Openness and information needed

by Abeer Mishkhas

Why is it hard for outsiders to understand the Middle East? Or is it hard for outsiders to understand the Middle East? The Middle East has been in the news for decades, and still people who do not live there think of it as a danger zone full of terrorists and oppressed people. For others it is a region of Arabian Nights countries. These conceptions are supported by the media coverage and Hollywood version of the Middle East. When foreign media direct their attention to the region, they do so with a preconceived idea of what the Arab world is like. Few come with a mind open to finding a different image.

After the 9/11 attacks on New York, the spotlight fell on the Middle East in a different way. There was a surge of interest in the area of origin of the hijackers, as well as a huge influx of journalists into the region. As Patrick Seale wrote in al-Hayat, "A whole intellectual industry has sprung up in western think tanks, university departments, and among media pundits, seeking to dissect and understand the 'violence', 'hate', and 'fanaticism' which the Arab and Muslim world is said to direct against the West."

In Saudi Arabia, we had to face the preconceived notions those journalists brought with them. An already distorted and unreal image of the Middle East was now shaped by the attacks on the Twin Towers. Explaining and defending the region and its culture is the main line taken by Arab media, but that line is not always taken seriously in the West, so what is to be done to correct misconceptions?

Both sides have to be open to a new conception of the other. That means even the Arab world has to reconsider its image of the West. Dialogue, proposed by many, seems to be the only way out for creating better understanding between the East and West. The German Foreign Ministry started a project of dialogue with the Islamic world with the purpose of exchanging ideas and open discussion on issues that affect both sides. On May 24, a conference was held in Berlin to launch a program that attempts to foster understanding between the Muslim world and West. According to the German website qantara.de, the conference "aimed to help do away with stereotype misconceptions about the role of women in Muslim societies as prevalent in the western world."

On the Middle East side, there must be a campaign to break western stereotypes of Arabs by using the media to create an awareness of Arab issues. The reason behind the gap is both sides' ignorance of the other's culture and language, which results in a reliance on negative media portrayals for information. People in the Middle East, generally speaking, know some English, whereas people in the West do not know Arabic, which again does not help outsiders get a better understanding of Arab culture.

However, Arabs frequently complain that the western media are biased towards Israel and against them but do little to give an Arab side of the story. Ben Bradlee, former managing editor of the Washington Post, explained in a seminar in Dubai why the Israeli/Jewish lobby is much heard in the United States while the Arab side is not: "Israel sends its best people to interact with the policy- and opinion-makers in Washington, while the Arabs host parties and indulge in public relations exercises which fail to convey much. The same is reflected in the media. Americans demand information, but seem to be getting little or nothing from the Middle East," he said.

So until the Arab side deals with the media as the only tool to create an awareness of Arab issues, there will always be a wide gulf separating the East and West.

-Published 10/6/2004(c)bitterlemons-international.org

Abeer Mishkhas is a Saudi Arabian journalist and an editor at the Arab News newspaper in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia.

This article was originally published in the 10-6-2004 ediition of Bitter Lemons-International. It is used here with permission.