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By
Vivian Salama
In late January 2006,
the Fatah-controlled Palestinian government announced the closure
of Hamas’ new Al Aqsa television network. The station’s
demise after only a few weeks on air came as no surprise to
those familiar with the tug-of-war that is Palestinian politics.
Named in honor of the famous Jerusalem mosque of the same name,
Al Aqsa TV had sought to reflect a softer, more civilly responsible
side of Hamas, the militant Islamist group that is considered
a terrorist organization by the US and Israel. In the months
leading up to its January 9 launch, Al Aqsa TV already had sparked
considerable controversy, and the Fatah-led government’s
move to silence Al Aqsa after less than three weeks on the air
ignited a firestorm of anger among Islamists in the West Bank
and Gaza. Rael Abu Deir, head of the controversial network,
admitted the station did not have a license but complained that
he had not been notified of the decision prior to the announcement.
"We have been trying for a year (to receive a license),”
he told Al Jazeera. “But the information minister told
us he was not yet taking applications.” With just three
days left before the Palestinian territories’ first parliamentary
election in a decade, it seemed that Hamas and the future of
Al Aqsa were at the mercy of the ruling Fatah party.
But then the tables
turned. On January 25, Palestinians living in the West Bank,
Gaza and East Jerusalem headed to the polls. By the end of the
next day, the green flags of Hamas draped the Palestinian territories
in triumph. In their first attempt at organized politicking,
the group—founded on principles that include armed resistance
and the obliteration of the state of Israel—had won an
unprecedented 56 percent of the seats (76 of 132) in the newly
established parliament.
Among other things,
Hamas’ victory instantly threatened Palestine’s
flow of financial aid. Nearly $2 billion of the Palestinian
Authority’s annual budget comes from overseas sources
– the majority from the European Union (EU). After Hamas’
win, US President George W. Bush took to the airwaves, asking
his Arab and European allies to take a firm stand against the
new Palestinian government unless it quashed its anti-Israel
rhetoric. Although the US eventually backed down somewhat and
pledged $245 million in response to the growing humanitarian
crisis in the Palestinian territories, the lack of funds remains
a major problem for the Hamas-led government.
Parliamentarians
promise the media is a priority, but it is just one of many
concerns awaiting consideration by the newly established government
– which is busy just trying to stay afloat. “There
is really a great deal of uncertainty thus far,” said
Ziad Abu Amr, an independent MP from Gaza. “But the media
is a tool in the struggle. This is a national struggle and so
we mustn’t air just any programming in haste.”
The Palestinian media arsenal currently consists of more than
80 public and private stations. These channels will now be re-formatted
to better serve the vision of the new, Hamas-led government,
Hamas officials told TBS. Not surprisingly, however,
concerns have arisen about the content of broadcasting, since
militant programming aired in the past has been directly linked
to Hamas. What influence will a Hamas government have on the
Palestinian media, particularly television? And as noted above,
funding remains a major concern. Some experts believe the Palestinian
Authority would be defunct were it not for the substantial financial
aid it receives annually. Will the proposed cuts leave the embattled
Palestinian media shell shocked?
Media: A
Tool in the Struggle
Prior to 1994, Palestinians
living the West Bank and Gaza Strip relied almost entirely on
Israeli-owned and operated news organizations for their information.
On July 2, 1994, an experimental transmission of the Voice of
Palestine was launched. Its objective was to broadcast messages
of solidarity uniting the people in the two occupied territories
toward the goal of achieving an independent Palestinian state.
Established by President Arafat with former head of the Arab
Journalists’ Association Radwan Abu Ayyash as its chairman,
it was the first taste of domestic media for the people of Palestine.
The experimental
transmissions were broadcasted twice daily – in the morning
from 6:30 to 10:30 and then again the evening from 5:00 to 10:30
– airing programs that ranged from music to news bulletins
and including programs about health, culture and sports. One
year after its launch, experimental transmissions were replaced
by permanent programming. Transmission times were extended and
the quality and quantity of programs rapidly increased.
Two years after
its debut, the Voice of Palestine – renamed the Palestinian
Broadcasting Corporation (PBC) – launched its first television
broadcasts. By that time, its radio counterpart had begun broadcasting
past midnight every night with ransmissions in Arabic, Hebrew
and English. By establishing a domestic television network,
the government sought to unify the media activities of the Palestinian
resistance through organized telecasts – including newscasts,
talk shows and entertainment.
“One of the impediments of Palestinian television is that
it is subject to the control of the Israelis,” explains
Ibrahim Saleh, a professor of journalism at the American University
in Cairo and the author of a book about Arab-Israeli dialogue,
Prior to the Eruption of the Grapes of Wrath in the Middle
East. “It’s like having a wheelchair for a
crippled person. It might help the crippled person move around
but this movement will be limited and orchestrated and monitored.”
Palestinian officials
admit there was difficulty. “It was a miracle that early
in the game, we were able to establish a radio and television
station, and eventually a satellite station,” says Nabil
Shaath, Palestine’s deputy Prime Minister and Minister
of Information until the 2006 elections. “I think we started
very early for a people under occupation.”
Indeed, the Palestinian
Liberation Organization (PLO) ran a tight ship at the PBC. Under
the auspice of President Arafat and the Palestinian Ministry
of Information, the message broadcast was generally in support
of the Oslo Agreement, signed in August 1993 by Israeli Prime
Minister Yitzhak Rabin and PLO Chairman Yasser Arafat in the
presence of US President Bill Clinton. The agreement sought
to normalize relations between Israel and the Arab world, though
many have deemed that agreement a failure. Much of the programming
served as an apparatus for rallying support for Fatah, with
party members admitting that Yasser Arafat’s picture and
voice became a national system used by government-owned stations.
“What happened was the politicians would choose all of
the circumstances to benefit their own interests,” explains
Moustafa Kabha, a professor of communications at Ben Gurion
University in Jerusalem.
It was not until
the Second Intifada that the Palestinian territories turned
into a free-for-all for both domestic and foreign news organizations.
Palestinian businessmen began to finance their own networks
as their national cause drew international attention. Television
and radio made a dramatic shift from a government-driven public
service to a nationalist bullhorn. “The media ultimately
changed from a political voice to a patriotic voice,”
Kabha notes.
And perhaps surprisingly,
Shaath agrees: “Rarely was anybody other than those carrying
the government’s message 100 percent allowed on our television
or radio. It was a very unilateral approach.” But Shaath
claims this attitude began to change after he took over.
Virtual Palestine
As mentioned above,
more than 80 radio and television networks are based in the
West Bank and Gaza – with the majority of radio stations
in Gaza and most television stations in Ramallah, Nablus and
Bethlehem. More than 30 of them are privately owned television
networks (territorial law requires the owner of any private
network be a Palestinian individual, registered company or an
NGO.) Revenues for all private networks —with the exception
of Al-Quds Educational Television, which receives funding from
local NGOs and international donor groups like USAID—come
from commercials and NGO-funded programs.
Satellite dishes
have become a more affordable luxury in recent years, and so
Palestinians in the isolated territories remain connected through
audio-visual transmissions. Palestinians living in both the
West Bank and Gaza as well as those in Israel can watch the
extensive coverage of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict not only
on their own channels but also on pan-Arab satellite stations
such as Al Jazeera and Al Arabiya as well as Hizbullah’s
Al Manar, US-funded Alhurra, and hundreds of other networks.
Though they couldn’t attend in person, Palestinians tuned
in to the funeral procession held in Cairo for Arafat before
his body was brought back to its final resting place in Ramallah.
Residents of the West Bank celebrated by remote the withdrawal
of Israeli troops and settlers from the Gaza Strip in August
2005. Today, Palestinians watch tensely as Israel’s new
Prime Minister Ehud Olmert – whose Kadima Party swept
the March elections – officially proposes plans for establishing
the final borders between Israel and the Palestinian territories.
“The Palestinian media has changed the image and politics
of the government,” says Kabha. “It has changed
Palestinian relations with Israel."
Israeli Broadcasting
Authority
Palestinians living
in the West Bank and Gaza have access to the two networks aired
by the Israeli Broadcasting Authority (IBA). Funded entirely
by sponsorship from commercial entities as well as by levying
television license fees from those with television sets, its
purpose upon creation was to facilitate and regulate commercially-operated
broadcasts in Israel. The IBA, since its first broadcast as
an independent station in 1948, has been assigned the responsibility
for the creation of public networks in Israel. Since its inception,
the networks under IBA have remained dedicated to directly addressing
citizen complaints and current events issues.
One of its television
stations, Channel 2, was established in November 1993. The channel,
which aired a variety of news, culture and entertainment programming,
was a major profit generator for the IBA. To this day, two percent
of the broadcast time allotted on IBA commercial channels is
reserved for public interest programs produced by the Authority.
“Channel 2 is amazing—the quality, the tactics,
the set, the reporters, the networking, the kind of guests they
bring,” Saleh enthuses. “They have the money; they
have the planning. One of the flaws in the Arab world is we
do not have this media management and economics. It’s
given no attention.”
Despite its efforts,
critics say that the Israeli media has remained disconnected
from the conflict with the Palestinians. Channel 2, for example,
does have a Palestinian affairs correspondent based in Gaza
— a Palestinian who files his reports in a fluent Hebrew
tongue. However, coverage of Israeli-Palestinian clashes were
sometimes overshadowed by alternate programming. “The
dilemma has been trying to create a balance between comedy,
drama, and say, a bombing,” says Itamar Marcus, director
of the ring-wing Israeli group Palestinian Media Watch.
Many Israeli activists
like Marcus believe Palestinian television greatly differs from
Israeli broadcasts in the sense that Palestinian media functions
as a tool for self-defense in the political struggle with Israel.
While Israeli media has the funding and political clearance
to broadcast, Palestinian media nonetheless has a clearer, more
unified vision. Some say Israel’s state-run broadcasts
fail to firmly establish its position or objective.
An example Marcus
cites goes back to the days of the Second Intifada. One of Israel’s
privately owned networks carried a live broadcast of a major
soccer game being played by the Israeli national team. At some
point in the game, a deadly suicide bombing ripped through an
Israeli town. After switching over to live pictures from the
scene of the bombing, network executives chose that the game
was too great a money-generator to forfeit. They then made a
highly criticized decision to carry both events live on split
screen. “On one side, there were people carrying away
dead bodies. On the other side, the soccer game,” Marcus
recalls. “It was a big, big blunder. But it goes to show
you that there is never an outward attempt by Israeli TV to
defend Israel.”
The Second
Intifada: ‘No one will mute the Palestinian voice’
In September 2000,
then-Likud party delegate Ariel Sharon made the controversial
visit to the mosque compound of the Temple Mount—deemed
the third holiest site in Islam—with a 1,000-strong armed
bodyguard entourage and claiming it was a march for peace. Waving
Israeli flags, the move provoked anger among Palestinians who
claimed it was an act of sheer incursion against the mosque.
Protests erupted in East Jerusalem as well as in the West Bank
and Gaza.
Violence quickly
escalated, marking the start of the Second Intifada. The state-owned
Palestinian media quickly turned into a “tool in the struggle.”
The PBC abandoned all regular programming, broadcasting minute-by-minute
coverage of the conflict with Israel. (Israeli television maintained
a regular schedule but would break in whenever there was a noteworthy
attack.) Commercials were created bluntly calling for Palestinians
of all ages to assume the role of freedom fighters for the homeland.
Critics attacked the Palestinian media for broadcasting messages
of terror. “It was a nonstop war atmosphere with 1-2-3
clips encouraging young kids to be shaheed (martyrs),”
recalls Marcus.
“During the
Intifada, television and radio became a tool for generating
resistance and generating steadfastness facing very difficult
times,” explained Shaath. “They became very militant
… attempting to show the criminality of Israeli attacks,
but to whom? The only ones who were watching the Palestinian
broadcasts were the Palestinians.”
The event that marked
perhaps the pinnacle of fighting during the Intifada was triggered
by the overwhelming coverage of the death of Mohammed El-Dura,
a 12-year old Palestinian boy who was captured by cameras dying
in his father’s arms after being caught in a hail of Israeli
bullets (many Israeli activists claim the bullets were in fact
from Palestinian gunfire). Within days of his death, commercials
were broadcast incessantly calling out to children to "Drop
your toys. Pick up rocks." One commercial featured a child
actor playing the role of El-Dura. It aired images of the boy
in “child heaven,” telling young viewers, “I
wave to you not to say goodbye but to say follow me.”
“It was a message of horror,” Marcus insists. “It
was a massive brainwash telling children they should be out
fighting.” The commercial sparked sharp criticism from
the West. US Senator and former First Lady Hillary Clinton spoke
out during a senate hearing on the ramifications of using violent
propaganda on Palestinian national television. “How can
you think about building a better future, no matter what your
political views, if you indoctrinate your children to a culture
of death,” she was quoted by the Jerusalem Post
as saying in November 2003.
Many Palestinians
saw the issue differently. “How do you objectively report
Israelis shooting and killing children?” questions independent
parliamentarian Abu Amr, angrily. “Yes, there are certain
things that go beyond the definition of national struggle, but
ultimately, this is a conflict. People are killing each other.
People are exercising aggressive measures. What do you expect
a people under occupation to do?”
As the back-and-forth
attacks continued, Israeli forces retaliated against the voice
of the people—the Palestinian media. Even in the early
days of the Intifada, the PBC was the site of several attacks
by Israeli forces. In October 2000, PBC officials allege Israeli
soldiers broke into their Ramallah headquarters, stealing files
and equipment and placing explosives in the building. The station,
as a result, was blown off the air for a day in October 2000.
Two months later, the network was incapacitated for one month
following a shelling by an Israeli Apatchi.
On January 18, 2002,
Al Aqsa Martyrs Bridages, the military wing of Fatah, claimed
responsibility for a deadly massacre on Jewish guests at a Bat
Mitzvah in Hadera that left six people dead and more than 30
wounded. The next day, Israeli soldiers once again left retaliatory
explosives in the PBC headquarters, destroying several floors
of the building. For one week, the PBC was once again off the
air. On February 26, PBC’s deputy coordinator Maher Al-Rayyes
was the first to broadcast a message during experimental transmissions.
“Sons of Arafat know very well how to start from nothing;
no one will mute the Palestinian voice,” he said.
It was not until
mid-2004 that the Palestinian media toned down the messages
of militancy and began to air programs having nothing to do
with the conflict with Israel. By early 2005, networks had resumed
regularly scheduled broadcasts. For Palestinians, it was a time
to rebuild. So much had been lost during the years of the Second
Intifada and just as the media was a tool in the struggle, it
now had to rise to the challenge of being a tool for the future.
Changing
Tides
No one really knew
for sure whether the Palestinian people would actually get to
vote in the first parliamentary elections in a decade, scheduled
for January 25, 2006. For starters, Israel’s then-Prime
Minister Ariel Sharon had fallen deathly ill from complications
from an earlier stroke. His incapacitation cast a cloud of uncertainty
on a number of issues, including the future of the Palestinians.
Having orchestrated the withdrawal from Gaza only months earlier,
the only party expected to carry out Sharon’s vision was
the centrist Kadima party, headed by acting Prime Minister Ehud
Olmert.
Consequently, the
issue of voting in East Jerusalem remained a concern for Israeli
authorities until the last minute. President Mahmoud Abbas had
vowed to postpone the elections so long as Palestinians living
in East Jerusalem were excluded. In an eleventh hour decision,
members of the Knesset chose to permit Palestinians to vote
in the old city’s Arab quarter at a post office alongside
the historic Damascus gate on the condition that Hamas could
not campaign in Jerusalem. All the while, more than a dozen
political parties battled it out in the West Bank and Gaza for
a place in Palestine’s newly established 132-seat parliament.
Each political party
was allotted 30 minutes per night during the campaign period
to present their case to people living in the war-torn territories
although Fatah and its biggest rival, the Hamas Islamic Resistance
Movement, were the predetermined favorites among the people.
Still, as incumbents, Fatah officials admit they had an advantage.
“There was no direct Fatah propaganda except during the
allotted half hour,” Shaath affirms. “Whether we
like it or not, however, some of the speakers invited to speak
on different shows were Fatah, so I wouldn’t say it was
a 100 percent disappearance of Fatah.” Kabha
confirms: “The elections were a good opportunity for politicizing
the image of Palestine, but official television showed all issues
through the image of Fatah.”
Election Day created
a media frenzy not just for the domestic networks – which
at that point had sprung up all across the two territories –
but for the international media community as well. The death
of Yasser Arafat more than a year earlier combined with the
withdrawal from Gaza and the political participation of Hamas
had sparked newfound international interest in the Palestinian
cause. Yet the frenzy would not really begin until the announcement
that Hamas would walk away with more than half the seats in
parliament. Suddenly, a story that had grown into monotonous
back-and-forth negotiations between the Fatah-run PA and the
Israeli government formalized into a diplomatic rivalry between
neighbors.
Palestinian
Television in the Hamas Age
“The question
now is will Hamas make positive changes for TV?” says
Kabha. “Before, there was so much corruption, no transparency.
The people saw this and decided for themselves.”
With Hamas earning
an unprecedented 56 percent of the reformatted parliament, the
people of Palestine are bracing for drastic changes. After assuming
an official role in government, Hamas was immediately forced
to make a decision regarding its stance toward Israel. So long
as the group promoted messages of anger and armed resistance
via its airwaves against the Jewish state, it could risk hurling
any future of a permanent Palestinian state into permanent limbo.
“We’ve
seen a rise in violent clips—clips with a little more
hatred in the messages being broadcast in the past few months,”
says Marcus. “By the time of the elections, Palestinian
television was showing more variety—children’s programs,
sports. Now so-called education programs dealing with ‘historical’
programs are bringing academics talking about why Israel has
no right to the land, about the delegitimization of Israel.”
Despite its militant reputation, Hamas’ commitment to
civic responsibility over the years – particularly in
Gaza – has paid off in the form of overwhelming support
in the last election. Officials with the new government say
the Palestinian media will serve as a mouthpiece, reflecting
a side of Hamas not commonly known to the outside world. “It
is not to our advantage to broadcast messages against Israel
or America,” notes Youssef Rezqa, Palestine’s new
Minister of Information under Hamas. “We want to correct
the international image of Hamas through the media. There is
so much about Hamas that has been forgotten because of this
political panic.”
Freedom of the press
remains a concern – though by no means does this make
the Palestinian territories an exception in the region. About
one month after Hamas officially took office, the Palestinian
Journalists’ Union reported alleged death threats to seven
Gaza-based journalists. The threats – received by telephone,
email and fax – were said to have been signed by Hamas.
Several Palestinian reporters have been beaten over coverage
of the Fatah government in the past, and a journalist who ran
a government-funded magazine was killed in 2004. Regional impediment
to free speech and reporting is frequent and journalists across
the region often suffer disciplinary action with regard to negative
coverage of ruling regimes – regardless of whether or
not it is true.
Meanwhile, as noted
at the beginning of the article, Hamas enticed international
audiences with the debut of its own official channel, Al Aqsa
just prior to the January elections. In 2003, the Fatah-run
Palestinian Authority had granted Hamas a broadcasting license
for radio and television in Gaza. The Voice of Al Aqsa, as it
was called, would quickly become the most popular radio station
in the Gaza strip. It took another two years for the group to
establish its television network. Modeled after Hezbollah’s
Al Manar satellite network in Lebanon, Al Aqsa broadcasts from
a secret location in Gaza to homes in the two territories. Israeli
satellites do not show the Hamas-run network.
Prior to its cancellation,
Al Aqsa served as a window into a world Hamas supporters say
is greatly misunderstood. Children’s programs featured
dancing actors in larger than life fuzzy animal costumes, singings
songs that would appeal to children anywhere. The network featured
cultural and “historical” programs which served
as a mouthpiece for a group that has been suppressed even by
the Palestinian government under Fatah. After Hamas’s
stunning victory in January’s election, Al Aqsa has begun
experimental transmissions, according to Rezqa, but remains
limited to an extent since the media is still under the auspice
of the president.
Hamas says it is
the responsibility of the new government to establish guidelines
for “appropriate” programming as based on the conservative
demands of society. “Some foreign music videos, for example,
we feel are against our morals,” explains Ghazi Hamed,
editor in chief of Hamas’s El Rasala (the Message) newspaper
and spokesman for the Islamic party. “We want to put a
frame that the media is not just for entertainment but to educate
the people. It’s a cultural weapon. It talks of our morals,
of our national struggle against Israel.”
Under Palestinian
law, the President remains the highest authority over the public
media. Fatah officials are concerned, however, that when President
Mahmoud Abbas goes through parliament to pass any legislation
related to the media, his minority faction will not get a word
in edgewise. “There will probably be a struggle,”
admits Shaath. “I think Hamas will try to take over the
radio and television from the president. Even when the president
tries to implement laws, they will be stopped by parliament
if Hamas doesn’t like them.”
As for funding,
the PA’s largest donor—the European Union—has
granted emergency funds as the United States threatens to freeze
financial transfers to the Hamas-run PA. In theory, the money
will go directly to support welfare issues, particularly to
those in Gaza who are in dire need of assistance. Shaath says
that funding to the media in recent years has come directly
from the Palestinian authority. Not so, say Hamas authorities,
who claim they will turn to the other Arab nations for help.
“It is shameful for the Palestinians to submit. Our morals
and values are more important than money,” says Hamed.
“If we get assistance, great, but it doesn’t mean
we should obey their demands. I think we can recruit money from
other sources, from the other Arab and Muslim countries.”
Regardless of the
source of funding, Hamas now has the opportunity to present
itself in a new light. If their televised messages reflect their
hostility, it could jeopardize progress that has been made in
the struggle for peace. Says Kabha: All in due time. “I
think we will see changes step by step.”
Vivian
Salama is a freelance journalist based in Cairo. She
also freelances as a field producer for the Associated Press
Television Network (APTN). She has reported for Newsweek
Magazine, The International Herald Tribune, The Daily
Star, The Jerusalem Post and Al Ahram Weekly. She
has aslo appeared as a commentator on BBC World, Egyptian Television
and South African Broadcasting Corporation. Until December 2003,
Vivian was the producer for NBC News.
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