Staff Reporter
CELEBRATED American journalist Seymour Hersh has described the latest war in Iraq as a diplomatic blunder committed by the US.
Delivering the keynote address at the two-day 3rd Al Jazeera Forum on ‘Media and the Middle East: Beyond the boundaries’, which began at the Doha Sheraton Hotel yesterday, the top investigative journalist pointed out that America had committed a number of diplomatic blunders, and the latest war in Iraq was just one of the examples.
“In the name of safeguarding democracy, so many lives, especially those of children, have been lost, and nothing reflected the collapse of a leadership better than this,” lamented Hersh.
When someone from the audience asked him why he chose to rely on mostly his sources in the US while reporting on the Middle East, Hersh replied that from his experience of dealing with those issues that dominated the polity of the region for several years, he had found that it was better to source information from authentic channels in his country than reporting events on the basis of what was told by somebody from the region or those who did not want to be identified later.
In a journalist’s profession, what is to be borne uppermost in mind is that an unofficial or unnamed source cannot be relied upon for long. “It is always good to quote authentic sources for information wherever they are,” Hersh said.
The well-known journalist, who has also penned a number of books, including the widely-read ‘The Price of Power: Kissinger in the Nixon White House,’ said that he was not very optimistic of the Western and eastern worlds initiating concerted efforts to have a better understanding of each other.
Referring to the ongoing tussle between the US and Iran over the latter’s reported possession of nuclear arms, Hersh said the general feeling among journalists in the US was that American authorities had no concrete evidence to prove that the Persian country had acquired a nuclear bomb.
“No US intelligence agencies had found any clear evidence,” Hersh stressed.
At the same time, he added that it would be unwise on the part of the US to underestimate the capacity of Iran to strike.
On the independence of media worldwide, the acclaimed American author said not even in the US the journalists were all that free as one thought.
“In America, there exists something like collective censorship in journalism,” he said.
While calling on journalists to strike a balance on all issues that bother the world, the author said there was a great need on their part to work for bringing out “something different”.
He said journalists all over were one and the same in most of their traits, and his experience over the years had proved that rarely one acknowledged the good works being done by the other.
“Not over, one doesn’t even approve the existence of the other in this profession,” pointed out Hersh.
About the changes that are reportedly going on in the region, especially in Egypt, which he visited recently, Hersh said the journalism scenario was undergoing a major transformation in the Middle East. “Unlike in the past, more women are storming the profession these days, and my expectation is that it should help facilitate bring about some major changes on vital spheres”, he said.
“Certainly there is more curiosity on the part of people here to get more information and no doubt Al Jazeera television channel is acting as a major catalyst for bringing about changes in the region’s news scenario,” he said.
The top journalist predicted that the region’s media would be able to exert severe pressure on autocratic regimes and change would be a continuous process thereafter.
When someone asked the author about the objectivity and impartiality of the media coverage of the Middle East, in particular the Israel-Palestine conflict, Hersh pointed out that there could be different perceptions among journalists on the issue. However, he said journalists should highlight those aspects that they felt was reality. |
