Viewpoints
Al Jazeera's reporting
by Patrick Jirschele
January 12, 2005
Wednesday
In Mark Neckameyer's letter of January 7th he wrote, "I
even read Al Jazeera. Yesterday they ran a story that claimed
that the Kurdish village called Halabja where we know the residents
were killed with poison gas by Saddam and his cousin "Chemical
Aly" was only a fictional tale made up by the Kurds and
Israeli agents to make the Arabs look bad. Al Jazeera also ran
a story about how the Asian Tsunami may have been caused by the
US and India using nuclear weapons to purposely harm Muslims.
Both these stories are patently ridiculous and are great examples
of nationalist outrageous propaganda."
I read Al Jazeera's website regularly and was surprised that
they would report in the manner that Mr. Neckameyer suggests.
And they didn't.
The Halabja story is in the opinion section of
AlJazeera, it is not a news story. The opinion is followed by
this disclaimer. "The opinions expressed here are the author's
and do not necessarily reflect the editorial position or have
the endorsement of Aljazeera"
It is sad, but it seems some
Americans can't differentiate between news, opinion, or entertainment.
It doesn't matter if you approve
of Al Jazeera's reporting, they have done what all the bullets
and bombs the U.S. can muster haven't been able to do. Al Jazeera
has brought freedom of the press, freedom of expression and freedom
of opinion into the homes of the Arab Middle East. These may
be the true seeds of democracy.
Of coarse, that would be my
opinion.
They say that credibility is
like virginity, once you lose it, it is gone forever.
Patrick Jirschele
Happy Point
Pennock Island, AK - USA
Related Viewpoint:
Serb Propaganda by Mark Neckameyer - Irvine, CA - USA
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