Al Jazeera co-founder speaks at Tufts

Combining wit, sarcasm, and an extensive knowledge of Middle Eastern affairs, famed journalist and Al-Jazeera co-founder Omar al-Issawi addressed a nearly full Cabot Auditorium on Monday.

In his presentation, which included a lecture and an extensive question and answer session, al-Issawi incorporated his personal experiences within the unique Middle Eastern media atmosphere to entertain the audience for nearly two hours.

Americans need to make real efforts to understand the minutiae of the Middle East if they hope to make intervention effective, al-Issawi said. "Understanding doesn't come from listening to the views of top officials. It comes from understanding the intricacies of the personal side of the conflict," he said.

According to al-Issawi, Americans have the technology to be fully informed, but lack the motivation. "[There is a] great degree of disinterest on the part of the American public about what is going on in the rest of the world," he said.

Al-Issawi became familiar to the Western world during the conflict in Iraq by sharing his knowledge with the world and becoming what lecture mediator Professor Jerry Meldon called a "guru for international journalists."

Until very recently, according to al-Issawi, the Arab world did not have access to an objective media source. Experiences with skewed or government controlled media sources taught people to assume that what the media confirmed was false and what the media denied was true and journalists and citizens who dared openly express their opinions ran the risk of being imprisoned or killed, he said.

Al-Issawi credits al-Jazeera with opening a forum in which people of all backgrounds can express their thoughts. "[Al Jazeera] has become a phenomenon in the Middle East because it is the first network to break the taboo of not being able to express opinions on air," he said.

Despite efforts to open the Arab world to a variety of opinions, al-Jazeera has been heavily criticized for its apparent bias toward people and organizations which the US government has accused of supporting terrorism. While al-Issawi admits that al-Jazeera has conveyed the messages of such controversial figures as Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden, he asserts that al-Jazeera is not acting as a "mouthpiece" through which these people can distribute their ideas.

"Al-Jazeera is more than bin Laden tapes. Al-Jazeera is more than Saddam Hussein appearing on our screens," al-Issawi said. Al-Jazeera's commitment to including these diverse views is central to its ability to remain objective. "To us this is the news business. This is the reality business. We're not in the business of hiding facts," he said. "If we don't broadcast it, I guarantee someone else will."

Al-Jazeera's broadcast of these radical ideas is not harmful, al-Issawi insisted. "We haven't seen the negative effects of our programming," he said. "Our viewers are not people who are influenced by bin Laden -- they're smarter than that. We give them more credit than that."

Others question al-Jazeera's professionalism, criticizing its notoriously disorderly debates and its sometimes inaccurate reports.

"We don't do anything out of malicious intent," al-Issawi said. "We're just trying to do our jobs in a very difficult environment."

Journalists lack support in the volatile political environment of the Middle East that is aggravated by deficits in knowledge, freedom, and women's empowerment, according to al-Issawi. Because many of these deficits result from huge gaps created by flawed and incomplete leadership, many people turn to extremist groups for answers, al- Issawi said.

"Extremist groups do more than kill and maim. They build schools. They provide food ... This is how people are attracted [to these groups]. They meet the basic needs of human beings" that many governments ignore, he explained.

Al-Issawi said that the Western world must "bear a great responsibility" in solving these problems. In an increasingly global society, al-Issawi stressed the importance of global cooperation. "We [the Middle East] need the rest of the world as much as the rest of the world will need us," he said. "We're all human beings. We need to work together."

Al-Issawi's lecture was sponsored by Tufts Coalition to Oppose War in Iraq (TCOWI).