The Arab
world is not monolithic. It’s dynamic. It’s a living entity. It’s home to
almost 350 million people. Many of these people know about you. What do
you know about them?
Every
Thursday before Noon ET, return here for something you may not see elsewhere:
Arab news.
Here are
headlines for—and personal comments about-- Arab news stories for November 3 – 6,
2013
Israel
- Jerusalem elections boycott sends
'strong' statement to Israel
- Militants 'shoot down' Israeli drone over Gaza Strip
- Israeli forces open fire on protests across West Bank,
injuring dozens
-Witnesses: Israeli forces
fire tear gas at Hebron schools
- [Arab] teens injured in Jenin
clashes [with IDF]
-Israeli forces assault
student in Aqsa compound
-PLO official: Israel not
serious about peace talks
The United States and the West
- Is the US trying to torpedo peace talks in Pakistan?
-Angry Pakistan to assess ties
with US
-Syria:
Kerry’s statements threaten [Syrian] peace talks
--U.S.
skeptical over Syria chemical deceleration, top official says
-Poll: 70
pct of Palestinians expect peace talks to fail
-Kerry:
Israeli settlements are illegitimate
-Dozens
protest in Bethlehem against Kerry visit
Internal Regional Arab news
-Wastage of
public funds tied to cancellation of hospitals project (Kuwait)
- Panel to investigate missing pay
orders at Education Ministry (Jordan)
-U.N. says cost of hosting
Syrian refugees in Jordan $5.3 bn
-Training helps young
Jordanians turn business ideas into reality
- Egypt: Authorities tighten security measures around Suez
Canal
- Syria's most fatal weapon: starvation warfare
-Not so finger lickin’ good:
Fast-food chain KFC shuts its doors in Syria
-Saudi
authorities arrest over 16,000 illegal workers
-Saudi
Arabia illegal worker crackdown leaves ‘shops closed, streets empty’
-Tunisian
leaders once again fail to agree on new PM
-Tunisia
crisis deepens after failure to pick new premier
-‘Medical
error’ deaths witness rise (Kuwait)
-Govt mulls
entry ban on gays (Kuwait)
-Bahrain
jails 10 "terrorists" from opposition
-Iranians
cry 'death to America' in huge rally
-Yemen's
rival sects declare new ceasefire
-Sectarian
fighting resumes in north Yemen
-Saudi to start inspecting
companies for illegal workers
-Paperless illegals can never
return to KSA (Kingdom of Saudi Arabia)
-Kuwait will ‘maintain’ high
standard of living for citizens’
-No citizen, expat will leave
Kuwait without settling dues’
-150,000 bogus-employed [in
Kuwait] face deportation
-Iraq attacks kill 10 people
as 2013 toll tops 5,500
The
non-Arab World
-India
Infanticide: "We accept the first girl, the second should be killed"
----
While the
Arab world certainly appears concerned about Israel, a reading of Regional
headlines for November 3 – 6, 2013 prompts two observations: first, Israel isn’t
the Arab world’s number one news story; and second, most of Israel-centric news
appears (in this news cycle) primarily in Palestinian Authority (PA) media. The
other Arab news outlets surveyed seemed far more interested in other issues.
You can see from
the list above what some of these other issues are. In Jordan, there
is concern about how government monies were being spent (or misspent). In Saudi
Arabia, the news this cycle focused on a crack-down on illegal immigrants. In
Kuwait, the focus was missing or faked visas and drivers licenses—up to 150,000
faked worker papers and 20,000 faked licenses. You can see also how violent and
unstable life is in Yemen, Syria and Tunisia—and a fear that unrest could
spread to Bahrain and elsewhere in the Region.
In this Arab
news cycle, Israel wasn’t the number one (or even the number two) issue. What
one does notice here is that, most particularly in PA news, reporting about
Israel is very, very carefully written. These stories, mostly about Israel
Defense Force (IDF) actions against Arabs, tell the who, what and where part of
the news. They completely ignore the why.
For example,
a story might tell you that IDF soldiers opened fire on protesters in Hevron.
The story will show close-up pictures of Arabs in pain, lying on the ground
bleeding, etc. But the story does not mention a single fact about why the
protesters were there, what they were protesting, how aggressively they were
protesting, why the IDF was there in the first place—and why the IDF fired at
the protesters.
The only
thing you learn from these stories is that Israeli soldiers injure Arabs. The
only thing you see are injured Arabs looking to be in considerable pain—and a
headline that highlights an IDF attack.
If you want
to find out the why of the story, the PA news won’t give it to you. You have to
go to Israeli media sites.
Meanwhile, Arab
media in places like Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and Kuwait didn’t bother with most
of these anti-Israel stories. Jordan—which has so many ‘Palestinians’ it must
be sensitive to their interests—did report some of these stories. But it
reported very few.
It makes one
wonder if the so-called ‘Palestinians’ are as important to the Region as we
have been led to believe. Is it possible that the ‘Palestinian cause’ is not the
Region’s central issue?
The stories above
covered less than one week’s news cycle. Certainly, there were other stories in
the Arab media. Almost all of these had nothing to do with the ‘Palestinian struggle.’
Will next week’s report tell a different story--or is the Arab world telling us something here?
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