Many interesting devolopments have happened this week since the Daily Mirror’s exclusive on a secret memo that Bush wanting to bomb Al Jazeera and Tony Blair talking him out of it.
Al Jazeera staffers have launched a Blog.
Wadah Khanfar, head of Al Jazeera, has gone to London to seek talks with Tony Blair.
The two men who leaked the document have been charged under the Official secrets act, and editors have been threatened with jail in the UK. The Blair government has obtained court injunctions against newspapers.
A member of Parliament from British Prime Minister Tony Blair’s Labour party filed a motion Friday urging publication of the leaked document in question.
Robert Fisk has an article out in The Independent entitled: No wonder al-Jazeera was a target (via dontbomb) You can actually read the whole article here (I just saved you a few pence)
Also, there is an interesting article out in Rolling Stone magazine by journalist James Bamford who outlines an elaborate plan for media manipulation involving Al-Jazeera, a job which the Bush administration out-sourced to The Rendon Group. It’s entitled: The Man Who Sold The World, talk about a suitable title. I quote:
The top target that the pentagon assigned to Rendon was the Al-Jazeera television network. The contract called for the Rendon Group to undertake a massive “media mapping” campaign against the news organization, which the Pentagon considered “critical to U.S. objectives in the War on Terrorism.” According to the contract, Rendon would provide a “detailed content analysis of the station’s daily broadcast . . . [and] identify the biases of specific journalists and potentially obtain an understanding of their allegiances, including the possibility of specific relationships and sponsorships.”
The secret targeting of foreign journalists may have had a sinister purpose. Among the missions proposed for the Pentagon’s Office of Strategic Influence was one to “coerce” foreign journalists and plant false information overseas.
Lastly, Jordan’s own Emad Hajjaj has the most vivid depiction of the situation in a cartoon entitled: “Bush Wanted to Bomb Al Jazeera”
“The Arab media how Mr. Bush wants it!”
Thanks for the Rolling Stones article man, it was very long, but I read it. And I read the responce from The Rendon Group and the author’s response to them.