Sunday, April 13, 2003
BY BRIAN DONOHUE
Star-Ledger Staff
You don’t have to read Arabic, or even English, to see the difference between the two stacks of newspapers on sale at the C&M Mini Mart in Jersey City.
GAP IN COVERAGE Stacked near the front door, the English language papers bear photos of American troops and artillery advancing on Baghdad, Iraqi citizens welcoming them, Saddam Hussein’s statue being toppled.
Over by the rose water and date cookies, the front page photos of Arab papers such as Al Quds and Al Ahram tell a different version of the war: wounded Iraqi children; rows of Iraqi civilian bodies on stretchers and on Thursday, a photo of the Firdos Square statue — this one snapped moments before it fell, with an American flag draped over its face.
The two stacks of papers illustrate the gap in both portrayal and perception of the war in the United States and in the Arab world, which largely views the war as an unjustified act of aggression.
The image of the flag-masked Saddam, which was carried on the front page of many papers throughout the Arab world, fed that perception more than anything.
“It really fit the belief that we are there for invasion and it’s not about democracy,” said Morad Abou-Sabe, president of the Arab American League of Voters of N.J.
The prominent play given to the flag-draped statue was far from the only difference between the English and Arabic newspapers at the C&M deli newsstand this past week.
Like most shops catering to Arab-American clientele, the shop offers a mixture of locally published weeklies, London-based Arab language dailies and government-controlled dailies — usually a few days late — from Egypt and other countries.
The top headlines in the April 4 edition of London-based Al Quds led with demonstrations against U.S. Marines in the city of Najaf; the Pentagon acknowledging the loss of two U.S. planes and accusations by Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld that Syria was aiding Iraqi forces.
On the same day, Egypt’s Al Ahram North American Edition featured page one photos of a wounded Iraqi boy delivering the “V for victory” sign from his hospital bed and Iraqi civilians crowding over a row of dead bodies.
The U.S. media’s focus on the advancing troops and the Arab media’s attention to civilian casualties are typical of wartime coverage, said Christopher Vaughn, a Rutgers University journalism professor and a former foreign correspondent for the Associated Press and the Miami Herald.
“In any war, the side that feels victimized is likely to focus on the victims,” Vaughn said. “Look at our press after Sept. 11 — lots and lots of photos of victims.”
Vaughan said such coverage could feed anger toward the United States. At the same time, the coverage itself could be seen as a release for such anger.
“By providing people a means to display their grief, they gain recognition and perhaps a sense that they are entirely under the boot, but that in their vitriol they are able to gain a sort of agency,” he said. “It’s probably cold comfort, but as a broader question it probably has some kind of a beneficial effect.”
Perhaps the starkest example of Arab mistrust was published in the Paterson-based Arab Voice last week.
An article on page one featured a satirical peek at the future in which Arab leaders are summoned to Washington, D.C., where they appear before Bush administration officials wearing only loincloths.
The paper acknowledged the scenario appeared far-fetched, but it also added “its accomplishment is only a matter of time.”
Other papers, such as the North Bergen-based Al Manassah Al Arabeyah focused on the war’s possible effects on immigrants and Arab-Americans.
The lead story in the current edition, dated mid-March, advised Muslims and Arabs of their constitutional rights and gave tips on what to do if questioned by the FBI or other authorities.
The different emphasis in coverage also explains the astonishment of many Arabs, both in the United States and abroad, at the quick collapse of Saddam’s regime.
Early last week, Americans realized the fall of Baghdad was imminent. Across the Arab world, however, newspaper readers were unprepared for the collapse of the city just six days after U.S. troops arrived at the outskirts of the capital.
Up to that point, the Arab press had given equal weight to the assertions by the Iraqi information minister that coalition forces were being driven back and were nowhere near the city.
Despite assertions by the U.S. military that troops were closing in on Baghdad, many Arab newspapers continued to predict a protracted battle for the city.
As recently as Monday, the Yemen Times reported “Iraqis as well as hundreds of Arabs are bracing for a long and exhausting guerrilla fighting that could be carried into the summer, when soaring temperatures would sap the American will to fight.”
