Dergham touched on a wide variety of issues in her discussion
including the responsibilities of journalists, as well as those of the
American public, and the importance of national interest in foreign
policy. She describes a very serious problem with the American public
that she calls an “attention deficit disorder.” She said: “We need to be
engaged in foreign policy and we need to care, and to look at things
differently.” Dergham encouraged the audience to show the television
networks that we have an interest in America’s place in the world, and
to help find creative ways to tell the public that foreign policy is a
personal issue.
She also believes that we cannot put all of the blame on the media,
because recent events have caused journalists to become afraid of
offending the public. “The matter of ignorance amongst the public on top
of apathy, on top of not getting interested in learning and doing
something about what is going on has resulted in a very rare occurrence
of the voice of reason from the media,” she said.
“The war on terrorism has in effect, hijacked the media’s investigative
reporting.”
Manchester Junior, Boris Nikolaev, found Dergham’s talk to be useful and
thought provoking, but also confusing at some points. “My impression was
that she was not straightforward or very definite in her answers,” he
said, “but she helped me to formulate my own questions about the
importance of truth and propaganda in the media.”
Dergham also mentioned that network television is the most influential
type of media, followed by cable, but print is “king” when it comes to
real journalism. “Television has been really demanding of the public
opinion and intellectual curiosity,” she said. “That is why half of the
American public still believes Saddam Hussein was directly related to
the events of Sept. 11. Something is fundamentally wrong with that.”
Mike Pillow
(Staff Writer)
The neo-conservatives have taken control the U. S.
government, and unless the public gets involved, we are headed for
national and international disaster.
That is the view of Raghida Dergham, senior diplomatic correspondent for
Al-Hayat, a pan-Arab, Arabic language newspaper. Dergham spoke Oct. 18,
at the Plowshares conference on the media, held on the Manchester
campus. She is a Lebanese-American who has worked for Al-Hayat since
1989.
“We are sitting on our bottoms while extremists hijack our
president and our country,” Dergham said. But she does not blame only
the Bush administration and the public for the troubled state of
international affairs. The media also is at fault.
Too many news organizations are “stepping away from the fundamentals of
journalism,” she said. She cited Fox News among U. S.–based
organizations that have given up traditional balanced news reporting and
news analysis in favor of mixed news and editorializing based on
patriotism and ideology. Among foreign media, Al Jazeera, the
Qatar-based Arab language television station, “gives authorization to
the angry and works to incite unrest.”
Other groups follow less extreme policies, but many base
editorial policies on economic interests and ratings. They practice
“opinionated coverage of news at the expense of an analytical approach”
along with “news management and censorship under the banner of national
interests.” A major failure of the U.S. media is its inability to
counter governmental “spin doctors,” who have been able to convince the
public of the mistaken notion that Saddam Hussein had something to do
with the September 11 terrorist attacks. Although the Bush White House
has spoken inconsistently on the Iraqi relation to Al Qaeda, one-half
the U. S. public believes the invasion of Iraq can be justified by the
war on terrorism.
In fact, Dergham said, the United States is embarking on a
doctrine of pre-emptive war unprecedented in our history; it is a new
policy of open-ended war. Unfortunately and dangerously, this war means
cooperating with Israel in a war against the Palestinians.
To Arabs the United States does not appear to be following its own
“roadmap for peace,” but rather seems to give unconditional support to
Israel, no matter how wrongheaded and destructive Israeli actions may
be. “We are being viewed as partners of Israel,” Dergham said.
In this battle, extremists on both sides mirror each other and push the
Middle East toward chaos. On one side is the extremism of Ariel Sharon,
who is building a wall between Israel and the West Bank and who may have
designs on Syria. On the other side, suicide bombers strike Israeli
civilians, while Arab terrorists organization are active throughout the
region, apparently moving into a destabilized Iraq, where they have the
opportunity to kill Americans.
In Washington, meanwhile, the neo-conservatives, once pushed
aside as dangerous radicals, have subverted the State Department and
gained control of foreign policy. Unless the president is defeated in
2004, Dergham said, the United States will be in for protracted war,
which is likely to bring back the military draft and cause a crushing
tax burden. Dergham does not see a necessarily happy ending to this
volatile predicament. “The Middle East is a ticking bomb that will blow
up in our face if things do not change,” she said.
And change can come about only if moderates in the United States
and in the Arab world work against extremism. On both sides, the public
needs to become more knowledgeable and more involved. Arab countries
require reform; in the United States extremists need to be turned out of
office; people everywhere should demand higher standards from the media.
“We need to personalize political issues,” Dergham said.
“It is no longer none of my business. It has to be brought home.
Make your voice heard. If you don’t like it, say so. Write or
e-mail.”
Charles Boebel
(Special to the Oak Leaves)
