I will begin this conversation with a true confession. And the confession is that in spite of the fact that the Arab Satellite TV Station Aljazeera is numbered in my humble household among some satellite stations of its kind as an attack news stations, Aljazeera is my favourite. We call some news stations as ‘’attack stations’’ because of their excessive and obsessive devotion to a graphic and sometimes gory reportage of casualties of conflicts, wars and natural calamities or disasters,
But, as I have said, in spite of this, Aljazeera remains my number one. Any time Aljazeera is not on in my parlour, it means that I am either not around or if I am, am engaged in some other activity not the gathering my daily intelligence about various parts of the world including my country Nigeria. Although the station has its many critics, especially on what they see as its biased handling of many Arab-Israeli conflicts, I love its news presentation and some other of its news features.
If I were a TV journalist, Aljazeera would certainly be my reference point. Ever since I grew up to be a journalist, never have I seen a news medium become so devoted to a people and their political and social cause as Aljazeera is to the Palestinian struggle for the ownership of the land of Palestine. Thousands and possibly hundreds of thousands of Palestinians and some Aljazeera journalists have died in this struggle. And Aljazeera has been very faithful in the reportage of these deaths.
My wonder and the inspiration for this piece is that has Aljazeera’s faithfulness on the side of the Palestinians has it helped or hurt the Palestinians? Has it helped or hardened the resolution of this conflict by making both sides obdurate? If Aljazeera were not around could the Palestinians have been more moderate in their stance on the conflict? The Israelis see the news station as a partisan on the side of its enemies not as a mere organ doing its job and doing it professionally so well which is the reason it quite often bans Aljazeera from reporting from some of the many theatres of the conflict.
For sure, some of the other ‘’attack stations’’ are biased in their reportage of some of the conflicts in the world, such as the Russian-Ukraine war, but they are so able in disguising their bias in the name of objectivity that you cannot accuse them of taking sides.
The Palestinian cause is a cause like many other causes in the world. It is also a cause that is unlike many other causes in the world. It is a cause about two cousins fighting for a home land and each side presents its argument with a certain amount of justification. But who is the rightful owner of the land of Palestine? Is it the Jews or the Arabs? Will the conflict ever be resolved in conferences or in theatres of war?
It is very unfortunate that the Palestinian conflict has degenerated from a fight about a homeland to one that has sharply divided the combatants into followers of Christianity and followers of Islam. Some have even said that there are prophecies in the Holy Books that the conflict will not be decided until the end of times. Whatever happens eventually this unending war over Palestine has taken too many lives. Can Aljazeera now become an umpire that will help to convoke a non-partisan conference that will find a genuine solution to this problem that seems to have defied all solutions including the Two- State one that seems to be the best way out of the lock jam?
Can this influential TV station that has turned partisan have a change of mind and become a genuine umpire that seeks an end to this war that has produced sons and grandsons and great grandsons?
I do not know why I have been inspired to make this call on Aljazeera and not the politicians, fighters and thinkers on both sides of this fight that has divided our world today. The people at war are said to be the children of Abraham, the father of Christianity, Islam and Judaism. Abraham is known on all sides as the father of faith. Why are all his children the children of war and destruction?
The father of faith mut be in paradise beholding all the atrocities that are being committed by his children. Is he proud of what he is seeing? I doubt very much if he is. Will any of the parties to this conflict join their father in the heavenly habitation he is in? I also doubt this very much.
