Covering Terrorism: The Media and 9/11

On September 27, the Christian Science Monitor—an American newspaper more prone than most to offer foreign news coverage—published a long article that responded to a question President Bush had asked while addressing a joint session of Congress: "Why do they [the terrorists] hate us?" Peter Ford, the writer for the Monitor, tried to summarize the grievances not only of people like Osama bin Laden and his terrorist organization but also of those people in the Arab and Muslim world who have strong anti-American feelings but do not resort to terrorism. He did a good job of articulating the feelings of individuals from those circles:

"The buttons that Mr. bin Laden pushes in statements and interviews—the injustice done to the Palestinians, the cruelty of continued sanctions against Iraq, the presence of U.S. troops in Saudi Arabia, the repressive and corrupt nature of the U.S.-backed Gulf governments#8212;win a good deal of popular sympathy in that part of the world."




	"Profile: Egyptians Look on the Attacks on the United States as Sad, Yet Something They Saw Coming." Reported by Anne Garrels, Weekend Edition, National Public Radio (September 23, 2001).

This article was only one of many similar reports. The print, television, and radio media suddenly discovered why Americans are hated in the Muslim and Arab world. I think it is interesting that in the two and a half weeks after the attacks of September 11, the major television networks and National Public Radio broadcast a combined total of 33 stories dealing with the basic question: What are the roots of anti-American sentiments in the Muslim and Arab world? In the more than eight months of 2001 that preceded the terrorism of 9/11, the same news organizations had not produced a single story on this topic.