So Peter Arnett, the Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter, has now been fired from NBC, MSNBC, and National Geographic. The news came as a shock to the worldwide junkies and fans of the Iraqi invasion television coverage who eagerly awaited his daily reports from the Iraqi capital. After all, he was the only veteran reporter of Gulf War 1 now reporting on the not-so-spectacular sequel. And what crime was poor Peter so guilty of as to deserve this categorical dismissal from not 1, but 3 news organizations? The truth is that he had conducted an unauthorized interview at the Iraqi Information Ministry, and then embellished it with a little commentary of his own, which may have been construed by his Western viewing audience as being positive toward the enemy, or may have painted a solitary Iraqi sound bite in a positive light; or more importantly, may have hinted at the plain fact that this war in nothing like the product that the US administration sold to the poor unsuspecting American public.
The reason given for the abrupt dismissal was “a serious error in judgment” on Peter’s part. He later appeared on NBC’s Today show to offer what seemed like an obligatory apology to his now ex-employers and to the American people. But I believe the real cause of poor Peter’s dismissal was the almost wholly predictable reaction to what the US administration, and its mouthpiece, the US media, classified as an unacceptable, horrible, and irresponsible act of shameless propaganda on the part of Peter, and a reprehensible violation of his professional ethics. Really, this would be outrageously funny if it weren’t so sad!
But should we really be that surprised? Face it — it had been broadcast on Al-Jazira and others only the day before the US administration adopted an overtly hostile stance toward anyone who dares to contradict its well-orchestrated media coverage, or who would show anything Iraqi in a favorable or sympathetic light, or who would relay the war scenarios coming out of Iraq in any way other the one approved by the US government. For viewers of both Arabic and Western war reports, the act of termination has therefore consolidated their feeling that Al-Jazeera is much closer to the mark than its Western counterparts when it comes to who’s telling the truth about this war.
If Peter had been working for a totalitarian regime, then I could certainly understand for it would be totally in character. But, if memory serves, poor Peter is a Western reporter, reporting for Western news agencies, serving Western interests, and lord knows, we have been repeatedly told over and over again — by the Western media — that the West stands for freedom, liberty, and the God-given constitutional right of free thought and expression. Does anyone see the irony here?
The West has always talked a good game. Putting their money where their mouth is is an entirely different matter; we Arabs should know, for we have been on the receiving end of the West’s mouthfuls of empty promises for decades now. So this example of, and exercise in, hypocrisy should really come as no surprise to all of us and we should in truth be well used to it by now. Western freedom of speech, freedom of thought, and the ever-so-popular freedom of expression is an illusion that will apparently crumble at the slightest prod, and which will withstand neither close scrutiny nor a viable acid test, especially in this most critical time, the time of war.
Maybe Peter’s contract should be picked up by Al-Jazeera. That would infuriate the house on Pennsylvania Avenue to no end, and would certainly imbue this unfolding tragedy/comedy of a war with a further new plot twist — or at least make a very good April’s fool joke.
Arab News Features 3 April 2003
