Breaking: Israel detains Al-jazeerah news chief. So much for free press

[cantstandbush]

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/0F587524-4A07-43A5-8197-E9AC7E6BB509.htm

[gasperc]

1. fucking stupid

this will enrage Arabs throughout the region. expect street protests in Jordan and Syria and possibly Egypt, dumb, dumb, dumb

[cantstandbush]

3. You would think the international media would be protesting BUT nooooo. n

[Ian David]

2. The same Al Jaseera that broadcast The Protocols and keeps calling

Israel, "The Illegal Zionist Occupier"?

THAT Al Jazeera?

[Name removed]

5. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Ian David]

7. And you are on my ignore list. n/t

[DistressedAmerican]

6. You May Not Like What They Say. But, They Have A Right To Say It.

Welcome to free speech.

Would you have the KKK detained for their hate speech too?

[Ian David]

11. You make a good point, but Al Jazeera isn't a free press...

and they bear great responsibility for fanning the flames of The Apocalypse.

[wakeme2008]

16. people who do not believe in a free press just made my ignore list

bye bye

[DistressedAmerican]

17. How So? They Certainly Aren't Free When They Are Being Jailed

or when our governemnt plans bombing strikes on their broadcasting facilities.

Al Jazeera is as free as CNN.

Do you have some facts to the contrary?

[Scribe]

19. That's twisted. A free press means Al Jazeera can say anything

The New York Times isn't a free press. It is an entity which benefits from the policy of a free press.

If you shut down any media outlet because you don't like what they've said, you don't have a free press.

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

21. They're not a free press?

Well, I suppose they aren't technically free anymore.

Thanks to Israel detaining their chief.

[theHandpuppet]

24. So should we ban FOX News?

Just wondering if your attitudes towards a "free and balanced" press walks both sides of the street.

[MyNameGoesHere]

26. Why is it not free press?

Because you deem it so?

[CoffeeCat]

39. One could also argue that Fox...

...News has done a lot to "fan the flames of The Apocalypse."

They propagandized us into a war, sold us this administration's lies and
continually spin BushCo into a positive light.

Just because you don't like what an organization--or a person--says--doesn't
mean that you have the right to kidnap them and kill them.

[Jacobin]

8. It may surprise some to learn

that the U.N. grant of lands to European Jews fleeing to the Middle East after world war II, is considered by a large majority of Arabs to be an illegal occupation of lands they had abandoned 2,000 years ago.

Whether their opinion is 'right' or 'wrong', the freedom of press that some in the U.S. ocassionally tout as being critical to getting all sides of the story in the open for discussion, with the hope that better decisions can be made by a fully informed public, is obviously not currently in favor.

[Minstrel Boy]

9. let's see a link for that. n/t

[klook]

22. The Aljazeera that called the Protocols a discredited anti-Semitic fraud?

The Hamas Covenant cites the long-discredited anti-Semitic fraud, The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, describing it as "the embodiment of the Zionist plan to usurp Palestine". Hamas dismisses the Freemasons, Lions Club, and the Rotarians as organizations promoting "the interest of Zionism." It accuses those organizations, and the "Zionist invasion" in general, of being "behind the drug trade and alcoholism in all its kinds."
Source: "Who are Hamas?," Aljazeera.com, 1/26/06

THAT Aj Jazeera?

Can you provide sources for your assertions?

[Don Claybrook]

25. .

.

[muriel_volestrangler]

29. Actually, that *is* a different Al Jazeera

aljazeera.com is a magazine; english.aljazeera.net is the TV station. They are not connected in any way.

However, the Al Jazeera TV channel regularly interviews Israeli spokesmen, so I very much doubt they ever refer to Isael as "the illegal Zionist occupier" - though other guests of theirs may do so. And I don't think it has ever broadcast a version of the Protocols of Zion either - being a news channel, it's not the kind of thing they'd do. I think the earlier poster's accusations are baseless.

[klook]

36. OK, thanks for the clarification! (n/t)

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

28. Are you sure you're not confusing them...

...with Egyptian state TV? I know they aired it.

[allemand]

31. Your source for this misinformation: Ann Coulter???

"Al-Jazeera also broadcast a TV miniseries last year based on the "Protocols of the Elders Of Zion.""
http://www.anncoulter.com/cgi-local/article.cgi?article=55

It turns out that Coulter was "borrowing" from a different article, but in the "process" some crucial information got lost:

"While Al-Manar may not yet enjoy the same name recognition as al-Jazeera, its pro-terrorist message does manage to reach an estimated 200 million viewers worldwide via satellite. Al-Manar regularly airs programs that glorify suicide bombers, including one that shows Palestinian "martyrs" preparing for suicide missions. It also broadcasts frequent footage of Hezbollah terrorists attacking Israeli soldiers.

In recent months, the network ran a Syrian-produced mini-series, Al Shatat ("The Diaspora"), which was based on libels found in the notorious anti-Semitic tract, The Protocols of the Elders of Zion. The series depicted Jews in Israel plotting a world takeover. One typically outrageous scene showed Jewish leaders engineering the murder of a Christian boy in order to drain his blood for Passover matzah."
http://www.nationalreview.com/comment/stakelbeck_babingyi200408190823.asp

The TV miniseries was broadcast on Al-Manar, not on Al-Jazeera!

Al-Jazeera is a news network, they don't show series, just documentaries, as far as I know.

[HeardOnTheHill]

38. Not a fan but...

So Al Jazeera may not be the most objective network, but I'm not sure that this current tactic is really the way to go.

[Viva_La_Revolution]

4. curious - no reason given... but here's a clue...

He and his crew were reporting from Kofor Yasif village, near the northern Israeli city of Akka on the Mediterranean coast.

snip

Al-Umari was also detained by Israeli police on Sunday night for two hours after broadcasting from Haifa.



Perhaps they don't like his 'reporting style'?

on edit: from yesterdays reports

The Doha-based channel said police had detained its Israel correspondent Elias Karram and his team, but did not provide details.

Al-Jazeera said earlier that Israeli authorities had ordered its team away from its seafront oil refinery after it broadcast live footage from the area shortly after the rockets attack.
http://www.news24.com/News24/World/News/0,,2-10-1462_1968510,00.html

The Israel Police on Sunday detained an Al-Jazeera news team after it broadcast live footage which disclosed the area of Sunday's deadly Katyusha attack in Haifa, in violation of military censorship rules, police and security officials said.

snip

The longstanding security regulations have been accepted by Al-Jazeera when they opened their office in Israel.

But, the police spokeswoman said, the crew broadcast live during the rocket attack from a nearby observation post. It was warned not to do so again.
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1150886017193&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull

[Jacobin]

10. The U.S. blew up Al Jazeera reporters and facilities

in both Iraq and Afghanistan.

Neither the U.S. nor Israel wants the Arab world to see what they are doing

[malaise]

35. It is really that simple

and they only want their version to be available for public consumption.

[cantstandbush]

12. Isn't this same thing the Germans did during WWII? nt

[Solo_in_MD]

14. Sounds like another Geraldo incident

IIRC there were similar cutoffs during the SCUD attacks on Israel. There was a memborable exchange on Nightline over it.

[partylessinOhio]

13. Well, I'm shocked Israel didn't arrest the American reporter when he

showed the missile hit damage in the pavement was no larger than a small pothole.

[northzax]

15. who ever said Israel had a free press?

while there is a tradition in Israel of a free press, and a vibrant media community, there is no guaranteed right to a free press, and this tradition does not extend to military and security matters, there publications are censored by the government. It really is one of the things that makes the US unique.

[Swede]

18. Unique how?

Details.

[northzax]

30. the US is the only country I know of

that has the guarantee of no government interference in a free press written into the founding documents of the country. No European country has that, no Latin American country has it, no Asian country has it, and I doubt whether any African country does (although I can't guarantee that, since I don't know for sure)

surely other countries have a tradition of free speech and a free press, but only in the US is that written into stone, considered so important that it was the first clarification written into the Constitution, more important than self defense, more important than a fair trial, more important than avoiding cruel and unusual punishment, second only to the freedom to worship. Americans take free speech and a free press for granted as an inalienable right, but in the rest of the world, it doesn't work that way, or hasn't until very recently. too often we forget that.

[Swede]

33. Thanks.

Thanks for the info.

[Spazito]

37. Hmmm, very true, bush was just lecturing Putin on the necessity of

a free press, I wonder if he will now lecture the Israeli Prime Minister on the same necessity, sadly, I think not.

[winter999]

20. I did hear that Hezbollah was using Aljazeeran live

broadcasts to evaluate missile damage and to adjust their targeting. Basically they were using the news feed as a forward fire-solution scout. Whether Aljazzera was doing this intentionally is not known.

[Avalux]

23. Where did you hear that Al-Jazeera is collaborating with Hezbollah?

That's essentially what you're saying. A link to your source would be appreciated. Thanks.

[DistressedAmerican]

27. Have You Watched CNN OR MSNBC This Morning.

I have seen them broadcast the locations of the missile hits with footage from their broadcast perch overlookinh Haifa.

Are they detained for the exact same thing that Al Jazeera did? No? Wonder why?

[wicket]

32. Oh boy

:popcorn:

[warrens]

34. Y'know, I used to really admire Israel

That's all in the distant past now. It's turning into a fascist state, and very rapidly.