according to the prime minister, Nuri al-Maliki; 400,000 US-trained army and police forces; six US-controlled secret Iraqi militias; and hundreds of private kidnap gangs. Pitted against some or all of these are tens of thousands of militias and resistance forces of various political hues. In total there are about 2 million actively organised armed men in the country. There are about 3,000 attacks on occupation forces every month, while tens of thousands of Iraqis languish in prison, where torture is widespread and trials considered an unnecessary formality.

The success of the occupation’s divide-and-rule tactics and their insistence on basing the new political and military structures on sects, religions, and ethnicities is threatening the communal cohesion that was once the country’s hallmark. This is a factor in the absence of a united movement, capable of leading the struggle to end the occupation. The occupation has sown divisions where there were none and transformed existing differences into open warfare.

And is it any wonder that the long-suffering Iraqi people find themselves at an impasse. Try catching your breath after decades of brutal dictatorship, 13 years of economic sanctions and four years of an obscene war.

But even in the absence of a unified anti-occupation front, the resistance of the Iraqi people has managed to thwart the world’s greatest military empire. And there are signs of a mass rejection of these sectarian forces, and the possibility that public anger will translate into the very unity that is so desperately needed. Rage against corruption and the collapse of public services is sweeping the country, including Kurdistan. Similarly, the proposed corporate occupation of Iraq, disguised as a legal document to tie the country to the oil companies for decades to come, has reminded the population of one of the main reasons for the US-led invasion. It has also reminded them what a self-respecting, sovereign Iraq looked like in 1961, when the government nationalised Iraq’s lands for future oil production.

In an opinion poll released by the BBC on March 19, 86% of people are opposed to the division of Iraq. This and other polls also show majority support for armed resistance to the occupation. Four years into this terrible adventure, both the US and Britain must realise that it is time to pack up and leave.

Sami Ramadani was a political exile from Saddam’s regime and is a senior lecturer at London Metropolitan University.

This confirms previous allegations of Israel preparing for a premeditated war long before Hezbollah’s kidnapping of two Israeli soldiers, and using the kidnappings as a convenient excuse to launch the invasion of Lebanon.

Such allegations were reported last summer by the New Yorker, the Guardian, the San Francisco Chronicle, the New Statesman, the Daily Mail, CNN and the BBC, among other media outlets. Further details are available here.

Certain columnists and editorials in much of the British media have suggested, during and since the conflict, that the blame lies with Hezbollah for instigating a conflict that would not have otherwise happened.

On 8 March 2007, the Israeli daily Ha’artez reported a leaked testimony by Olmert to the Winograd Commission, the body charged with investigating the 34-day war, in which he admits he first discussed the possibility of war in January 2006 and asked to see military plans in March.

Now that the matter is beyond dispute, AMW is discouraged to note that those who were so quick to lay the blame for war on Hezbollah have remained completely silent when Israel, the instigator, has owned up to its actions.

With Islam specialist Paul Grieve,
atheist and author: “A Brief Guide to Islam” (2006)

Islamic law has become a crude shorthand in the British media for everything supposedly “barbaric”, “sexist” and “backward” about Islam. Here’s you chance to ask the questions about Sharia you always wanted to ask.

Monday April 2
6.30pm

National Union of Journalists
Gray’s Inn Road
London WC1X

All welcome!