Why don’t we get the hell out of the Middle East and let the murdering bastards get on with it without us?
Until we work out quite where we stand (crouch/hide/retreat?) in this crazy modern form of warfare in which no one knows whose side anyone is on and where an enemy’s major objective seems to be to wage jihad on English-speaking journalists, the media should do a Dunkirk.
I’m suggesting what was previously, professionally unthinkable (and probably still is to the John Simpson/ Kate Adie/ Bob Fisk breed of reporter): I’m saying the media should get out of Iraq, Syria and Gaza and declare a blackout on reporting anything more than political events and diplomatic moves in the Middle East.
- David Banks
on reporting Isis
Until we work out quite where we stand (crouch/hide/retreat?) in this crazy modern form of warfare in which no one knows whose side anyone is on and where an enemy’s major objective seems to be to wage jihad on English-speaking journalists, the media should do a Dunkirk.
I’m suggesting what was previously, professionally unthinkable (and probably still is to the John Simpson/ Kate Adie/ Bob Fisk breed of reporter): I’m saying the media should get out of Iraq, Syria and Gaza and declare a blackout on reporting anything more than political events and diplomatic moves in the Middle East.
- David Banks
on reporting Isis
Tuesday 28 October The British photographer John Cantlie has appeared in a sixth video delivering a propaganda message for Isis. Instead of wearing the "Guantanamo" orange robes in which he had been seen before, he was dressed in a black shirt for what was presented as a documentary-style walkabout in Kobani. The battle for the city was coming to an end, he said.
It is not clear whether Cantlie was really being filmed outside.
A forensic analyst told the Times that the opening sequence had been photoshopped. “There are a number of scenes where he is in the same focus as the background, meaning they were filmed separately,” he told the paper. “The flies seen buzzing around him are also artificial visual effects and some marks on his neck come and go. It has been heavily compressed and edited.”
In a previous video Cantlie said that he had watched fellow hostages leave their cell, never to return, adding: "I await my turn." A 2,000-word article, allegedly written by Cantlie, has also been published in an Isis magazine.
Cantlie was kidnapped in Syria in 2012 and freed after a week, but was snatched again with James Foley. Foley was murdered in August, the first of five victims - two American journalists, two British aid workers and a former US soldier - whose deaths were recorded in videos posted online.
It is not clear whether Cantlie was really being filmed outside.
A forensic analyst told the Times that the opening sequence had been photoshopped. “There are a number of scenes where he is in the same focus as the background, meaning they were filmed separately,” he told the paper. “The flies seen buzzing around him are also artificial visual effects and some marks on his neck come and go. It has been heavily compressed and edited.”
In a previous video Cantlie said that he had watched fellow hostages leave their cell, never to return, adding: "I await my turn." A 2,000-word article, allegedly written by Cantlie, has also been published in an Isis magazine.
Cantlie was kidnapped in Syria in 2012 and freed after a week, but was snatched again with James Foley. Foley was murdered in August, the first of five victims - two American journalists, two British aid workers and a former US soldier - whose deaths were recorded in videos posted online.
This man is not a swashbuckling folk hero, so let's stop treating him as if he were
The masked man believed to have murdered at least six Isis hostages on video since last summer has been named as Mohammed Emwazi, a 26-year-old IT graduate from Maida Vale.
It's not hard is it?
You could replace Maida Vale with Kilburn or Kensington or Queen's Park or London. You could use "British" instead of "masked", "unmasked" instead of "named". If you wanted something racier you could introduce words like "butcher" or "beheaded". If you were looking for shorter and snappier, you could dump "on video last summer", or leave the age and even the name until the next par. You could tell this story in just 18 words - "The killer believed to have beheaded at least six Isis hostages has been unmasked as Londoner Mohammed Emwazi" - and people would know exactly who and what you were talking about. Yet no-one had the confidence to do so without recourse to the crass nickname coined by the Scottish Daily Mail after the murder of James Foley. Not even the BBC, which "broke" the story last Thursday, some hours after the Washington Post. 
Come Friday, every mainstream daily, with the exception of the Express, carried a front-page photograph of a man in black holding a big knife. Another giant clue to what this was all about.
The Guardian, Times, Independent, Mail, Sun and Mirror all managed to produce splash headings without the nickname, but then five of the six snuggled up in the security blanket when writing the subdecks and straps, leaving only the Guardian holding out. It succumbed in the second par, having lasted through a banner splash, two subheadings and 62 words of text. In a way, this was the saddest example of all. If the message hadn't got through by that point, the writers and subs should have packed up and gone in search of alternative employment. It took too many deaths for our newspapers to realise that it might not be a good idea to run photographs of a cowardly man in black subjugating courageous men in orange. Diane Foley recognised the significance of the pictures straight away when she asked people not to share photographs of her son as he faced death, but to use pictures of him vibrant and alive. By the time Alan Henning was murdered in October, most had grasped at least that point: the Sunday Telegraph was the only paper to put the familiar desert death scene on its cover and the picture of the Salford taxi driver holding a little boy in Syria became the only photograph to feature on every paper's front page last year. But having restored some dignity to the victims, we had yet to learn not to glorify the killer. We have not only accorded Emwazi an identity that might secure him a place in folklore, but continue to describe him as Isis's "star executioner" and write about him "featuring" in the group's videos as though he were a Hollywood hero.
What is particularly strange about all this is that the victims have largely been "family" - three journalists and two Britons. The natural reaction would be heightened outrage, yet we have been mesmerised by the killer almost to the point of sidelining those we should care about. We find more morbid kudos in the fact that this man is British than concern that our society could foster such hatred. For six months we have been providing propaganda for Isis - and sprinkling words such as "evil", "vile", "depraved" around doesn't mitigate that failing. Do we think that Emwazi cares that the Sun describes him as a monster or that the Mail says he's reviled? Do we think that he takes pride or feels shame in seeing himself portrayed as a ruthless killer and even "the world's most hated man"? Answer those two questions honestly and we can begin to make our coverage more appropriate.
Sadly, there has been little sign elsewhere of the nickname falling into disuse. Quite the reverse. It is now being regarded as interchangeable with Emwazi. Over the past week, it has featured in 59 weekday newspaper headlines and in text 267 times. The picture of the masked figure, understandable on day one, has been used 43 times - often as nothing more than a design device to break up a slab of text.
Oh, and one last gripe. Every paper and broadcaster has at some point this week used the phrase: "Mohammed Emwazi has been unmasked as..."
Actually, I think the Isis killer was unmasked as Emwazi. Friday 06 March, 2015 |
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Plaudits...
...to Geoff Martin, editor in chief of the Emwazi family's local paper the Ham & High.
He has banned the nickname from his group of papers, writing in this week's edition: 
Do we really need to attach a nickname to someone who has revelled in shedding innocent blood in the most savage and dispicable manner? I think not. The term that's being used to describe him makes him sound like a superhero from a Marvel comic. What next? Action Man figures? Mohammed Emwazi is no hero: he's an evil, cold-blooded killer who should be hunted down and brought to justice.
(but perhaps someone should tell the online caption writers) |
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