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Here's an editorial from last thursday's WSJ. It's an interesting read.
Jeers for Jazeera
The Qatar-based network is independent, but its journalism is wanting.
Thursday, June 5, 2003 12:01 a.m. EDT
Al-Jazeera earned the nickname "the CNN of the Arab world" by broadcasting tapes of Osama bin Laden after the World Trade Center bombing. Perhaps a better nickname would've been the "Saddam News Network." It now turns out that the network might have been an appendage of Saddam Hussein's disinformation campaign. Files recovered from Iraq's intelligence service show that al-Jazeera was infiltrated by Iraqi agents. Days after the latest allegations surfaced, al-Jazeera's director general was fired--although ostensibly for reasons other than his unusual contacts with Saddam's agents.
The Arab world, where most media are state-owned and uncritical of Arab dictatorships, certainly needs an independent TV media outlet. Al-Jazeera had substantial promise; the emir of Qatar, who gave the station $150 million in seed money in 1996, apparently meant it when he said he wouldn't interfere in its broadcasts. He may now regret his hands-off approach as evidence mounts that al-Jazeera's anti-Western tilt may have stemmed from more than just ideological opposition to U.S. foreign policy.
While appalling, the evidence now surfacing about Saddam's reach shouldn't be all that surprising. The Iraqi dictator had a long history of trying to distort news reports and compromise journalists. Last month The Weekly Standard's Stephen Hayes laid out some of Saddam's methods. "Media people were paid monthly by the Iraqi Embassy in Amman," Jordanian journalist Salama Nimat told him. "They were also given presents, like cars and expensive watches." Saddam Hussein even built a housing complex for the Jordanian Press Association that cost $3 million. "In the newspapers in Jordan, you wouldn't have seen anything negative about Saddam Hussein," Mr. Nimat added. "I don't want to generalize too much, but many of the editors were bought by the regime." A top Egyptian editor told The Wall Street Journal in 1991 about a fascinating conversation he had with Saddam: "I remember him saying, 'Compared to tanks, journalists are cheap--and you get more for your money.' "
It's not a big leap, then, to believe that Saddam tried to corrupt employees of al-Jazeera. The network reaches an audience Saddam needed to manipulate, which is why he had the network infiltrated by three Iraqi intelligence agents, as the Times of London reported last month. The Times has files, recovered from Iraqi archives and authenticated by experts on Iraqi intelligence, that show that the Iraqi agents worked inside al-Jazeera to obtain favorable coverage of the regime and spiked negative stories. One story the agents spiked was a 1999 report that would have shown footage of the regime's 1988 chemical attack on a Kurdish city.
The files, which cover the period between 1999 and 2002, show that one agent working in the international division, code-named Jazeera 2, "provides us with detailed information of all that takes place in the channel" and even passed on letters written by Osama bin Laden. Iraqi officials refer to al-Jazeera in their memos as "an instrument employed by us." Al-Jazeera says that such charges are preposterous, although it acknowledges that the man known as Jazeera 2 was "terminated some time ago."
The most important name to surface in the Iraqi intelligence files was that of Mohammed Jasim Al-Ali, who served as the network's managing director from its founding in 1996 until his firing last week. A former official with Qatari television, he is listed in the files as having had extensive contacts with Iraqi intelligence, although there is no indication either that he was an agent or that he was being blackmailed by Iraq.
Al-Jazeera insists that Mr. Jasim's firing last week had nothing to do with the discovery of the Iraqi files. Jihad Ballout, an al-Jazeera spokesman. says "these rumors and allegations about al-Jazeera are not taken at face value." He noted that Mr. Jasim retains a seat on al-Jazeera's board of directors and claims that he simply left because he always planned to return to his post at Qatari television.
Ibrahim Hilal, the editor in chief of al-Jazeera, told Channel 4 News in Britain that he didn't believe Iraqi agents had worked at his network, but he added that "you can never guarantee that any person working in a newsroom cannot be an intelligence agent."
Perhaps, but the burden is on with al-Jazeera to clean up its act. Only last month it aired a tape it said was from Ayman al-Zawahiri, Osama bin Laden's deputy, who called on Muslims to engage in terrorism against Jews, Americans and their allies. Al-Jazeera aired the tape--giving whoever who made the tape a platform to stir up hatred--instead of having a reporter paraphrase its content.
Al-Jazeera would also to do well to stifle its sneers at other media outlets trying to report on the Arab world. In April, Mr. Hilal trashed reporters for Radio Sawa, a new information channel funded by the State Department: "Arabs understand that it is a tool of the U.S. government." Are Arabs fully aware of the extent to Arab reporters became tools of Saddam?
I was in Qatar in April for a conference on the economic modernization of the Middle East hosted by Freedom House, Americans for Tax Reform and the government of Qatar. One of the panels dealt with the importance of establishing a free press, and I was scheduled to appear with Mr. Hilal, the editor-in-chief of al-Jazeera. He didn't show, and an empty chair on the dais was the only representation from the Arab media on the panel. (Later, someone told me that Mr. Hilal had been called to liberated Baghdad on short notice.)
I wish Mr. Hilal had been there. I took pains to praise al-Jazeera for trying to be an independent media voice but cautioned it to avoid the worst excesses of Western news channels. I would have asked him about al-Jazeera's decision to air video of murdered U.S. prisoners of war, a curious one since a few days later it rejected a request from the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals to air an ad that featured graphic images of slaughtered animals because it was too graphic. After I raised this mild criticism of al-Jazeera, a well-dressed woman in the audience walked out in disgust.
Another issue I raised concerned the different treatment two congressmen attending the Qatar conference received at the hands of al-Jazeera. Both members, Democrat Nick Rahall of West Virginia and Republican Darrell Issa of California, were invited to appear on a prime-time show. Mr. Rahall opposed the U.S. invasion of Iraq, and Mr. Issa a supported it. Shortly before Mr. Issa was scheduled to go to al-Jazeera's studios, he was told that plans had changed and he wasn't needed. When Mr. Rahall arrived at al-Jazerra, he told me, he was ushered onto the set where the announcer told the audience that Mr. Issa had chosen not to appear and so Mr. Rahall would have to answer the questions prepared for both men.
I called Mr. Hilal's office to raise these questions again, but an aide said he was traveling again. I can understand why in the wake of recent revelations he might want to spend more time out of the office. Al-Jazeera has a fair distance to travel before its reports are accorded the respect and credibility its supporters in the Arab world say it wants to earn.
The Qatar-based network is independent, but its journalism is wanting.
Thursday, June 5, 2003 12:01 a.m. EDT
Al-Jazeera earned the nickname "the CNN of the Arab world" by broadcasting tapes of Osama bin Laden after the World Trade Center bombing. Perhaps a better nickname would've been the "Saddam News Network." It now turns out that the network might have been an appendage of Saddam Hussein's disinformation campaign. Files recovered from Iraq's intelligence service show that al-Jazeera was infiltrated by Iraqi agents. Days after the latest allegations surfaced, al-Jazeera's director general was fired--although ostensibly for reasons other than his unusual contacts with Saddam's agents.
The Arab world, where most media are state-owned and uncritical of Arab dictatorships, certainly needs an independent TV media outlet. Al-Jazeera had substantial promise; the emir of Qatar, who gave the station $150 million in seed money in 1996, apparently meant it when he said he wouldn't interfere in its broadcasts. He may now regret his hands-off approach as evidence mounts that al-Jazeera's anti-Western tilt may have stemmed from more than just ideological opposition to U.S. foreign policy.
While appalling, the evidence now surfacing about Saddam's reach shouldn't be all that surprising. The Iraqi dictator had a long history of trying to distort news reports and compromise journalists. Last month The Weekly Standard's Stephen Hayes laid out some of Saddam's methods. "Media people were paid monthly by the Iraqi Embassy in Amman," Jordanian journalist Salama Nimat told him. "They were also given presents, like cars and expensive watches." Saddam Hussein even built a housing complex for the Jordanian Press Association that cost $3 million. "In the newspapers in Jordan, you wouldn't have seen anything negative about Saddam Hussein," Mr. Nimat added. "I don't want to generalize too much, but many of the editors were bought by the regime." A top Egyptian editor told The Wall Street Journal in 1991 about a fascinating conversation he had with Saddam: "I remember him saying, 'Compared to tanks, journalists are cheap--and you get more for your money.' "
It's not a big leap, then, to believe that Saddam tried to corrupt employees of al-Jazeera. The network reaches an audience Saddam needed to manipulate, which is why he had the network infiltrated by three Iraqi intelligence agents, as the Times of London reported last month. The Times has files, recovered from Iraqi archives and authenticated by experts on Iraqi intelligence, that show that the Iraqi agents worked inside al-Jazeera to obtain favorable coverage of the regime and spiked negative stories. One story the agents spiked was a 1999 report that would have shown footage of the regime's 1988 chemical attack on a Kurdish city.
The files, which cover the period between 1999 and 2002, show that one agent working in the international division, code-named Jazeera 2, "provides us with detailed information of all that takes place in the channel" and even passed on letters written by Osama bin Laden. Iraqi officials refer to al-Jazeera in their memos as "an instrument employed by us." Al-Jazeera says that such charges are preposterous, although it acknowledges that the man known as Jazeera 2 was "terminated some time ago."
The most important name to surface in the Iraqi intelligence files was that of Mohammed Jasim Al-Ali, who served as the network's managing director from its founding in 1996 until his firing last week. A former official with Qatari television, he is listed in the files as having had extensive contacts with Iraqi intelligence, although there is no indication either that he was an agent or that he was being blackmailed by Iraq.
Al-Jazeera insists that Mr. Jasim's firing last week had nothing to do with the discovery of the Iraqi files. Jihad Ballout, an al-Jazeera spokesman. says "these rumors and allegations about al-Jazeera are not taken at face value." He noted that Mr. Jasim retains a seat on al-Jazeera's board of directors and claims that he simply left because he always planned to return to his post at Qatari television.
Ibrahim Hilal, the editor in chief of al-Jazeera, told Channel 4 News in Britain that he didn't believe Iraqi agents had worked at his network, but he added that "you can never guarantee that any person working in a newsroom cannot be an intelligence agent."
Perhaps, but the burden is on with al-Jazeera to clean up its act. Only last month it aired a tape it said was from Ayman al-Zawahiri, Osama bin Laden's deputy, who called on Muslims to engage in terrorism against Jews, Americans and their allies. Al-Jazeera aired the tape--giving whoever who made the tape a platform to stir up hatred--instead of having a reporter paraphrase its content.
Al-Jazeera would also to do well to stifle its sneers at other media outlets trying to report on the Arab world. In April, Mr. Hilal trashed reporters for Radio Sawa, a new information channel funded by the State Department: "Arabs understand that it is a tool of the U.S. government." Are Arabs fully aware of the extent to Arab reporters became tools of Saddam?
I was in Qatar in April for a conference on the economic modernization of the Middle East hosted by Freedom House, Americans for Tax Reform and the government of Qatar. One of the panels dealt with the importance of establishing a free press, and I was scheduled to appear with Mr. Hilal, the editor-in-chief of al-Jazeera. He didn't show, and an empty chair on the dais was the only representation from the Arab media on the panel. (Later, someone told me that Mr. Hilal had been called to liberated Baghdad on short notice.)
I wish Mr. Hilal had been there. I took pains to praise al-Jazeera for trying to be an independent media voice but cautioned it to avoid the worst excesses of Western news channels. I would have asked him about al-Jazeera's decision to air video of murdered U.S. prisoners of war, a curious one since a few days later it rejected a request from the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals to air an ad that featured graphic images of slaughtered animals because it was too graphic. After I raised this mild criticism of al-Jazeera, a well-dressed woman in the audience walked out in disgust.
Another issue I raised concerned the different treatment two congressmen attending the Qatar conference received at the hands of al-Jazeera. Both members, Democrat Nick Rahall of West Virginia and Republican Darrell Issa of California, were invited to appear on a prime-time show. Mr. Rahall opposed the U.S. invasion of Iraq, and Mr. Issa a supported it. Shortly before Mr. Issa was scheduled to go to al-Jazeera's studios, he was told that plans had changed and he wasn't needed. When Mr. Rahall arrived at al-Jazerra, he told me, he was ushered onto the set where the announcer told the audience that Mr. Issa had chosen not to appear and so Mr. Rahall would have to answer the questions prepared for both men.
I called Mr. Hilal's office to raise these questions again, but an aide said he was traveling again. I can understand why in the wake of recent revelations he might want to spend more time out of the office. Al-Jazeera has a fair distance to travel before its reports are accorded the respect and credibility its supporters in the Arab world say it wants to earn.
And people actually believed Al Jazeera... 
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