Inside the Control Room

By Jillian Sloan

For many Americans, Al Jazeera is most likely a vague word they heard somewhere, some time ago, associated with terrorism, propaganda or links to Al Qaeda.  

Not even close. For its viewers in the Arab world, Al Jazeera (which means “the Penninsula” in Arabic) is a news network free of censorship and government control that serves as a voice to the voiceless—and it has nothing to do with promoting war. 

Shedding the sour image as the mouthpiece for terrorism, Al Jazeera is rising as an authoritative news source for understanding the world. With over 69 bureaus across the globe, the Al Jazeera network is covering stories in countries habitually missed or glossed over by other prominent networks.  

During a tour of the studio today, I looked out over the first-rate newsroom with its HD capability and computer-operated cameras. The state-of-the-art equipment and facilities have only been in place since 2006, just 12 years after Al Jazeera’s first steps as a small independent network that, in the beginning, aired a teasing six hours a day.

After building itself a name through the coverage of the three wars in Iraq since 2000, it now airs 24 hours a day, seven days a week and in over 100 countries, excluding (for now) the U.S. According to the broadcaster, it’s the leading news channel on YouTube and its website receives 22 million hits each month. This is a news organization that’s got its act together. 

In the US, coverage of global events, particularly of the Middle East, is mediocre at best. In our meeting today with Hassan Ibrahim, a correspondent for Al Jazeera English and principle role in the documentary “The Control Room” (watch it streaming), he said, “The American people are done a great injustice by their own media.” 

A peek at today’s top stories on Al Jazeera Net and CNN.com show the contrast in geographical and contextual focus. Al Jazeera’s lead story is the mosque shootings in Thailand, aided with a timeline for background information and numerous videos for added perspective. The story doesn’t make the cut on CNN’s top story list. In fact, the two top stories are an update on the France Air crash and Europe’s election.  

“We are less Western-Centric, European-Centric, which is appealing,” said Managing Director of Al Jazeera English Tony Burman. He said Al Jazeera provides a more global sense of this complicated world. 

In places like the Middle East, Africa and Asia where U.S. or British new organizations have sometimes as few as two correspondents, Al Jazeera has multiple bureaus and contacts with independent film makers who can produce material in some of the most inhospitable environments in the world.   

“I wish the understanding of the Middle East was a higher priority in the US,” Ibrahim said.  

The key is in the context. Ibrahim began to reference US history—some history that I’m not sure any American student in the room was even aware of—making the point (in this journalist’s opinion) that you can’t understand the present without knowing the past. US broadcasts and articles on the Middle East are mosaic tiles to a big picture never put into context. How does a car bomb or a shooting at a mosque paint any clear story of what’s going on and why?  

“Our goal is to help people understand the context,” Burman said. “The expectation from our viewers is a wider view and context for the issues in the region.” 

And many news organizations, particularly in the U.S., may argue that it’s difficult to convince people to eat the brussel sprouts of news. It seems that our attention only turned to the Middle East when it was suddenly our own countrymen in the danger.

Even then, the attention paid seemed minimal because the events that had been set in motion arguably thousands of years ago were already beyond our understanding, like trying to jump in eight rounds late to a game of Phase Ten. And many Americans I know have almost completely turned a blind eye to Middle Eastern news. 

Al Jazeera’s Deputy Director of Programs Giles Trendle said, “We had to find new ways to get people engaged in something they had heard about but probably did not know a lot about.”  

The Al Jazeera Documentary Channel is a new addition that airs Arabic documentaries that provide context to current events. All of Al Jazeera programs also run on Youtube, making it accessible even where the network channel is not. 

“[It] changes people’s perspectives on Al Jazeera,” said Trendle. 

Al Jazeera also received flak for broadcasting videotapes from Osama Bin Laden. To this, Sheikh said that former President Bush’s coined “Axis of Evil” began two camps, and “each one has to be given the chance to speak out.” It refers to the Al Jazeera motto, “The opinion and the other opinion.” The tapes are reviewed and edited and only what is newsworthy makes it on air, Sheikh said. 

One student asked how Al Jazeera got tapes from Bin Laden. Sheikh was not remotely surprised by the question and, smiling, said, “We get them. I don’t have to tell you how. Don’t expect me to tell you how. You have to protect your sources.”  

For at least this American, Al Jazeera is not a muddled conception of something evil or even foreign. If they live up to their promises of global understanding, I believe it will help reshape the landscape of world coverage and maybe, just maybe, convince America to get in touch with the world beyond our cousins.

Like Oil and Vinegar: Video Journalism and Egypt

By Carla Babb

Video journalism and the Egyptian police simply don’t mix. Sure, the government allows Egypt TV to work under close supervision and censorship, but good luck to anyone else wanting to carry a camera and tripod around the country. While in Cairo, I attempted to produce a video report on archeology and tourism, but the production process turned into an experience filled with threats, denials, and a little “red carpet” treatment all in the same day.

Saturday is normally a weekend, but for me it was a workday. Thanks to Zahi Hawass, the Secretary General of the Supreme Council of Antiquities in Egypt, I was given permission to shoot video at four major historical locations in Egypt: the Cairo Museum, the government dig locations behind Giza, the well-known Giza pyramids, and Sakara, home to the oldest step-pyramid in the world. But as I soon found out, “permission from authority” is relative in a police state.

I arrived at the Cairo Museum at 9am with three friends from our American University in Cairo journalism program. I entered the gates, camera and tripod in hand, ready to shoot footage and move on to the next site. I handed the policeman at the gate my permission letter with Hawass’ signature, but he told me I couldn’t film there because I needed yet another permission form. My friends and I waited and argued outside for more than an hour before they finally let us in the museum. When we finally went inside, we only had one hour to shoot all the footage before the museum security kicked us out.

My next stop was the Giza pyramids. I initially thought this would be the easiest place to carry around a camera since tourist carry cameras there all the time. However, a guard met us at the entrance and accompanied us the entire time I shot footage. When I interviewed tourists, the police kept a watchful eye on my every move. I also interviewed a merchant working at the pyramids, and that interview was the last straw for police. They encircled us during the interview and then followed me to the bus and spoke forcefully to me in Arabic. I couldn’t understand. My Arabic-speaking friend explained to me that they were giving me three choices: I could either erase the interview, give them my camera, or go to jail. Obviously, none of those choices were acceptable, but arguing did nothing. I took a deep breath, rewound my tape for about thirty seconds in front of the policeman, and recorded two minutes of black. What the policeman didn’t know was that the interview was in fact about six minutes further back on the tape instead of 30 seconds back. Fortunately, he didn’t check the tape to make sure I had erased it.

Behind schedule and exhausted, we headed for the digs. We made it to the entrance road and no farther. They refused to let us in the area despite our permission, and there was nothing any of us could say or do.

Finally, we headed to Sakara. The pyramid was like a mirage, with nothing nearby for what seemed like miles. In the far distance stalked the shadows of tall, modern buildings, but there everything was tranquil and ancient. The manager greeted us at the door, read our permission form and ushered us in with excitement. He took us to all of the “great filming spots” and allowed us in tombs other tourists could not enter. He bragged how he had just taken National Geographic cameramen around a few months before, and he said he loved when journalists did stories involving the great step pyramid and its surrounding tombs. Not a single policeman objected.

I couldn’t believe it. Was I in the same country? How could he be so helpful while everyone else was so restrictive? I came to the conclusion that even when I jumped through hoops for policemen and archeologists, access ultimately depended on their mood and sense of security. Al Jazeera English programming director Scott Ferguson told me his video journalists deal with this problem of access all the time in the Middle East. “It depends on their [the police officers’] moods, which ebb and flow at any given point of time,” he said.

Maybe the Egyptian policemen I met thought they would lose their jobs if I went into a restrictive dig site. In America, however, my experiences with authority and cameras have resulted in the opposite way of thinking. Authority figures in the states have often thought they might lose their jobs if they did not let me into a place in which I had permission to film. Free press often trumps restriction in the states, but I found that restriction rules the day in Egypt. So video journalists, be prepared to move mountains, turn water into wine and mix oil and vinegar when you come to this country.