Al-Jazeera appears to be the main target in an ongoing war, the latest episode of which occurred with the arrest and detention of well-known journalist and anchor Ahmed Mansour by the German authorities. He was detained at Berlin’s Tegel Airport as a result of Egyptian claims that the journalist assaulted a lawyer in Tahrir Square. The incident in Berlin lifts the veil on the real German and Western view about freedom of the press and the right to free expression and the manner in which one gathers facts for public dissemination.
We, as a people, do not have any illusions about the Western mind, which measures what is just according to where its interests and benefits lie. Justice is determined by those “interests” and “interests” are what are just; neither of these two notions is fixed.
From here one can say that Mansour’s arrest was based on false accusations of “theft, rape and kidnapping” (of which he was cleared by INTERPOL last October), which were alleged by the forces behind the coup that have taken over Egypt since June 2013. Such accusations are outrageously more suited to a criminal than a famous Al-Jazeera journalist. The irony of the situation is that such charges really do apply to those who have hijacked the democratic process and the country of Egypt as a whole. The regime has begun to accuse people of the very things that it is guilty of by projecting the actions and crimes of the oppressor onto its victims.
Looking at this from another perspective, we find that Germany now finds itself equated with Al-Sisi’s regime, which is ironic given that the West has been driving us crazy with its never-ending chorus about the right to freedom of expression and the freedom of the press as well as the need for liberties and democratic values. Western governments work tirelessly to protect the rights of journalists who have waged a racist campaign against Muslims and Islam and have come to the defence of newspapers that have published insulting images of Prophet Muhammad. However, when the issue at hand has anything to do with the rights of Arabs and Muslims to express their opinions, every Western interpretation is turned on its head and turned into a crime that warrants the arrest of someone like Ahmed Mansour, a prominent figure in the international media.
What happened to Mansour, who hosts Bila Hudoud and Shahid Ala Al-Asr on Al-Jazeera Arabic channel, also happened just months ago to an Al-Jazeera correspondent in Pakistan, Dr Ahmed Zeidan, who was responsible for leaking some of the criteria on what constitutes a terrorist organisation. Zeidan’s action allegedly warranted his arrest and detention in Guantanamo Bay despite the fact that he carried nothing on his person except a camera and a microphone. Now, though, he is classed as a terrorist simply for delivering messages to the world that the West did not approve of because it does not want people to know the truth.
In the same vein, a journalist and media personality by the name of Mohamed Al-Qudousi was sentenced to ten years in prison after being found guilty of trying to stage a coup against the Egyptian regime. There was also the arrest of another Al-Jazeera correspondent, Abdullah Al-Shami, who carried out the longest hunger strike ever conducted by a journalist after he was thrown in jail for no reason and without a fair trial. Another journalist from Al-Jazeera English was arrested after he was accused of founding a terrorist cell. Furthermore, the Houthis in Yemen placed media personality Dr Mohammad Humairi on their “watch list”.
These recent attacks on Al-Jazeera appear to be part of a series of events. The network’s journalist Tariq Ayoub was assassinated in Baghdad by US bombs; leaked documents revealed that the then US President George W Bush discussed with British Prime Minister Tony Blair the bombing of Al-Jazeera’s headquarters in Iraq in the hope that they would silence the network forever. Al-Jazeera’s offices in Afghanistan were also attacked and, in Libya, the Gaddafi regime assassinated cameraman Ali Al-Jaber. Another colleague, Sami Al-Haj, was imprisoned in Guantanamo Bay for six terrible years without charge or trial, and the criminal Assad regime seized the home of well-known Al-Jazeera host Faisal Al-Qassem, who told Damascus that he would have willingly given up his “free home”, which is situated a few kilometres from the occupied Golan Heights, if the Syrian government successfully liberated the area.
In fact, Dr Al-Qassem sent Ahmed Mansour an interesting, tongue-in-cheek message via Facebook: “My dear brother Ahmed, count your blessings that you have only been accused of rape, theft and kidnapping. Wafic Nasser, the head of military intelligence in Suwaida accused me of converting my home into a terrorist training den and an arsenal for bombs. They also found many weapons and plane replacement parts in my garden, which I worked to make in Doha so that they would be ready for use in Suwaida. They also accused me of digging out a tunnel that spans 20 kilometres from the top of the mountain to my house so that I could carry out terrorist activities. Thank God that the nuclear weapons they found in my house were biological. God protected us. You should be happy, mate.”
The campaign against Al-Jazeera and its journalists is serious and is categorised by arrests, assassinations, detentions and other forms of harassment. This is the price that Al-Jazeera pays for deciphering the truth in the middle of an Arab world dominated by Western media, and for granting its journalists the novel opportunity to enjoy the right to freedom of expression.
Translated from Arabi21, 23 June, 2015.
The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Monitor.