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UPDATED ON:
Friday, July 11, 2008
22:28 Mecca time, 19:28 GMT
Programmes LISTENING POST
Arab media blind to Darfur
The conflict in Darfur is a news story that has been widely and emotively
covered by western media but has attracted relatively little coverage within
the Arab media.
The Listening Post's Salah Khadr finds out why.
There are many similarities between the violence in Iraq and Darfur from the
estimate of the number of civilians killed to paramilitaries operating closely
linked to the government forces, to victims who are targeted for membership of
an ethnic group.
However international media coverage generally reports one as a civil war or
cycle of insurgency and the other as a genocide.
More than 200,000 people have died in the conflict in Darfur, with millions
more turned into refugees and the situation becoming a picture of "hell on
earth" according to the UN.
Sudan's population is 40 per cent Arab and Arabs are at the heart of the
conflict, but for many in the Arab world, the humanitarian catastrophe may as
well not exist.
The reason being the Arab media have largely ignored it.
Lawrence Pintak, a journalist and Arab media expert, says the problem with
Darfur when it comes to the Arab media is that it does not fit the template of
Arabs being the victims and other people the aggressors.
"Arabs here are good guys and bad guys," he says.
'State of denial'
"I think we are in a state of denial," Jehad Khazen, a former editor of the
al-Hayat newspaper, says.
"People say 'the Arabs or Muslims – cannot do this – it did not happen' – but
they did do this and it did happen - and they have to reconcile themselves to
the fact."
Listening Post
Find out more about the programme
Just because the Arab media does not cover a lot of what happens in the Darfur
crisis does not mean that Arab public opinion is not interested says Nadim
Hasbani, an Arab media analyst from the International Crisis Group.
"A Zogby poll around March or April in 2007 showed there is a real eagerness in
Arab public opinion to read more and learn more about what is happening in
Darfur. But this is not reflected in the Arab media."
It could be argued that geography plays a role in the limited coverage given
the conflict is in Africa, not the Middle East.
But whilst Darfur largely remains a non-event on the Arab media scene, European
and North American media travel from greater distances to cover this story.
"There is always going to be some sort of reluctance to demonise their own, the
Arabs as they will see themselves," Opheera McDoom, Reuters correspondent in
Darfur, says.
"But I think while there has been coverage in the Arab media, there has been a
reluctance in the Arab media to go to Darfur and check things out for
themselves.
"I see a lot more western media going to Darfur and spending weeks in Darfur
than I do Arab media and that is where you see the difference. You will get a
much more in-depth coverage and a lot more interesting coverage if you actually
go to Darfur, and that is where the Arab media has fallen down."
However, some Arab media analysts say that the implied rationale from the
American media in particular is that the story in Darfur is Arabs killing
Africans because they do not know anything other than violence.
US suspicion
"That's what the audience is left to conclude," says Mahmood Mahdani of
Columbia University.
"So that's of course not acceptable if you are part of the Arab media. You can
immediately sense that you are being caricatured and demonised at the same
time."
It is questionable, however, if such suspicions over the motivation and vigour
of US media coverage account for the strategy of limited coverage from many
Arab media outlets.
Arab media's coverage of Darfur is often more analysis than reporting [EPA]
"What is most striking to me is that the media coverage has a single focus and
that's a focus on atrocities, on atrocity stories, there's no attempt to place
them in context," Mahdani says.
"There's no attempt to explain, to locate it historically, to show that there's
any change happening.
"I think it is about linking Darfur with the larger war on terror by portraying
and framing the perpetrators of violence in Darfur as Arabs."
The 22 Arab states all have a distinctive media output and often it is not so
much a question of following an agenda but deciding which agenda to follow.
"It is not one agenda – every Arab government has a different agenda from the
other – Egypt is more interested in Darfur as Sudan is next door and doesn't
want a spill over," Khazen says.
"But a country a like the UAE or Oman – find they are not directly involved and
they can't influence events – so you find that the coverage is much more
limited there."
Government hindrance
Covering Darfur is also hindered by the government of Sudan who have imposed
strict access criteria and will often not issue visas or take journalists to
government-controlled areas.
"They [the government] know that if more information comes out there will be
added pressure on the Sudanese government," Hasbani says.
"It's not easy to cover Darfur – its not easy for Western Journalists and its
not easy for Arab journalists," Lawrence Pintak says.
"I talked to an Al Jazeera correspondent who was based in Khartoum a while back
– and he said to go and cover Darfur – you have to go to Khartoum – then to
Nairobi – to West Africa up to Cameroon, across from Cameroon to Chad and then
in through the back door to the refugee camps.
"If you don't do that then you are on a guided tour and you may as well go to
Disneyland."
The result of these restrictions has been a move toward more analytical
coverage and away from hard reporting.
"What's happened in Arab media is that we have so much coverage of the
political issues related to Darfur like – what is the UK, France, US, UN
reaction to Darfur – but what we really need actually is not the political
coverage, but the coverage from the ground," Hasbani says.
"What are the facts, what are the stories, where are the images of the refugees
of the people being killed? These are images we don't have but are the images
we need – its not about the political process."
A Listening Post special on the media coverage of Darfur can be seen on Al
Jazeera from Friday July 12 at the following times GMT:
Friday 1230 and 2030; Satruday 0430; Sunday 0600; Monday 0530; Tuesday 0730 and
2330; Wednesday 0300 and 1930; Thursday 0630 and 1430
Source: Al Jazeera
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Jusfiq Hadjar gelar Sutan Maradjo Lelo
Allah yang disembah orang Islam tipikal dan yang digambarkan oleh al-Mushaf itu
dungu, buas, kejam, keji, ganas, zalim lagi biadab hanyalah Allah fiktif.
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