The Arab News carries little beyond vitriolic commentary on the events in Lebanon and Gaza today:
Why Israel Can’t Win the War
Yes, We Are Witnessing War Crimes in Lebanon
Who Are the Real Terrorists in the Mideast?
Which Status Quo Are They Talking About?
Some of the opinion pieces are clearly more emotive than informative, but they’re still worth reading, if only to see how the Saudis are viewing the crisis.
The Enemy of My Enemy Is Still My Enemy
By BERNARD HAYKELWITH Israel at war with Hezbollah, where, you might wonder, is Al Qaeda? From all appearances on the Web sites frequented by its sympathizers, which I frequently monitor, Al Qaeda is sitting, unhappily and uneasily, on the sidelines, watching a movement antithetical to its philosophy steal its thunder. That might sound like good news. But it is more likely an ominous sign.
Al Qaeda’s Sunni ideology regards Shiites as heretics and profoundly distrusts Shiite groups like Hezbollah. It was Al Qaeda that is reported to have given Sunni extremists in Iraq the green light to attack Shiite civilians and holy sites. A Qaeda recruiter I met in Yemen described the Shiites as “dogs and a thorn in the throat of Islam from the beginning of time.â€
But now Hezbollah has taken the lead on the most incendiary issue for jihadis of all stripes: the fight against Israel.
Many Sunnis are therefore rallying to Hezbollah’s side, including the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt and Jordan. The Saudi cleric Salman al-Awda has defied his government’s anti-Hezbollah position, writing on his Web site that “this is not the time to express our differences with the Shiites because we are all confronted by our greater enemy, the criminal Jews and Zionists.â€
For Al Qaeda, it is a time of panic…
Here’s an interesting op-ed from The New York Times. The writer argues that Al-Qaeda must now do something dramatic if it is to retain relevance in its struggle against modernity. While I don’t necessarily agree with the entire analysis, it’s certainly worth reading.
The Royal Court Statement
Wednesday, 26 July 2006
Following is the statement issued Tuesday by the Royal Court:The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia has undertaken the role as part of its religious and national duty with regard to the situation in the region and the crisis in Lebanon and the occupied Palestinian territories.
In this regard it has cautioned, warned and extended advice. It has striven from the first moment to stop the aggression, moving on more than one front and using various means to persuade the international community to force Israel to agree to a ceasefire.
The Kingdom has dispatched the Foreign Minister and the Secretary General of the National Security Council to meet the US President in Washington and inform him of its views on the grave and unpredictable consequences of the Israeli aggression. The Kingdom has also asked personal envoys to visit the capitals of the Security Council permanent member states to convey the same message.The Arabs have proclaimed peace as a strategic option for their nation. They presented a just and distinct plan for regaining the occupied Arab territories in exchange for peace. They refused to respond to provocations and ignored anti-peace extremist calls.
It should be stated that patience cannot last forever. If the Israeli military brutality persisted with killings and destruction, no one can predict the consequences and then regrets will be in vain. Therefore, the Kingdom addresses an appeal and a warning to the international community in its entirety as represented by the UN and in particular the US.
Saudi Gazette provides a transcript of today’s Royal Court statement on Lebanon. It’s worthr reading the whole thing.
First Saudi tabloid survives closure and arrest
Andrew HammondRIYADH (Reuters) The fact that he still has a newspaper to edit is proof enough to Khalaf Alharbi that the ceiling of freedom in ultraconservative Saudi Arabia is rising.
His mischievous tabloid Shams, Arabic for Sun, has endured suspension, the arrest of one of its journalists and the carping of Islamist hard-liners who say it embodies the Westernized future they fear Saudi Arabia will face if liberals get their way.
But with a daily print-run of nearly 70,000, and recent permission to print inside the oil-producing kingdom instead of in neighboring Bahrain, Alharbi says the paper for young people aims to set a new standard after its first turbulent six months.
“Boldness is one of the basic tools of a journalist. You have to try to enter all the sensitive areas and you have to try to go over the line,” he said in an interview.
“Fear of the free press is based on an illusion. Countries that have a free press have discovered that there’s no problem, that the press can be responsible, because in the end the press is patriotic and loves its country.”
Shams, which is owned by a grandson of Crown Prince Sultan, has certainly put its money where its mouth is.
Trying to break the mold of Saudi Arabia’s sometimes drab print media, it avoided hiring experienced journalists.
“We preferred to have a team without previous journalistic experience. The rules of work on the other papers are a bit traditional, and we wanted to be different,” Alharbi said.
Saudi Arabia is one of the world’s most conservative societies, an absolute monarchy which governs through a strict interpretation of sharia, Islamic law. When King Abdullah came to power last year, he promised progress on a range of political, social and economic reforms.
The appearance of Saudi Arabia’s first tabloid last December has been seen as another sign of slow, but inevitable, change.
The paper has published sensational features about forced marriage for young girls, premarital relationships, unemployment among women, an official ban on school sports for girls and arbitrary detention by police.
Shams, the only Saudi newspaper to publish the notorious “Danish cartoons”, is the subject of this good piece from Andrew Hammond. Hammond is one of the better Reuters reporters, in my experience, who reliably covers news from the Arabian Peninsula. There were rumors that Shams was to both create an on-line presence and an English version, but I’ve not yet seen either. That’s a pity.
King Announces $1.5 Billion for Lebanon
Riyadh, 25 July (AKI) – Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah has decreed donations totalling 1.5 billion dollars to Lebanon, the king said in a statement on a state television network on Tuesday. A total 500 million dollars have been earmarked for the reconstruction of Lebanon, and the King has authorised one billion dollars to be deposited in Lebanon’s central bank to support the battered economy.
The king said that the Saudi government had been trying to bring a halt to the violence between Israel and Lebanon since it began on 12 July, when Hezbollah guerrillas snatched two Israeli soldiers in a cross-border raid from Lebanon
Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Jordan and Kuwait – which are traditionally allies of Washington – have criticised Hezbollah for the fighting in Lebanon.
More than 390 people have been killed in the past 14 days and over 600,000 Lebanese have been displaced. More than 40 Israelis have been killed, many in Hezbollah rocket attacks on northern Israel.
In the face of complaints by ordinary Saudis that the government condemns Hezbollah while hundreds of Lebanese non-combatants die, the King has announced this reconstruction program. That’s a good step, but obviously something else has to happen first.
US Summer Camps in Saudi Arabia
Mohammed Al-JazairyA different kind of summer camp is currently underway in Saudi Arabia’s eastern region. Under the auspices of the American Center and Informax, a global company, an educational summer camp is currently being held in Dammam, al Khobar and Jubail.
According to Thaer Manaa, the camp’s director, organizers hope participants will learn English, basic computer skills and enjoy the entertainment and advice on offer. The camp is divided into two age groups; each has its own activities.
The camp features an hour-long session with an U.S or British teacher followed by a session with an Arabic teacher. Participants then learn how to use the computer and play sports.
As a complementary piece to that about The 20th Terrorist (see below), Asharq Alawsat‘s Mohammed Al-Jazairy writes about summer camps for youths in Saudi Arabia. In contrast to the American-style camp, he notes the typical curriculum of a “traditional” Saudi camp:
As I met Firas and Yazid, newspapers announced the start of The Sea summer forum in Jeddah. In the first week, participants will attend lectures entitled: the end of humanity, the truth behind death, the last second of your life, tales of hypocrites… In the second week, lectures included: the reality of daawa in Africa, a girl’s tragedy, the delight of worship…
Big difference.
The Would-Be Terrorist’s Explosive Tell-All Tale
By Faiza Saleh AmbahJIDDAH, Saudi Arabia — When Abdullah Thabit recently saw a photo of one of the Sept. 11 hijackers for the first time, he felt a jolt of fear, and then a sadness so intense that tears streamed down his cheeks. The hijacker, Ahmed Alnami, was from Thabit’s home town, and he looked familiar.
Thabit is the author of “The 20th Terrorist,” which recounts his years as a religious extremist. He thinks he could easily have been in Alnami’s place.
“I felt like someone who’d gotten off a boat just in time and then watched it capsize with him and the others onboard,” Thabit says. “I love Nami, but I hate what he did. And it terrifies me that that could have been me.”
Abdullah Thabit is a brave man. He was deeply mired in the process by which extremism is created, subject to the whims and fantasies of radical Islamist teachers as a teenager in the Asir. He escaped, however, and has written about how extremism is created among young Saudis.
While he’s received death threats for blasphemy in attacking parts of the religious establishment, he’s also received support from at least some government officials. And he’s doing his best, through this best-selling book in Saudi Arabia as well as through small group meetings with Saudi youths, to break the chain. This Washington Post article is very much worth reading.
Two Views of the Same News Find Opposite Biases
By Shankar VedantamYou could be forgiven for thinking the television images in the experiment were from 2006. They were really from 1982: Israeli forces were clashing with Arab militants in Lebanon. The world was watching, charges were flying, and the air was thick with grievance, hurt and outrage.
There was only one thing on which pro-Israeli and pro-Arab audiences agreed. Both were certain that media coverage in the United States was hopelessly biased in favor of the other side.
Verying interesting piece in The Washington Post about how people who both have an opinion about something, as well as knowledge about it, tend to see bias in media reporting, whichever side of the argument they stand on.
The tendency to see bias in the news — now the raison d’etre of much of the blogosphere — is such a reliable indicator of partisan thinking that researchers coined a term, “hostile media effect,” to describe the sincere belief among partisans that news reports are painting them in the worst possible light.
Were pro-Israeli and pro-Arab viewers who were especially knowledgeable about the conflict immune from such distortions? Amazingly, it turned out to be exactly the opposite, Stanford psychologist Lee D. Ross said. The best-informed partisans were the most likely to see bias against their side.
Ross thinks this is because partisans often feel the news lacks context. Instead of just showing a missile killing civilians, in other words, partisans on both sides want the news to explain the history of events that prompted — and could have justified — the missile. The more knowledgeable people are, the more context they find missing.
Even more curious, the hostile media effect seems to apply only to news sources that strive for balance. News reports from obviously biased sources usually draw fewer charges of bias. Partisans, it turns out, find it easier to countenance obvious propaganda than news accounts that explore both sides.
“If I think the world is black, and you think the world is white, and someone comes along and says it is gray, we will both think that person is biased,” Ross said.
Do read the entire article.
In a thematically related article, the Post‘s media writer, Howard Kurtz, offers an interesting look at how the American media—particularly TV—is covering the war in Lebanon. That’s worth a look, too.
Bush Meets With Saudi Officials on Mideast Crisis
By Paula Wolfson
VOA — White HousePresident Bush met privately at the White House Sunday with top Saudi diplomats as the search continues for a formula to end the bloodshed between Israeli and Lebanese-based Hezbollah militants. The meeting took place just hours before Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice was scheduled to head to the region.
Voice of America (VOA), the US government’s international radio broadcasting channel, carries this report of the meeting between President Bush, Saudi Foreign Minister Saud Al-Faisal, and head of the Saudi National Security Council, Pr. Bandar bin Sultan.
The Foreign Minister told VOA:
He said he gave President Bush a letter from Saudi King Abdullah calling for an immediate ceasefire. “We requested a ceasefire to allow for the cessation of hostilities that would allow for the building of the forces of Lebanon,” he said.
Saud said the primary concern is protecting Lebanon’s sovereignty, adding President Bush is well aware of the toll the conflict is taking on the Lebanese people. “I found the president very conscious of the destruction and the bloodshed the Lebanese are suffering and anxiety to see the cessation of hostilities,” he said.
But the Bush administration has said an immediate ceasefire will not work, and that only a long-term solution that disarms Hezbollah while strengthening the Lebanese government will ensure peace.
The Saudi Official refused to speak about the differences of approach to the matter, saying only that he did not want to say anything that would jeopardize Secretary Rice’s trip. He also sidestepped questions about reports the United States wants Saudi Arabia to use its leverage with Syrian to convince Damascus to rein in Hezbollah.
The VOA webpage gives links to audio files of this brief interview, in Real Media format.
The Washington Post carries its own, similar report.
The New York Times report has more information, particularly noting that the US and Saudi Arabia are clear in their understanding of the issues. It also reports that the Saudis believe Secretary of State Rice’s visit to the region—now underway—will help reduce Arab anger toward the US.
The Arab News has gone into full anti-Israel mode in its commentary on the current Middle East crisis.
Today’s issue is full of material taken from the pages of CounterPunch magazine. That magazine, the product of Andrew Cockburn and Jeffrey St. Clair, represents a political view from the hard, revolutionary left. Among its contributors like Robert Fisk, are a couple appearing in this issue: Uri Avnery and Kathleen Cristison. The writings of both appear somewhat regularly in the paper. There’s also a report by Dr. Azmi Bishara, an Arab member of the Israeli Knesset. There are no surprises in his opinions.
While people certainly have the right to hold their own political opinions, newspapers like Arab News, to be responsible, should be carrying a variety and range of opinion. Restricting the viewpoint presented to one alone does several mischiefs.
First, it misinforms its readers by leading them to believe that the opinion expressed is wide-spread. Second, it prevents argument and discussion by pretending that there is only one side of the issue.
Third, it falls into a trap that it too frequently falls into. It assumes that because a writer says one thing favorable to the paper’s own point of view, then all of that writer’s opinions are somehow favorable. The Saudi papers have done this before when, for instance, they took up reprinting nonsense from David Duke or citing “The Protocols of the Elders of Zion” as authoritative.
Those later two came from the far right of the political spectrum in spreading their hate. The writers currently in favor come from the far left, but are no less hateful in their messages.
It’s really too bad that the paper has gone down this path. It loses credibility by doing so.
The Carnegie Endowment, an independent think tank, offers a collection of analyses (10-page PDF document) on the current crisis in the region.
The pieces look at Hezbollah, Syria, Iran Hamas, regional reaction (including Saudi Arabia’s), and the limitations of US policy in the region. It’s worth reading.
Making headlines today in the Saudi media are stories about the US’s expediting the shipment of previously ordered munitions to Israel, Secretary of State Rice’s impending visit to the region, and the threat of a major Israeli ground attack into Lebanon. The report on Rice’s press conference and a follow-up briefing by Assistant Secretary David Welch is rather even-handed. The others tend toward the vitriolic.
Editorials are predominantly anti-Israeli action.
The Letters to the Editor in Arab News carry a considerable number of letters by Americans. These challenge an earlier editorial and note that while the Arab media screams for Israel to abide by UN resolutions, there doesn’t seem to be much comment about UN resolutions about the disarming of Hezbollah (along with all other Lebanese militias) and the calming of the southern Lebanese border with Israel.
