14/11/01

Memenangi Perang Propaganda Melalui Kemusnahan Kebebasan Akhbar

(Winning The Propaganda War By Bombing The Free Press)

Oleh: Christopher Bollyn.

Sebuah stesen penyiaran TV bebas di Afghanistan telah menjadi satu penghalang besar dalam peperangan propaganda yang memudahkan Amerika dan sekutunya sebelum mereka berjaya menawan Kabul. Kerana itu Amerika telah memusnahkan stesen itu dengan bom untuk membisukannya.

Di Kabul ada satu pejabat kepunyaan saluran TV dan berita bebas berbahasa Arab, Al-Jazeera, yang telah dikritik hebat oleh kerajaan AS kerana cara liputan berita ketika peperangan Afghan melanda. Stesen itu telah dimusnahkan oleh peluru berpandu AS beberapa jam sebelum askar Pakatan Utara memasuki bandaraya Afghan itu pada November 13.

Sebuah peluru berpandu Amerika telah memusnahkan pejabat Al-Jazeera lantas menutup terus apa yang merupakan satu sumber yang memberikan maklumat bebas daripada kotaraya Afghan itu ketika kuasa beralih tangan kepada pasukan anti-Taliban, yang dikatakan telah menyambut kemenangan mereka dengan merompak dan melakukan pembunuhan kejam.

Al-Jazeera memang terkenal kerana bersuara lantang, memberikan laporan bebas sehinggakan laporan itu menjadi satu penghalang dalam perang propaganda terhadap Taliban sejak Amerika melancarkan tindakan ketenteraan di Afghanistan. Para pegawai Amerika telah mengkritik Al-Jazeera dengan menuduh bahawa liputannya terhadap kempen pengeboman itu sebagai 'propaganda yang membakar semangat.'

Saluran berbahasa Arab yang berpangkalan di Qatar itu, merupakan hanya satu saluran penyiaran yang dibenarkan oleh Taliban di wilayah mereka, dan ini membolehkan Al-Jazeera menyiarkan gambar rakaman video rakyat Afghan berdemonstrasi dan membakar kedutaan Amerika di Kabul pada 26 September

Al-Jazeera telah dikritik oleh kerajaan AS kerana menjadi jurucakap Al-Qaeda setelah ia menyiarkan dua rakaman video menunjukkan Osama bin Laden yang merupakan tuduhan utama dalam serangan bulan September. Dalam rakaman video itu Osama Laden telah mengutuk kerajaan Amerika dan mendesak umat Islam bangkit dalam satu peperangan jihad - ketika pesawat pengebom AS menggugurkan bom menyerang sasaran mereka untuk memusnahkan Taliban di Afghanistan.

Siaran demikian menyakitkan hati pentadbiran Bush dan Setiausaha Negara Colin Powell yang menuduh Al-Jazeera memberikan terlalu banyak masa menyiarkan 'kenyataan yang berbisa dan tidak bertanggungjawab.' Kerajaan AS berkata saluran itu telah digunakan oleh Al-Qaeda untuk mengeluarkan pesanan berisyarat kepada para penyokongnnya di seluruh dunia.

Tetapi, Al-Jazeera enggan mengaku kalah untuk dibisukan. 'Kami adalah bergiat dalam bisnes pemberitaan. Dasar kami ialah menyiarkan pelbagai jenis berita dan pendapat. Seluruh dunia tertumpu kepada Afghanistan. Kalaulah kami tidak tayangkan yang benar, siapa lagi?' tanya Ibrahim Hilal, ketua editor Al-Jazeera. 'kami siarkan setiap perkataan dan pergerakan Presiden Bush. Orang Arab menuduh kami terlalu pro-Amerika, malahan pro-Israel. Orang Amerika berkata kami pro-Taliban. Ini bererti tentu ada kebenaran kepada pekerjaan kami.'

Walaupun Al-Jazeera kini sudah diberikan penghormatan sejagat kerana siaran eksklusif mengenai Osama Bin Laden, dan diketahui dan dihormati sebagai hanya satu sumber maklumat yang boleh dipercayai serta rakaman video daripada kawasan yang dikawal Taliban di Afghanistan, pengeboman AS yang memusnahkan pejabatnya tidak dilaporkan di Amerika Syarikat.

Seorang kolumnis American-Israeli, Zev Chafets ketika menulis di New York Daily News baru-baru ini mengutuk Al-Jazeera sebagai 'satu alat propaganda Arab dan 'salah satu senjata berbahaya di pihak ketumbukan Islam' dan beliau telah mencadangkan agar tentera Amerika 'memusnahkannya.'

Chafets berkata:; 'kebebasan akhbar merupakan satu lambang Amerika yang dibenci oleh musuhnya' dan kemudian beliau menulis agar AS mengebom satu-satunya jaringan TV yang bebas di Afghanistan dan juga di Timur Tengah.

'Mengajar Al-Jazeera adalah satu tugas yang mesti dilakukan oleh tentera kita. Membisukannya adalah satu keutamaan kerana kalau dibiarkan begitu, ia akan mempnyai kuasa untuk meracuni udara lebih berkesan dan lebih berbisa daripada yang termampu dilakukan oleh anthrax,' kata Chafets.

Sebutir bom Amerika telah digugurkan mengena pejabat siaran itu di Kabul pada 3.00 pagi 13 November, sehingga memusnahkan bangunannya. Pengarah Urusan Al-Jazeera, Mohammed Jasem al-Ali menaksirkan kerugian sekitar $800,000.

Al-Ali tidak pula menyebut apakah pejabat jaringan siarannya memang sengaja menjadi sasaran, tetapi dia berkata lokasi biro itu memang diketahui umum termasuk tentera AS. 'Pejabat ini memang diketahui umum, pesawat Amerika memang tahu lokasi pejabat kami, dan mereka tahu kami melakukan siaran dari situ,' kata beliau.

'Pejabat itu terletak di satu kawasan berpenduduk. Kami tidak pasti apakah ia sengaja disasar, tetapi Amerika memang tahu lokasi pejabat itu. Saya tidak nampak kenapa sebutir bom boleh digugurkan di lokasi itu di Kabul ini,' kata Al-Ali.

Jurucakap Pentagon Lt.Col. David Lapan (USMC) memberitahu AFP bahawa bangunan itu telah menjadi sasaran kami kerana ia merupakan satu 'pusat arahan dan kawalan untuk Al-Qaeda pimpinan Osama bin Laden. Lapan berkata tentera AS 'tidak mempunyai maklumat yang tempat itu pejabat Al-Jazeera.'

Sebelum itu Al-Ali pernah menafikan bahawa Al-Jazeera bersikap anti-Amerika, sambil menyebut betapa barat sengaja berdendam kerana kejayaan stesen itu memberikan liputan peristiwa dunia dan barisan professionalnya (kebanyakannya dilatih oleh BBC) di kalangan para wartawan, juruacara utama dan para editor.

'Al-Jazeera mahu menentukan liputan yang berimbang dengan mengetahui kisah di sebalik tabir, seperti yang dilakukan oleh CNN ketika perang Teluk,' kata Mahmoud Tarabay, seorang professor 'Journalism and Media Studies' di 'American University' di Lebanon.

Serangan peluru berpandu Amerika itu telah turut memusnahkan pejabat 'the Associated Press' (AP), dan British Broadcasting Corp. (BBC) di Kabul. Setengah jam sebelum itu sebiji bom yang besar telah digugurkan sehingga menghancurkan sebuah rumah yang digunakan oleh BBC yang terletak beberapa blok jaraknya dari pejabat Al-Jazeera, dan mencederakan William Reeve seorang wartawan yang sedang menerbitkan beritanya. Reeve meloncat untuk meniarap di atas lantai ketika bertugas itu dan pasukan BBC itu kemudiannya cabut lari meninggalkan pejabat, mencari perlindungan di sebuah hotel untuk keselamatan mereka.

Setelah mengalami kemusnahan bom Amerika itu, Al-Jazeera telah dihalang lagi daripda menghantar rakaman serangan yang dibuat oleh askar Pakatan Utara ketika mereka memasuki bandaraya itu dan juga beberapa pekan di utara Afghanistan. Al-Jazeera yang mempunyai kontrak dengan CNN, terpaksa menyiarkan rakaman yang dibuat oleh CNN di Kabul kepada 35 juta peminatnya yang berbahasa Arab di seluruh dunia.

Sebelum wujudnya Al-Jazeera, dunia Arab terpaksa bergantung kepada siaran CNN yang merupakan satu-satunya sumber berita utama daripada media Barat yang dianggap oleh keseluruhan dunia Arab sebagai pro-Israel.

Pada November 12, Kabul bergelora pada sebelah petangnya. Ketika itu tentera Taliban meninggalkan bandaraya itu beberapa jam lebih awal sebelum kemunculan kereta-kebal Pakatan Utara. Pasukan yang disokong oleh AS itu telah masuk pada subuh Selasa.

Pasukan tentera Pakatan Utara pada asasnya dianggotai oleh tiga kabilah (suku kaum) bukan Pashtun - Tajik, Uzbek dan Hazaras. Uzbek dan Hazarah merupakan sukusakat Mongol. Anggota pasukan Pakatan Utara itu telah merompak tiga buah bank dan beberapa rumah kediaman di Kabul sebaik mereka menawan bandaraya itu. Demikian laporan Taliban pada November 13.

Sumber Taliban itu juga melaporkan betapa tiga buah kampung di pinggir Mazar-e-Sharif telah dimusnahkan samasekali oleh pengeboman Amerika yang tersalah sasar kerana maklumat silap yang dihantar oleh talibarut daripada Pakatan Utara.

Penduduk kampung itu adalah etnik Pashtun dan bukannya ahli Taliban kata sumber itu sambil menyebut ramainya manusia yang mati terkorban.

Ketika Pakatan Utara memasukai wilayah Taliban menghala ke Kabul, rompakan dan pencurian menjadi-jadi apabila kumpulan entik Uzbek, dan Tajik menyambut kemenangan mereka sambil membunuh Pashtun Afghan, Arab dan Pakistan. Pashtun merupakan kumpulan puak yang terbesar di Afghanistan dan menggunakan nama yang eksklusif dengan Afghanistan sebelum nama itu dijadikan panduan kepada setiap pribumi Afghanistan sekarang ini.

Seorang wartawan Al-Jazeera di Kabul, Tayseer Allouni, telah diberitahu oleh Pakatan Utara bahawa dia menjadi sasaran mereka yang mahu membunuhnya. Allouni mempunyai janggut dan memakai jeket dan uniform 'khaki' dan merupakan seorang yang dikenali oleh penonton Arab seluruh dunia, kerana laporannya daripada kawasan yang dikuasai oleh Taliban secara lintas langsung. Dia kerap memberi liputan menunjukkan kawasan yang dibom oleh Amerika yang mencederakan orang awam dan mengorbankan wanita dan kanak-kanak.

Selepas kejadian pengboman Amerika itu, Allouni didapati hilang lebih satu hari lamanya. Di dalam satu perbualan telefon yang disiarkan pada Nov. 14, dia menceritakan bagaimana dia bersama rakan setugasnya di Kabul telah lari daripada bandaraya itu sejurus sebelum pejabatnya dibom dan telah menyaksikan 'senario dahsyat yang tidak dapat saya gambarkan....maafkan saya...'

Allouni dan rakan setugasnya lari keluar daripada pejabat mereka sebelum pejabat itu musnah oleh bom Amerika. Dia telah dikasari ketika melarikan diri bersama pengunduran Taliban, demikian laporan stesen TV itu pada Nov. 14.

Allouni enggan menyebut siapa yang memukul dan menghambatnya dan seluruh anggota petugas pejabat Al-Jazeera di Kabul. Mereka telah diselamatkan oleh penduduk Afghan setempat yang turut mendapatkan semula peralatan mereka, katanya.

Allouni memberitahu Al-Jazeera betapa pasukan petugasnya berada dalam keadaan selamat. Namun dia masih dalam keadaan 'terkejut yang amat sangat'. Allouni ialah kelahiran Syria dan memiliki paspot Sepanyol. Belaiu sedang meninggalkan Afghanistan untuk mendapatkan rawatan kepada penyakit terseliuh tulang belakang.

Apabila Setiausaha Pertahanan Donald Rumsfeld ditanya oleh wartawan pada November 13, mengenai laporan media mengenai keganasan yang berlaku di kawasan yang telah dirampas oleh Pakatan Utara, dia menyoal balik; 'Siapakah yang membuat laporan itu?'

Stephanie Bunker, jurucakap PBB di Islamabad, memberitahu satu persidangan akhbar, 'kami menerima berita daripada sumber yang dipercayai betapa lebih 100 askar rekrut Taliban yang masih muda dan menyorok di sebuah sekolah di Mazar-e-Sharif yang telah dibunuh oleh Pakatan Utara pada Sabtu lalu.'

Oleh kerana pengunduran Taliban berlaku satu hari sebelumnya, dan mengikut laporan Bunker, pejuang muda itu telah dibunuh 24 jam kemudiannya, ini menunjukkan mereka telah dibunuh dan tidak mati dalam peperangan. Wakil Pakatan Utara di Uzbekistan telah menafikan laporan itu.

Ratusan manusia telah terkorban dan banyak bekalan perubatan telah dirampas di Mazar-e-Sharif, mengikut laporan International Red Cross (Palang Merah Antarabangsa), yang melaporkan bagaimana para petugasnya telah membantu mengebumikan mayat mereka yang terkorban. 'Jumlahnya adalah ratusan banyaknya,' kata jurucakap wanita Antonella Notari. Tidak pula dapat dijelaskan berapa ramaikah yang terkorban itu orang awam dan berapa ramai pula pejuang Taliban.

Christian Berthiaume, seorang jurucakap wanita daripada World Food Program melaporkan: 'Mengikut laporan, di Mazar terdapat banyak kecurian dan juga penculikan orang awam, serta tembak-menembak yang dilakukan oleh orang-orang yang bersenjata secara berleluasa di jalan raya.'

Terjemahan: SPAR.

Asal:

http://www.rense.com/general16/freeasd.htm

Winning The Propaganda War By Bombing The Free Press

By Christopher Bollyn

bollyn@enteract.com

11-14-1

An independent television station broadcasting from Afghanistan was a problem in winning "the propaganda war" so before "America,s allies" overran Kabul - an American bomb silenced it.

The Kabul office of the independent Arabic news channel Al-Jazeera, which the U.S. government had criticized for its coverage of the Afghan campaign, was destroyed by a U.S. missile just hours before the U.S. backed Northern Alliance entered the Afghan capital on Nov. 13.

An American missile obliterated al-Jazeera,s office and effectively shut down what had been the only independent source of information from the Afghan capital as it fell to fighters from the anti-Taliban coalition, who reportedly celebrated their conquest with looting and summary executions.

Al-Jazeera has a reputation for outspoken, independent reporting and its reporting had been an obstacle to winning the propaganda war against the Taliban since the start of the US-led military action in Afghanistan. American officials criticized al-Jazeera,s coverage of the bombing campaign as being "inflammatory propaganda."

The Qatar-based Arabic language network, being the only media outlet with access to Taliban-held territory, broadcast video pictures of Afghan demonstrators attacking and setting fire to the US embassy in Kabul on 26 September.

Al-Jazeera was criticized by the U.S. government for being a mouthpiece for al-Qaeda after it broadcast two videotapes of Osama bin Laden, Washington,s prime suspect in the September attacks, in which bin Laden denounced the American government and urged Muslims to rise up in a holy war - as U.S. bombers pounded Taliban targets in Afghanistan.

These broadcasts aroused the ire of the Bush administration and Secretary of State Colin L. Powell said al-Jazeera was giving too much time to "vitriolic, irresponsible kinds of statements." The U.S. government said the channel was being used by the al-Qaeda network to pass on coded messages to supporters around the world.

But al-Jazeera refused to be silenced. "We are in the business of news. Our policy is to air all shades of opinion. The attention of the world is riveted on Afghanistan. If we don't show it, who will?" asked Ibrahim Hilal, al-Jazeera's chief editor. "We put every word, every move of President Bush on the air. Arabs accuse us of being pro-American, even pro-Israeli. The Americans say we're pro-Taliban. We must be doing something right."

Although Al-Jazeera had achieved global stature with its exclusive access to Osama Bin Laden, and was known and respected as the only credible source of information and video footage from Taliban controlled areas of Afghanistan, the U.S. bombing of its office was not widely reported in the United States.

The American-Israeli columnist Zev Chafets, writing in the New York Daily News had recently called Al Jazeera "an Arab propaganda outfit and "one of the most potent weapons in the Islamic Axis arsenal" and proposed that the U.S. military "shut it down."

Chafets said, "the free press is a symbol of what America's enemies hate about this country" and then went on to say that the U.S. should bomb the only independent television network in Afghanistan - and the Middle East.

"Dealing with Al Jazeera is a job for the military. Shutting it down should be an immediate priority because, left alone, it has the power to poison the air more efficiently and lethally than anthrax ever could," Chafets said.

An American bomb hit the network's office in Kabul at 3 a.m. on Nov. 13, destroying the building. Al-Jazeera's managing director, Mohammed Jasem al-Ali estimated the loss at $800,000.

Al-Ali did not speculate as to whether the offices were deliberately targeted, but he said the location of the bureau was widely known by everyone, including the U.S. military. "This office has been known by everybody, the American airplanes know the location of the office, they know we are broadcasting from there," he said.

"The office sits in a residential area. We cannot say for sure that it was deliberately targeted, but the Americans know exactly where the office is. I can see no other reason why a bomb would land in that section of Kabul," al-Ali said.

Pentagon spokesman Lt. Col. David Lapan (USMC) told AFP that the building had been intentionally targeted because it was a "command and control facility" for Osama bin Laden,s Al-Qaeda group. Lapan said that the military "had no information that it was the al-Jazeera office."

Al-Ali had previously denied that al-Jazeera was anti-American, saying Western media begrudged the station its successful coverage of world events and its coterie of professional (mostly BBC-trained) correspondents, anchors and editors.

"Al Jazeera wants to ensure balanced coverage by getting out the other side of the story, just like CNN did during the Gulf War," said Mahmoud Tarabay, a professor of journalism and media studies at the American University in Lebanon.

Missiles also damaged the offices of The Associated Press and the British Broadcasting Corp. in Kabul. Half an hour earlier, a huge American bomb badly damaged a house used by the BBC just a block away, striking while William Reeve, a reporter, was broadcasting. Reeve dived to the floor in mid-sentence and the BBC team left the building shortly afterwards, crossing the city to the safety of a hotel.

After being destroyed by American bombs, Al-Jazeera was prevented from sending televised images of the atrocities being committed by the alliance fighters as they occupied the cities and towns of northern Afghanistan. Al-Jazeera, which has contractual relations with the American broadcaster CNN, was forced to broadcast CNN,s footage of events in Kabul to its 35 million Arabic speaking viewers around the world.

Prior to Al Jazeera,s emergence, Arab TV audiences had to rely on CNN and other sources from the Western media, which are generally regarded as pro-Israel in the Arab world.

Kabul fell into chaos late in the day on Monday, Nov. 12, as the ruling Taliban forces abandoned the capital hours ahead of the advancing tanks of the Northern Alliance. The U.S.-backed opposition arrived in the city early Tuesday.

The Northern Alliance is primarily comprised of three minority (non-Pashtun) ethnic groups - Tajiks, Uzbeks and the Hazaras. The Uzbek and Hazara people are of Mongol descent. Alliance fighters looted three banks and several houses in Kabul after taking over the city, Taliban sources in Islamabad said on Nov. 13.

The Taliban sources also said that three villages had been completely destroyed around Mazar-e-Sharif after U.S. planes bombarded them on the basis of wrong information provided by the Northern Alliance about the presence of Taliban there.

The people in the villages were ethnic Pashtuns and not Taliban members, the sources said, adding that the raids had killed a large number of people.

As the Northern Alliance advanced through previously held Taliban territory on the way to Kabul looting was widespread as the ethnic Uzbek and Tajik rebels celebrated by executing Pashtun Afghans, Arabs, and Pakistanis. The Pashtun comprise the majority of the population of Afghanistan and bore the exclusive name of Afghan before that name came to denote any native of the present country of Afghanistan.

Al-Jazeera's reporter in Kabul, Tayseer Allouni, had been told by the Northern Alliance that if they captured him he would be killed. The bearded Allouni, who usually wore a khaki vest, had become familiar to Arab viewers around the world, providing live reports from Taliban - controlled areas barred to most Western reporters. He had often described U.S. missiles hitting civilian areas and killing women and children.

After the bombing, Allouni was missing for more than a day. In a phone interview broadcast Nov. 14, he said that he and the rest of the Kabul staff had fled the city shortly before his office was bombed and witnessed "scenes that, I'm sorry, I couldn't describe to anybody."

Allouni and his team left their offices minutes before it was bombed by U.S. aircraft. Allouni was assaulted as he fled the Afghan capital amid the Taliban retreat, the station reported on Nov. 14.

Allouni would not say who beat and mugged him and the rest of the Kabul office staff of al-Jazeera. They were saved by Afghan tribesmen who also retrieved their equipment, he said.

Allouni told al-Jazeera that he and the team were now safe, but he was "in deep psychological shock." Allouni, who is Syrian born and carries a Spanish passport, is leaving Afghanistan to receive medical treatment for a slipped disc.

When Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld was asked by reporters on Nov. 13 about media reports of atrocities coming from areas overrun by the Northern Alliance, he responded, "Who's making these reports?"

Stephanie Bunker, U.N. spokeswoman in Islamabad, told a press conference, "we've had sources that have corroborated that over 100 Taliban troops who were young recruits who were hiding in a school [in Mazar-e-Sharif] were killed by Northern Alliance forces on Saturday."

Because the Taliban retreat had occurred the day before, and according to Bunker's account, the young recruits were killed more than 24 hours later, it appeared they had been executed and did not die in battle. The Northern Alliance,s representative in neighboring Uzbekistan denied the reports.

Hundreds of people had been killed and tons of aid supplies were looted in Mazar-e-Sharif, according to the International Red Cross, who said its workers were helping bury the dead. "It is in the hundreds," said spokeswoman Antonella Notari. It was unclear how many of the victims were civilians and how many were Taliban fighters.