DEMOCRACY NOW
CONT'D - Control Room: Behind the Scenes Arab News
Sun Nov 27, 2005 14:33
64.140.158.21
AMY GOODMAN: You want to ask Jehane, what you were most surprised by as you filmed Al-Jazeera? How long did you film? JIHAN NIZAM:I filmed for about six weeks, which isn't very long. The last film I made, I spent a year-and-a-half filming. So, when I left, I felt like there's a possibility that there is not a film here. It took going through 200 hours of footage to realize we had something. In terms of surprise, I was surprised that we had the level of experience and openness of Al-Jazeera reporters. The two people -- I mean, I'm biased towards the two people that I followed. I tend to follow people that I like and I'm inspired by, so I'm sure there are other Al-Jazeera reporters that I may not have liked so much, but the two people that I followed, Hassan and Samir, were people that have been in journalism for 25 years. Hassan has covered ten wars, went to college at University of Arizona, grew up in Saudi Arabia was in grade-school with Osama bin Laden. He has had a very -- he has visited the palaces of Saddam Hussein. I wanted to be around people with that level of experience to try to understand what was going on. Samir, again, has had a huge amount of experience in journalism, and has covered a number of wars, and I think that the interesting thing is that it's not like just going down the street to get a job. In the Arab world, the access you have to being able to work at a network that is not run by the state is very difficult because there aren't a lot of free stations available you to. I think that people who have a real dedication to working for the freedom speech in the Arab world will go to Al-Jazeera. You do end up finding kind of a high-level when you go there. That was surprising to me, after hearing the criticism in the Arab world and the United States about Al-Jazeera.
AMY GOODMAN: Samir, let's talk about the images of POW’s and of casualties. In this country, in the U.S. networks, we hardly saw images of casualties. Reporters called them tasteless, but they were all over the rest of the world. Can you talk about Al-Jazeera’s decisions both around casualties and also showing POW’s?
SAMIR KHADER: Look, we are in the business of news. News means facts. Facts should prevail speculation. From -- right from the beginning the American’s announced and told the American people that this would be a very proper and clean surgical war, very quick. There are no -- very few casualties amongst the civilians and where they suffered no losses. So, when we had these pictures of soldiers killed or taking prisoners, we thought, okay, the American’s are saying and telling their people something, but these pictures show something else. If the Americans don't want to show these pictures, it's their decision, but our audience wants to see this -- these pictures. At least to see that the war is not as clean as the Americans used to pretend. So, we shot them, but I think that the American audience or the American public opinion was followed by the American media at that time by only talking about the Americans. They had all American soldiers, the patriotic war against terrorism, against weapons of mass destruction that they used to frighten America and to talk about the number of tanks and how was progress -- they used to progress towards Baghdad and showing pictures of satellite pictures of bombs exploding. Without telling the American people that what was the result of this explosion. So, we decided in Al-Jazeera to cover the same story as the American media, but from another perspective. It's the perspective of the human cost. Any war has a human cost, whether it's a human cost regarding the Iraqi population, the casualties among the Iraqi populations, or the human costs among the American soldiers.
JEHANE NOUJAIM: I like what Lieutenant Rushing actually said about this which is that, you know, these pictures are disgusting, they make me queasy, they give me a stomach ache, but war should give you a stomach ache and people should be seeing this, and Americans and Arabs should be seeing the casualties on both sides of the war: the Americans that are dying and the Iraqis that are dying. Because it's not a clean war. I guess that's what was also interesting about being at Al-Jazeera. We went through the footage of their library. They use about 10% of the footage that they had, you know. There was a lot more gruesome footage, in there, let's say. So to see they the very, very strong reaction from the American administration based on the 5% of the footage they showed was actually -- was very surprising to me. Because you see it in the states. It's very clean. It's very -- you don't see any of this stuff.
AMY GOODMAN: Haven't the power of the pictures been proven by the photos that have gotten out now of the torture at Abu Ghraib. I think it's interesting to see the response in this country. There's often mentioned the Arab world is incensed. I don't think it's because Arabs have a particularly hypersensitive gene. I think the whole world is incensed. When they see the picture, you can hear -- that's one thing, and then the government can always say it's not true. But to see these pictures, I think it is really showing us the power of what an image has.
JEHANE NOUJAIM: It makes it into reality. When you just see it in print somehow it's not a reality. A week before the prison photos, or two weeks before the prison photos were released, 600 civilians were killed in Fallujah. We didn't see the pictures. I read ton the subway on -- in one of the newspapers, and I was like -- you know, oh, my goodness, and then Samir sent footage back of Fallujah and it hit me how terrible it was, but it didn't hit the United States because you didn't see it.
AMY GOODMAN: Don't you share your footage with other networks? Doesn't CNN, for example, use your footage of bombs over Baghdad, especially when they were kicked out and they couldn't show it themselves?
SAMIR KHADER: Our footage is available to any station willing to take them. Many, many, many American stations took the pictures as to what did they do with the pictures, I don't know.
AMY GOODMAN: General Powell, Secretary Of State, Colin Powell, just went to Qatar and word was he was putting pressure on the government there around Al-Jazeera. Is that true?
SAMIR KHADER: I don't know. We have – I didn't have the feelings that we were under pressure. I didn't receive any phone call from any high manager. Maybe there are discussions with the Qatar government, but the fact is that when Al-Jazeera was created in 1996, the stated goal was that the Qatar government will finance the station, but will never, never, never interfere in the editorial line. Up until now, it was the case. I hope it will continue to be the case.
AMY GOODMAN: I want to thank you both for being with us. I know you're showing this film in many different places. I was just up in Vermont celebrating Independent Media throughout the state in Brattleboro and Montpelier and Burlington. They said June 1 at the Eclipse Theater in Stowe, Vermont, that they are going to be showing Control Room. And are you traveling around the country?
JEHANE NOUJAIM: We are. You can check out where it's being released and when, at controlroommovie.com. That's my plug for people who are checking out where it's playing.
AMY GOODMAN: Well I want to thank you both for being with us, Samir Khader, senior producer with Al-Jazeera, and Jehane Noujaim, the filmmaker, who did this film in a six week period during the invasion of Iraq. of the film. Al-Jazeera means what?
SAMIR KHADER: It means the island of the peninsula. In both cases, it means the isolated place. We isolate ourselves from the environment of dictatorship and oppression. We want to expand and spread democracy, freedom and free speech and human rights.
To purchase an audio or video copy of this entire program, click here for our new online ordering or call 1 (888) 999-3877.
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=04/05/25/1423202
===================================
"Control Room" takes a hard look at the Al-Jazeera news network
http://disc.server.com/discussion.cgi?disc=149495;article=96302;title=APFN
LISTEN MONDAY... 7 AM -- 10 AM KXXT 1010 AM PHX AZ
CHARLES COYETTEE WILL BE TALKING ABOUT "CONTROL ROMM:
http://1010kxxt.com/shows.php?sid=2
AMY GOODMAN: Samir, let's talk about the images of POW’s and of casualties. In this country, in the U.S. networks, we hardly saw images of casualties. Reporters called them tasteless, but they were all over the rest of the world. Can you talk about Al-Jazeera’s decisions both around casualties and also showing POW’s?
SAMIR KHADER: Look, we are in the business of news. News means facts. Facts should prevail speculation. From -- right from the beginning the American’s announced and told the American people that this would be a very proper and clean surgical war, very quick. There are no -- very few casualties amongst the civilians and where they suffered no losses. So, when we had these pictures of soldiers killed or taking prisoners, we thought, okay, the American’s are saying and telling their people something, but these pictures show something else. If the Americans don't want to show these pictures, it's their decision, but our audience wants to see this -- these pictures. At least to see that the war is not as clean as the Americans used to pretend. So, we shot them, but I think that the American audience or the American public opinion was followed by the American media at that time by only talking about the Americans. They had all American soldiers, the patriotic war against terrorism, against weapons of mass destruction that they used to frighten America and to talk about the number of tanks and how was progress -- they used to progress towards Baghdad and showing pictures of satellite pictures of bombs exploding. Without telling the American people that what was the result of this explosion. So, we decided in Al-Jazeera to cover the same story as the American media, but from another perspective. It's the perspective of the human cost. Any war has a human cost, whether it's a human cost regarding the Iraqi population, the casualties among the Iraqi populations, or the human costs among the American soldiers.
JEHANE NOUJAIM: I like what Lieutenant Rushing actually said about this which is that, you know, these pictures are disgusting, they make me queasy, they give me a stomach ache, but war should give you a stomach ache and people should be seeing this, and Americans and Arabs should be seeing the casualties on both sides of the war: the Americans that are dying and the Iraqis that are dying. Because it's not a clean war. I guess that's what was also interesting about being at Al-Jazeera. We went through the footage of their library. They use about 10% of the footage that they had, you know. There was a lot more gruesome footage, in there, let's say. So to see they the very, very strong reaction from the American administration based on the 5% of the footage they showed was actually -- was very surprising to me. Because you see it in the states. It's very clean. It's very -- you don't see any of this stuff.
AMY GOODMAN: Haven't the power of the pictures been proven by the photos that have gotten out now of the torture at Abu Ghraib. I think it's interesting to see the response in this country. There's often mentioned the Arab world is incensed. I don't think it's because Arabs have a particularly hypersensitive gene. I think the whole world is incensed. When they see the picture, you can hear -- that's one thing, and then the government can always say it's not true. But to see these pictures, I think it is really showing us the power of what an image has.
JEHANE NOUJAIM: It makes it into reality. When you just see it in print somehow it's not a reality. A week before the prison photos, or two weeks before the prison photos were released, 600 civilians were killed in Fallujah. We didn't see the pictures. I read ton the subway on -- in one of the newspapers, and I was like -- you know, oh, my goodness, and then Samir sent footage back of Fallujah and it hit me how terrible it was, but it didn't hit the United States because you didn't see it.
AMY GOODMAN: Don't you share your footage with other networks? Doesn't CNN, for example, use your footage of bombs over Baghdad, especially when they were kicked out and they couldn't show it themselves?
SAMIR KHADER: Our footage is available to any station willing to take them. Many, many, many American stations took the pictures as to what did they do with the pictures, I don't know.
AMY GOODMAN: General Powell, Secretary Of State, Colin Powell, just went to Qatar and word was he was putting pressure on the government there around Al-Jazeera. Is that true?
SAMIR KHADER: I don't know. We have – I didn't have the feelings that we were under pressure. I didn't receive any phone call from any high manager. Maybe there are discussions with the Qatar government, but the fact is that when Al-Jazeera was created in 1996, the stated goal was that the Qatar government will finance the station, but will never, never, never interfere in the editorial line. Up until now, it was the case. I hope it will continue to be the case.
AMY GOODMAN: I want to thank you both for being with us. I know you're showing this film in many different places. I was just up in Vermont celebrating Independent Media throughout the state in Brattleboro and Montpelier and Burlington. They said June 1 at the Eclipse Theater in Stowe, Vermont, that they are going to be showing Control Room. And are you traveling around the country?
JEHANE NOUJAIM: We are. You can check out where it's being released and when, at controlroommovie.com. That's my plug for people who are checking out where it's playing.
AMY GOODMAN: Well I want to thank you both for being with us, Samir Khader, senior producer with Al-Jazeera, and Jehane Noujaim, the filmmaker, who did this film in a six week period during the invasion of Iraq. of the film. Al-Jazeera means what?
SAMIR KHADER: It means the island of the peninsula. In both cases, it means the isolated place. We isolate ourselves from the environment of dictatorship and oppression. We want to expand and spread democracy, freedom and free speech and human rights.
To purchase an audio or video copy of this entire program, click here for our new online ordering or call 1 (888) 999-3877.
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=04/05/25/1423202
===================================
"Control Room" takes a hard look at the Al-Jazeera news network
http://disc.server.com/discussion.cgi?disc=149495;article=96302;title=APFN
LISTEN MONDAY... 7 AM -- 10 AM KXXT 1010 AM PHX AZ
CHARLES COYETTEE WILL BE TALKING ABOUT "CONTROL ROMM:
http://1010kxxt.com/shows.php?sid=2
- FORCED ENTRY & NO EXIT PLAN —Bernard Weiner, Sun Nov 27 15:22
Message Board by American Patriot Friends Network [APFN]
