Sunday
Nov252007
al-Hurra: reality check
By 
Issandr El Amrani | Media US
Issandr El Amrani | Media US
I just got my satellite dish repaired and was surfing the channels. I came across Rob Satloff interviewing Dennis Ross about the Israeli-Palestinian peace process. So basically Satloff, head of the pro-Israel think tank WINEP, interviews Ross, former pro-Israel American diplomat who is spending his exile at... wait for it... WINEP. What channel was this? Al Hurra, where Satloff apparently has this show called "Dakhl Washington" (Inside Washington). Actually Satloff's Arabic surprised me, although the accent is grating. But who am I to talk?
Anyway, apparently this is what I've been missing from not watching al-Hurra: Israeli tools. Satloff is basically a professional lobbyist, which actually makes him more bearable than Ross, who has been spreading his extremely skewed vision of Oslo / Camp David II for years, sabotaging reasonable US policy along the way, while pretending to some kind of statesman status (he is also advising both Obama and Clinton - another reason to vote Edwards if you're a Democrat. Update: apparently Ross also advises Edwards. Oh well.) Apparently, the other regular feature on al-Hurra is Iraqi Shia propaganda, or so they say.
But really, everything that needs to be said about al-Hurra has already been said by Abu Aardvark.
Anyway, apparently this is what I've been missing from not watching al-Hurra: Israeli tools. Satloff is basically a professional lobbyist, which actually makes him more bearable than Ross, who has been spreading his extremely skewed vision of Oslo / Camp David II for years, sabotaging reasonable US policy along the way, while pretending to some kind of statesman status (he is also advising both Obama and Clinton - another reason to vote Edwards if you're a Democrat. Update: apparently Ross also advises Edwards. Oh well.) Apparently, the other regular feature on al-Hurra is Iraqi Shia propaganda, or so they say.
But really, everything that needs to be said about al-Hurra has already been said by Abu Aardvark.
Reader Comments (10)
No, you are right. His accent is grating and I am an American learning Arabic.
Last time I checked, criticizing someone based on their accent is filed neatly under 'racism'.
As any of my fellow ELLs know all too well.
Given the massive amount of almost universal and not very nuanced anti-Israel propoganda in the Arab World, letting Arabs hear Dennis Ross' opinion for 30 minutes might not be the most horrible thing in the world.
Jose, never heard of finding someone's accent annoying being racism. That's ridiculous. And what's an ELL?
Ethan, I'd happily hear the voices of Israelis speaking for themselves, but please keep Dennis Ross and others who pretend to neutrality away from my TV set.
Come to think of it, you can keep them on TV if in exchange you keep them away from my government (the US one).
"Jose, never heard of finding someone’s accent annoying being racism. That’s ridiculous. And what’s an ELL?"
Wow. Ok an ELL is an English language learner. Here is the wikipedia page for Linguicism: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linguicism. Essentially, the main idea is that criticizing someone's accent, or some other culturally-linked aspect of language, is a thinly veiled form of racism.
Having been an ELL myself (I learnt English when I was 12) and having a pretty odd accent (or so my friends tell me), I think that's political correctness gone mad.
Here's a good overview of how it goes beyond political correctness:
www.law.harvard.edu/students/orgs/blj/vol18/wiehl.pdf
Also, "learnt" is quaint British English that isn't used much these days. I think the BBC switched to "learned" a few years ago.
Having spent much time in Britain I must have picked that up. I know it's not generally written like that in journalism. Anyway, Satloff's elocution can be grating. I guess I don't know about his accent -- from now on, just as Stephen Colbert is color-blind, I am accent-deaf.