Reporting war is getting more dangerous, difficult and complicated but working with citizen journalists is one way of getting around the censorship, lack of resources and danger. That was the verdict of four top TV journalists reflecting on the coverage of the Gaza conflict a year ago at a Polis panel debate.
I was surprised by the degree to which the ‘traditional’ reporters embraced the potential of citizen journalists as informal correspondents or stringers and as a source of material. When the chap from citizen photojournalism site Demotix got up to make his case he found he was pushing at an open door.
Jeremy Bowen (BBC Middle East Editor) and Alan Fisher (Al Jazeera) were both subject to the Israeli exclusion of journalists from Gaza during the invasion 12 months ago. Sherine Tadros (Al Jazeera English) was actually inside because her channel had a staffed bureau in Gaza. Louise Turner made the superb Unseen Gaza programme that told the story of how the media was excluded and the effect on the reporting of the conflict.
Jeremy Bowen defended the overall BBC coverage of the Gaza crisis but he was clear that his own reporting lost a significant dimension by not being there. But he pointed out that the same thing happened in Sri Lanka this year, and in that place there was no Al Jazeera or citizen journalism to provide an alternative source.
Bowen warned that reporting war has got vastly more complicated in the last 15 years as the authorities – including groups like Hesbollah – use public relations, manipulation and intimidation to restrict the news media.
It was clear from Sherine Tadros’ passionate description of the appaling story that she had to report, that there is no substitute for being there – for acting as a direct witness.
And as her colleague Alan Fisher warned, journalists have to be very aware of how they are being pressurised, right down to the language used. Don’t call the Israeli Army a ‘Defence Force’ if it is invading somewhere else, for example.
It was not clear whether the ban had actually worked for the Israeli authorities, because of the backlash from frustrated journalists. But Louise Turner felt that in the end it did distract and limit the western media.
What was interesting was the consensus that conventional ideas of balance are all but redundant in modern conflict where so often the sides are dispropotionate. Tadros thought it was impossible to give equal weight when one side loses a few dozen while hundreds die on the other.
There was also a thoughtful debate around whether TV channels serving western audiences should show as much gore as Arab broadcasters routinely do. Bowen thought that the BBC could show more but as soon as you go too far it loses its impact. And both Fisher and Tadros agreed that to get the most impact, you don’t have to resort to explicit horror. Louise Turner watched hours of rushes of stomach-churning imagery in the making of her documentary about Gaza and she said that the effect was to numb not to inform.
And if the professionals are under such pressure, is there a role for the citizen journalist? Jeremy Bowen was very happy with the work of the BBC interactive hub that fosters public participation. He saw it as a great way to garner more material as long as the broadcaster is transparent about where material is from.
Louise Turner called for much braver use of citizen journalism. Instead of just relying on citizen in places like London and New York, broadcasters should be tapping into networks in more remote parts of the world, she said.
And Al Ajzeera’s correspondents said that is precisely what they are doing, handing out cameras to people to report for them beyond their network of bureaux.
If you’re calling for good reporting, how can you advocate incorrect reporting? It’s name is the Israeli Defence Force. You may not like the name, but that’s what it’s called, so that is what you should call it surely?
And whilst your being pernickty about names, maybe the BBC will adopt a similarly ‘honest’ approach and start using the word terrorists when referring to groups like Al Aqsa Martyr’s Brigade or Hamas.
Reporting conflict had always been a dangerous business, but as Jeremy Bowen pointed out it was only in the past ten to fifteen years that the value of media attention began to be matched with the kind of media strategies that are now part of everybody’s fighting plan – some strikingly simple, some sophisticated media operations. This means that journalists increasingly become targets themselves. It also means that where they are not literally targeted, kidnapped or shot at, they are increasingly subjected to sophisticated attempts to manage the message and draw their attention to specific events – and, as the media ban has shown, away from others.
As Louise Turner observed, this was not quite like any other war – journalists were greeted at the accreditation centre with press packs at the ready. The international media might have been critical of the way it had been handled by the Israeli government, but this criticism, it was felt, also helped to distract from the real story just across the border.
Images were still getting out of Gaza, Arab journalists were present and so was the international English-language channel Al Jazeera English. The kind of stories the ban prevented most effectively were not news of more wounded arriving at overcrowded hospitals. They were the stories that had some kind of personal investment the viewer could relate to. The panel seemed to agree that the impact of a story lay not in the extent to which physical wounds were exposed, but the extend to which journalists managed to expose the psychological pressures and trauma of people attempting to salvage whatever was left of their everyday lives.
Sherine Tadros had been doing exactly that. She had been inside Gaza for Al Jazeera English throughout the military operation following up and reporting intensely personal stories, the kind of stories Jeremy Bowen said he would have liked to do all along for the BBC had he had a chance to go in. The images of a father kissing goodbye his dead son were still on his mind when he finally did get into Gaza after the fighting had seized. The fate of this man’s family was one of many he followed up in a much acclaimed BBC Panorama that Jean Seaton and Suzanne Franks described as a ‘forensic examination’ piling up evidence ‘brick by challenged brick’ in a recent British Journalism Review article entitled ‘Is saving the world journalism’s job?’ Still, as he readily admits, it was not the same as being there during the offensive the way Al Jazeera had been.
Nor was it the same, as Alan Fisher pointed out early in the debate, to join the assembled international media on the infamous hill in Israel as a correspondent for Al Jazeera English. He made the important point that if you are working for a news organization that has its own people on the inside, being restricted to the ‘hill of shame’ suddenly looks a lot less embarrassing. Experiencing the same limitations as everybody else on that side of the border he had even been detained at one point, but for him facing restrictions did not have the same implications, because he could relate what he could see from the hill to the larger picture provided by correspondents from both sides of the border.
Everybody on the hill would have wanted more access, and sooner. So was there nothing to be done? Sherine Tadros put her finger on the problem when she pointed out that it was no coincidence that her colleague Ayman Mohyeldin had been inside Gaza all along, but that the kind of long-term commitment that would be required to prevent a similar lack of access from occurring in the future was not being put in place by much of the international media.
In the end the fact that the media had been once more targeted, both literally in some cases inside Gaza and in terms of a denial of access for those reporting from Israel, just goes to show how important the media is recognised to be by all sides in any conflict and how much is at stake for journalism in reporting war transparently.
The Polis panel on Covering Gaza under Media Ban provided an interesting glance into what seems to characterize contemporary war reporting, and perhaps more generally, contemporary journalism. All four panellists agreed that reporters’ aim should not be to seek balance, impartiality or objectivity. Journalists should avoid a ‘on the one hand, on the other hand’ reporting. Rather, they see their goal as ‘seeking the truth.’ Balance is Out, Truth is In.
This approach is clearly a product of an ongoing process of reflexivity: journalists’ continuous reflection on their practice, its significance and goals, but also, importantly, its limits. Jeremy Bowen was specifically reflecting on the importance of recognizing the particular background, views and subjectivity that forms one as a journalist and how they inform and shape his or her reporting.
‘Seeking the truth’ as the desirable goal for reporting conflict, at one level, reminds us that journalists are, first and foremost, human beings – something that the values/myths of objectivity, balance and impartiality, together with the popularization of the war correspondent as a hero, have made us forget. Sherine Tadros openly described how she called her mother to ask her what type of story she would like her to report on from Gaza. She sought to tell her audience about what she was witnessing in Gaza; not to provide them an objective, impartial balanced account.
At the same time, I think that the idea of ‘seeking the truth’ is far from unproblematic and one that needs to be reflected on more critically. Telling the truth, as we know all too well, especially when it comes to reporting conflict, is much thornier than simply ‘not lying’. It seems to me that what Sherine and the other panellists describe, is a desire to seek a truth. This echoes the phrase ‘contextual objectivity’ that Adel Iskander and Mohammed El-Nawawy coined to describe Al Jazeera’s journalistic presentation. But it seems to extend beyond Al Jazeera, if the views expressed by Jeremy Bowen (BBC) Louise Turner (Channel 4) reflect the broader culture of journalism.
Some (including, if I’m not mistaken, Jon Snow in Unseen Gaza) described the journalists who were herded on the ‘hill of shame’ as handicapped – forced to become remote observers reporting the war from a distance. While the media ban has clearly imposed a huge obstacle on reporters, the Polis panellists – including Bowen who could not enter Gaza – showed that they were more able than what they may think. One of their greatest resources to overcome the ‘disability’ created by their physical distance from the events in Gaza was their reflexive and critical distance from their own practice.
‘Defence Force’ and Terrorist are ideologicially loaded terms. There are millions of people who believe that Hamas et al are fighters opposing an occupation, while millions believe that israel’s armed forces only ever take defensive action.
I think when referring to the Israeli military – the duck paradigm works here. If it looks like a duck, walks like a duck and quacks like a duck….it’s an army
Citizen journalism can also be a product of properganda when you start handing cameras out to locals.
I think people should think of the long term effects citizen journalism has on journalism as a whole. As well as putting professional journalists out of business (picture editors dont pay citizen journalists much if anyting) it’s truth is something that overtime will not stand up like it does with a professional.