Matthew Chance, CNN’s “senior international correspondent,” seems to have little if any insight into why Libyans defending the city of Tripoli might be a tad bit unhappy with he and other Western journalists. In a live audio feed filed Wednesday on CNN’s website, Chance discusses what reporters who were held in the Rixos Hotel experienced during their 4-5 days of captivity. The group of some two dozen or so journalists are now free, having been released on Wednesday through intervention of the International Committee of the Red Cross, but Chance seems to find it shocking that the Libyans who held them were not particularly charitable or hospitable:
We’ve been living in fear for the past five days because we’ve been, you know, really, being held against our will by these crazy gunmen who were in the lobby of our hotel wearing green bandanas waving Qaddafi flags wielding around their Kalashnikov assault rifles. They’ve been very hostile towards us at times. They’ve often told us about how they think we’re spies, you know, NATO spies, set on, bent on destroying Libya. One of them shouted up to me just yesterday. We all corralled ourselves away from them because we didn’t want to, you know, make too much contact with them because there was such hostility. Uh, one of them shouted up to me yesterday, “I suppose you’re happy now, aren’t you, now that Libyans are killing Libyans,” you know, once again underlining that idea, that the Qaddafi loyalists who were in control of that pocket of the Rixos Hotel, uh, uhm, you know really held the international media for some reason responsible for this crisis in Libya. And so I can’t tell you how pleased we all are and how relieved we all are, and how relieved our families will all be, that we’ve finally managed to get out of that place.
Yes, it seems the Libyans in the hotel “for some reason” held Chance and his fellow reporters responsible for the crisis that has overtaken their country. How unreasonable of them! And what do you know? Apparently Chance was free to post Twitter feeds throughout his ordeal. Did not the evil, crazy, bandana-wearing Qaddafi loyalists think to confiscate his and the other reporters’ phones or computers? Apparently not. Reportedly the captive journalists “wept with relief” upon leaving the hotel, but how did they manage to get out? The “crazy gunmen” released them unharmed to the ICRC.
In an Internet profile published here, Chance discusses the obligations of a professional journalist and the importance of maintaining a sense of fairness and impartiality. He comments, “Sometimes, when you are surrounded by violence or human tragedy, it is hard not to shed a tear or to lose your nerve. It's difficult to understand, but impartiality can be a refuge. I just try and remember my professional responsibility to get the facts across and keep my head down.” However, in one of his tweets posted from the Rixos Hotel, in what no doubt was a moment of emotion, he said, “I can see the NTC rebels. We are nearly there!” It is a rather telling “tweet,” to say the least. “We are nearly there!” Who is “we”? Presumably Chance and the other cornered journalists, but “we” could also be interpreted as including the “NTC rebels.” Does the tweet reveal the CNN correspondent’s personal biases? Do Chance’s sympathies lie with the “NTC rebels,” and has he lived up to his standards of impartiality if so?
Another reporter who has been covering the Libya conflict is Lizzie Phelen, who seems to be a journalist of a far different caliber than Chance. Here is a report she filed for RT last weekend when people on the streets of Tripoli were being subjected to random sniper fire from rooftops, sniper fire presumably carried out by NATO’s heroic “rebels” in an effort to create panic and fear among the population. Pay special attention to what Phelen says about “the Western media and Al Jazeera in particular,” and how they have been “responsible for a number of really grave lies.”
Propaganda, of course, is as much a part of war as the bombing and shooting. If anything, this has been even truer since 9/11. When journalists become propagandists for NATO, how should they expect to be treated when taken captive? Would the defenders of Tripoli have been justified in regarding their detainees as enemy combatants rather than as journalists? And, if so, would they have been justified in treating them accordingly? Chance and his colleagues got off lucky. Very lucky. In other situations, in other conflicts around the world, they might not have fared so well. But do you suppose they learned anything from this experience? It would be nice to think so. I have a hunch, however, they will go on to the next war, say in Syria perhaps, or Iran, and continue to fulfill their roles as propagandists for NATO and the Pentagon. And this is the problem.
Journalistic malpractice has tragic consequences. Think how many Iraqi and American lives would have been spared, how many innocent civilians, including children, would now be alive, had the U.S. media not functioned as paid propagandists for the Bush administration and the Pentagon back in 2002-03. But journalists like Chance seem oblivious to this. And this is why something needs to be done. It is long past time to start holding journalists accountable for the wars they help start. Those who deliberately spread propaganda and lies need to start facing war crimes charges.
River to Sea
Uprooted Palestinian
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