Daily Times

One of the biggest fallouts of the GWOT has been the impact on journalists worldwide.

British and American reporters, in the early days of the Iraq war, were instructed to drop civilian body counts from stories; on the grounds that it was damaging the war effort. And, in a sense, Bush and Blair were right. For the military misadventure was launched on both false premise and promise. The former said Saddam had WMDs. The latter provided that the fall of the regime would miraculously transform the region into a beacon of light and democracy. Intrinsic to bending the truth is a compliant media. Thus journalists became pawns in the great game; a crucial component to the propaganda machine.

One international news outlet that has always stood resolute is Al Jazeera. And it has paid the price. From having American missiles hit bureaus in both Kabul and Baghdad. To having one of its cameramen picked up and taken to Guantanamo Bay. Sami al-Hajj, a Sudanese national, spent six long years at the detention facility that still exists some 16 years later; and a good five years after Obama said it must be shut down. Al-Hajj, to date, bears the dubious honour of being the only journalist ever sent to Gitmo. In his recently published memoir, Prisoner 345, here counts how he was picked up here in Pakistan and handed over to the Americans who first flew him to Bagram in Afghanistan before sending him to Cuba.

It is important to note that Al-Hajj was detained just two months after the US-UK-led war on Afghanistan back in 2001. Simply because he had been training as a journalist for around just one-and-a-half years; Al Jazeera was his first gig. This raises serious questions about media practice and sending reporters, correspondents and cameramen to war zones. How much experience is sufficient? How much is not enough? War reporters like Kate Adie, John Simpson and Robert Fisk are virtually a dying breed. Though they, of course, have always enjoyed, to various degrees, multi-layered privilege: whiteness; First World passport, even if this happens to be issued by one of the aggressor nations; and being on the payroll of western news outlets. Al-Hajj was not so fortunate. In fact, as soon as he was in US custody — the Americans reportedly did their best to force him to confess that Al Jazeera had links with Al Qaeda.

This is how those who commit excesses try and win the propaganda war. This is something that the fourth estate must never forget. Wherever it may be operating.  *

Published in Daily Times, May 7^th 2018.