http://www.boston.com/news/globe/edi...sses_the_news/

TWO DAYS after the liberation of Baghdad, a senior news executive at CNN disclosed that his network had for years been sanitizing its reports from Iraq. In an op-ed column titled "The news we kept to ourselves," Jordan Eason confessed that CNN routinely chose not to report on the atrocities committed by Saddam Hussein's regime. To have revealed the truth, he wrote, "would have jeopardized the lives of Iraqis, particularly those on our Baghdad staff."
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Suppressing news by threatening reporters with violence or death is one of the dirty little secrets of Middle East journalism. In his 1989 memoir "From Beirut to Jerusalem," Thomas Friedman wrote that "physical intimidation" was a major impediment to honest reporting from Beirut during the years when southern Lebanon was in the grip of Yasser Arafat's PLO.

"There were . . . stories which were deliberately ignored out of fear," Friedman admitted. "How many serious stories were written from Beirut about the well-known corruption in the PLO leadership. . . ? It would be hard to find any hint of them in Beirut reporting before the Israeli invasion." Instead of reporting what they knew, journalists censored themselves. "The Western press coddled the PLO," Friedman acknowledged. "For any Beirut-based correspondent, the name of the game was keeping on good terms with the PLO."

That was more than 20 years ago. Has anything changed?

In the wake of the 1993 Oslo Accord, Arafat and the PLO assumed control of the Palestinian population in Gaza and the West Bank. Reconstituted as the Palestinian Authority, or PA, they lost no time cracking down on the press.

Arafat's "security forces have made more than 30 arrests of journalists and editors," the Columbia Journalism Review noted in 1996. "Although they have been almost completely freed from the Israeli yoke of military censorship, Palestinian journalists are being fettered in new ways. Reporters Sans Frontieres, a watchdog group based in Paris, released a report . . . deploring the Palestinian Authority's policy of suspending newspapers and employing threats and violence against journalists. . . . The result is a tame, compliant press that . . . rarely engages in investigative journalism and publishes only . . . `vegetarian' criticism of the regime."

ONGOING HARASSMENT

Recent events would indicate that no, nothing has changed in the Palestinian areas. Violence and threats against journalists working for foreign news agencies -- and Palestinians who dare to report independently -- remain all too common. Here are some of the violent incidents in 2004 alone:

*http://usa.mediamonitors.net/layout/...iew/full/5029/

Journalists protest lack of protection
by Ahmad Sub Laban
(Thursday 19 February 2004)

January 2004 - Reporter Seifeddin Shahin of Dubai's Al Arabiya television network is beaten at gunpoint by masked Palestinians. Shahin had reported on internal divisions within Arafat's Fatah party.
*
February 2004 - The offices of Al Quds Educational Televison in Ramallah are ransacked and staff members are threatened by masked Palestinians. Also, Munir Abu Rizek, bureau chief of the PA daily Al Hayat al Jadeeda, has his car torched after reporting on corruption within the PA
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*http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satelli...=1078373359847
Mar. 4, 2004 10:27 | Updated Mar. 5, 2004 21:40
Losing authority
By KHALED ABU TOAMEH

March 2 2004 - Khalil al Zaban, editor of the monthly Al-Nashra, is murdered in Gaza City while working on an article critical of Gaza leader Mohammad Dahlan.
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*http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satelli...1087787670433&

p=1078027574121
Jun. 21, 2004 23:44 | Updated Jun. 22, 2004 13:49
Aksa Martyrs admit attacking journalist
By KHALED ABU TOAMEH

April 22 2004 - An Agence France Press photographer has both arms broken by two masked Palestinian gunmen from Yassir Arafat's Al Aksa Brigades.
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*http://backspin.typepad.com/backspin...inians_tr.html
Thursday, May 20, 2004
Palestinians try to kidnap NY Times reporter

May 19 2004 - New York Times Jerusalem bureau chief James Bennet is a victim of an attempted kidnapping by Palestinian gunmen in Gaza City.
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http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satelli...090653170416&p

=1078397702269
Jul. 24, 2004 14:53 | Updated Jul. 25, 2004 1:13
Palestinian journalists receive death threats
By KHALED ABU TOAMEH
*
July 20 2004 - The Palestinian Journalists Syndicate warns that any reporter caught covering clashes between rival groups in Gaza will be 'punished severely.'
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*http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satelli...1092021259340&

p=1078027574121
Aug. 9, 2004 23:10 | Updated Aug. 9, 2004 23:15
Reporters warned not to cover PA chaos
By KHALED ABU TOAMEH
August 9 2004 - Armed Palestinian militias in Gaza threaten to attack journalists working for Arab satellite stations due to their continued focus on the power struggle in the Palestinian Authority.

WHAT THE MEDIA MISSED

The ongoing intimidation of journalists removes the presumption that media coverage is fair and unbiased, as Jacoby writes: 'Journalists like to cultivate a reputation for fearlessness, for a publish-and-be-(*)(*)(*)(*)ed commitment to putting out the story no matter what. The reality is not always so heroic.'

With the magnitude of this problem, one can't help but wonder if some important stories are being suppressed, for example:
*http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/3527204.stm
Jailed Palestinians killed

August 2: Palestinians accused of aiding Israel are attacked first in a PA prison, then gunned down in their hospital beds. Imagine the outcry in the media and from human rights groups if Israeli troops were to storm a hospital and open fire within! But was this story even mentioned on your local news?
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*http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=stor...ideast_un_dc_1
Palestinians Mislead UN on Youth's Death -Israel

July 22: When a Palestinian teenager tries to prevent Palestinian terrorists from using his family's backyard as a base for rocket fire into Israel, the teenager is shot dead

by the terrorists. The Palestinian delegate to the UN then includes this boy among 59 "martyrs" recently "killed by the Israeli occupying forces." Did this story make your local news?
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*http://abcnews.go.com/wire/World/ap20040811_1275.html
Explosion at West Bank Checkpoint Kills 2
Bombing at West Bank Checkpoint Kills Two Palestinians, and Wounds 13

August 11: After terrorists from Yassir Arafat's Al Aqsa Brigades detonate a bomb at the Kalandiya checkpoint, killing two Palestinian bystanders and wounding more than 10 others, the head of the Jenin branch of the terrorist group apologizes, explaining, 'We didn't expect people to be killed.' And the PA cabinet secretary shows callous disregard for innocent life by stating, "These groups must avoid every spot where there is a possibility that a Palestinian will be there."

Yet news outlets such as Reuters ignore these statements, choosing instead to print PA Prime Minister Qureia's boilerplate announcement that the attack merely 'harmed Palestinian interests.'
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.j...toryID=5954140

TAKING ACTION

With journalists in danger of harm should they report negatively on Arafat's PA or terrorist groups, concerned readers should redouble efforts to ensure that these important stories make their local news outlets nonetheless.

Ccontact your local or network news editor, asking that these items be given the coverage they deserve.

...chance you could squeeze that into a few paragraphs?

DarkEN

__________________
Walk down the right back alley in Sin City and you can find anything...

Show your kids you love them by buying them the No. 7 brand.

nope. The body count is too high and the examples are all different. sorry.....blame the pa.