Actually, al-Jazeera does a better job of covering the Middle East than most Arab and Israeli media. While the Israeli media, for example, does include interviews with “moderate” Arabs, for example, they exclude interviews with “extremists” and frequently censor the news, changing words and phrases to those more acceptable to the Israeli audience.

On the otherhand, al-Jazeera frequently interviews rightwing Israeli fanatics like Benjamin Netanyahu, along with many more moderate Israelis. They frequently have interviews with leaders of the extremist Israeli settler movement, for example, and regardless of whether one might agree about the use of the terms “moderate” or “extremist” they are appropriate int he context of how audiences in the Arab world view Netanyahu and the settlers … and how Israelis view “moderate” and “extremist” Israelis.

I think its great that Israel is finally allowing more media into the country. I wish they would stop censoring and restricting media coverage of the Occupied Territories and allow more Arab journalists to cover those activities firsthand without relying on wire serviced news reports covered locally and then transmitted to major media.

Anyway, just my thoughts
Ray Hanania
http://www.ArabWritersGroup.com

And on unrelated note, Anna Nicole Smith just died. Esra’a — any plans to write fanmail to her — or maybe an obit — in the satire section?

Wow, you know about that? I thought no one read/enjoyed those. That’s why I stopped writing it.

this was mostly a response to the comments, not to the post itself, as she stated she was curious and not at all threatened. But the comments that came later is what bothered me which triggered my lengthy response.

I hear what you’re saying. And I’m with you, sister! Hopefully, in our lifetimes, we’ll all be able to visit each other’s countries, report the news with a sense of humor, and get to know each other.

And hello to you, too, Jina,

Israel claim to be a free society, if you don’t allow Al-Jazeerah then you are a hypocrite and shouldn’t claim to be a free society.

I’m proud that Israel allows Al-Jazeera, even if it can sometimes feel like masochistic behavior. You’re right, it goes a long way to providing a proof point for the country’s openness and commitment to freedom of speech.

Great discussion, in the end, Eliesheva, even if it started out a bit angry in the comments…

And on unrelated note, Anna Nicole Smith just died. Esra’a — any plans to write fanmail to her — or maybe an obit — in the satire section?

And if you ‘own’ an Israeli passport and don’t use it to come in or leave the country, they do get mighty pissed, doesn’t matter what your last name is.

I have many more stories like this. What you think about this?

What’s funny is that Iran wasn’t letting an Arab-Israeli in for that Holocaust conference because his passport was Israeli.

Yeah, it’s like what’s the point of the conference if Israelis weren’t allowed to attend? Who else were they expecting? Haha.

Jordan is fine. Syria is a surprise because I’ve been told there’s no way, and I assumed Lebanon does whatever Syria does. Truth is, I’d like to go to Lebanon, not Syria. Anyway… Jordan and Sinai are 100% ok on Israeli passports, Egypt is supposed to be too (though I’d go on the American anyway). Other than that, things get complicated. My dad was getting messed up for Dubai because he had Israeli stamps in his American. I’m sure there are all kinds of factors and it’s not the same for everyone.

It’s about why Eliesheva or me, or my mother, or the guy at the corner market where the Al Jazeerah reporters buy their milk, can’t visit the UAE, or Saudi Arabia, or any other number of places.

Answer to this is simple. Al-Jazeerah is not the problem here, it’s the dictators and their governemnt in those Arab countries.

Israel claim to be a free society, if you don’t allow al-Jazeerah, then you are a hypocrite and shouldn’t claim to be a free society.

My gf’s mom has an Israeli passport, she was in Syria and Jordan last year, Lebanon also I think.

If you started working for Al Jazeera that would be the coolest thing. And yeah, British accents, that’s international, and that means no messing around. The international version is taken way more seriously and from what I’ve seen of it, it’s very thought provoking and decent.

Apply apply apply.

I’m going to assume for now English, though, as I overheard two of their staff who were clearly not Jewish or Israeli or Arab, speaking in British accents.

In fact, imagine that we have a law that says all Israeli, Iranian, Kurdish and Arab networks are required by our collective constitution to provide satirical news only. Not even sports coverage are allowed if we’re not mocking the game itself.

That is utopia… oh man. We’d crack up all day together and no one would feel the need to bomb themselves in a crowded cafe.

Either that or we require everyone to riverdance to Celtic music with at least 5 people of different cultural backgrounds – Israeli, Sunni, Shia, Kurdish, whatever the hell you are – you just dance.

See we got ideas. All we need is to eliminate 99% of the Mideast’s overall population and we may actually be getting somewhere.

By the way – is it Al Jazeera English or Arabic that is there? The reporting is actually very different. The international one tends to be more calm and, well, “international.” The Arabic one reports a lot from Iraq and Lebanon and it’s way more unethical. Dead bodies everywhere.

If arriving by air or by sea and wishing to go to Arab states with the same passport, ask the Israeli immigration officer to put his stamp onto a separate piece of paper. Then you’re safe not to be denied entry by the Arab states named above. Citizens of some countries (such as Germany or Czech Republic) have the possibility of applying for a second passport. This allows them to have an Israeli stamp in one passport and travel to the Arab states with another one.

So while it’s not a legal thing, many people do resort to this method, and get away with coming in and out of Arab states under different passports and getting away with no stamps, etc.

They don’t ban you because they hate you, necessarily. They do so because of fear from the powerful Israeli government, and remember, this is like holding the 1967 grudge which many Arab leaders have yet to get over. We got all of these useless laws between us but I don’t think we should make the gap even bigger by making it seem like it just applies to a single nation. It applies to us as well – we get an Israeli stamp and we’re screwed. Some even risk losing citizenship. It’s not about keeping you out of our lives, it’s about keeping BOTH OF US, arabs and israelis, away from each other. So in this, we are both victims.

Remember that our governments LOVE using the “Israel is evil” divisionary tactics in order to get away with their own crimes, if we get the chance to come to you, that will be over. We’d realize that you guys pose no bigger threat than say, Iran does. Etc. It’s nothing to do with hatred, even though it’s portrayed that way. It’s a strategy used by Arab leaders.

I’m cool with that. I love that. I want more of that. All over the Middle East. Don’t we all? Isn’t that part of this site’s message/mission?

That was exactly my point, but you get people complaining, with all of the preconceived ideas about Al Jazeera’s intentions in Israel.

It’s about why Eliesheva or me, or my mother, or the guy at the corner market where the Al Jazeerah reporters buy their milk, can’t visit the UAE, or Saudi Arabia, or any other number of places.

Then this has absolutely nothing to do with Al Jazeera and everything to do with our governments.

And just so you know – we can’t come to your country either. Our own governments wouldn’t allow it, so Al Jazeera being there means that we’d have a better taste of what’s going on. First we had blogs to do that, now we have an actual news network doing all the field work. It’s exciting, not threatening at all, and it’s a great sign. I’m sure that due to this, Qatar will changes its laws, Bahrain was already in talks about changing the laws to make us freely visit Israel and vice versa, etc. It’s progress.

Also, a very large number of Israelis have dual citizenships. Israeli/Russian, Israeli/American, Israeli/Canadian, Israeli/French, etc. And thus, I meet many of such people in the Arab world. They can visit very easily and many of them do, so it’s hardly an issue of being imprisoned or whatever. Many Israelis really do travel all over the Arab world under their own passports, and the lifestyle in Israel is much better off than most of the lifestyles in Arab countries, especially when it comes to education and job opportunities for all, so I don’t think they should be portrayed as victims here. They’re clearly not. Our governments do not represent our own opinions.

This discussion is not about saying Al Jazeerah reporters suck or that they shouldn’t be in Israel. It’s about why Eliesheva or me, or my mother, or the guy at the corner market where the Al Jazeerah reporters buy their milk, can’t visit the UAE, or Saudi Arabia, or any other number of places.

Its an intersting contrast, is all. These reporters, who transmit stories that their audience seemingly WANTS to be anti-Israel can come to Israel, see the country and hopefully meet the people and learn more. And Israeli people with a genuine interest in seeing other Arab countries and meeting those countries’ people, can’t do that.

This isn’t about Al Jazeera reporters per se, but rather about what their presence in her office building got Eliesheva thinking about — at least that’s what this discussion means for me. Of course, do not mean to speak for her ideas, or anyone else’s.

But for the people who are watching Al Jazeera, and seeing all the terrible things Israel does, and are not seeing all the terrible things that other countries do

Sorry but this is not the case at all.

Al Jazeera are banned from certain countries for a reason – they are reporting and exposing things from all over, NOT just about Israel and in fact there were many journalists who were giving a voice to Israelis and Jews.

Look at Al Jazeera English if you may, it gave a powerful voice to an Israeli activist on the night of Eid. It totally was in favor of Israel, Israelis, and Jews and the opinions were met with the utmost respect. You really call that hate, propaganda, etc? It promoted interfaith THROUGHOUT Eid, Christmas, and all the other celebrations. Jews were in the studio, and were portrayed very nicely on the show, as were the Muslims and Christian interfaith activists.

Al Jazeera is so misunderstood. People blame it for being all those things without actually watching shows in their entirety – if you even notice, EVERYONE is offended. Me as a Muslim, you as a Jewish Israeli, Americans, everyone is exposed, everyone is at some point misportrayed, it’s how media works and it is NOT Al Jazeera’s intention to create or incite violence at all. So I really wish you guys would cut them some slack, a lot of them risk their lives to do their jobs, many of them get caught in the violence and die not in the process of inciting hatred but in the process of giving us information. Their journalists are specifically targeted, everywhere. They target them because they are REPORTING as best as they can, not promoting hate.

Muslims hate them, Americans hate them, now Israel hates them – seriously guys, they are reporters. They’re just trying to do their jobs. Give them a chance to and let’s cut the paranoia a bit. Remember that they were kicked out and banned from Arab countries for the mere reason that they were exposing a lot of OUR faults too. Not just yours.

You can quote their journalists and editors and say “they’re haters,” but the truth is that many of them are critical of Arab regimes. There are many journalists working there, and having met many of them, I know that they are making a huge effort to try and make this more about the truth than to sell an agenda, and guess what? ALL news services, including Israeli ones, are guilty of that. Why hold a grudge against Al Jazeera? Because you think it doesn’t help you out in the massive PR war?

I don’t agree with many things that Al Jazeera does, like I said they better review their code of ethics, but they are making a huge effort to make your voices heard. It bothers me that just because of their previous reputation, you think that ownership doesn’t change, filters don’t change, journalists don’t change – they do. Al Jazeera English is actually proof of the struggle, they give a lot of light to issues that no other news network dares to report. Their staff has become incredibly diverse.

If you wanna talk about racism and prejudice Howie, you should look at your own response. So what, you’re going to ban every other Arab network from Israel and then claim to want “peace”? You wanna work hand in hand with other Arab media? Who says they’re going to damage your reputation? People are learning to stand up and criticize their own governments as a RESPONSE to a lot of the things Al Jazeera promotes, free speech included. Give them that credit, and never claim that you’re not as guilty as they are when Israel launches one PR campaign after another in hopes of maintaining dominance over news outlets that get exported out into the world. EVERY news service is guilty. There is a hidden agenda and an ideology behind everything. I think Al Jazeera having an office in Israel is a really good sign for all of us, you included. I really do.

Al Jazeera at the end of the day is an Arabic service. It caters to ARAB viewers, of course they would have to appeal to their ideals and report the type of things that they want to hear. But so does Fox News, who also have a very defined audience. So does a lot of Israeli sources. So do the French news channels that I’ve seen which also have a specific audience amongst their own population – Muslims, Algerians, etc vs. the very conservative and nationalist French types.

Sorry for the massive post. They just do not deserve what you guys are saying about them. If anything you should be excited about this.

You can whitewash around the edges all you want…it is utter prejudice…pure and simple…mixed with the fear the brainwashed citizens might find out they have been lied to by their governments about Jews and Israelis.

Pure nonsense, Howie. Sorry, but you really have a misinformed opinion, I already laid out why this happens in my previous post and I think you should read it.

It’s NOT about Israelis and Jews. It’s about PRESS LAWS that apply to ALL Arabs as well.