BEN- GURION UNIVERSITY OF THE NEGEV FACULTY OF HUMANITIES AND SOCIAL SCIENCES DEPARTMENT OF MIDDLE EAST SCIENCES
Portrayals of Neda Agha-Soltan's Death: State-Funded English-Language News Networks and the Post-2009 Iranian Election Unrest
THESIS SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTER OF ARTS
NEAL UNGERLEIDER UNDER THE SUPERVISION OF DR. HAGGAI RAM UNDER THE SUPERVISION OF DR. TAL SAMUEL-AZRAN
SEPTEMBER 2010
1 BEN- GURION UNIVERSITY OF THE NEGEV FACULTY OF HUMANITIES AND SOCIAL SCIENCES DEPARTMENT OF MIDDLE EASTERN SCIENCES
Portrayals of Neda Agha-Soltan's Death: State-Funded English-Language News Networks and the Post-2009 Iranian Election Unrest
THESIS SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTER OF ARTS
NEAL UNGERLEIDER UNDER THE SUPERVISION OF DR. HAGGAI RAM UNDER THE SUPERVISION OF DR. TAL SAMUEL-AZRAN
Signature of student: ______Date: ______Signature of supervisor: ______Date: ______Signature of supervisor: ______Date: ______Signature of chairperson of the committee for graduate studies: ______Date: ______
2 Abstract:
This thesis examines international media coverage of Neda Agha-Soltan, a 26-year-old Iranian woman who died of a gunshot wound in Tehran during the 2009 post-election demonstrations. Agha-Soltan's death was captured by at least two camerapersons. The resulting footage appeared on television news worldwide, with Agha-Soltan's death becoming one of the most readily identifiable images of the demonstrations in Iran. International media in Iran relied strongly on user-generated content created by bystanders in Tehran. For international news organizations who found their employees expelled from Iran, use of bystander-generated footage became a convenient method of reporting on a major world event. The easy availability of camera- equipped mobile phones among Tehran's middle- and upper- classes meant a surplus of video footage of oftentimes violent demonstrations and rallies. Specific news coverage taken is from three organizations: The BBC, Al Jazeera English and RT (Russia Today), an English-language international news channel funded by the Russian government. This thesis focuses on internet news coverage by all three networks of both Agha-Soltan in particular and of Iran in general. This includes text, video and audio material offered on their websites, as well as television footage that was also broadcast on YouTube. The time frame for coverage analyzed in the thesis extends from June 20, 2009 (the date of Agha-Soltan's death) to December 31, 2009. This time period is further divided into three separate sub- periods: June 20, 2009 – June 22, 2009 (early coverage of Agha-Soltan's death), June 23 – September 22, 2009 (extended coverage, after-events and analysis during the sixth months following Agha-Soltan's death) and September 23 – December 31, 2009 (miscellaneous 2009 news and year-end retrospectives). This thesis begins with a description of Agha-Soltan's death on June 20, 2009 as reconstructed from the two videos (“Video A” and “Video B”) that were made of her final moments. Although multiple camerapersons are visible in the videos, these are the only two videos to have shown up on the internet as of date. The description of Agha-Soltan's death is supplemented by background information reconstructed from three other user-generated videos that appear to show her in Tehran the same day. In both the death videos and the three Tehran videos, Agha-Soltan appears accompanied by her music teacher Hamid Panahi. The introduction continues with an explanation of the unique confluence of factors that led to the profusion of video from June 2009 Tehran: easy availability of camera-equipped mobile phones, the use of social networking services such as Twitter, Facebook and YouTube and the relationship between Iranians and the Iranian diaspora. This thesis attempts to create a timeline of the dissemination of the two Agha-Soltan videos; an explanation is given of the complicating factor of deletion of early Agha-Soltan videos (and, in fact, of much violent footage from June 2009 Iran) by YouTube, which maintained an ambivalently worded anti-violence policy at the time of Agha-Soltan's death. A chapter on Existing Literature examines prior research conducted on the BBC, Al Jazeera English
3 (along with their Arabic-language mother channel) and RT/Russia Today, along with academic studies of possible antecedents to Agha-Soltan. This chapter makes extensive use of the research of Philip Seib, director of the University of Southern California's Center on Public Diplomacy. Seib has written extensively on Al Jazeera and the reframings encountered by mass media on the internet. Brief mention is given to the history of media criticism of foreign reporting in the Middle East, with special attention given to the works of Edward Said and the changes to Middle East reporting pre- and post- internet. Possible antecedents to the coverage of Agha-Soltan's death – and the two videos themselves – appear in numerous studies such as Hall Gardner's examination of the influence of portable transistor radios on coverage of the 1989 Tienanmen Square events, Adrienne Russell's survey of new media effects on coverage of the 2006 Parisian banlieu riots and Mark Deuze's parsing of the role of mobile camera-equipped phones in turning “observers” into news “producers,” along with the many studies of the role of social media and user-generated content in coverage of the 2003 invasion of Iraq. Contemporaneous studies into the effects of gender, beauty, femininity and feminism into media coverage of Agha-Soltan's death are also mentioned. Although BBC, Al Jazeera and RT coverage of Agha-Soltan was rarely as unsubtle as the British newspaper which called her the “Angel of Iran,” writings by authors such as Peggy Drexler and Golbarg Bashi are cited in order to examine the complicated question of how Agha-Soltan's gender effected coverage of her death. I also summarize the rich history of academic research on the BBC. Numerous studies of the media organization's news-gathering, multimedia and public diplomacy presences have been published in recent years. The BBC's relationship with the region, through the various BBC Persian and BBC Arabic services as well as Anglophone broadcasts, was researcherd by Seib and Mohammed Ayish. Magisterial surveys of the BBC's internal operations by Philip Schlesinger and others are parsed as well. Internal BBC studies on the use of social media within the network are cited. Finally, an overview is made of allegations of bias in BBC coverage and their possible applications to the network's Agha-Soltan depictions. Also summarized is previous academic writing on Al-Jazeera English and RT. Due to the young age of both networks, there is rather less literature on the pair. Nonetheless, books by Hugh Miles, Marc Lynch, Mohammed El-Nawawy, Seib and others have discussed Al Jazeera's Arabic-language operations. However, specialized research into Al-Jazeera's English-language coverage by John Owen, Tony Burman and El-Nawawy is discussed, as is the smaller corpus of literature on RT put out by authors at the University of South California's Center on Public Diplomacy and elsewhere. My examination of BBC coverage of Agha-Soltan's death in the larger context of the Tehran demonstrations finds an ongoing narrative where the network's attempt to perpetuate a “1979-in-2009” framing rapidly gives way to childish infatuation with the possibilities of using user-generated video content to cover a major world news event. Following the Iranian government's order that the BBC's Jon Leyne lead the country,
4 the BBC came to frequently rely on user-generated video obtained via the internet to cover the events in Tehran. In the 72 hours following Agha-Soltan's death, most news coverage of the shooting on the BBC was packaged with a translated interview with her fiancee, Caspian Makan, that was originally aired on BBC Persian. In these early days, Agha-Soltan is painted as a symbol of the Iranian government's brutal treatment of young, idealistic protesters. Over the remainder of 2009, the network aired extensive after-coverage of Agha-Soltan's death. These stories were related to both breaking news stories such as her arba'een ceremony and to ongoing retrospective features. Multiple packagings and framings of an interview with Arash Hejazi, the doctor who treated Agha- Soltan after her shooting, were made. I analyze the multiple formats of this interview, of a documentary film on Agha-Soltan that was broadcast on the internet and interviews with other figures, including Rostami Motlagh, the mother of Neda Agha-Soltan. During this time period, a consistent pattern is uncovered where the BBC actively perpetuates a “martyr” framing around Agha-Soltan's death that turns her into an unwilling symbol of Iranian democracy. Both the Hejazi and Motlagh interviews emphasize the cost Agha-Soltan's death took out on those around it: for Hejazi, exile from Iran and purported hounding by state authorities and for Motlagh, the inability to properly mourn her daughter's death. Similar coverage was broadcast on Al Jazeera. However, the network stayed largely true to their self- proclaimed mission of “the voice of the global south.” While Agha-Soltan's depiction on Al Jazeera was as sympathetic as the BBC's, Agha-Soltan is put into a pan-Muslim context several times. During a discussion on Al Jazeera's Riz Khan talk show, callers and emailers use a story on Agha-Soltan's death as a reason to accuse the larger Muslim world of forsaking Iran and “the readiness by Western media and politicians to accept any criticism spread by Twitter against the Iranian government.” Another talk show on the network, media criticism program The Listening Post, ran a segment accusing the Western media of “double standards” in their adoring coverage of Agha-Soltan compared to the sparse coverage of an Egyptian woman named Marwa el-Sherbini who was killed in a racist attack inside a German courtroom. Al Jazeera's coverage was far less reliant on user-generated video content than that of the BBC, but the same infatuation with new technology remains. Stories related to Agha-Soltan during 2009 primarily take a sympathetic tone, but one with far less idealization of Agha-Soltan than that of the BBC. An interview with Nobel Peace Prize winner Shirin Ebadi is held to establish that “Iran's Neda Killing 'Was Illegal.'” Al Jazeera interviewed Makan as well; the network used a similar framing as the BBC while repackaging the interview in far fewer formats. In comparison, RT's coverage of Agha-Soltan's death was sparse, skeptical and hostile. One of the only actual mentions of Agha-Soltan was from an interview show held in New York City's Times Square neighborhood which asks questions of “the man on the street.” In this show, viewers were reminded that New Yorkers think it is “too easy to cross the line between protests and riots.” RT's Iran coverage in general is found
5 to veer into realms of conspiracy theory, with Western media accused of destabilizing Iran and viewers consistently reminded of the Anglo-American role in engineering the 1953 coup in Tehran.
6 Table of Contents
Preface - 3 Introduction - 5 Methodology - 15 Existing Literature - 19 Analysis of BBC Coverage - 41 Analysis of Al Jazeera English Coverage - 57 Analysis of RT/Russia Today Coverage - 68 Conclusions – 75 Appendix - 84 Bibliography – 105
7 Preface
This thesis deals with the portrayal in the international press of Neda Agha-Soltan, a young Iranian woman killed in the disorder following the 2009 Presidential election. Agha-Soltan's life and death were interpreted very differently by Al Jazeera English, the BBC and Russia Today/RT, the three news services analyzed herein. For transcription of Arabic and Persian, the decision was made to keep usage and transliteration as simple as possible. When video titles or commentary were written in either language, they are transcribed in Arabic script as written. Al Jazeera and their programs are spelled with a capitalized “Al” (e.g. “Al Jazeera”) in keeping with the network's own identification. All Arabic and Persian text is transliterated into Latin characters except in the case of direct quotes from original source material and footnotes, which are left in original script in order to accurately reflect URLs and publishing information. When directly quoting literature or web sources, the original spelling is reproduced. Persian and Arabic transliteration was conducted via the mylanguages.org website. The process of producing scholarly literature on current events poses unique challenges. For obvious reasons, a corpus of journal articles and academic texts on the aftermath of the 2009 election does not yet exist. In the absence of a comprehensive history and time line of the post-election events, use was made of The New York Times, The Economist, The Guardian and the Times of London for basic background research. Similarly, academic literature for two of the networks profiled is rather sparse. Al Jazeera English was only founded in 2006 and RT/Russia Today was established at the end of 2005. Academic literature on both does exist; various scholarly papers and books referencing them have been used as sources herein. However, the bulk of objective and detailed writing about the operations of Al Jazeera English and RT was originally published in mass market newspapers and magazines. For this thesis, use has been made of examinations of these networks from non-academic journal periodicals such as The Atlantic, The Washington Post, Foreign Policy, The American Prospect and The New York Times. These sources are also supplemented by the rich subgenre of academic literature dedicated to Al Jazeera English's Arabic mother network. The Dubai-based network's meteoric rise and attendant controversies – including its coverage of the Iraq/Afghanistan wars, the Second Intifada and its contentious relations with Middle Eastern governments - are all extremely well-documented. As will be explained later, Al Jazeera and Al Jazeera English share a common corporate hierarchy, with the degree of their respective integration still open to informed speculation. In order to create a reasonable sample size of content to analyze, this thesis makes use of web content only. While television footage from the Iranian post-election events and Agha-Soltan's death is available from sources including New York's Paley Center and the British Library in London, several factors led me to consider
8 web content. First was the ease of accessing publicly-available internet content. Secondly, the important fact that all three networks have converted the bulk of their on-air material into web content. But most importantly, the circumstances of Agha-Soltan's death warrant a specific focus on web content. Her death was captured on mobile camera phone footage and quickly spread worldwide via the internet. In order to analyze the framing of her death and the rapid changes that the narrative of the Iranian post-election events took in worldwide media, a specific focus on web content was necessary. For the purposes of this thesis, “content” is defined as any material which was made publicly available by the networks or by individuals on the internet, be it on their websites or on external services such as YouTube/Twitter. When analyzing the web content of all three news services, content from between the dates of June 20, 2009 (when Agha-Soltan died) to September 22, 2009 (three months after her death was first mentioned by the BBC) was searched for the keyword “Iran” via Google and YouTube. Additional usage was also made of stories relevant to Agha-Soltan found by an identical search made for the date range of September 23, 2009 to December 31, 2009. Content which only had a tenuous relationship to Iran, however, was not included. Also filtered out were duplicate entries (i.e. the same piece of television footage uploaded both to YouTube and to Al Jazeera English's web site); however, repurposings of the same content were counted as different pieces (ie the BBC producing multiple edits of interviews with Arash Hejazi).
9 Introduction On June 20, 2009, a 27-year-old Iranian woman named Neda Agha-Soltan was reportedly traveling in her automobile with three other passengers to attend a demonstration in Tehran's Ahzadi (Freedom) Square protesting the outcome of the 2009 Iranian Presidential election. One of the passengers has been positively identified as Agha-Soltan's music teacher, Hamid Panahi; two others have yet to be conclusively identified1. The four had parked their car on Karegar Street, a short (~600 meter) side street in the vicinity of the former United States embassy, located approximately 400 meters to the east2. The four passengers exited the car on a day when at least two of them – Agha-Soltan and Panahi – had attended other demonstrations in Tehran. Total attendance at the June 20 demonstrations was estimated in the tens of thousands, far fewer than at the initial protests the week prior. The day prior, Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei implied that protesters would be at personal risk in a televised speech3. While on Karegar Street, Panahi told the Los Angeles Times that the four were standing outside when he heard a sound and saw Agha-Soltan collapse to the ground. In Panahi's exact words, “we were stuck in traffic and we got out and stood to watch, and without her throwing a rock or anything they shot her […] It was just one bullet.” In the seconds that followed, two separate videos were taken of Agha-Soltan's death that spread worldwide. The first video was taken on a mobile camera phone with a high megapixel count and zoom capability, while the second video lasts 15 seconds and features a low megapixel count. The most widely distributed video of Agha-Soltan's death, hereby referred to as 'Video A,'4 is of higher quality technically. In one of Video A's first uploads to YouTube on June 20, 2009, it was titled in Persian “Keshth Shdn Dkhtr Jwan Twst Lbas Shkhsa" - “Young Girl Killed By Plain Clothes.” It apparently begins a short period of time after Agha-Soltan was shot and lasts, in the longest version yet found online, for 40 seconds5. In it, we see a woman's body at :00 being carried either from a sidewalk or from immediately behind a black car by two men. At :01, the camera then zooms in (at a speed suggesting a camera zoom rather than the
1 Panahi gave an interview to the American Los Angeles Times shortly after Agha-Soltan's death. See Borzou Daragahi, “From the Archives: Family, friends mourn 'Neda,' Iranian woman who died on video,” Los Angeles Times, June 23, 2009, http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-iran-neda23-2009jun23,0,6240992.story?page=1 (accessed December 16, 2009) that contradicted later testimony placing Panahi and Agha-Soltan at demonstrations for at least two hours prior.. 2 Distance compiled using Google Maps' Tehran data, originally gathered by Europa Technologies and current to 2009. 3 Nazila Fathi, “Iran's Top Leader Dashes Hopes for a Compromise,” New York Times, June 19, 2009, http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/20/world/middleeast/20iran.html?_r=1 (accessed December 16, 2009). ,YouTube, June 20, 2009 ”,کشته شدن دختر جوان توسط لباس شخصی“ ”,An early upload was by “Hamedfrt 4 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MrdRwOlmIxI (accessed February 15, 2010). It is impossible to trace the original upload to Facebook and YouTube due to deletions of violent content that took place on both sites during June 20, along with Facebook's privacy settings.
5 “Feelthelight,” “Iran, Tehran: Wounded Girl Dying in Front of Camera, Her Name Was Neda,” YouTube, June 20, 2009, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bbdEf0QRsLM (Accessed February 15, 2010).
10 cameraman moving closer) and jerks slightly to show the two men placing her on the pavement. One older man – Panahi - is wearing a blue/white striped shirt and has a ponytail; the other has short hair and is wearing a white shirt. Numerous bystanders are seen in the background, hovering around a separate parked car. Two other men are briefly glimpsed in the off-camera area to the woman's left. At :02, the camera zooms in closer and the viewer can see a pool of blood below the woman, who is wearing a chador with blue jeans and white sneakers. Between :03 & :05, the cameraman moves from filming in front of the woman at a distance to standing close-up by her side. A woman's face is now clearly visible and her fists are clinched by the sides of her head. Both men are on-camera holding her body and apparently trying to assist the woman. Starting at :07, the injured woman's eyes roll into the back of her head while agitated shouting takes place in the background. By :12, a third man is now on-camera attempting to help; the camera still remains centered on the injured woman. At :13, copious blood begins streaming from the woman's mouth and quickly pools on-camera, both on the ground and in her chador. At :18, another man appears on camera in white shirt and jeans – later confirmed as a doctor, Arash Hejazi - and we hear anguished male and female screams. Hejazi blocks the gaze of the camera for approximately .5 seconds; once he is no longer blocking the lens, the arms of a fifth man become visible on- camera. The cameraperson moves around the newest person who arrived on camera at :22 and regains a clear view of the woman. This shot at :22 shows a clear view of a seriously injured woman. Her face is now covered in blood and bystanders are clearly giving her medical assistance. Anguished cries are clearly audible from the man in white shirt and jeans. By :25, he is kneeling next to the injured woman, along with the other men. At :32, he begins to clear a pool of blood from her face. He then proceeds to give CPR and to assist with her breathing. More cries from the crowd are audible the whole time. The audio stream drops out at :37. The video ends at :40, with the second man in the white shirt still attempting to give medical assistance. The crowd is still around around him, but the two men who were previously helping him have withdrawn into the crowd. The second video of Agha-Soltan's death6 ('Video B'), lasts only 15 seconds and was taken on a lower quality mobile camera phone. At :00, it opens with the cameraperson standing in the middle of Karegar Street. The camera is situated approximately 10 feet behind the original origin point of Video A and the cameraperson is filming from the left of a parked green car. Behind the green car, a driveway or alley is visible leading off Karegar Street; the familiar white car is parked at the other end of the driveway. Video B's camera operator appears to have started filming 25 seconds after Video A began. A crowd of four men is visible immediately around Agha-Soltan, with two kneeling around her body and two standing at her left. Five individuals are on- camera at the intersection of the alleyway/sidewalk and the street. One, wearing a white patterned shirt and blue jeans, is holding an object in his hands that appears to be a camera or a mobile phone. This is likely to be the cameraman of Video A; his position is consistent with the camera shot of the man in the white shirt. Beyond him 6 “b0wl0fud0n,” “Shot By Basij [WARNING GRUESOME],” “YouTube, June 20, 2009, http://www.youtube.com/watch? v=fmi-LePl894 (Accessed February 15, 2010).
11 and the alleyway bystanders, there are two more individuals of indeterminate gender further down the sidewalk. A man in a half-unbuttoned white shirt is also visible walking down the street and another bystander can be spotted at far right. As the cameraman ran towards Agha-Soltan, his finger slipped onto the lens at :01. By :02, the view is clear again and we see a pool of blood collecting around the woman's sneakers. The cameraman maneuvers around the crowd and focuses on her lower body between :05 & :07. Agha-Soltan's jeans are clearly covered in blood, we see blood on her chador and the men assisting her are also getting covered in blood. By :08, we have a clear view of Agha-Soltan's face and blood can be clearly seen pouring from her mouth and nose. The cameraman switches positions and by :09 there is a close-up of her face. It is covered in blood, it is being propped up in one of the man's arms with blood is pooling around Agha-Soltan's left eye. The anguished cries on camera become even louder between :09 & :10 and the camera loses focus on Neda and picks up the crowd instead. A woman wearing a chador is also present; several others appear at the camera's margins. At :13, the man giving assistance is clearly seen with his hands on Agha-Soltan's face, covered in blood, while the loud cries continue. Audio cuts out at :13.5 and the camera lens turns towards the ground immediately after. At :15, the video ends. Various translations have been made of the audio that was captured by both cameramen. It is agreed that one of the bystanders is shouting “please don't die!”7 and “press it, press it, press it!” in reference to the wound. One full early translation of Video A reads8: “"She has been shot! She has been shot!" And we see a few men run towards her, and there is some blood around her already. They hold her down. One man says (and I think it is the person w/ the camera), "someone come and drive her away [to hospital]." The other guy (leaning on her) says "don't fear, don't fear" with a soft voice. Then she opens her eyes and look towards the direction of the camera [AND I WILL NEVER FORGER THIS FACE]. "Press it! press it!" [...] "press it, press it, press it, PRESS IT!!!! PRESS IT!!!" says the man as she starts bleeding from the bullet entry point. In shock, she knows it is bad. Then it is just chaos.“ An alternate translation was provided in the November 2009 BBC Two television documentary This World: “An Iranian Martyr”9: “Don't be afraid! Don't be afraid, Neda. Stay with me, Neda! Stay with me!” This World will be discussed in greater depth later. Despite Panahi's testimony implying the pair had not attended any June 20 demonstrations, three other videos posted to YouTube conclusively identify Agha-Soltan and Panahi at Tehran demonstrations on the same
7 For one of the earliest translations, see comment “ChantalMatar,” “Iran, Tehran: Wounded Girl Dying in Front of Camera, Her Name Was Neda,” YouTube, video posted June 20, 2009, http://www.youtube.com/watch? v=bbdEf0QRsLM (accessed December 17, 2009). 8 “bmorsh,” ibid. 9 This World, “An Iranian Martyr,” BBC News, November 24, 2009, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/this_world/8361837.stm (accessed December 17, 2009).
12 day. The wealth of mobile camera phones on the streets of Tehran in the election's wake appear to have poked holes in his story. The first video with Agha-Soltan and Panahi is a 61 second clip of Iranian demonstrators being attacked10. At :01, a man and woman clearly identifiable as Panahi/Agha-Soltan – wearing identical clothing and physically indistinguishable from the figures in Videos A & B – are walking arm-in-arm in a large bloc of demonstrators that have taken over a wide Tehrani boulevard. Agha-Soltan and Panahi are on the far left of the boulevard. Agha-Soltan and Panahi disappear to the left of the camera a few seconds later; the video then focuses on protesters in the central lanes. At :17 an attack by unknown parties appears to take place ahead of the cameraperson; the lens is then covered as they run. By :29, the image is stabilized. The cameraperson appears to have found a safe spot to film from the entryway to a building. At :34, smoke is visible nearby and multiple people in civilian dress – one middle aged - are filmed running away. In front of the entryway is an intersection11 and Panahi is clearly identifiable by his white ponytail and striped shirt in the crowd on one corner. The remaining video consists of footage of protesters from the doorway. The second video featuring Agha-Soltan and Panahi was also taken during the same demonstration12. This shorter 25 second clip, based on the poor resolution, also appears to have been filmed on a low-end mobile camera phone. The cameraperson, amazingly enough, appears to be filming at the intersection that the cameraperson of the previous video was filming between :29 and :61. Panahi and Agha-Soltan are clearly visible standing side-by-side from the back at :01 and then the camera veers away from them by :02; the video instead focuses on nearby demonstrators chanting “Allah Akbar.” Agha-Soltan and Panahi appear in the crowd of protesters at :05 as the camera swings back to focusing on the street sign, which is unreadable due to the low resolution. The pair are visible in the crowd between :05 and :19. At one point Panahi turns around to look at the protesters behind him; his face becomes clearly visible on camera. The pair then join a crowd of marching protesters. The third video that appears to show Agha-Soltan and Panahi was apparently filmed in the minutes before her death13. This short 60 second clip was filmed on a rooftop and focuses mainly on nearby fires, gunfire and Basij paramilitaries on motorcycle. This video was likely filmed on a camcorder, a camera or a high-end mobile camera phone owing to the high resolution. A gunshot is audible at :03 and a crowd of approximately 15 people runs down the street. At :06, the scene abruptly changes (two video files spliced together?) to a zoomed- out wide view of Karegar. Fires are clearly visible in the distance. Now people no longer seem to be running.
10 One early appearance of this video is “redeyetreefrogjili,” “A Video of Neda Aghasoltan About One Hour Before Her Death,” YouTube, June 25 2009, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6i48qZpxI5Y&NR=1 (accessed December 17, 2009). Interestingly, this video is the only one “redeyetreefrogjili” ever posted to YouTube. 11 The resolution of this video made positive identification of the street sign impossible. 12 One early appearance of this video is “nov1110,” “Tehran Neda Before She Got Shot 20 June Tazahorat,” YouTube, June 21 2009, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OD7UjH9FYis (accessed December 17, 2009). 13 “ahriman56,” “Neda Before She Gets Shot,” YouTube, June 24, 2009, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=asv7nFFbw54 (accessed December 17, 2009).
13 The cameraperson pans down the street at :15 and focuses on a nearby intersection – not the intersection the previous two videos were filmed at. Agha-Soltan and Panahi are briefly visible here. Despite the rooftop view, Panahi can be clearly identified due to his white hair and bright blue shirt. At :25, fires are visible in the street and a parade of Basij can clearly be identified riding down an intersecting street on matching red motorcycles at :31. The cameraperson then films the Basij for 10 seconds before panning out. Now the viewer can clearly see people on the street running from the Basij. At :44, a loud sound is heard – apparently a gunshot – and the stunned cameraperson drops the camera. At :45, the image suddenly changes to a shot of people on a street corner and a frame is placed around a pair that the video claims is Agha-Soltan and Panahi. However, the blurry close-up zoom on the camera used on the pair makes positive identification impossible. Nonetheless, the This World documentary features the footage. Piecing together an exact account of the events before and after Agha-Soltan's death on June 20 has proven difficult. Family members were in contact with Agha-Soltan that day14 along with her fiancee Caspian Makan15. In the days and weeks following Agha-Soltan's death, Panahi gave numerous interviews to the press that contradicted each other. He told the Los Angeles Times that the death occurred as they just left the car16 and implied that the government - “they” - had shot Agha-Soltan: “Her friends say she, Panahi and two others were stuck in traffic on Karegar Street, east of Tehran's Azadi (Freedom) Square, on their way to the demonstration sometime after 6:30 p.m. After they stepped out of the car to get some fresh air and crane their necks over the jumble of cars, Panahi heard a crack from the distance. In the blink of an eye, he realized Agha-Soltan had collapsed to the ground. "We were stuck in traffic and we got out and stood to watch, and without her throwing a rock or anything they shot her," he said. "It was just one bullet."“ However, Panahi contradicted the account he gave to the Western media in an interview he granted to Iranian state television in July 2009. In an article published by state-run English language news channel Press TV, Panahi seems to deny any possible government involvement in her death17: “Arash Hejazi, an Iranian physician currently studying in England, told the BBC that he had witnessed a member of the Basij shooting Neda. His comments were a contributing factor in the Western-led media campaign against the Ahmadinejad government. Panahi said contrary to Hejazi's account of the incident, 'there were no security forces of Basij members nearby'. “In his interviews with foreign media outlets, Mr. Hejazi said that the culprit behind Neda's death was arrested on the spot. I saw nothing of the sort. There were only about a dozen people present at the scene. No one was
14 This World. 15 Ibid. 16 Daragahi. 17 Press TV, “Key Witness Disputes Hejazi Account of Neda Death,” Press TV, July 29, 2009, http://www.presstv.com/detail.aspx?id=101954§ionid=351020101 (accessed December 18, 2009).
14 arrested,” he said. To prove his point, Panahi said that new revelations have found that Neda was in fact shot not in the chest, but in the back. Panahi is not the first to dismiss Hejazi's account of Neda's death. Earlier in June, the man who drove Neda to hospital had also said that there were no Basij members around at the time.” Panahi also appears to have given a short interview to the New York Times' Roger Cohen on June 22 as well18. Nonetheless, it is important to note the possibility that Panahi may have given his interview to Press TV under pressure from outside authorities. Multiple credible reports have surfaced of government harassment and threats to witnesses and others connected with Agha-Soltan. Hejazi fled Tehran fearing for his life and entered police protection in Britain19. Makan was held in Evin Prison for more than two months after giving interviews to foreign media outlets20; he is presently in exile as well. Hajar Rostami, Agha-Soltan's mother, reported that her family was forbidden to hold a memorial service21; she was later attacked and threatened by Iranian government officials22. Under these circumstances, a multitude of potential scenarios exist under which Panahi may have changed his story. As the New York Times' Robert Mackey pithily puts it, Panahi's Los Angeles Times interview was given “in a much more defiant mood, after the Iranian government had denied her family permission to bury or mourn her in accordance with Shiite tradition.”23 An alternate narrative was constructed by Hejazi, the other primary on-site witness. In a September 2009 documentary by American public television broadcaster PBS (which, incidentally, was a retooled and abridged version of This World, he gives an extended account of events24): According to this narrative, Hejazi and his friends walked out onto an "alley that ends on Karegar Street" when he saw a crowd of protesters that ranged in ageed and outward religious observance. Riot police were standing 200 yards away and firing tear gas directly at protesters. Agha-Soltan was among the protesters chanting something along the lines of "Death to the Dictator" while in the company of Panahi. Hejazi claims he recognized Agha-Soltan because she was wearing a sun hat at the time and was
18 Roger Cohen, “Life and Death in Tehran,” New York Times, June 22, 2009, http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/23/opinion/23cohenweb.html?pagewanted=2&_r=2 (accessed December 18, 2009). 19 Martin Fletcher, “Iranian Doctor Arash Hejazi Who Tried to Rescue Neda Soltan Tells of Wounds That Never Heal,” Times of London, November 13, 2009, http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article6913273.ece (accessed December 18, 2009). 20 Arash Sahami and Angus Macqueen, “Neda Soltan's Boyfriend Caspian Makan Interview,” The Observer, November 15, 2009, http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/nov/15/iran-neda-caspian-makan-interview (accessed December 18, 2009). 21 Wayne Drash, Octavia Nasr, “Neda's Mother: She Was 'Like an Angel',” CNN, November 5, 2009, http://edition.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/meast/11/05/neda.mom.speaks/index.html (accessed December 18, 2009). 22 Martin Fletcher, “Grave of Neda Soltan Desecrated by Supporters of Iranian Regime,” Times of London, November 16, 2009, http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/middle_east/article6917831.ece#cid=OTC-RSS&attr=797093 (accessed December 18, 2009). 23 Robert Mackey, “July 30: Updates on Post-Election Protests in Iran,” New York Times, July 30, 2009, http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/07/30/updates-on-new-post-election-protests-in-iran/ (accessed December 18, 2009). 24 Frontline, PBS, “Interview with Arash Hejazi,” September 18, 2009, http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/tehranbureau/deathintehran/interviews/hejazi.html (accessed December 18, 2009).
15 accompanied by Panahi. Basiji were also in the area, accompanying the riot police. Hejazi also asserts that he saw neither the police nor Basij using firearms at this time. However, he heard gunfire shortly thereafter. Following the first sounds of gunfire, Agha-Soltan was shot directly in front of the Karegar Street alley from the front. Hejazi saw "blood gushing out of her chest" and tried to give her "primary medical care" and to put pressure on her wound. According to Hejazi's interview, the injury took place in the chest below the neck and that "her aorta was shot [and] her lung as well." Agha-Soltan lost consciousness, according to Hejazi, 30 seconds later and passed away shortly thereafter. In the interview, Hejazi takes pains to note that he was in a "state of shock" due to the violent circumstances of the death he witnessed. Bystanders subsequently carried Agha-Soltan's corpse into the body of yet another bystander who drove her to a hospital. Meeanwhile, a man was being assaulted by a crowd while shouting "I didn't want to kill her." After some period of the man being assaulted, he was let go following a heatd argument over whether to kil him or not. An ID card grabbed out of the man's pocket, according to Hejazi, proved his membership in the Basij. Hejazi notes that members of the crowd were afraid of giving him to the police for fear of their own safety and were afraid of Basiji reprisal if they killed the man. Instead, the crowd apparently let the suspected shooter go. The video footage of Agha-Soltan's death, especially the blood flow from the mouth and nose, is consistent with being shot in the front with damage to the lungs. However, no sun hat was visible on Agha- Soltan in any of the five videos taken that day.
Basij demonstrations held in Tehran in November 2009 accused Hejazi of killing Agha-Soltan; a crime scene reenactment was subsequently held intending to prove that Hejazi was the “real killer.”25
A third account was given by Rostami, who had been in phone contact with Agha-Soltan all day. This account was given to the American network CNN26 and is copied verbatim:
“On June 20, Neda Agha-Soltan, 26, headed to Tehran's Nilofar Square, where thousands of protesters gathered. Clashes were particularly intense that day, with demonstrators and riot police squaring off. Neda, accompanied by her music teacher, called home with frequent updates. "Mom, there are just too many clashes going on. There are a lot of police and forces around." Tear gas was lobbed at the crowd. Neda headed to a medical clinic to get her eyes washed. "My eyes are really burning hard," she said. Twenty minutes later, Neda's mom reached her again. "She said she was on her way back home -- that I
25 Radio Zamaneh, “Iran: Neda's Mother Condemns Street Reenactment of Her Death by Basij,” December 4, 2009, http://www.payvand.com/news/09/dec/1038.html (accessed December 18, 2009). 26 Drash & Nasr.
16 need not worry." Neda told the same thing to her aunt and uncle, who also called to check up on her. Wearing blue jeans, a black shirt and white sneakers, Neda walked toward her car, parked on a side street not far from the heated protests. "It didn't occur to her that anything was going to be different," her mother said. Then, Neda was killed. A single bullet struck her chest. Recalling that day, her mother paused in the hour-long interview. The family, she said, has gone back to the scene and retraced Neda's movements. "She was only 26 steps from her car."” In addition to the multiple narratives describing Agha-Soltan's death, a second problem exists in tracking the spread of the Neda death videos. Multiple accounts confirm that YouTube deleted many bloody Iranian videos in the first weeks of the Iranian protests. Some early copies of the Neda Agha-Soltan video appear to have been among them. YouTube's terms of service specifically forbid “graphic or gratuitous violence” along with the amorphous category of “gross-out videos of accidents, dead bodies or similar things intended to shock or disgust.“27 Robert Mackey, who “liveblogged” the events in Iran for the New York Times, noted this phenomenon28 as did numerous YouTube users in June 200929. According to Olivia Ma of YouTube, the deletion of violent Iranian protest videos was a combination of company discretion and users deciding to delete videos on their own30: “We've noticed some claims going around that YouTube has been engaging in acts of censorship and removing some of these videos from the site. Unless a video clearly violates our Community Guidelines, we will not take it down. In general, we do not allow graphic or gratuitous violence on YouTube. However, we make exceptions for videos that have educational, documentary, or scientific value. The limitations being placed on mainstream media reporting from within Iran make it even more important that citizens in Iran be able to use YouTube to capture their experiences for the world to see. Given the critical role these videos are playing in reporting this story to the world, we are doing our best to leave as many of them up as we can. YouTube is, at its core, a global forum for free expression. Take note that if you see a video that is unavailable on the site, it may be because the user decided to remove the video him or herself.” It is important to note that YouTube seems to have lightened their hand in regards to deleting Iranian footage in the days following Agha-Soltan's death. A post on the official YouTube blog from June 22 was devoted to violent footage from the Iranian protests31 and included an early (June 20) upload of Video B32. Despite these gaps in the record, a general trajectory of Video A's dissemination has been established. According to Matthew Weaver of The Guardian, it was originally uploaded to Facebook and YouTube by an Iranian refugee in the Netherlands33. The refugee claims to have received the video from one of Hejazi's friends,
27 YouTube, “YouTube Community Guidelines,” 2009, http://www.youtube.com/t/community_guidelines (accessed December 18, 2009). 28 Robert Mackey, private correspondence. 29 “Why are Videos From Iran Being Deleted From YouTube?,” YouTube Help Forum, June 2009, http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/youtube/thread?tid=5c80505ef1f5919b&hl=en (accessed December 18, 2009). 30 Olivia Ma, “More Footage From Protests in Iran on YouTube,” YouTube Blog, June 16, 2009, http://youtube- global.blogspot.com/2009/06/more-footage-from-protests-in-iran-on_8218.html (accessed December 18, 2009). 31 Ramya Raghavan, “More From Iran: On-The-Ground Footage, Tribute Videos,” YouTube Blog, June 22, 2009, http://youtube-global.blogspot.com/2009/06/more-from-iran-on-ground-footage.html (Accessed December 18, 2009). 32 “LastFreedomNet,” “A Very violent Film. Tehran 20 June 2009,” YouTube, June 20, 2009, http://youtube- global.blogspot.com/2009/06/more-from-iran-on-ground-footage.html (Accessed December 18, 2009). 33 Matthew Weaver, “Iran in Crisis: Live,” The Guardian, June 22, 2009,
17 whom he knew from Tehran and who was not publicly identified in The Guardian. The refugee then uploaded the video to YouTube and Facebook and e-mailed it to the BBC and CNN. The YouTube version was uploaded on June 20, 2009 with the Persian title “Kesheth Shedn Dekhetr Jewan Tewset Lebas Shekhesa” - “Young Girl Killed By Plainclothes” in English34. Attached to it was the following message: “This is the text which I have copied and did paste it here from my friends email, as bellow:
Basij shots to death a young امروز، سی خرداد، ساعت 7 بعد از ظهر این دختر جوان توسط لباس شخصی ها کشته شد woman in Tehran's Saturday June 20th protests At 19:05 June 20th Place: Karekar Ave., at the corner crossing Khosravi St. and Salehi st. A young woman who was standing aside with her father watching the protests was shot by a basij member hiding on the rooftop of a civilian house. He had clear shot at the girl and could not miss her. However, he aimed straight her heart. I am a doctor, so I rushed to try to save her. But the impact of the gunshot was so fierce that the bullet had blasted inside the victim's chest, and she died in less than 2 minutes. The protests were going on about 1 kilometers away in the main street and some of the protesting crowd were running from tear gass used among them, towards Salehi St. The film is shot by my friend who was standing beside me. Please let the world know. “ The statement “I am a doctor” implies that Hejazi had some hand in forwarding the video to the refugee, even if he was not the cameraperson himself. Hejazi also appears to have assisted in forwarding the video, according to a separate message attached to the early Video B upload to YouTube35 by a user who identifies himself as b0wl0fud0n on that service and as @changcommaalex on Twitter: “Original source - Facebook: Basij shoots to death a young woman in Tehran's Saturday June 20th protests At 19:05 June 20th Place: Karekar Ave., at the corner crossing Khosravi St. and Salehi st. A young woman who was standing aside with her father watching the protests was shot by a basij member hiding on the rooftop of a civilian house. He had clear shot at the girl and could not miss her. However, he aimed straight her heart. I am a doctor, so I rushed to try to save her. But the impact of the gunshot was so fierce that the bullet had blasted inside the victim's chest, and she died in less than 2 minutes. The protests were going on about 1 kilometers away in the main street and some of the protesting crowd were running from tear gass used among them, towards Salehi St. The film is shot by my friend who was standing beside me. Please let the world know. Follow me here on twitter for updates: http://twitter.com/changcommaalex” Despite early censorship attempts on the part of YouTube and Facebook, the two videos spread across the internet. From there they quickly made their way to journalists – within 48 hours of the videos' creation, they were aired on television news and featured in the print editions of major newspapers36. A major factor in the dissemination of the Agha-Soltan videos was Twitter. Described by its creators as a “real-time short messaging
http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/blog/2009/jun/22/iran-ayatollah-ali-khamenei (Accessed December 22 2009). 34 “hamedfrt,” YouTube. 35 “b0wl0fud0n,” YouTube. 36 Nazila Fathi, “In A Death Seen Around the World, a Symbol of Iranian Protests,” The New York Times, June 22, 2009, http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/23/world/middleeast/23neda.html?_r=1 (accessed February 15, 2010).
18 service that works over multiple networks and devices,“37 Twitter allows users to broadcast short messaging service (SMS) messages, simultaneously, to subscribers and the general public. Importantly, the service does not require any knowledge of English – Twitter embraces non-Latin alphabets. Thanks to Twitter's ability to also send computer URLs as messages, users have created programs that allow them to distribute hypertext links to images and video to the public at large. Portions of the Iranian public and the diaspora eagerly embraced Twitter. While an exact count of Iranian Twitter users has not been attempted – the service does not require users to provide a physical location – use of Twitter during the days and weeks after the Iranian election was widespread. At one point, Twitter founder Biz Stone announced that the site's host moved a scheduled outage during the middle of the night in the United States (where the service is based), for the convenience of Iranians38: “A critical network upgrade must be performed to ensure continued operation of Twitter. In coordination with Twitter, our network host had planned this upgrade for tonight. However, our network partners at NTT America recognize the role Twitter is currently playing as an important communication tool in Iran. Tonight's planned maintenance has been rescheduled to tomorrow between 2-3p PST (1:30a in Iran). Our partners are taking a huge risk not just for Twitter but also the other services they support worldwide—we commend them for being flexible in what is essentially an inflexible situation.” With users in Iran being able to upload video and sound from demonstrations and to report, as native Iranian speakers, with an ability that most foreign reporters lacked, the traditional flow of knowledge was disrupted. Rather than adhering to the post-Edward Said model of Middle East reportage functioning “as interpretations produced for and by […] communities of interpretation,”39 the phenomena of internet-based news dissemination put a worldwide audience in the hands of Iranian local news producers. The distribution of the Agha-Soltan videos took place in a decentralized marketplace of information where traditional patterns of global news distribution were disrupted and rendered superfluous. What took place when news channels such as the BBC and Al-Jazeera aired the Agha-Soltan videos was a perfect example of Giddens' “reverse colonization”40 theory. In a 1999 lecture, Giddens stated41: “But globalisation is becoming increasingly de-centred - not under the control of any group of nations, and still less of the large corporations. Its effects are felt just as much in the western countries as elsewhere. This is true of the global financial system, communications and media, and of changes affecting the nature of government itself. Examples of 'reverse colonisation' are becoming more and more common. Reverse colonisation means that non- western countries influence developments in the west. Examples abound - such as the Latinising of Los Angeles, the emergence of a globally-oriented high-tech sector in India, or the selling of Brazilian TV programmes to Portugal.” 37 Twitter.com, “About Us,” Twitter.com, http://twitter.com/about#about (accessed December 28, 2009). 38 Biz Stone, “Down Time Rescheduled,” Twitter Blog, http://blog.twitter.com/2009/06/down-time-rescheduled.html (accessed December 28, 2009). 39 Edward Said, Covering Islam (New York: Vintage Books, 1997), 8-9. 40 Anthony Giddens, Runaway World: How Globalization is Shaping Our Lives (London: Routledge, 1999), 6-20. 41 Anthony Giddens, Globalization, http://www.periwork.com/peri_db/wr_db/2006_April_12_18_57_11/Globalisation.html (Accessed December 28, 2009).
19 Part of this, also, it seems, is individuals in Iran (not traditionally considered a “western country”) being able to create media which reaches the “west” either without a mediator or with a mediator who is bound by strenuous terms. Nonetheless, reframings of the Agha-Soltan story occurred on the BBC, Al Jazeera English and RT/Russia Today that varied widely. But, in the end, the general public had access to the raw footage for the first time.
20 Methodology
This thesis examines internet-distributed Anglophone news content from the BBC, Al Jazeera and RT/Russia Today mentioning the death of Neda Agha-Soltan, a young Iranian woman killed in the disorder following the 2009 Presidential election and other current events in Iran. For the purpose of research analysis, “content” includes traditional text-based articles, photographs, audio (both internet-only and terrestrial/satellite/shortwave radio distributed on the internet) and video (both internet-only and television segments distributed on the internet). Agha-Soltan's life and death, along with the general situation in Iran, were interpreted very differently by all three networks.
In order to answer the question of how Agha-Soltan's death was interpreted by these three networks and in order to prove the conclusion that coverage was effected primarily by bias (the “2009-as-1979” effect) and the unpredictable dissemination patterns of the internet, several analytical methods were used. The preferred method of analysis used herein is content analysis, conducted according to the definition of Earl Babbie in ”The Practice of Social Research,” which will then be applied in a primarily qualitative manner to the source material at hand. Qualitative analysis was conducted through a mixture of case testing and evaluation of words/images/audio with special attention paid to terminology, imagery (including video), choice of primary and secondary sources in news stories and constructions of conscious or unconscious narratives.
This qualitative analysis will examine the varying framings created by the three media networks in their internet coverage of Neda Agha-Soltan's death and in the post-election disturbances that took place in Iran during 2009. The timeframe in which content was chosen for examination spans from the date of the election on June 12, 2009, until December 31, 2009. However, the bulk of content analyzed falls within the dates of June 20, 2009 (when Agha-Soltan was shot) until September 22, 2009, three months after the BBC first reported on Agha- Soltan's death.
Simultaneously, this thesis also applies a limited amount of quantitative analysis methodology to its evaluation of Agha-Soltan coverage on varying networks. The frequency and length of Agha-Soltan content is analyzed. Also analyzed is “regular” Iran coverage, defined as any content discussing Iran as either its primary or secondary source with the exception of business stories and sports stories that do not mention current events in Iran anywhere. The number of posted pieces of content discussing Agha-Soltan are compared to the number of "regular" pieces discussing Iran during the timeframes of June 20-22 and June 23-December 31 across all three networks. All content discussing Agha-Soltan is sorted into one of three categories, “cursory,” “medium,” and “in-depth.” Content described as "cursory" will only have mentions of Agha-Soltan in one or two sentences. "Medium" content will have at least one paragraph devoted to Agha-Soltan. "In-depth" content will center around Agha-Soltan.
21 Attention is also paid to how the post-election events are portrayed (for instance, the varying use of the terms “riots,” “demonstrations” and “disturbances”). Special attention is also paid to the description and framing of Agha-Soltan's death videos. Depending on the network and the date, the fact that she is a woman/Iranian/student/Muslim/protester/a bystander is alternately highlighted at the expense of other facets of Agha-Soltan's life. RT/Russia Today consistently asks critical questions of Agha-Soltan's death with implications that she was a protester that "went too far" in her defiance of the government while a popular Al Jazeera English program (The Listening Post) broadcast a segment to the internet comparing coverage of her death to that of Egyptian-German hate crime victim Marwa El-Sherbini. Meanwhile, the BBC found itself in the days following Agha-Soltan's death nicknaming her the “Angel of Iran.”
Also undergoing analysis is the choice of individuals interviewed in Agha-Soltan related content by both the BBC and Al Jazeera English. Depending on the date, the network and the particular aim of the story, various sources were drawn on including Hamid Panahi, Arash Hejazi, Caspian Makan and Hajar Rostami. They were interviewed at varying points in time and by different networks. The facts they stated in the interviews differed (or, more accurately, were framed extremely differently). Content obtained from the networks' sister services used in the pieces will be examined to see if it is used in a different context or towards different aims than in the original. The photographs, audio and video accompanying text-based content will also be analyzed through respective qualitative analysis methods in line with Babbie.
Content will also be analyzed according to “situational framing” - the identities and goals of the news organizations placing stories on the internet. The BBC has maintained an extensive Persian-language service for years that (like all BBC services) is funded by the British government. The Iranian government jammed BBC Persian broadcasts during much of the post-election period and accused the BBC of fomenting conspiracies and spying. Al Jazeera English was founded by Qatari Emir Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani and parent network al-Jazeera is headed by Sheikh Hamad bin Thamer al-Thani. To this day, al-Jazeera is subsidized by bin Khalifa and maintains ambiguous links to the Qatari government – which has pursued a generally pro-Iranian foreign policy. Meanwhile, Russia Today – though state-funded like both the BBC and Al Jazeera – maintains a staunchly pro-Kremlin editorial line and frequently mentions both trade/commodity links with Iran and Russia's involvement in the Iranian nuclear program in news coverage.
For the purposes of this thesis, “content” is defined as any material which was made publicly available by the networks or by individuals on the internet, be it on their websites or on external services such as YouTube/Twitter. When analyzing the web content of all three news services, content from between the dates of June 20, 2009 (when Agha-Soltan died) to September 22, 2009 (three months after her death was first mentioned by the BBC) was searched for the keyword “Iran” via Google and YouTube. In Google, the searches were restricted to domains "news.bbc.co.uk," "english.aljazeera.net" and "www.rt.com" as appropriate. The search
22 results were then filtered to remove duplicate stories and extraneous stories (ie sports and business stories that do not make any mention of factors outside of results/changes in prices) at the author's discretion. However, repurposings of stories (ie multiple edits of the same interview and stories edited for length/content for mobile internet or YouTube) are included at the author's discretion.
A separate time-period analysis is also made for June 20 to June 22 to reflect the initial dissemination of Agha-Soltan's death videos. This 72 hour analysis is also included in the larger June 20-September 22 analysis as well. Additional usage was also made of stories relevant to Agha-Soltan found by an identical search made for the date range of September 23, 2009 to December 31, 2009. Content which only had a tenuous relationship to Iran, however, was not included. Also filtered out were duplicate entries (i.e. the same piece of television footage uploaded both to YouTube and to Al Jazeera English's web site); however, repurposings of the same content were counted as different pieces (ie the BBC producing multiple edits of interviews with Arash Hejazi).
In order to competently discuss media coverage of the Agha-Soltan videos, the videos themselves were analyzed. As this thesis conclusively proves, two separate videos of Agha-Soltan's death were taken by two camerapersons in close physical proximity to each other. These videos were both uploaded to the internet at approximately the same time and have become conflated in the public consciousness. For the purposes of analyzing the two Agha-Soltan videos (and several other related videos analyzed out of necessity), a textual analysis was conducted of the events depicted on camera according to guidelines laid out by Kimberly Neuendorf. Neuendorf's guidelines offered primary criteria for analysis of camera angles, location of filming, audio anomalies and quality of video and other technical qualities. For other aspects of the analyses including extrapolating the physical location of events in Tehran and the construction of proposed timelines of dissemination, the author's personal experience as a journalist was drawn upon.
For several questions of media coverage of the 2009 Iran events, the author conducted interviews by email with journalists who were either primary or secondary witnesses to the post-election events in Tehran. These journalists are all credited in footnotes where applicable and offered invaluable insight into the news- gathering process in Iran following the elections.
Five tables are included in this thesis for each organization for referral, resulting in 15 total. These tables are based on the statistical methodology listed above. The first table analyzes individual content pieces for agenda-setting. Pieces are coded as falling under the categories of “hard news,” “op-ed” and “hybrid” depending on the terminology used within. The presence of emotional descriptors that, intentionally or unintentionally, could cause the receiver to interpret stories as “pro-Neda” or “anti-Neda” are used as the primary criteria for determination of coding within the three categories. More detailed information is available for each media organization.
A second table analyzes the number of sources used on a per-piece bases. Pieces are coded based upon
23 the number of sources used, with specific mention made of all sources used. The intent in this qualitative/quantitative analysis is to purposefully examine both the sources of original content (social media as per the root of this thesis? material from the same media organization? material from different media organizations?) and the range of sources used by each media organization.
Owing to the character of new media, detailed tables will be created centered around keyword analysis. “Keywords,” in this case, are to be considered as nouns, adjectives and verbs that repeatedly show up in each media organization's content. Due to the fact that the BBC, Al Jazeera and RT/Russia Today are headquartered in separate states with differing internal styles and highly different ratios of native vs. second language English speakers, keywords will vary wildly. However, a detailed list is posted of keywords (along with their definitions) for the reader.
Content tone is the subject of a separate table. Based on the agenda-settting criteria listed for the first table and the third table, articles will be coded as “for” “against” and “neutral” on the question of the justification of the 2009 Iranian post-election protests/gatherings. Due to the linguistic and stylistic differences at Al Jazeera, the BBC and RT/Russia Today, the coding for each network will be different and will be separately discussed in each chapter.
Finally, a separate table will undertake visual analysis of all video and graphics ported to the web. Due to the nature of visual communication as interpreted by Babbie, both still images and video are coded into this table. Visual content will be analyzed for source, use and style.
24 Existing Literature
The demonstrations and riots that followed the 2009 Iranian Presidential election marked the most violent unrest in Iran since the 1979 Islamic Revolution. Despite the cottage industry of literature surrounding 1979, a limited number of books and papers deal with international media coverage of Iranian. The best known text written about media coverage of 1979 remains Edward Said's Covering Islam. As the title indicates, Said uses “Islam” as a common denominator in analyzing North American and European reportage of the amorphous Middle East/Near East region. However, Said's approach as a media critic is almost a mirror image of the “Orientalism” he famously decried. Wide-ranging trends in North American/European media with origins as diverse as budget restrictions (the use of one regional bureau to cover the entire Middle East/Near East) or individual news show programming styles (criticism of American network PBS' MacNeil/Lehrer Report's coverage of the 1979 Revolution42) were used by Said as signifiers of what he viewed as “an invented or culturally determined ideological framework filled with passion, defensive prejudice, sometimes even revulsion.”43 Said's monolithic “Islam” that he said dictated all foreign media coverage of the Middle East/Near East is an inflexible entity; other authors such as Aziz al-Azmeh offer an infinitely more multifaceted model of Islam44 that is much more applicable to BBC coverage of Agha-Soltan's death. In one memorable passage, Said excoriated the aforementioned American television program for hewing to the cliches of American news broadcasting45: “Given an unconventional news story about as unfamiliar a part of the world as Iran, the viewer will immediately be made to feel an intense disparity between the mobs “out there” and the carefully dressed, carefully balanced cast of guests whose uniform qualification is expertise, not necessarily insight or understanding.” The difference between the Iran coverage of 1979 and the Iran coverage of 2009 is summed up in this sentence. The international media's heavy reliance on internet services such as Twitter, YouTube and Facebook allowed the Iranian public to serve as the direct producers of content – in effect, letting the mobs “out there”' mediate their own portrayal in foreign countries with vastly different cultures. However, the flip side of this process is that the BBC, Al Jazeera English and Russia Today/RT all reframed the death of Agha-Soltan and the demonstrations in culturally familiar idioms. This is a dramatic change from past framings of Iran in the Western media. A good example of this can be found in a 2007 working paper by Katharina Notzold which cities Thomas Deltombe and Kai Hafez to put forward the point that Iran has been viewed primarily as “Islamic” in news reports since the downfall of the Shah46.
42 Said, 97. 43 Said, 7. 44 Aziz al-Azmeh, Islams and Modernities (New York: Verso, 1993). 45 Said, 95-6. 46 Katharina Notzold, “Do Western Media Really Understand the Islamic World?,” working paper, University of Erfurt, January 2007, http://www.maz.ch/aktuell/news/270_N%C3%B6tzold.pdf (accessed January 5, 2010).
25 All this is a long cry from the jingoistic shoddiness that the American and British press exhibited during the 1979 revolution. Philip Seib quotes Haynes Johnson of the Washington Post47: “Americans awoke in the morning to see the menacing figure of the ayatollah breathing hatred and preaching holy war against 'pagans' and 'heathens.' They went to bed at night after seeing mobs of Iranian demonstrators marching before the occupied US Embassy, waving their fists, shouting defiant slogans, burning the American flag and effigies of Uncle Sam and Jimmy Carter. Morning after morning, evening after evening, the TV networks showed these same scenes. Through TV, the Iranian crisis became institutionalized and a part of American daily life... “ A number of academic papers have examined precedents for the role of Twitter, YouTube and Facebook in disseminating the Agha-Soltan video worldwide. Hall Gardner has written about the portable transistor radio's role in “providing alternate views to those of the government” during the Tienanmen Square events of June 1989 48. Similarly, Mark Deuze has made a convincing case that the rise of mobile phones and the internet has recast the “masses” as journalistic producers rather than consumers, upending the role of traditional journalists in the process49. The variety and range of user-created content during the 2009 Iranian events – aptly shown by the existence of two separate videos of Agha-Soltan's death and multiple videos of her at demonstrations being disseminated worldwide by an informal web of internet users in Iran and abroad – may have been preceded by near real-time coverage of the 2003 invasion of Iraq. Donald Matheson and Stuart Allan have written extensively on the flood of near-real time footage American and British media entities were able to generate courtesy of the journalistic 'embedding' process taking place and subsequent dissemination50. Although the 'embeds' of the Iraq war were the product of a much different process than the citizen activists/journalists of 2009 Iran – the 'embeds' were part of a conscious Anglo-American military decision to rally citizen support behind a deeply unpopular, divisive war – the result was the same. Matheson and Allan also presage the parallels between the Agha-Soltan footage and earlier historic events51: “It was by extraordinary chance that the assassination of US President John F. Kennedy on 22 November 1963 was captured on an 8mm home-movie camera by clothing manufacturer Abraham Zapruder. In stark contrast, it has become common in recent times for violent events, such as the shooting by Chinese border patrols of Tibetan pilgrims making their way across a high Himalayan pass to India in 2006, or the assassination of Pakistani politician Benazir Bhutto in 2007, or the killing of Japanese photojournalist Kenji Nagai by a Burmese soldier earlier that same year, to be videoed on hand-held digital cameras or cell phones by members of the public standing nearby.” However, the dissemination of footage of this type often faces challenges due to its graphic content. Again using the Iraqi precedent, Michael Pick and Robin Gold have noted that citizen-generated internet video and photographs of war and civil unrest face distribution challenges due to the extreme graphic content often
47 Philip Seib, Headline Diplomacy: How News Coverage Affects Foreign Policy (Santa Barbara: Greenwood, 1997), 32. 48 Hall Gardner, Cyber-conflict and Global Politics, ed. Athena Karatzogianni (London: Routledge, 2008), 20. 49 Mark Deuze, “Toward Professional Participatory Storytelling: Mapping the Potential,”manuscript presented at 2005 MIT4 conference, http://web.mit.edu/comm-forum/mit4/papers/Deuze.pdf (accessed January 5, 2010). 50 Donald Matheson and Stuart Allan, Digital War Reporting (Cambridge: Polity, 2009), 66. 51 Matheson and Allan, 102.
26 shown52. In the case of Agha-Soltan, this was demonstrated through the early deletions of her death videos by both YouTube and Facebook. One of the major factors behind the spread of the Agha-Soltan videos is the spike in internet usage worldwide that resulted from individuals seeking news from Iran. Although detailed metrics of site usage are only sparsely available, the existing evidence matches up with past events of world importance. Seib's prior work on correlating internet site usage patterns to major news events such as the 2003 invasion of Iraq, September 11th and the Kosovo War53 appears to anticipate Agha-Soltan. Also noted by him is Al Jazeera's stated justification for showing bloody footage from the Iraq conflict, which parallels that of YouTube in justifying the continued hosting of Agha-Soltan's death videos – freedom of speech54: “Editor-in-chief Ibrahim Hilal defended these reports [showing atrocities] stating that “what we are doing is showing the reality. We didn't invent the bodies, we didn't make them in the graphics unit. They are shots coming in from the field. This is the war. We have to show that there are people killed in this war. The viewer has to judge whether war is the most suitable way to solve problems. If I hide shots of British or Americans being killed, it is misleading to the British and American audience.” A precedent to the heavy use of SMS, camera phones and internet services during times of civil unrest can be found in the 2005 French banlieu riots. Adrienne Russell, in her research into media dissemination of the riots55, has noted numerous trends that paralleled 2009 Tehran. Much like in Tehran, the traditional news media in France (including Le Monde, Liberation and Le Figaro) relied disproportionately on user-generated content. In the cases of the banlieu riots, SMS messages, blog interviews with rioters, live updates from Wikipedia and comments from users on newspaper websites were reprinted verbatim in the newspapers' print editions. Although the effect of mobile camera phones was negligible due to technology restrictions in 2006, the manner in which Le Monde and L'Hebdo featured user-generated content in riot coverage was almost identical to that of the BBC and Al Jazeera English during the 2009 demonstrations. Giddens' theory of reverse colonization applies neatly to the Agha-Soltan videos' worldwide spread. It is also an example of information 'contraflow' from the “East” to the “West.” In a previous paper, Mugdha Rai and Simon Cottle analyzed cultural contraflow in television news as a result of satellite channels resulting in pluralization56. Although Rai and Cottle came to the conclusion that the flow of information between “West” and “East” was primarily one-way, they did find an interesting exception: the growth of satellite television news networks in the Middle East, North Africa and Central Asia centered around Al Jazeera and the Arab and Muslim 52 Michael Pick and Robin Goode, “Iraq News: Bloggers and Independent Journalists are the Only Reliable Sources for Western Media News (Before They Are Censored),” http://www.masternewmedia.org/news/2006/12/23/iraq_news_bloggers_and_independent.htm (accessed January 5, 2010). 53 Beyond the Front Lines, 90. 54 Philip Seib, “Hegemonic No More: Western Media, the Rise of al-Jazeera and the Influence of Diverse Voices,” International Studies Review 7 (2005). 55 Adrienne Russell, “Digital Communications Networks and the Journalistic Field: The 2005 French Riots,” Critical Studies in Media Communication 24, no. 4 (2007). 56 Mugdha Rai and Simon Cottle, “Global Mediations: On the Changing Ecology of Satellite Television News,” Global Media and Communications 3, no. 1 (April 2007), p. 63.
27 expatriate communities of the “West.”57. A similar theme in regard to Middle Eastern satellite television broadcasting that has ramifications in the events of 2009 can be found in the works of Naomi Sakr and Ingrid Volkmer. Sakr noted the divergence in news reporting between Arabic and non-Arabic language television in Europe58. In some cases, such as the reaction of French viewers to the Hezbollah Al Manar television station's coverage of the Denmark Jyllands-Posten Mohammed cartoon controversy, portrayal of stories differed markedly59. Volkmer posits that the existence of these foreign-language satellite stations creates a supranational space for European viewers60: “In times of political crisis, the access to diverse 'conflict' information seems to position national publics in a supranational space. Whereas about 20 years ago, only major US and European channels could afford to distribute programmes in a number of world regions, today these somewhat globalized satellite cultures include, besides commercial US satellite channels, national broadcasters which deliver their programmes on various continents (not only in Europe). Among these are Arirang World, CCTV-9 – a Chinese English-language channel, a worldwide Korean channel and Cubavision Internacional, as well as news channels from France 24, Al Jazeera, Zee TV & BBC World.” Al Manar – an Arab-language channel – also offers an example of citizen content production finding its way to the “West.” However, in this case, the “citizens” are also Hezbollah sympathizers and members. Writing in the Wall Street Journal, Mark Dubrowitz, Jay Solomon and Mariam Fam detailed how the channel's locally created content managed to create subjective, pro-Hezbollah news shows while simultaneously attracting multinational advertisers such as Proctor & Gamble and Coca-Cola61. One trope in early media coverage of the post-election unrest was how user-created content sites did a better job of covering events than traditional media. Ari Berman claimed that Twitter users in Iran constituted a revolution62 and Lev Grossman referred to the use of Twitter by Iranian protesters as “the medium of the moment.”63 An example of how traditional media sources such as the BBC and al-Jazeera latched onto user-created content on Twitter was cited by Jeff Jarvis64: “Journalists end up playing new roles in the news ecosystem. Again, I followed the Iran story in the live blogs of The New York Times, the Guardian, the Huffington Post, and Andrew Sullivan and they performed new functions: curating, vetting,
57 Ibid. 58 Naomi Sakr, “Diversity and Diaspora: Arab Communities and Satellite Communication in Europe,” Global Media & Communication 4, no. 3 (2008), 283. 59 Ibid. 60 Ingrid Volkmer, “Satellite Cultures in Europe,” Global Media & Communication 4, no. 3 (2008), 237. 61 Mark Dubrowitz, Jay Solomon and Mariam Fam, “After Bombing, Al-Manar TV Keeps On Broadcasting; Sign of Hezbollah Resolve,” Wall Street Journal, July 27, 2006, http://www.defenddemocracy.org/index.php? option=com_content&task=view&id=11777766&Itemid=0 (accessed January 6, 2010). 62 Ari Berman, “Iran's Twitter Revolution,” The Nation, June 15, 2009, http://www.thenation.com/blogs/notion/443634 (accessed January 6, 2010). 63 Lev Grossman, “Iran's Protests: Why Twitter is the Medium of the Movement,” Time, June 17, 2009, http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1905125,00.html (accessed January 6, 2010). 64 Jeff Jarvis, “The King of Twitter,” BuzzMachine, June 26, 2009, http://www.buzzmachine.com/2009/06/26/the-king-of- twitter/ (accessed January 6, 2010).
28 adding context, adding comment, seeking information, filling out the story, correcting misinformation. They worked with social media, quoting and distributing and reporting using it. I watched the filling out of the Neda video story as the Guardian called the man who uploaded it to YouTube and Paulo Coelho blogged about his friend in the video, the doctor who tried to save Neda. Piece by piece, the story came together before our eyes, in public. The journalists added considerable value. But this wasn’t product journalism: polishing a story once a day from inside the black box. This was process journalism and that ensured it was also collaborative journalism – social journalism, if you like. “ Kathika Muthukumaraswamy has found roots in this phenomenon within Lazarsfeld's theories of the two-step flow of communication – the idea that mediators serving as “opinion leaders” play a central part in transmitting information from the media to audience65. Although commentators have been almost unanimously united in proving that new media was not the primary organizing tool of the Iranian demonstrators, they have proven the utility of new media services as an impromptu mediator between the audience and the “opinion leaders.” A similar phenomenon was noted in the Arab world by Khalil Rinnawi, who noted how the balance of the transnational media's “structural-organizational level” has changed due to media technology innovations66. Ellen Goodman traced the impromptu distribution of the Agha-Soltan videos, once again using the Tienanmen comparison67: “If the searing image of Vietnam was the AP photo of a girl stripped naked by napalm, if the image of Tienanmen Square was a young man facing down tanks, well, the iconic image of Iran is a cellphone video of Neda Agha Soltan dying on the streets of Tehran. And this time the message was in the momentum. The mournful video was passed from a cellphone in Tehran to an e-mail address in Europe, then to Facebook and YouTube, and finally CNN. All in a matter of hours.” Others noted this apparent shift in communication. Brian Stelter of the New York Times has detailed how the wealth of user-generated content from Iran forced newspapers to rewrite the traditional “rules of journalism.” 68 The aforementioned “liveblogs” of Iranian unrest coverage published by the New York Times and The Guardian used a variety of unverified user-generated content that were presented to users with disclaimers, including video footage, anonymous Twitter messages and pseudonymous blog postings. Stelter interviewed Bill Mitchell of American journalism thinktank Poynter Institute, who said that the extent of public involvement in coverage of the Iran crisis seemed to herald a new way of thinking about journalism. This sea change was confirmed by one of the highest ranking figures in world media. Reuters News' editor-in-chief David Schlesinger told the International Olympic Committee that the growth of Twitter would
65 Kathika Muthukumaraswamy, “J-Tweeters: Are they journalists or tweeters? Does it matter?,” Online Journalism Blog, June 25, 2009, http://onlinejournalismblog.com/2009/06/25/j-tweeters-are-they-journalists-or-tweeters-does-it-matter/ (accessed January 5, 2010). 66 Khalil Rinnawi, Instant Nationalism: McArabism, al-Jazeera and Transnational Media in the Arab World (Lanham: University Press of America, 2006), 10. 67 Ellen Goodman, “Journalism in the era of Twitter,” Boston Globe, June 26, 2009, http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2009/06/26/journalism_in_the_era_of_twitter/ (accessed January 5, 2010). 68 Brian Stelter, “In Iran, Journalism Makes Use of Unverified News,” New York Times, June 28, 2009, http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/29/business/media/29coverage.html?_r=2&pagewanted=1&ref=middleeast (accessed January 5, 2010).
29 force his agency to rethink rights, accreditation and “journalism itself” during a meeting to discuss the issue of press accreditation:69 “Fundamentally, the old media won’t control news dissemination in the future. And organisations can’t control access using old forms of accreditation any more. Those statements mean what they say and not necessarily more. I am not arguing that newspapers and magazines and news services will die. No, just that they must change. I am not arguing that organisations that define themselves by issuing formal accreditations to professional journalists will disappear from the face of the earth. No, just that they must change their definition of what they are and what they do.“ However, others criticized the predominance of Facebook, Twitter and YouTube in coverage of Agha- Soltan's death and the Iranian demonstrations. The fact that Twitter was frequently used to convey partial or incorrect information has been noted in many sources70. Many false rumors generated in the Iranian fog of war managed to make it online. False accusations were made of three million protesters at an early June demonstration, that Mir Hussein Mousavi was put under house arrest in June 2009 and of an annulment of Presidential election results. Even one of the largest proponents of user-created content in traditional media, American journalist Andrew Sullivan, noted that Twitter was more about finding out “the mood than hard facts.” 71 Similarly, his fellow Atlantic journalist Marc Ambinder came to the conclusion that the use of Twitter by Iranians was more of “an intelligence service for the Iranian opposition” than a primary source for foreign journalists72. In one example of the limitations of user-generated content in providing accurate Iranian news, misidentified photos of Agha-Soltan circulated online for more than 72 hours after her death. Allegedly, earlier versions of the Agha-Soltan death video posted by the aforementioned Hamed R. referred to her as “Neda Soltani.” A photo of a similar-looking young woman bearing that name was found on the internet, which was quickly forwarded to demonstrators. This photo of a woman in a hijab was then disseminated by these demonstrators around the internet. One American writer, Amy Beam, detailed in June 2009 what she discovered.
73
According to Beam, she was told by one of the early YouTube video disseminators over Twitter that the name of the dead woman was “Neda Soltani” and that the video had been “sent to him, outside of Iran, by the doctor who had been at Neda's side as she bled to death.” Following that, Beam conducted a Facebook search for
69 David Schlesinger, “Rethinking rights, accreditation, and journalism itself in the age of Twitter,” Reuters, June 24, 2009, http://blogs.reuters.com/reuters-editors/2009/06/24/rethinking-rights-accreditation-and-journalism-itself-in-the-age-of- twitter/ (accessed January 5 2010). 70 Joshua Kucera, “What if Twitter is leading us all astray in Iran?,” True/Slant, June 15, 2009, http://trueslant.com/joshuakucera/2009/06/15/what-if-we-are-all-wrong-about-iran/ (accessed January 4, 2009). 71 Andrew Sullivan, “Something is Happening in Iran,” The Atlantic, June 15, 2009, http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2009/06/something-is-happening-in-iran-2.html (accessed January 4, 2009). 72 Marc Ambinder, “The Revolution Will Be Twittered,” The Atlantic, June 15, 2009, http://politics.theatlantic.com/2009/06/its_too_easy_to_call.php (accessed January 4, 2009). 73 Amy Beam, “Mistaken Neda Photo Symbols of Iranians for Freedom,” wipoun, June 23, 2009 (accessed January 4, 2009).
30 “Neda Soltani” and found, among them, a Neda Soltani whose picture was identical to that being forwarded around the internet. She messaged her and received a positive reply approximately one hour later, indicating that she was alive and well – and not the woman in the video. The pair then became Facebook friends and carried on a subsequent correspondence. Beam also began contacts with the “Hamed R.” who uploaded the early Neda video onto the internet as well. Her interest piqued by the subject, Beam found this message, translated from Persian to English from a n unidentified website that is currently (according to Ryan) offline, posted to her Facebook wall by Sultani: The posting was shown under the thumbnail profile photo and the name of the living Neda Soltani, so visitors to my Facebook wall mistakenly assumed the photo of the living Neda Soltani was the woman who was Neda Agha-Soltan, the woman who was killed. So the photo of Neda wearing the patterned headscarf was copied and reposted EVERYWHERE (sic) within minutes and hours. By the time I woke up June 22, the wrong photo of the living Neda Soltani was being displayed on TV, blogs, youtube (sic) videos, placards and banners around the world. Neda Soltani emailed me via Facebook begging for help to correct the mistake. I have spent hours posting corrections and asking people to remove her photo. Most people do; some people seem hell-bent on ignoring the truth and they insist on spreading this photo as the symbol of the Neda who was killed.” One technically-inclined internet news source, the information technology blog Techdirt, used this incident to demonstrate the limitations of Facebook as a news source, stating that “certainly, bad information flows in this day and age, but the series of events and confusion that led to this result is quite fascinating, if a bit scary (especially for the living Neda Soltani)74.
Multiple analysts have formulated a feminist framing of Agha-Soltani's death. The longtime leftist commentator Alexander Cockburn alleged that the death of Agha-Soltani gained undue attention in the face of other atrocities such as the Sri Lankan conflict due to her physical beauty75. Latoya Peterson has contrasted the Agha-Soltan footage with other widely viewed Iranian demonstration pictures and found that the visual narratives of women in the demonstrations “emphasize clothing and beauty.”76 Peggy Drexler, a professor at Cornell University and a blogger at the popular American Huffington Post web site, did not address Agha-Soltan directly while claiming that the large number of women at demonstrations was a result of the contrast between the Islamic Republic's success at getting women into universities compared with their limited job opportunities after graduation77. Golbarg Bashi, who wrote her thesis on feminism and the human rights discourse in Iran, cites Agha-Soltan in describing a “feminist awakening” in post-revolution Iran78. A similar reframing took place in the
74 Anonymous, “The Speed At Which Wrong Information Flows,” Techdirt, June 23, 2009, http://techdirt.com/articles/20090623/1153075328.shtml (accessed January 7, 2009). 75 Alexander Cockburn, “Twittergasms,” The Nation, June 24, 2009, http://www.thenation.com/doc/20090713/cockburn (accessed January 2, 2010). 76 Latoya Peterson, “Global Politics of 'Pretty' Women Bends Coverage of Iran's Election Protesters?,” Women's News Network, May 26, 2009, http://womennewsnetwork.net/2009/06/26/global-politics-of-%E2%80%98pretty%E2%80%99- bends-coverage-of-irans-election-protesters/ (accessed January 7, 2010). 77 Peggy Drexler, “It's Hard to Debate Feminism When You Are Dodging Bullets,” The Huffington Post, June 25, 2009, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/peggy-drexler/its-hard-to-debate-femini_b_220591.html (accessed January 7, 2010). 78 Golbarg Bashi, “Feminist Waves in the Iranian Green Tsunami?,” Tehran Bureau, June 29, 2009, http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/tehranbureau/2009/06/feminist-waves-in-the-iranian-green-tsunami.html
31 American press when Tracy Clark-Flory wrote a piece in Salon connecting the dots between the female protesters of 2009 and those of 1979 and 1906, citing personal interviews with Iranian-American scholars Hamid Dabashi and Abbas Milani79. While again not focusing on Agha-Soltan, the popular American female-interest website Jezebel connected female beauty with a fight for personal autonomy that was taking place in the streets of Tehran. Jezebel's Megan Carpentier put forward the argument that female beauty and the wearing of cosmetics is a form of resistance in the Islamic Republic and that “Western” observers who comment on that “don't realize that it's part of the point.”80 Other observers, primarily in the Arab world and the diaspora, have framed Agha-Soltan's death in an Arab-feminist context. This framing, while not denying the brutality of her death, follows Cockburn in asking why so much attention was paid to Agha-Soltan in lieu of other tragedies. The August 21, 2009 episode of Al- Jazeera English's magazine show The Listening Point, which will be discussed later, explicitly compared Agha- Soltan's death to that of the brutally murdered Egyptian-German woman Marwa el-Sherbini. A second example of this Arab-feminist framing can be found on the Muslim feminist site Muslimah Media Watch. Although explicitly pan-Muslim rather than pan-Arab, their findings largely gel with Khadr's hypothesis. A writer on the site, the pseudonymous Fatemeh, claims that the videos of Agha-Soltan's death enforce colonialist attitudes81: “Aside from the talk that she is a martyr for Iran’s opposition movement, many in the West are using her death to educate themselves about Iran’s current crisis, viewing Iran through a lens of violence and cruelty, which many add to their current knowledge of the country as repressive, backward, and unsafe for Americans. Neda’s death may help Iranians band closer together and become stronger in their fight for a government that treats them with respect, but here in the West, her lifeless body is little more than another reminder of the instability and danger of “over there”. “ A similar viewpoint can be found in the writings of Sumbul Ali-Karamali, author of The Muslim Next Door. Ali-Karamali contrasts Agha-Soltan's death to the 2004 movie The Stoning of Soraya M., which was based on the real stoning of a teenage girl in 1990s Tehran82. All of these interpretations of Agha-Soltan's death, while rooted in sympathy for the plight of the woman in Iranian society, remove her from the context of her surroundings. Writers who were not familiar with the rich history of Iranian protest/dissent were unaware of prior precedents for the women of 2009. While, of course, the graphic death of a young Iranian woman with precise facial expressions on air never occurred in the past, women (accessed January 7, 2010). 79 Tracy Clark-Flory, “Unveiling the Revolution,” Salon, June 27, 2009, http://www.salon.com/mwt/feature/2009/06/27/iran_women/ (accessed January 7, 2010). 80 Megan Carpentier, “In Iran, 'Pretty' Is Sometimes the Protest,” Jezebel, June 16, 2009, http://jezebel.com/5292899/in- iran-pretty-id-sometimes-the-protest (accessed January 7, 2010). 81 “Fatemeh,” “There Will Be Blood: Neda Agha-Soltan's Post-Mortem Image in the Media,” Muslimah Media Watch, June 26, 2009, http://muslimahmediawatch.org/2009/06/there-will-be-blood-neda-agha-soltans-post-mortem-image-in- the-media/ (accessed June 26, 2009). 82 Sumbul Ali-Karamali, “Stoning Soraya, Murdering Neda, and the Hope of Muslim Women,” Huffington Post, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/sumbul-alikaramali/stoning-soraya-murdering_b_222090.html (accessed January 7, 2010).
32 have participated in Iranian dissent before. Hammed Shahidian, writing on the Islamic Revolution, noted the importance of female members in groups opposed to the Shah's rule83. During the Anglo-Soviet occupation of Iran during World War II, the Communist Tudeh party actively established a woman's branch and a monthly political periodical aimed at woman, Bidari-i Ma, was released. This, however, was not to last. Years later, as Tudeh aligned itself with Khomeini in the 1979 Revolution, it published the periodical Women's World - dealing primarily in “recipes and sewing advice.”84 Although women participated in underground guerrilla groups, Shahidian feels they were “symbols” who “although admired, had little relevance for the woman who was busy changing diapers and preparing meals and was outraged by the exploitation of her sexuality in everyday life.”85
The direct participation of women in the 1979 Islamic Revolution was studied by Patricia J. Higgins, who noted how Tehrani women turned International Women's Day into a demonstration against compulsory veiling laws less than 60 days after the Shah fell from power86. The “thousands of women” who took part in that demonstration shouted slogans and displayed signs protesting the exclusion of women from the judiciary and military, along with proposed (and arguably regressive) amendments to Shah-era marriage and family law proposed by Khomeini. Janet Afary's description of that demonstration shows parallels to 200987:
“In response to Khomeini's edict, thousands of angry urban women and their male supporters poured onto the streets near the university, where they held large demonstrations against the ruling. The demonstrations continued for five days. At their height, tens of thousands of women and men participated in Tehran. Some leftist men formed a cordon around the women, fighting off armed attackers from the Hezbollah. The demonstrators chanted “No to the Chador,” “Down with the Dictatorship,” and even the occasional “Down with Khomeini.” One widely quoted banner read, “We Made the Revolution for Freedom, But Got Unfreedom,” while others proclaimed, “At the Dawn of Freedom, There is No Freedom.” Hezbollah chanted in response, “You Will Cover Yourselves or be Beaten,” but their actions were mainly nonverbal: stones, knives, and even bullets aimed at protesting women.”
Higgins notes that some female protesters participated in “leftist political organizations or guerrilla groups”88 but that the potential talent pool for these was limited to urban middle-class women who had lived abroad prior. However, the increasingly religious aspect of anti-Shah and immediate post-revolution demonstrations made them “safe” for working-class and poor women in Higgins' interpretation. This argument may hold water when applied to the events of 2009; many of the “Green Revolution” signifiers are religious and Shi'ite. Although much of this is via the primacy of religion in the Islamic Republic's public sphere, an argument
83 Hammed Shahidian, “The Iranian Left and the 'Woman Question' in the Revolution of 1978-79,” The Journal of Middle East Studies 26 (1994), 223-247. 84 Shahidian, 236. 85 Ibid., 235. 86 Patricia J. Higgins, “Women in the Islamic Republic of Iran: Legal, Social, and Ideological Changes,” Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society, Vol. 10 No. 31 (1985), 477-494. 87 Janet Afary, Sexual Politics in Modern Iran (Cambridge: Cambridge University, 2009), 273. 88 Higgins, 486.
33 for it making the 2009 protests “safe” can be made.
Afary's analysis of sexual politics in Iran also includes the culture of militant resistance among Iranian women. The various anti-regime guerrilla movements that evolved in the 1960s such as the Fedayeen Khalq and Mojahedeen Khalq all had a large percentage of female members. Again, it is noted that their membership drew primarily from the urban middle-class. However, Afary downplays the fact that many members had traveled abroad in favor of noting that most were university students89. There was a class divide within the urban middle- class in both. Fedayeen members were primarily “dressed in jeans, short-sleeved T-shirts, and Maoist shirts” while Mojahedeen members tended to wear the hijab90. It is important to note that Agha-Soltan – and many of the 2009 protesters – wore makeup and embraced the complicated relationship of post-1979 urban women to the hijab. Many of these women were later killed engaging in terror attacks or under torture. The Fedayeen granted them the traditionally male-only status of shahids (martyrs) and wrote semi-hagiographic accounts of their lives91. Portrayals of their deaths were absorbed by the tradition of “Shi'i-Iranian veneration of pain, suffering and martyrdom.”92 Although Agha-Soltan was not a professional revolutionary, and in fact, appears to have been highly politically engaged at all, these portrayals prefigure how she was treated in her death. However, all this may have been for naught. The bulk of male Fedayeen membership took a more regressive view of women and may have even disapproved of the prominence of women in the group. According to Afary, who cites Maziar Behrooz, “the Fedayeen's ambivalent stance toward women's rights during the revolution was the trigger for the group's breakup and the unraveling of the secular Iranian left as a whole.”93
A nuanced portrayal of Iranian protest before the panopticon of user-generated content, outside of the Tehrani metropolis can be found via Mary E. Hegland. Hegland chronicled the activities of Iranian women in Aliabad, a small village outside Shiraz94 before and during the 1979 Revolution. Despite conservative social mores constraining the public behavior of women, the women of Aliabad participated in the Revolution. By defining the Shah's downfall as a religiously sanctioned event, the town's women eagerly participated in protests. Despite the fact that only 11 out of Aliabad's approximately 500 women worked outside the home, many participated in protests and demonstrations. More women participated in the protest who had daughters or relatives in Shiraz than did not. Teachers served as the group's vanguard. Ironically enough, the BBC played a role in their protests through translations English-language broadcasts. Later on, they participated in protests in Aliabad that paralleled the growth of demonstrations during 2009:
“The women agreed to go on their own demonstration after dark, about 7:00. When the time came, some of the women were
89 Ibid., 245. 90 Ibid., 245-8. 91 Afary, 246. 92 Ibid., 249. 93 Ibid., 250. 94 Mary E. Hegland, “Aliabad Women: Revolution as Religious Activity,” Women and Revolution in Iran (ed. Guity Nashat) (Boulder: Westview Press, 1983), 171-194.
34 having second thoughts, but a few resolute ones gathered the whole group together, and they came out. They walked up the alley shouting their chants. When the men heard their voices, they came out and joined in shouting slogans. The women were somewhat nervous, but they were also pleased, excited, and very proud of themselves. The following evening the women again assembled to march. This time they were joined by a few men and a group of teen-age boys. Their slogan shouting began to follow a pattern: the men and boys, marching together in the front, shouted the first phrase in a revolutionary couplet; the women and girls, marching behind, responded with the second phrase. Others joined the marches as they proceeded throughout the village; even some of the most pious and modest women ventured out. The demonstrators gave special attention to shouting slogans when they passed the courtyards of known Shah-supporters. This time the marchers covered more distance than they had the night before. The women began to feel that much was possible.”
Moving away from the feminist interpretation, an alternative framing of Agha-Soltan's death in the Anglophone media was that of the “snuff film” - American/British slang for film showing the death of an individual. A reporter for CNN, Carol Costello, explicitly compared the Agha-Soltan footage to that of massacred American protesters at Ohio's Kent State University95. According to media critic Matthew Balan96:
“Anchor Kyra Phillips introduced the overall theme of Costello’s report: “By now, you’ve probably heard about Neda, the young Iranian woman that was gunned down in Tehran. Well, in death, she’s become quite a symbol of countless Iranians demanding new elections. The question now: will the memory of Neda help make that happen?” After giving some details into the college student’s death, the correspondent described the international reaction to it: “It seems the whole world now knows Neda and aches for her- and why not? It watched her die.” Costello subsequently played a clip of Iranian author Azar Nafisi’s reaction to the Neda death video. She then proposed her question about the impact of the video: “It’s difficult to say right now, though, if this image of Neda will change everything. We know that pictures sometimes do. Many believe this shot taken at Kent State of a student gunned down after a Vietnam War protest helped end the war, yet this video of a lone student standing up to Chinese tanks did not end communism in China.”
This argument was echoed by American media critic Dana Stevens97:
“I haven’t been able to bring myself to watch the entire unedited Neda video on YouTube; it feels too close to a snuff movie. Assuming this graphic clip really does document a young woman’s death at the hands of paramilitary snipers—something we lack the reporting to confirm—what gives us the right to watch it and forward to and fro as proof of our solidarity with the forces of democracy and reform in Iran (something that, as you point out, Mousavi is far from representing)? I wouldn’t want my own death, or that of someone I loved, to be instrumentalized in that way. (We don't, for example, treat the deaths of U.S. soldiers abroad as YouTube-able moments.) And the fact that “Neda” is a young and pretty woman somehow adds to the ickiness of disseminating the scene of her murder (if that is indeed what the clip shows) as a propaganda tool.“
95 Carol Costello, Newsroom, CNN, June 22, 2009. 96 Matthew Balan, “CNN's Carol Costello Equates Neda Murder With Kent State,” NewsBusters, June 23, 2009, http://newsbusters.org/blogs/matthew-balan/2009/06/23/cnns-carol-costello-equivocates-neda-murder-kent-state (Accessed January 7, 2010). 97 Dana Stevens, “Is the “Neda” Video a Stunt Movie?,” DoubleX, June 22, 2009, http://www.doublex.com/blog/xxfactor/neda-video-snuff-movie (Accessed January 7, 2010).
35 Jennie Yabroff at the American edition of Newsweek makes a similar point98: "The Western memory museum is now mostly a visual one," Susan Sontag wrote in 2004, following the release of the Abu Ghraib torture photographs and videos. Today, even more than when she wrote those words, the Internet, cell phones, and cable TV have made that museum all-access, and open 24 hours. Within hours of the death of Neda Agha-Soltan, who was shot when she got out of her car amid antigovernment protests in Tehran on Saturday, graphic videos of the final seconds of her life were available on YouTube, and being broadcast repeatedly by CNN and other news channels. The New York Times printed stills from the video of Agha-Soltan lying on the ground with her eyes open, with captions describing "blood gushing from her body." A wealth of research exists concerning BBC Middle East and foreign coverage. But oddly, the best known scholarly text about Middle Eastern media coverage, Said's Covering Islam, makes no mention of the BBC at all – a surprising omission given that the book discusses everything from the American CBS news network to Le Monde99. The BBC's foreign service – which includes foreign-language television and radio broadcasts - has made considerable inroads into the Middle East. Rinnawi noted the BBC Arabic radio service's gained in listenership during the post-Nasser era100. Mohammed El-Nawawy and Adel Iskandar confirmed that the BBC was the model for al-Jazeera in an interview with Washington bureau chief, Hafez al-Mirazi101. The BBC Arabic radio service, in fact, is the network's oldest foreign-language venture, as Seib noted in 2008102 - it was founded in 1938 in the midst of serious disturbances in Iraq and Palestine. Reports from BBC Arabic – and BBC Persian – regularly find their way to Anglophone audiences watching standard BBC reports on television or the web, which will be elaborated on later. The increased requirements for Middle Eastern and Central Asian news gathering at the BBC following September 11th and the 2003 Iraq invasion caused the network to look into innovative news gathering policies in those regions. A “logistical and technological cooperation” agreement exists between the BBC and Al Jazeera103 that allows the former to use the latter's facilities for financial compensation. Currently, the BBC retains a strong following among news professionals and news audiences in the Middle East104. Writing in 1991, Muhammad Ayish noted the popularity of BBC news programs within the Arab world105. During the 2003 invasion of Iraq, the ratings of the BBC's overseas network, BBC World, grew due to a perceived difference in news coverage between them and American networks106: “The BBC won new viewers [in 2003], often at the expense of US news organizations such as CNN that were 98 Jennie Yabroff, “Notes on the Death of Neda Agha-Soltan,” Newsweek, June 24, 2009, 99 Said, 129-30. 100Rinnawi, 26. 101Mohammed El-Naway and Adel Iskandar, Al-Jazeera: How the Free Arab News Network Scooped the World and Changed the Middle East (Boulder: Westview, 2002), p. 40. 102The Al-Jazeera Effect, 31. 103Beyond the Front Lines, 16. 104Hegemonic No More, 606. 105Mohammed Ayish, “Foreign Voices as People's Choices: BBC Popularity in the Arab World,” Middle Eastern Studies, vol. 27, no. 3 (July 1991), p. 374-389. 106ibid., 608.
36 perceived as being biased. In fact, the Turkish audience's move away from reliance on US news media was not unique. During the war, BBC World's ratings increased 28% in the US, with its programs being watched in 662,000 US households. Around the globe, BBC World reaches 254 million homes in 200 countries. BBC radio broadcasts are translated into 43 languages and reach 150 million listeners, and the BBC's online news, also in 43 languages, attracted 200 million page views (58 million from the United States) during March 2003. On just the first day of the war, the BBC News web site had 33 million page views and received more than 27,000 emails. This surge took place while “the Beeb” was drawing political fire from both the left and the right (usually a good sign). It was called the “Blair-Bush Corporation” by some and “The Baghdad Broadcasting Corporation” by others.” Part of the BBC's news gathering methods during Iraq was an increased reliance on user-generated content that would be very similar to what they would use in 2009. However, BBC News head Peter Horrocks has stated in 2008 that the use of user-generated content by the network was still in its infancy107. The use of user-generated content in one pre-2009 BBC news story has been examined in depth by the network. In a Harvard University report, BBC World Service Director Richard Sambrook detailed his network's use of user-generated content while covering the July 7th London tube bombings108. Within six hours of the attacks, the network had received 20 amateur videos, 1000 photographs, 4000 SMS messages and 20,000 emails documenting the attacks and their aftermath. In Sambrook's words, the main BBC July 8th evening newscast “began with a package edited entirely from video sent in by viewers” and the network “crossed a rubicon” in journalistic methods as a result109. The wide availability of cheap, relatively advanced camera phones and the BBC's willingness to air user-generated content meant a variety of footage from the scene became available for worldwide airing. While this pattern reoccurred on a larger scale in 2009 Tehran, it is not without a price – Sambrook recognizes that the BBC's relationship with its viewers is changing. More importantly for journalists, 3000 BBC jobs were cut in 2007 while the network began to rely more heavily on user-generated content. Writing in 1987, Philip Schlesinger analyzed the BBC's foreign news coverage in a pre-internet age. His study offers an invaluable glimpse into the BBC's corporate structure, which remains much the same in 2009 as 1987110. One obvious difference is the consideration of arrival times of foreign film and Eurovision link-ups, which have become irrelevant in the age of high-quality digital video: “The morning meetings [of the BBC] begin to address a definite agenda. This is the News Diary, a document which lists home and foreign news stories which are thought to be newsworthy. Each service has its own diary. They are separately compiled overnight at Radio News, and in the late evening at Television News. The diary gives information on the availability of reporting staff at home and abroad; it lists the times at which circuits are available for feeding in reports from home and foreign correspondents, and reporters in various parts of the British Isles. The Television News diary contains a lot of detail about the arrival times of film from abroad, satellites and Eurovision link-ups. The diaries have two distinct
107Jose Alberto Garcia Aviles, “'Citizen Journalism' in European Television Websites,” presentation, 2008. 108Richard Sambrook, Citizen Journalism and the BBC, Nieman Report, Harvard University, http://www.nieman.harvard.edu/reportsitem.aspx?id=100542 (Accessed January 7, 2010). 109ibid. 110Philip Schlesinger, Putting “Reality” Together: BBC News (Taylor & Francis, 1987), p. 50.
37 sections: Home and Foreign. In both services, home news stories, which are generally far more numerous than foreign stories, are considered first.” The basic foreign reporting setup of both BBC and Al Jazeera English was detailed by Claude Moisy in 1996111. According to Moisy, approximately 40 bureaus with 70 total correspondents operated on the BBC's behalf outside of the United Kingdom for both radio and television. Meanwhile, the BBC's foreign reporting is frequently criticized from multiple fronts. The Iranian government has been a vociferous critic of the BBC. In 2009, Ethiopian tour operators launched an anti-BBC campaign alleging that the BBC news' recycling of 1984 famine footage was hurting the country's tourism industry112. Criticism has been mounted against the BBC's coverage of the 2004/2005 tsunami in Indonesia by Scott Downman, who argued that aggressive BBC and CNN reporters worsened the situation of already traumatized Indonesians in Banda Aceh through “ill-considered disaster journalism.”113 Allegations of an anti- Indian bias were made due to the wording of reports about the 2008 Mumbai terrorist attacks114. In 2009, allegations were made of bias in the BBC science stories concerning climate change, genetically-modified foods and the MMR vaccine115. However, most criticism of BBC foreign reporting has taken place in the context of the Israeli-Arab conflict. Allegations have been made of BBC coverage taking a consistent pro-Palestinian or pro-Arab bias. These allegations led to the commissioning of 2004's Balen Report, a document written by senior BBC journalist Malcolm Balen for Sambrook analyzing the network's coverage of the Israeli-Arab conflict. The BBC later refused to release the Balen Report to the public, arguing it fell outside of Freedom of Information Act jurisdiction. The BBC spent approximately GBP200,000 blocking release of the document116. Allegations have also been made of the BBC having a systemic pro-Israeli bias in stories relating to the Israeli-Arab conflict. Writing in 2003, Mohammed Samaana detailed claims that the BBC ignored Palestinian
111Claude Moisy, The Foreign News Flow in the Information Age: Will the Americans Still See the World When They Travel on the Infobahn?, Joan Shorenstein Center for Press Politics and Public Policy / Harvard University, November 1996, http://www.hks.harvard.edu/presspol/publications/papers/discussion_papers/d23_moisy.pdf, p. 96. (Accessed January 7, 2010). 112Ash Smyth, “Ethiopians Attack BBC's Doom-laden Coverage,” The First Post, November 24, 2009, http://www.thefirstpost.co.uk/56503,news-comment,news-politics,ethiopians-attack-bbcs-doom-laden-coverage (Accessed January 7, 2010). 113Scott Downman, “”Swamped: The Tsunami Media Coverage in Banda Aceh – When Help is Not Helpful,” paper presented to the Journalism Education Conference, Griffith University, November 29 – December 2 2005, http://know.brr.go.id/dc/articles/20051129_Swamped_Tsunami_Media_Coverage_Banda_Aceh.pdf (Accessed January 7, 2010). 114Sheela Bhatt, “The BBC Cannot See the Difference Between a Criminal and a Terrorist,” Rediff India Abroad, December 14, 2008, http://www.rediff.com/news/2008/dec/14mumterror-mj-akbar-slams-bbc-for-biased-coverage-of- mumbai-terror-attack.htm (Accessed January 7, 2010). 115Paul Revoir, “BBC Probes Bias in its Science Coverage,” Daily Mail, January 7, 2010, http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1241209/BBC-probes-bias-science-coverage.html (Accessed January 7, 2010). 116Michael Herman, “BBC Asks Court to Block Israel Report,” Times of London, March 27, 2007, http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/law/article1575543.ece (Accessed January 7, 2010).
38 civilian casualties during the Second Intifada117. Similar charges were made by British watchdog group Arab Media Watch. AMW's Sharif Nashashibi alleged that the BBC (and Al Jazeera) were consistently biased in support of Israel and overwhelmingly relied on Israeli sources in a survey of 2009 news stories118. Although the Balen Report is still not publicly available, the BBC has placed their editorial strategy guide for coverage of Israel and the Palestinians online119. A rich corpus of scholarship exists on Al Jazeera (“The Island” or “The Peninsula”), although most focuses on the Arab-language parent network. Al Jazeera was founded in 1996 with a US$150 million grant from Qatari Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani, approximately one year after he deposed father Sheikh Khalifa bin Hamad al-Thani as Emir. The Sandhurst-educated junior al-Thani initiated limited reforms upon his ascension120. Al Jazeera appears to be, if not directly part of the reforms, closely related. Evidence suggests that al-Thani was aiming to create a pan-Arab satellite news channel, “whether for financial gain, or from a desire to make political capital over his long-term rivals the Saudis, or out of a genuine yearning for democratic reform” since August 1994121, when he unsuccessfully attempted to lobby the yet-to-be-deposed elder al-Thani on the issue. When Al Jazeera launched in 1996, the bulk of the network's staff was recruited from the aborted BBC Arabic television service of the 1990s. A collaborative satellite news station jointly operated by the BBC and the Saudi Arabian government's Orbit Satellite service, the 1990s BBC Arabic was founded in 1994. However, the network was effectively forced to stop broadcasting in the face of strenuous Saudi protests following an appearance by Saudi Islamist exile Muhammad al-Mas'ari122 and complaints over the popular Panorama documentary show on the BBC's English-language mother service airing an episode on alleged Saudi human rights abuses. Al-Mas'ari's appearance triggered a series of mysterious “technical errors” on the network, and accusations flew back and forth between the BBC and Orbit's backers among the Saudi royal family. BBC Arabic abruptly went off the air in April 1996, replaced by the Disney Channel on Orbit's channel roster. Out of the approximately 250 employees of the 1990s BBC Arabic service, 120 relocated to Qatar and signed contracts with Al Jazeera123. A replacement BBC Arabic satellite television service was founded several years later under Hokkam El Sokkari that functions as a competitor to Al Jazeera.
117Mohammed Samaana, “Is the BBC Taking Sides in the Middle East?,” Fortnight, November 2003, http://www.jstor.org/pss/25561004 (Accessed January 7, 2010). 118Sharif Hikmat Nashashibi, “BBC & Al Jazeera Coverage of Israeli-Palestinian Violence,” Arab Media Watch policy paper, 2009, http://www.arabmediawatch.com/amw/Portals/0/documents/media/20090609BBCAlJazeeraCoverageOfIsrPalViolence.p df (accessed January 7, 2010). 119Interestingly, the document – which refers almost entirely to the Israeli-Arab situation, is labeled with the misnomer “Middle East Strategy.” BBC News Management, “Editorial Coverage of Israel and the Palestinians,” BBC, http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbctrust/assets/files/pdf/our_work/govs/bbcnews_middleeast_strategy.pdf (accessed January 7, 2010). 120Hugh Miles, Al-Jazeera: The Inside Story of the Arab News Channel That is Challenging the West (New York: Grove Press, 2005), p. 14, 29. 121ibid, p. 28. 122ibid, p. 31. 123ibid, p. 33.
39 As the first “Western”-style news channel in the Arab world, Al Jazeera quickly gained a considerable viewership – first a minority, than a plurality – throughout the Middle East, Maghreb and Arab diaspora. Several popular shows began airing on the network, including news shows Al Itidjah Al Mouakass (“The Opposite Direction”) and Al Irshad (“The Long View”) and the extremely popular Muslim religious program Ash Sharia w'Al Hayat (“Sharia and Life”). Presenters, including Yosri Fouda, Faisal al-Kasim and Sami Haddad, became genuine celebrities in the Arab world. Al Jazeera inked a series of ambitious distribution and content-sharing deals in the 1990s, including a video sharing deal with state-run Iranian television and a distribution agreement with an Israeli cable television operator alongside the standard European, South Asian and North American distribution deals124. Audaciously, an ambitious advertising blitz was undertaken for Al Jazeera's Arabic-language programming in China – network chiefs viewed Xinjiang's Uighur Muslim population as a potential audience125. Al Jazeera's decision to air extended video statements by Osama bin Laden and to broadcast live from Taliban-controlled Afghanistan in the months following September 11th led to criticism of the network and intervention from foreign governments. The New York Daily News suggested that the network was “more dangerous than Anthrax”126 and employees of Al Jazeera's London bureau appear to have been tracked by MI5127. In November of 2001, Al Jazeera's Kabul bureau was destroyed by an American missile strike. This pattern repeated itself in the 2003 invasion of Iraq. In the months prior to the invasion, the network was the target of a disinformation campaign from Pentagon-hired consultants The Rendon Group. Once the war was underway, Al Jazeera's Baghdad bureau was again destroyed by an American missile strike – reporter Tayeq Ayyoub was killed. Simultaneously, Al Jazeera correspondents covering the New York Stock Exchange and NASDAQ found their credentials revoked under the rubric of “security reasons.” In 2004, a leaked British memo transcribing a conference between Tony Blair and George W. Bush revealed that the American President had been seriously considering an aerial strike on Al Jazeera's Qatar headquarters in April 2004128. Despite all this, or perhaps because of it, an English-language version of Al Jazeera was launched in November 2006. Titled Al Jazeera English, the network bills itself as “the world's first global English language news channel to be headquartered in the Middle East”129 and tells viewers that it is the “Voice of the South” and is “reversing the North to South flow of information,” in a conscious homage to post-Fanon and post-Nasser Third Worldist theory. Al Jazeera English launched with an on-screen staff that included Sir David Frost, Riz Khan and American Nightline correspondent Dave Marash. Marash left Al Jazeera English after vocally
124ibid., p 61. 125ibid., p 171. 126ibid., p 149. 127ibid., p. 144. 128NBC News, “U.K. Charges Official Over Leak Memo,” msnbc.com, November 22, 2005, http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10153489/ (Accessed January 10, 2009). 129Al Jazeera English Corporate Profile, english.aljazeera.net, http://english.aljazeera.net/aboutus/2006/11/2008525185555444449.html (Accessed January 10, 2009).
40 criticizing the station in 2008130. As of writing, Al Jazeera English is available worldwide via satellite and has signed extensive cable television distribution agreements throughout Europe, Asia, Africa and Oceania. North America, however, has remained a challenge in Al Jazeera English's attempts to gain distribution in the Anglophone world. Canadian government permission for satellite television distributors to rebroadcast Al Jazeera English was only granted in 2009 and has not been enacted as of publication time131. In the United States, cable distribution is limited to several small cable networks in Vermont, Ohio and Washington DC. The country's largest cable providers, Comcast and Time-Warner, have opted not to air the channel. The same goes for major satellite television providers DirecTV and Dish, although limited Al Jazeera English broadcasting has been repackaged on American satellite network Link TV. Instead, Al Jazeera English has embarked on an ambitious internet-based distribution strategy for their station in a bid to reach North American audiences. All shows and news reports are aired in full on YouTube and the station broadcasts live 24/7 over the LiveStation service and Al Jazeera English's web site132. Numerous books have been written on Al Jazeera English's Arabic mother channel. El-Nawawy and Iskandar's was the first to be released, in 2002. Written well before the launch of Al Jazeera English, the book's mention of future English-language extension plans is short and vague. Generally well received133, the focus of the text stays on station operations and Al Jazeera's evolution throughout the 1990s. Although attention is paid to the station's many clashes with Arab governments, the thorny (and ambiguous) relationship between Al Jazeera and the Qatari government is only briefly examined. Where Al Jazeera is especially helpful is in its details of government clashes, especially the thorny relationship between Algeria and the network. In a subsequent 2005 journal article, Iskandar proposes that while al-Jazeera still represents “alterity” in the “West,” the network's very success has negated its alternative and subaltern status within the Arab world134. The second long-form work released on the topic also dates from 2005. Miles has the advantage of having been released after the 2003 invasion of Iraq, when the network's reportage galvanized high ratings throughout the Arab world - and simultaneously gained criticism in the English-speaking world. A British citizen who grew up in Saudi Arabia and Libya135, Miles' strength lies in extensive interviews including spokesperson Jihad Ballout (who would later defect to rival Al Arabiyya), London bureau director Muftah al-Suwaida, hosts
130Brian Stelter, “American Anchor Quits Al Jazeera,” New York Times, March 27, 2008, http://mediadecoder.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/03/27/american-anchor-quits-al-jazeera/ (Accessed January 10, 2009). 131Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, “Al-Jazeera English Gets CRTC Approval,” CBC News, November 26, 2009, http://www.cbc.ca/arts/tv/story/2009/11/26/al-jazeera.html (Accessed January 10, 2009). 132“I Want Al Jazeera,” iwantaje.net, http://www.iwantaje.net/watch (Accessed January 10, 2009). 133For a representative review, see Ziauddin Sardar, “A Voice of Reason,” The New Statesman, September 9, 2002, http://www.newstatesman.com/200209090038 (accessed January 11, 2009). 134Adel Iskandar, “Is Al Jazeera Alternative? Mainstreaming Alterity and Assimilating Discourses of Dissent,” Transnational Broadcasting Studies 15, http://www.tbsjournal.com/Iskandar.html (accessed January 11, 2009). 135Terry Gross, “Inside Al-Jazeera, As It Plans An English Version,” Fresh Air, National Public Radio (USA), March 14, 2005, http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4533916 (accessed January 11, 2009).
41 Yosri Fouda, Faisal al-Qasim and Qatari politicians such as Interior Minister Prince Nayif al-Thani. As a result of these interviews, intriguing anecdotes are raised (such as the divisive appeal of female host Luna Shubel among Arab women and the question of whether journalistic ethics include not tipping off authorities to the physical location of terrorists). Rinnawi argues that Al Jazeera has served as a bonding mechanism for an “instant nationalism” in the Arab world, offering an updated conception of pan-Arabism through shared media within a context heavily informed by Benedict Anderson and Marshall McLuhan136. Marc Lynch has written extensively on his research into the effect of Al Jazeera programming on Arab public opinion in the 2003 Iraq invasion and their reflection of an increasingly diversified sphere of public opinion in the Arab world137. In Seib's Beyond the Front Lines, the content-sharing agreement signed between the BBC and Al Jazeera is analyzed as a sign of diminishing parochialism due to the implicit logistical and technological cooperation required138. Writing later in The Al- Jazeera Effect, Seib puts forward the hypothesis that Al Jazeera's popularity among Arabic-speaking viewers takes place in the context of an increasingly sophisticated use of technology by regional television stations (web sites, interactive content) and a battle in the public diplomacy realm by unlikely players such as Spain and Russia139. Most intriguingly, Seib's work expounds upon the pan-Arab hypothesis with a number of case studies that contrast Al Jazeera's conceptualization of a shared Arab cultural sphere with the pan-Islamic narrative of Saudi rival Al Resalah and the neo-Caliphate narrative expounded by jihadist websites140. Miladi has emphasized the network's policy of mixing religious, secular, Muslim and Christian employees side- by-side and placed them in “an emerging transnational Arab public sphere.”141 The question of Al Jazeera and other networks such as Al Manar in the Arab diaspora was also examined by Sakr. Sakr argues that the popularity of those channels have spurred European governments to create their own Arabic-language channels due to the emergence of transnational media patterns among the Arab diaspora142. Azran argues that Al Jazeera indicates an adoption of the 'Western'-oriented Liberal Commercial system by Arab media and that the network exists in a state of 'Western'-'Eastern' 'in-betweenness' related to larger trends of hybridization and transculturation143. Additional agreement is also found with Seib's hypothesis, with content sharing agreements with CNN and ABC News cited that could be predecessors of Al Jazeera English. In
136Khalil Rinnawi, Instant Nationalism: McArabism, al-Jazeera and Transnational Media in the Arab World (Lanham: University Press of America, 2006). 137 Marc Lynch, Voices of the New Arab Public: Iraq, al-Jazeera, and Middle East Politics Today (New York: Columbia University, 2005). 138Seib, Beyond the Front Lines, 16. 139The Al-Jazeera Effect, 32. 140ibid., 29, 60. 141Nouredinne Miladi, “Satellite TV News & the Arab Diaspora in Britain,” Journal of Migration Studies 32 no. 6 (August 2006), 949-955 142Naomi Sakr, “Diversity & Diaspora: Arab Communities & Satellite Communication in Europe,” Global Media & Communication 4(3), 277-295. 143Tal Azran, “'Mirror, Mirror on the Wall': The Positioning Hypothesis,” Media and Communications, Traffic (January 2006), 140-156.
42 2005, Seib also detailed how wording in Arabic Al Jazeera stories (for instance, referring to the United States-led coalition in Iraq as “invading forces” rather than the “forces of aggression” cited by other Arabic television stations) helped to serve a diversifying market in the Arabic world and vastly increased the station's name recognition while damaging its economic health144. Another of Seib's journal articles (in this case, one written for the United States military) reframes Al Jazeera's stories in the context of the post-Huntington “Clash of Civilizations” scenario. Seib accepts limited aspects of Huntington's claims, mainly those related to a shared idea of “joint unity” in the Arab world rather than in the larger Muslim world. Al Jazeera is cited as an example of how “clashes between civilizations can occur in ways other than armed conflict.” The claim is also put forward the online internet news providers will be integral players in the creation of a new conception of pan-Arabism – a process that will ultimately defuse 'civilizational conflicts' through diffusion in Seib's view145. Three unusual studies of Al Jazeera's coverage are also worthy of mention. Balsom has analyzed the station's reportage in terms of Qatari foreign policy and found intriguing evidence that Al Jazeera exists within a conscious effort by Qatar to gain leverage against larger neighbors such as Iran and Saudi Arabia146. Auter, Arafa and Al Jaber have conducted research into the parasocial identification of Al Jazeera viewers with anchors, correspondents and writers across national lines147. Cherribi analyzed Al Jazeera's reportage on the discourse of veil wearing in France and came to the conclusion that the network's vaunted motto of “the opinion and the other opinion” was cover for promotion of a shared supranational identity – but a supranational pan-Muslim identity as opposed to the pan-Arab community of Seib and Lynch148. Limited literature exits on Al-Jazeera English. Owen has noted the contrast between Al Jazeera English's luring of high-profile personalities such as Sir David Front and the network's inability to find a cable distributor in the United States149. Tony Burman, the network's managing director as of 2009, detailed Al Jazeera English's adoption of the “global south” discourse and argued that the network consciously makes an effort to adopt a third-worldist ideology in their coverage of issues150. McKelvey argues that the network has accumulated “radical-chic allure” through an approach to news coverage that parallels CNN's 24-hour breaking news channel Headline News, only with a slant towards covering obscure news stories. McKelvey also raises concerns over Al Jazeera English's editorial independence from their parent, arguing that past statements made by al-Thani and the station's Doha headquarters are indicators of a belief in “Doha being the center of the world.”151
144Philip Seib, “Hegemonic No More: Western Media, the Rise of al-Jazeera & the Influence of Diverse Voices,” International Studies Review 7 (2005), 601-612. 145Philip Seib, “The News Media and the 'Clash of Civilizations,' Parameters (2004/5), 79-81. 146Ed Balsom, “Beyond Schlock and Awe – Qatar's New Worldview,” Queens Quarterly vol. 10 no. 2 (2006), 218-222. 147Philip Auter, Mohamed Arafa, Khalid Al Jaber, “Identifying with Arabic Journalists,” Gazette 67(2). 148Sam Cherribi, “From Baghdad to Paris: Al-Jazeera and the Veil,: Harvard International Journal of Press & Politics 2006 no. 11, p. 122-133. 149John Owen (ed.), International News Reporting: Frontiers and Deadlines (Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell, 2009), 113. 150Tony Burman, “World Perspectives: Ignoring the World at Our Peril,” International News Reporting, 131. 151Tara McKelvey, “In Arabic in English in DC,” The American Prospect, December 17, 2006, http://www.prospect.org/cs/articles?article=in_arabic_in_english_in_dc (accessed January 11, 2009).
43 El-Nawawy and Powers are currently conducting the Al-Jazeera English Research Project, a self- described “purposive sample survey in Malaysia, Indonesia, Qatar, the United Kingdom and the United States to analyze the demographics, worldviews, and cultural dispositions of viewers of [Al-Jazeera English]” to test the possibility of Al Jazeera English functioning as a form of conciliatory media; the survey currently has an active web presence152. The same researchers also conducted a study for the Knight Foundation that detailed Al Jazeera English's possible function as a mediator in contentious news stories153 Research into Al Jazeera English's conscious adoption of third-wordist viewpoints and “global south” memes has been conducted by Campbell, who argues that the network has expanded the realm of discourse among Anglophone news channels as a result 154. Evidence for the “global south” approach has also been provided by Sreeharsha, who has analyzed Al Jazeera English's Latin America coverage and noted that their six-person Buenos Aires bureau has been responsible for more than 600 stories in less than two years and has offered more dedicated Latin American coverage than either CNN or Fox News155. The network's tenaciousness in coverage has been praised by Kaplan, a proponent of Huntington's theories who found an “eclectic internationalism” at the heart of their reporting and the station's knack at under reported stories while disdaining Al Jazeera English's “emerging developing world-bourgeoisie” viewpoints156. Lamont has put forth the opinion that Al-Jazeera Arabic and Al Jazeera English have begun to diverge widely in terms of coverage and tone, with the Arabic version remaining superior157. RT was founded as Russia Today as part of an ambitious public diplomacy blitz in 2005158 on behalf of President Vladimir Putin through state news agency RIA Novosti. According to editor-in-chief Simonyan, Russia Today aimed to “show my country the way I see it, the way my editorial team and the people with whom I work [see it].”159 The Russian government took an active part in the network's launch that included easing the visa process for 72 initial foreign employees and an undisclosed amount of funding that appeared to be more than US$30 million in 2005 alone160. Russia Today's first week of broadcasting in December 2005 was plagued by mysterious technical problems that forced the network off air for more than 48 hours. The network's official
152Al-Jazeera English Research Project, http://ajerp.com/ (accessed January 11, 2009). 153Mohammed el-Nawawy, Shawn Powers, Mediating Conflict: Al-Jazeera English and the Possibility of a Concilatory Media, John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, http://uscpublicdiplomacy.com/projects/AJERP%20el%20Nawawy %20&%20Powers%20Nov%205.2.pdf (accessed January 11, 2009). 154Deborah Campbell, “The Most Hated Name in News,” The Walrus, October 2009, http://www.walrusmagazine.com/articles/2009.10-media-the-most-hated-name-in-news/1/ (accessed January 11, 2009). 155Vinod Sreeharsha, “Al-Jazeera Focuses on Latin America,” The Miami Herald, November 4, 2008, http://www.miamiherald.com/news/americas/story/755094.html (Article unavailable online; internet cache used instead). 156Robert D. Kaplan, “Why I Love Al-Jazeera,” The Atlantic Monthly, October 2009, http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200910/al-jazeera (Article viewed January 10, 2009). 157Ned Lamont, “Al Jazeera Goes Mainstream,” The Nation, December 14, 2007, http://www.thenation.com/doc/20071231/lamont (Accessed January 10, 2009). 158“Corporate Profile,” Russia Today, http://rt.com/About_Us/Corporate_Profile.html (Accessed January 11, 2009). 159Robert Parsons, “Russia: New International Channel Ready To Begin Broadcasting,” Agence France-Press via Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, December 9, 2005, http://www.rferl.org/content/article/1063693.html (Accessed January 10, 2009). 160“Russia Today Built on Kremlin Ties,” Kommersant, September 16, 2005, http://www.kommersant.com/page.asp? id=609300 (Accessed January 10, 2010).
44 statement was that hackers placed a virus on their computer network; outside observers floated the possibilities of shoddy computer programming or even of the crash being a publicity stunt161. Russia Today was later rebranded as RT. Creative publicity stunts have been a hallmark of Russia Today/RT brand identity. Past stunts have included the first ever live television broadcast from the North Pole in August 2007, renting two of the giant television screens in New York's Times Square on New Year's Eve, hiring a busload of Russian “Father Christmas” costumed characters to drive through the streets of New York and an aggressive advertising campaign in London questioning the veracity of global warming theories162. The network's Arabic service, Rusiya al-Yaum, began airing in 2007 with a mixed Russian- and Arabic- speaking staff. Akram Khuzan, Al Jazeera's former Moscow bureau chief, initially headed the channel before accepting a subsequent job in Syria. He was replaced by a Russian, Aidar Aganin, with a background at Russia's Foreign Ministry. Simonyan was made the channel's formal EIC163. Rusiya al-Yaum's broadcasts are a mix of original content, translated RT pieces, translated segments from Russian television and recycled content from Arab broadcasters. The station has a cult following in the Arab world. Content often takes jabs at American foreign and fiscal policy in Arab countries164. A Spanish-language service, also branded as RT, began airing in December 2009165 - with the awkward slogan “El Ritmo de los Tempos.” RT/Russia Today's coverage is characterized by several tropes. First is a pro-Kremlin editorial line that is a far cry from the treatment of London or Doha granted by the BBC or Al Jazeera. Conflicts in ex-Soviet regions such as Georgia, South Ossetia and Dagestan are framed in pro-Russian language166, with Russian soldiers referred to as “peacekeepers” and the Russian military valorized167. Second is the network's aggressive courting of figures marginalized by mainstream Anglophone media. Past RT guests have included ultra-right-wing British MEP Nick Griffin, American conspiracy theorist Alex Jones and education theorist Bill Ayers, subject of a minor scandal in the 2008 American presidential election. Third is an aggressive anti-American/anti-European Union/anti-non governmental organization slant in stories. In RT's world, the H1N1 virus168 and the European
161Anna Arutunyan, “Russia Today Glitch A Break-In Or PR Stunt?,” Moscow News, December 14, 2005. 162Luke Harding, “Russia Today Launches First UK Ad Blitz,” The Guardian, December 18, 2009, http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/dec/18/russia-today-propaganda-ad-blitz (Accessed January 11, 2010). 163Anne-Birte Stensgaard, “Top Appointments at Rusiya al-Yaum TV Channel,” AMEinfo.com, December 30, 2007, http://www.ameinfo.com/142717.html (Accessed January 11, 2010). 164Charles Ganske, “Rusiya Al-Yaum,” Discovery Institute, July 26, 2007, http://www.russiablog.org/2007/07/russia_today_launches_satellit.php (Accessed January 11, 2010). 165“Russia Today TV Channel Launches Spanish Broadcasting,” RIA Novosti, December 28, 2009, http://en.rian.ru/russia/20091228/157403656.html (Accessed January 11, 2010). 166Example, see “Russia Sinks Georgian Boat After Attack,” RT, August 11, 2008, http://rt.com/Top_News/2008-08- 11/Russia_sinks_Georgian_boat_after_attack.html (Accessed January 11, 2010) or “North Caucasus Militants 'Should Be Physically Destroyed,' RT, January 8, 2010, http://rt.com/Politics/2010-01-08/russia-terrorism-north-caucasus.html (Accessed January 11, 2010). 167Example, see “Taking a Shot At It: Russian Leader Gives Machine Gun a Good Workout,” RT, January 14, 2010, http://rt.com/Best_Videos/2010-01-14/medvedev-drives-combat-vehicle.html (Accessed January 14, 2010). 168“The Reality Behind the Swine Flu Conspiracy,” RT, November 26, 2009, http://rt.com/Politics/2009-11-26/reality-
45 Union169 are nefarious conspiracies and the United States ripe for socialist revolution170. Despite RT/Russia Today's editorial slant and government backing, the most interesting thing about them is their aesthetics. News pieces make use of hip-hop and loud rock for instrumentals and magazine segments can often be shockingly informal171. Production values often appear rushed and impromptu, which lends the network an idiosyncratic feel. While Anglophone Russians and Russian-descended individuals in the diaspora are mentioned, there are few attempts to forge and solidify collective identity a la Al Jazeera English. While the network is the latest in a long tradition of government-funded news stations serving as soft propaganda (see pre- 1989 Radio Free Europe/Free Liberty and the Nasser-era Sawt Al Arab in Egypt), their general approach can be compared less to Ross' epistemic merit model of propaganda and more to that of a newly founded daily newspaper. While an argument may be made that some sort of regional bonding takes place through the network, RT is there to signify a Russian presence more than anything else. Brown has identified RT/Russia Today in the context of post-Soviet attempts by Russia to enhance their overseas image after several years of laggard public diplomacy172. Simultaneously, Owen has cited RT/Russia Today as one of the best examples of internet distribution for a 24-hour Anglophone news channel173. Writing for the University of Southern California's Institute on Public Diplomacy, Cull has simultaneously praised the channel for its “fascinating window on Russia's view of the world” while disdaining what he called the “unmistakable tone of advocacy for the state position.”174 The most notable factor in all prior literature on the three networks is the relative lack of emphasis on the effect of the internet on news dissemination, framing, sourcing and distribution. Of course, exceptions such as Owen, Seib and the rich vein of online literature exist. Nonetheless, the Middle East is particularly vulnerable to widespread changes in foreign media portrayal due to the internet. Social media such as YouTube and Twitter forces a redefinition of the traditional journalist-publication/network partnership that allows the Middle Eastern public (or at least that of a certain socioeconomic and geographic class) a vastly increased ability to assert their own narrative. It is the author's hope that additional systematic studies will be conducted of regional media in the future to reflect the changes wrought since 2007.
swine-flu-conspiracy.html (Accessed January 15, 2010). 169“European Union Gets Medieval With Ultra-secret Elections,” RT, November 20, 2009, http://rt.com/Politics/2009-11- 20/european-union-medieval-elections.html (Accessed January 15, 2010). 170“We Have to Prepare for Socialist Revolution in US – Economist,” RT, January 3, 2010, http://rt.com/Politics/2010-01- 03/socialist-revolution-united-states.html (Accessed January 15, 2010). 171Stephen Heyman, “A Voice of Mother Russia, in English,” New York Times, May 18, 2008, http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/18/arts/television/18heym.html (Accessed January 15, 2010). 172John Brown, “Public Diplomacy as a Global Phenomenon, 2006: An Internet-Based Overview of the English-Language World Media,” Place Branding & Public Diplomacy, 2007 (3), 180. 173Owen, 114. 174Nicholas J. Cull, “Russia Today: Views From My Hotel Room,” USC Center on Public Diplomacy Newswire, October 30, 2008, http://uscpublicdiplomacy.com/index.php/newsroom/pdblog_detail/russia_today_views_from_my_hotel_room/ (Accessed January 15, 2010).
46 BBC
The BBC began coverage of the Agha-Soltan story in a June 22, 2009 news piece, timemarked 18:08 GMT entitled “Death video woman 'targeted by militia'.”175 The story consisted of (surprisingly, at this early stage) an interview with fiancee Makan originally aired on BBC Persian. Web viewers saw Makan's testimony translated into English, accompanied by photos both of Agha-Soltan and reputed gravesites for demonstrators created by the regime. Makan's testimony appears to implicate the Basij. However, it also contains the apparently false narrative of her “just having stepped outside her car” that saturates early descriptions of her death, echoing Panahi: “She was near the area, a few streets away, from where the main protests were taking place, near the Amir-Abad area. She was with her music teacher, sitting in a car and stuck in traffic. She was feeling very tired and very hot. She got out of the car for just for a few minutes.” This story appeared in the context of a steady stream of stories focusing on the Iranian post-election demonstrations' descent into violence. Other stories posted to the BBC website on June 22 include “Iranian Views: Tension Rising” (a compilation of telephoned and emailed testimony from BBC viewers in Iran in English), “Analysis: Iran Splits Widen” (illustrated by a graphic photo of demonstrators confronting riot cops in Tehran), “Iran Asks BBC Reporter to Leave” (detailing the Islamic Republic's order that BBC Tehran correspondent Jon Leyne leave the country) and “Iran Silences Street Protesters.” In these early stories, a triangular narrative is established that contrasts the effusiveness of the demonstrators with the regime's repression while simultaneously expressing a fascination with the new electronic tools that allowed news agencies access to user-generated content. A search of the BBC's Iran coverage between June 20 – June 22, using Google.com to search the site news.bbc.co.uk for keyword “Iran” uncovered 45 stories directly related to Iran176. Of these 45 stories, 16 of them contained either mobile camera phone footage, email/telephone calls from Iranians or pictures taken by Iranian citizens and uploaded to the internet – almost one-third of the total. This count includes stories that consisted of uploads of BBC News television stories (for example, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/8111098.stm) that also include content of the criteria listed above. In these stories, an emerging vocabulary and framing is visible that would color most of the BBC's subsequent coverage of Agha-Soltan. Demonstrators are usually referred to as “protesters,” a heavy emphasis is put on Iranian user-generated content sent to both the BBC and BBC Persian and coverage of behind-the-scene government mechanisms in Iran is eschewed in favor of a framing that emphasizes the volatility and violence of the street protests.
175BBC News, “Death Video Woman 'Targeted By Militia',” BBC News, June 22, 2009, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8113552.stm (Accessed January 21, 2010). 176This search, conducted on January 21, 2010, resulted in a total of 66 hits. However, 21 were removed from the final count due to only mentioning Iran in sidebars, story scrolls or peripheral columns.
47 These stories also show the appearance of one of the most common tropes in the BBC's coverage of the Iranian demonstrations, the “2009-as-1979 scenario.” The 2009-as-1979 scenario was perfectly articulated in a commentary piece by BBC world affairs editor John Simpson177: “The last time I found myself in Valy Asr avenue in Tehran, shouldering my way through a shouting, sweating, half-excited, half-frightened crowd - in order to get television pictures of a fire that was sending up a column of choking black smoke into the sky - it was 1979 and I was 30 years younger. Things have changed a bit now, of course. Back then, people did not have mobile phones to hold up in the air and take snapshots or videos of what was going on and send them round the world. There were not nearly so many young women among the demonstrators. Then, people did not automatically spot who I worked for. Now, vast numbers of people in Tehran watch BBC television news broadcasts in English and Persian, and it is hard to get through a crowd without being spotted. […] Of course, even to suggest there might be any similarities at all with the revolution of 1979 enrages the government here. But if you remember those days as well as I do, you can spot the parallels at once.” Simpson's testimony also clearly refers to the above mentioned fascination with new technologies and, in passing, the feminist framing mentioned prior. In these early reports, the free and heavy use of camera phone footage and first-person testimony is integrated seamlessly into reports from Tehran. First-person reports are given from the protests Agha-Soltan attended on the 20th that claim “riot police and plain clothes guards” were opening fire on protesters with live ammunition178: “I was part of the protest in Valiasr Square. When we got there, there were riot police and plain clothes guards shooting at people, I could see that people had been shot and were on the ground. There were also water cannons. We decided to head towards Azadi Square, and there were guards on motorbikes attacking people with batons. There were thousands of people out on the streets the police were using tear gas - the whole experience was terrifying. Towhid (Unity) Square looked like a battle ground. There were lots of female protesters - I saw a guard attack one women and then she went back up to him and grabbed him by the collar and said 'why are you doing this? Are you not an Iranian?' - he was totally disarmed and didn't know what to do but her actions stopped him. There were no ambulances around - people were helping each other - helping the wounded - taking them to safety away from further attacks.” -Siavash, Tehran, Iran Regular news reports of the unrest continue with the same themes. An unnamed BBC correspondent wrote a first-person piece on police, Revolutionary Guard and Basij deployments in downtown Tehran179. This correspondent contrasted the fact that shops were open and traffic flowing largely unhindered with the demonstrations throughout Tehran and wrote that “some of the [pedestrians] looked as if they were waiting for some leadership, for a demonstration that they could join.” In a June 22 piece on the Islamic Republic's effort to monitor mobile phone transmissions180, technology correspondent Rory Cellan-Jones takes note of the fact that
177John Simpson, “Iranian Protest Parallels With 1979,” From Our Own Correspondent, BBC, June 20, 2009, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/from_our_own_correspondent/8109101.stm (Accessed January 21, 2010). 178“Your Reaction to Iranian Protests,” Have Your Say, BBC, June 20, 2009, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/talking_point/8111009.stm (Accessed January 21, 2010). 179“BBC Eyewitness: 'Security Everywhere,” BBC, June 20, 2009, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8111152.stm (Accessed January 21, 2010). 180Rory Cellan-Jones, “Hi-Tech Helps Iranian Monitoring,” BBC, June 22, 2009,
48 women's rights activists found their SMS messages and instant messages under surveillance before the election. Over the following 90 days, the BBC narrative of Agha-Soltan's death – and of the larger context of Iranian post-election discord – continued to evolve. 23 BBC stories discussed Agha-Sultan's death between June 23rd and September 22nd 2009, out of a total of 229 counted through a Google.com search of the site news.bbc.co.uk for keyword “Iran” filtered to remove duplicate stories and extraneous stories (ie sports stories that mentioned Iran once in passing). The implication – that almost 10% of the BBC's Iranian coverage in sum during that 90-day period mentioned Agha-Soltan – is staggering. These references ranged from short mentions of Agha-Soltan's death (ie a user-sent email claiming that “Iranian news” reported Israeli intelligence killed Agha-Soltan included in a roundup of user emails from Iran181) to nine articles focused on Agha-Soltan. During this period, two specific BBC radio programs discussing Agha-Soltan were ported to the news.bbc.co.uk site. On July 28, 2009, the BBC World Service radio program Digital Planet devoted a segment to user- generated content from Iran182. The segment's introduction, presented by Gareth Mitchell, posits the BBC's use of user-generated content as an inevitable response to censorious behavior by Iranian authorities. In Mitchell's words, “you're a major news organization and you're covering the Iran story while the fallout continues after the disputed election. The thing is, none of your correspondents are on the ground because they have been asked to leave the country.” Mitchell uses this introduction to segue into an interview with BBC Persian staff including interactive producer Azi Khatiri. While discussing the use of these social networks to cover the story, she characterizes BBC Persian's aggressive use of user-generated content as a dilemma because “as a news organization, we have to be accurate and correct. So we look at what is going on Twitter and we follow it up in order to verify it. We have various contacts inside Iran we call up, to make sure, for example, a protest reported as occurring at multiple locations actually happened. […] People take footage.” Then Khatiri gets to the interesting part. The BBC producer states that “the very interesting thing that's happened within these few weeks, if you like, is the massive use of mobile phones to capture video footage and take pictures. We are flooded with them. We literally get hundreds on days when massive protests take place in Iran. When someone tells us that something happened and we get 10 or 20 pieces of film coming in from mobile phone footage that come in, it shows us that it really did happen and that it is the truth.” Mitchell asks Khatiri if the user-generated content makers are representative of the larger Iranian population or if it is mostly the younger generation. Khatiri asks Mitchell to consider the fact that 70% of the Iranian population is under 30 years old and that her older (Iranian) parents are also out on the street. Khatiri notes, however, that most footage BBC Persian receives is from Tehran. She says she hears from listeners in small cities and towns that most http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/8112550.stm (Accessed January 21, 2010). 181“Iranian Views: 'Critical Times',” BBC News, June 25, 2009, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/8118616.stm (Accessed January 22, 2010). 182An online magazine piece based on the segment is available at Dave Lee, “The Rise of Iran's Citizen Journalists,” Digital Planet, BBC World Service, July 30, 2009, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8176957.stm (Accessed January 22, 2010). Audio of the actual radio show can be found at Digital Planet, BBC World Service, July 28, 2009, http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p003r606 (Accessed January 22, 2010).
49 residents there support protesters, but that the security situation in small cities and towns does not allow residents to protest in reasonable safety. In her words, “they are scared to come out.” Khatiri offers anecdotal evidence that residents of some smaller towns have in fact traveled to Tehran. Mitchell then switches to commentator Bill Thompson to discuss internet users finding news on Iran by Twitter and other social networks. He notes that there is no validation or verification for users of news found online and that the role of news organizations (including, of course, the BBC) is to verify and validate that information for their audience. Thompson notes that in complex political situations when lives are at risk, traditional news organizations have to “get the balance right” in verifying online information. The online version of this segment focuses much more on Agha Soltan. Online, the BBC's Dave Lee notes183: “It has been 40 days since Neda Agha-Soltan, a young Iranian woman, was killed during an anti-government protest in Tehran. Within hours, graphic scenes showing her final seconds of life dominated newspapers and bulletins over the world. Yet this moment wasn't recorded by a professional journalist working for a big news organisation. Instead, a regular bystander captured the powerful footage and uploaded it online. The clip of Agha-Soltan's death is just one of hundreds of pieces of citizen journalism to come from Iran in the past few months. With journalists forced to stay in their hotel rooms, or even leave the country, these amateur recordings quickly became the only means of getting uncensored news out of Tehran.” Again, the iconic nature of the Agha-Soltan video is emphasized and it is again mentioned that it is the result of user-generated footage. The second show was the July 30, 2009 edition of BBC Radio 4's Today184. In a 3:31 segment, Leyne interviews Agha Soltan's mother, Hajar Rostami Motlagh, and asks questions about the death of her daughter. In an introduction to the piece, presenter Sarah Montague describes Agha-Soltan as “the young woman whose death was seen by millions around the world because of a video that was posted around the internet. As a result, she has become a symbol of the opposition struggle there.” Radio 4's piece consisted of an interview given by Leyne through an interpreter with the mother that was reused numerous times by the network's English language services and BBC Persian. Leyne paraphrases the Iranian-language interview Soltan gave. Agha-Soltan is described as having “just gone out for a piano lesson” and having “effectively just kind of bumped into the demonstrations.” Agha-Soltan's involvement in the demonstrations is described by Leyne as the result of “curiosity” and it is repeatedly mentioned that she spoke with her mother via mobile phone in the last hours of her life. Leyne quotes the mother as saying that “Agha-Soltan was not politically active; she simply went to look at the demonstration.” A translator quotes Agha Soltan's mother as saying that “this was all about being young and feeling passionate about freedom. She wasn't political; she wasn't active in any party or group. She didn't support any faction. Every other young Iranian was there and she was one of them.” Leyne explains to listeners the Shi'ite Arbaeen mourning that was currently underway for Agha-Soltan
183ibid. 184Jon Leyne, Today, BBC Radio 4, July 30, 2009, http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/today/newsid_8175000/8175771.stm (Accessed January 22, 2010).
50 and how the Iranian government was forbidding attendees to participate. Leyne quotes the mother as saying she is not “engaged in day-to-day politics, but is grateful for the outpouring of support from around the world. The translator cites the mother as stating that “I want to thank politicians and leaders from every country, at all levels, who remembered my child. Her death has been so painful and I can never describe my true feelings. But knowing that the world has cried for her, that has comforted me. I am proud of her. The world has seen her as a symbol and that makes me happy.” Montague notes that July 30's Arbaeen ceremony occurred at a time of increased Iranian domestic criticism of the government for “things like the abuses going on in the prison there.” Leyne notes that the criticism is coming not just from the opposition, but from conservative sectors that are usually supportive of Ahmadinejad He notes the regular suspicious deaths that took place in Iranian prisons after the 2009 election and notes that Ahmadinejad has released many protesters; Leyne implies this was a direct result of internal pressure by these conservative elements. The interview between Leyne and Motlagh was also ported to the internet in its entirety185, as well as reframed in a separate, two minute and fifty-two second long version186. This version reveals additional nuances that were missing from the Today treatment. Motlagh describes Agha-Soltan leaving the house and is translated as saying “she left the house mid-afternoon. I couldn't join her, but said I would be in touch. I asked her what was going on and she said the streets were full of people. I asked her to come back home and told her I was worried about her being in the crowd. She said 'fine' and said she would come home soon.” Then, according to Motlagh, Agha-Soltan said in a later phone call that she became “stuck” in the area of the street and that the last people to speak to her besides Panahi were Soltan's aunt and uncle, who she spoke to on the phone. Motlagh then describes finding out that Agha-Soltan was injured and rushing to the hospital. According to the translator, Motlagh said “Mr. Panahi, his shirt was covered in blood. I wanted to know the truth; I know what [the hospital staff] was telling me was wrong. They kept on telling me different things about where she had been shot. 15 or 20 minutes later, I learned my daughter was dead.” Leyne asks Motlagh if Agha-Soltan had been political before that day, with the response that was later used on Today. Then, Motlagh's answer goes on to contain information excised from the original, short Today piece: “She was very special. She finished high school and then got married. Philosophy and theology were her favorite subjects. She was a spiritual person, she believed in God. She loved music; you can't blame young people for wanting to go out and wanting to feel free.” The following question from Leyne is an inquiry into Agha-Soltan's plans for the rest of her life. According to the translated answer Rostami Motlagh gives, “young people have dreams. I can't tell you what hers were. She had dreams like any other young person, but she was not given the chance to have hers come true. But there was one dream she spoke about very openly – that she longed to become a mother. She used to ask me
185“Interview: Mother's Tribute to Neda,” BBC News, July 30, 2009, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8176098.stm (Accessed January 30, 2010). 186Jon Leyne, “Mother's Tribute to Shot Iranian Woman,” BBC News, July 30, 2009, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8176053.stm (Accessed January 30, 2010).
51 how it feels to be a mother, what it was like. For me, this was the most painful thing of all. She got married but she never had a child. She lived with her husband but they separated after three years. For the past few years, she was living with me.” At this point, this version of the interview cuts off. However, the extended eight minute, three second interview that the BBC also posted to their website is significantly different in its framing. Leyne is not credited in this piece (instead, it merely says that Rostami Motlagh spoke with the BBC World Service) and an excised portion is available in the transcript that deals directly with current Iranian politics in July 2009187. In the interview, Mostlagh gives her opinions on the Iranian government's official investigation of his daughter's death, details on his meetings with Karroubi and a subsequent interview for Etemad and his communications with Sohrab Arabi and Ashkan Sohrab, fellow parents of children who died in the post-election protests. It is not known whether the 8:03 version comprised the entirety of Rostami Motlagh's interview with the BBC World Service. Inquiries to the BBC regarding this question were not answered at the time this paper was written. But this interview does display the reframing of the Agha-Soltan narrative that took place around this time. The edits of Rostami Motlagh's testimony, dictated by time considerations, nonetheless excised Agha Soltan's death from the political context they were in. The further cutting of the Today show interview also excised the fact that she was a divorcee and omitted much of her biographical information. The second interview related to Agha-Soltan that was heavily used by the BBC, BBC Persian and BBC World Service (along with the subsequent Agha-Soltan documentary) was with Hejazi, the doctor who treated Agha-Soltan when she was shot. First aired on June 25, 2009, the original aired interview was a 19 minute long conversation with correspondent Rachel Harvey188, who primarily reports from southeast Asia. Hejazi, who as previously mentioned, was studying in Great Britain, speaks fluent English and there was no need for an interpreter. Harvey tells listeners that “one of the most striking images to come out of Iran in the last few turbulent weeks was that of a young woman called Neda who was shot dead on the streets of Tehran. The images, which were first broadcast on the internet and shown around the world, show Neda lying on the ground in a pool of blood and two men bent over her, trying in vain to save her life. One of these man was Arash Hejazi.” Again here, we see the BBC's ongoing personalization of Agha-Soltan by repeatedly referring to her by her first name. The interview between Hejazi and Harvey takes place not in a news studio, but on a park bench – a pastoral English scene. Hejazi is asked to describe the “turbulent events” by Harvey. He describes Agha-Soltan's death as a “terrible thing” and explains the circumstances that led him, an English resident, to be in Tehran. This initial account differs from the one given in the November BBC/PBS documentary: “We heard that there were things going on in the street nearby – protests going on, so we walked outside to take a look. We
187“Interview: Mother's Tribute to Neda.” 188“Iran Doctor Tells of Neda's Death,” BBC News, June 25, 2009, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8119713.stm (Accessed January 30, 2010).
52 walked through an alley called Fusradi to the main street, Kareghar, where the protests were going on. The anti-riot police were coming by motorcycle towards the crowd. While we were standing there, Neda and that man who was with her all the time, who I thought was her father at the time because they were so close, and who I later heard was her music teacher, were there among the crowd. Then everything turned crazy because the anti riot police threw tear gas at the people and the motorcycles started going at people. Everyone ran towards the Fusradi alley, we too with my friends, and we ran to the other end of the street, the intersection with Salahi Street – which can be found on the map if necessary. There, people were just standing and didn't know what to do. Either to scatter and leave or wait to see what happens. Harvey then interjects to remind viewers that Hejazi is a doctor, despite the fact that he is employed at a publishing house in the United Kingdom. Hejazi interjects that he was a general practitioner in Iran before he started his publishing house. He explains that her aorta and lung were hit by the bullet and claims Iranian authorities did not perform an autopsy due to the speed of her burial. However, Hejazi assures Harvey he feels the bullet came from the front and did not lead from her back. He said that the bullet “seemed to have blasted inside her chest” and that blood exited from her mouth and nose in a strange fashion, leading him to believe the lungs were hit as well. He says Agha-Soltan died in less than one minute. Hejazi said that he did not see the direction the bullet was fired from due to the general disarray: “Things went into chaos afterwards. The man started crying 'My Child! My Child!' - another thing giving me the impression that he was her father. Then we heard the sound in front of us, had the impression it was from a rooftop. But a few minutes later, because they [other bystanders] took the body and put it in a car when she died to put her in a hospital or somewhere, they just went away. But afterwards, some people believed they actually took someone with a Basij card and said he was on a motorcycle coming from the other way, hiding in the corner. Some people shouted that 'We got him!' Some people went towards him, disarmed him and took his Basij member ID card. He said, he shouted 'I did not want to kill her! I did not want to kill her!' People caught him and did not know what to do with him.” Hejazi then explains how the crowd let the Basij member go in the ensuing chaos and says that he did not personally know who the members of the crowd who captured the Basiji were. He notes members of the crowd were also taking pictures of the militiaman. Then Hejazi explains that he went to his office to recover from the trauma and to wash the copious blood from Agha-Soltan off his body: “I've seen people dying many times before, it's my profession. I've seen people hit by bullets. While I was over her body, I did not think about anything other than what a doctor has to do when he is faced by such a situation. But afterwards, I went to the bathroom, washed off the blood, and just... started washing my hands compulsively. I do not know for how many minutes. I was appalled. When I stood up and realized she was dead and there was nothing I could do, suddenly a fear of death overwhelmed me. I felt that she was one meter away from me, that meter could have hit me. That guy, that person who shot her could still be there and it was the first time in my life that I felt that fear of death. I felt so bad about myself because I had that fear, and shes dead, and I'm fearing about myself. I had a profound sense of guilt that I could not save her, and now I was thinking about myself? I could not sleep for three nights afterwards. The look in her eyes, she didn't have time to say anything. She just had a look in her eyes, 'why did this happen?' A very innocent look. I was overwhelmed. I didn't go home that night. I went to my father's home, I did not want to think about it.”
53 Hejazi then explains how he initially kept the trauma to himself. He claims he then told his parents what happened once initial broadcasts of Agha-Soltan's death appeared on foreign television, which his family watched. Harvey then discusses with Hejazi how Agha-Soltan's death (again referred to as Neda) footage has become a rallying cry for protesters, and asks how he feels about it. Hejazi said that the simple fact that he appeared in the death video was enough to force him to become a part of the opposition. He says that, in his view, her death occurred because she was protesting for the right to vote and freedom of assembly that is enshrined in the Iranian Constitution. Then, Harvey asks Hejazi what he thinks of the possibility, promoted by the Iranian government, that Agha-Soltan was killed by a stray bullet from the protesters. Hejazi denies this, saying that the protesters were largely peaceful and that the government behaved violently during post-election protests. He states that Agha- Soltan's death “was not collateral damage.” He then says that the government should persecute her killers and asks why they did not allow her family to hold her funeral normally. Hejazi complains of a crackdown on commemorations of her death and says that heard of a garbage truck dumping trash on memorial flowers for her. In his words, “this is what enrages people.” The remainder of the interview consists of Hejazi giving his evaluation of Iranian protest footage he saw after his return to the United Kingdom. Then Harvey asks if he can envisage going back to Iran after threats made to his safety by the Iranian government. Predictably enough, Hejazi says he cannot. Hejazi than says the government will denounce everything he says and “put things on him” and states that he has never been in politics and has never advocated anything but human rights. Then he rehashes what he saw, adds that the Basij are armed and do not follow the rules of the police, and the interview concludes. The abridged version of this interview aired on nightly news programs and ported to the internet189 lasts for 2:23 and consists of edited footage from the Hejazi-Harvey conversation. It starts with “We heard a gunshot. Neda was standing one meter away” with the “then” preceding the gunshot sentence edited out. It continues until the line “she died in less then one minute,” where the excerpt then ends. In this short (< 3 minute) excerpt, Agha- Soltan's death is treated in explicitly clinical terms. During the June 23rd – September 22nd period, a number of the tropes previously mentioned in BBC's Iran coverage reappeared. The first is the fixation on new technologies and user-generated content. A surprising number of stories discuss this aspect. For instance: • A segment on the BBC's television program on technology, Click190, focusing on “cyber wars in Iran” - a process described by reporter Adel Shaygan as the “cat and mouse game over control of information [that] has been raised significantly, with opponents of the regime trying to keep one step ahead of
189'She Died in Less Than a Minute,” BBC News, June 25, 2009, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8119741.stm (Accessed February 19, 2010). 190Adel Shaygan, “Cyber Wars in Iran,” Click, BBC News, June 26, 2009, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/click_online/8120858.stm (Accessed January 22, 2010).
54 government censorship.” YouTube and Twitter are mentioned, and telecommunication firm Nokia Siemens is painted in a negative light for providing the Iranian government with a monitoring center with the capability to track the entirety of the nation's web traffic. The online article based on the segment features a graphic showing changes made to BBC Persian's signal to ensure it was received in the Islamic Republic, thus aligning the BBC with the protesters. • Flagship BBC program Newsnight ran an interview with Arianna Huffington, creator of the popular American Huffington Post website and Anne McElvoy of the Evening Standard on Iranian user- generated content. The segment, “Amateurs Key to Iran Reporting,” was largely supportive and enthusiastic of the user-generated content being uploaded to the internet191. • A web-only Newsnight piece by Siobhan Courtney published on July 3, 2009 took a contrarian note and detailed the extraneous/incorrect information that had surfaced on the web in relation to Agha-Soltan and the Tehran demonstrations. These included the previously mentioned incorrect picture of Agha-Soltan and an incident when rival CNN aired YouTube demonstration footage that turned out to be four years old. This story also contains a depiction of Agha-Soltan as the “Angel of Iran.”192 • The BBC republished a December 2008 piece on Iran's blogosphere in late June 2009. Titled, “Iran's Bloggers Thrive Despite Blocks,” it describes the nation's active online community and government censorship. A professor at Agha-Soltan's Islamic Azad University is quoted193. • The BBC World Service prominently mentioned Iran's censorship of BBC Persian, Flickr and Twitter on their own technology program, Digital Planet, in the context of a piece on “cyber-wars” worldwide194. • An America-based BBC reporter covering the Silicon Valley beat, Maggie Shiels, ran a piece on American “cyber-activists” such as Austin Heap and Daniel Colascione who set up proxy servers and anti-filtering software for Iranian demonstrators195. Most of the BBC's stories covering the Iranian events, Agha-Soltan and related stories in July/August of 2009 used ambiguous phrasings to describe the post-election scenario. These phrasings imply electoral wrongdoing on the government's part, while acknowledging Ahmadinejad's victory and the subsequent violence. A typical phrasing, written in August 2009, reads196: “More than 40 days have passed since the election result declared for Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Many in Iran believe there
191 “Amateurs key to Iran reporting,” Newsnight, BBC News, July 1, 2009, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/newsnight/8127800.stm (Accessed January 22, 2010). 192Siobhan Courtney, “The Buzz – Neda – A Case of Mistaken Identity,” Newsnight, BBC News, July 3, 2009, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/newsnight/8129083.stm (Accessed January 22, 2010). 193“Iran's Bloggers Thrive Despite Blocks,” BBC News, December 15, 2009, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/mobile/middle_east/7782771.stm (Accessed January 22, 2010). 194Alka Marwaha, “What Rules Apply in Cyber-Wars?,” BBC World Service, June 24, 2009, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/mobile/technology/8114444.stm (Accessed January 22, 2010). 195Maggie Shiels, “On Iran's Virtual Front-Line,” BBC News, August 6, 2009, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/8186761.stm (Accessed January 22, 2010). 196ibid.
55 was electoral fraud and opposition leader Mir Hussein Mousavi should have won. At least 30 people have died and hundreds have been jailed for their part in protesting the outcome.” During this period, the 2009-as-1979 trope reoccurred numerous times. Jim Muir, the former BBC Tehran correspondent who is best known as the network's longtime Beirut specialist197, wrote an analysis piece on July 4, 2009, that explicitly compared the two198: “Three weeks after Iran was shaken by its most serious unrest since the 1979 revolution, the dust seems to have settled. Banned and broken up by force, the largely peaceful, massive protest demonstrations have fizzled out. The Guardian Council - the powerful, appointed watchdog body - has formally endorsed the re-election of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, whose unexpectedly large declared margin of victory triggered the protests. On the face of it, Tehran and other Iranian cities now look much as they did before the 12 June elections. So does that mean everything is back to normal, and nothing has changed? That seems unlikely.” World Affairs editor Simpson made the parallel again on June 25, just five days after he last compared 2009 to 1979 – when writing about a Revolutionary Guard acquaintance he met in Iran who supports Mousavi, he stated that “I think that these last weeks may turn out to be as momentous as the Islamic Revolution I witnessed there 30 years ago.”199 The same trope occurs even in ordinary news articles. In a feature describing the behavior of police, Revolutionary Guard and Basij during protests, Leyne notes disapprovingly that “it is clear the leaders of the Islamic Republic have taken their own lessons from the way they took power in 1979.”200 During this time period, mention of the Islamic Republic's repressive policies seeped into not concerned with Agha-Soltan or the post-election demonstrations. A BBC Radio 4 story on the growing ties between Iran and Venezuela cites President Hugo Chavez as supporting Ahmadinejad in his post-election behavior (in a piece with a parodying/editorializing title, “The Axis of Annoyance”)201. A story on rifts between Ahmadinejad- and Mousavi- supporting mullahs in Iran contains the line “Others [Mullahs] are appalled at the way protest has been suppressed, and worry that this has thoroughly discredited the Islamic Republic - and, by extension, the clerical establishment.”202 A story on smugglers who run alcohol from Iraqi Kurdistan to Iran paints the smugglers as heroes who defy stiff government policies up to and including the death penalty203. Incidentally, alcohol and drug use in Iran is another reporting frame frequently used by the BBC – since 2000, literally dozens of segments and
197Peyvand Khorsandi, “Fast-Foward Man: Interview With Jim Muir,” iranian.com, September 26, 2009, http://www.iranian.com/PeyvandKhorsandi/2006/September/Muir/index.html (Accessed January 22, 2010). 198Jim Muir, “Analysis: Iran Crisis Set to Rage On,” BBC News, July 4, 2009, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/8134484.stm (Accessed January 22, 2010). 199John Simpson, “Secret Voices of the New Iran,” BBC News, June 25, 2009, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8116825.stm (Accessed January 22, 2010). 200Jon Leyne, “Iran Learns From Past to Crush Dissent,” BBC News, July 9, 2009, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/8143279.stm (Accessed January 22, 2010). 201Linda Pressly, “The 'Axis of Annoyance',” Crossing Continents, BBC Radio 4, August 13, 2009, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8195581.stm (Accessed January 22, 2010). 202Roger Hardy, “Iran Vote Dispute Moves to Seminary,” BBC News, July 7, 2009, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/8137076.stm (Accessed January 22, 2010). 203Jiyar Gol, “Iran's Defiant Alcohol Smugglers,” BBC News, July 6, 2009, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8135510.stm (Accessed January 22, 2010).
56 articles concerning the subject have been run on the BBC's website. This includes both original content and ported radio/television segments. These range from pieces such as a translated BBC Persian discussion of the traditional drinking of liquor during Nowruz (which, incidentally, equates the drinking of bootleg liquor by Iranians with the manufacture of homemade LSD-based derivatives)204 to a Muir-penned piece over a spat over the serving of wine at a state dinner by former President Mohammed Khatami in France205. The BBC's framing and language when discussing Agha-Soltan and Iran in general underwent further nuances in the remainder of 2009. Due to other stories replacing Agha-Soltan in the news cycle, her mentions dropped sharply. Between September 23, 2009 and December 31, 2009, the BBC mentioned Agha-Soltan exactly four times. One was in a “Faces of the Year” retrospective206 and the other three were Agha-Soltan-related news stories. Notably, the BBC in this time period no longer refers to her in headlines or audio as “Neda,” and reverted back to using her full name. A November 11, 2009 story describes a scholarship established at Oxford University's Queen's College in Agha-Soltan's honor207 via anonymous donations. The Neda Agha-Soltan Graduate Scholarship was established at Queen's College for graduate students of philosophy of Iranian nationality or descent; the scholarship pays full graduate fees. The thrust of the BBC's story deals with a harsh public statement made by the Iranian Embassy in London in reaction to the scholarship. The piece describes Agha-Soltan as “a women killed during post-election unrest” and makes mention of allegations that Ahmadinejad rigged the polls early in the story. Towards the end of the piece, it is mentioned that “eyewitnesses say a member of a government militia shot her.” The second piece dates from December 4, 2009. In it, the BBC describes how Agha-Soltan's family is now publicly claiming that she was killed by Iranian security forces208. Illustrated with an Associated Press file photo of Agha-Soltan and a still from one of the death videos, the story is built around a translated BBC Persian telephone interview with father Ali Agha-Soltan. The translated BBC Persian excerpts quote the senior Agha- Soltan as saying “I openly declare that no one, apart from the government, killed Neda. Her killer can only be from the government” and “They've been avoiding responsibility from the very beginning. They want to put the responsibility on other people... This is how the Islamic Republic behaves.” The article also mentions Iranian claims that him and his wife accepted money from an American television network (presumably PBS, as cited prior) that wanted to make a film about his daughter. Also mentioned in the piece is the fact that Agha-Soltan's
204Faraj Balafkan, “Iran's Festive Drink and Drugs Binge,” BBC Persian Service, March 27, 2009, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/7963647.stm (Accessed January 22, 2010). 205Jim Muir, “”Wine Upsets Iranian Trip,” BBC News, March 29, 1999, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/307087.stm (Accessed January 22, 2010). 206“Faces of the Year,” BBC Magazine, BBC News, December 30, 2009, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/magazine/8433845.stm (Accessed January 26, 2010). 207“Iran Denounces Oxford Scholarship,” BBC News, November 11, 2009, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8354372.stm (Accessed January 26, 2010). 208“Neda Agha-Soltan's Family Accuse Iran of Her Killing,” BBC News, December 4, 2009, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8396052.stm (Accessed January 26, 2010).
57 parents were detained and assaulted by Iranian security forces while attending an opposition demonstration in November 2009. This fact never merited a separate article on the main BBC website. In this piece, Agha-Soltan's death video was referred to as “iconic.” But most interestingly, the BBC aired an hour-long documentary about Agha-Soltan's death in November 2009 on BBC 2. The documentary, aired on the This World program, was titled “An Iranian Martyr.”209 Full video of the documentary was placed online, but is only viewable from the United Kingdom due to licensing restrictions. However, numerous viewers placed copies on YouTube and on Torrent sites that are still accessible as of January 2010. “An Iranian Martyr” was produced and directed for This World by British firm Ronachan Films. Monica Garnsey directed and Ros Farney and Angus MacQueen served as executive producers. With changes in narration, voice-overs and structure, footage from “An Iranian Martyr” was reused by American public television network PBS for a shorter, 40-minute documentary on their Frontline program210. Frontline's documentary, “A Death in Tehran,” included additional content from Iranian-American pro-opposition website tehranbureau.com as well. According to Ronachan's own description211, “Neda Agha-Soltan became the international symbol of protest after the disputed elections in Iran in June 2009 when her death was caught on a phone camera and uploaded onto the internet. The film pieces together the story of her death in the context of the elections and the violence that followed. Driven by the astonishing footage of the protests caught on tens of phone cameras, this is a moving story told by people who were there and whose lives have been forever altered since, “An Iranian Martyr” attempts to understand what happened and how and why the Iranian Government responded in the way it did - both at the time and in the months that followed.” Ronachan's documentary is especially interesting because large portions were actually filmed in Tehran. The film (in both its BBC 2 and PBS permutations) includes footage of Karegar Street and a host of other downtown Tehran locations crucial to Agha-Soltan's death. Additional footage appears to have taken place within Turkey and a Turkish fixer is listed, presumably for Iranians interviewed in the documentary who are now in exile. However, no credits are given for Tehran fixers or translators is given for presumably obvious reasons 212. Interview subjects for “An Iranian Martyr” include Arash Hejazi, Hoda Agha-Soltan (Neda's sister), Caspian Makan,a former reporter for Iranian state English-language news channel Press TV identified only by the first name “Faranak,” Scott Peterson of the Christian Science Monitor, journalist Delbar Tavakoli, Sina
209“An Iranian Martyr,” This World, BBC 2, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/this_world/8361837.stm (Accessed January 26, 2010). 210“A Death in Tehran,” Frontline, PBS, November 17, 2009, http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/tehranbureau/deathintehran/ (Accessed January 26, 2010). 211“Productions,” Ronachan Films, http://www.ronachanfilms.co.uk/Ronachan_site/Productions.html (Accessed January 26, 2010). 212This World credits (video only); credits for the American film are available at http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/tehranbureau/deathintehran/etc/credits.html
58 Motalebi of BBC Persian, journalist Nader Mokhtari and former Iranian Deputy Prime Minister Mohsen Sazegara. Footage for the documentary was gathered from disparate, eclectic sources. Apart from the on the ground shots from Tehran, which is of uncertain provenance, archival footage varies widely. There are some expected sources (Associated Press, BBC Archives, BBC Persian, CNN) and several unexpected (Caspian Makan, Javad Moghimi Pasha, Press TV, FARS News Agency). The BBC documentary describes Agha-Soltan as a theology student who “disagreed with the course” and only lasted three terms, who then “married young and divorced” - a fact missing from most prior BBC coverage of Agha-Soltan. Later, it is mentioned how neither she nor Makan intended to vote although she changed her mind at the last minute to cast a ballot for Mousavi – which the BBC alleges she was unable to do due to irregularities at her polling place. The program also implies that Agha-Soltan was far more political than early portrayals indicated. The fact that she regularly attended demonstrations is bought up multiple times by both Hoda Agha-Soltan and Makan. Most of the interview time in “An Iranian Martyr” is with Makan and Hejazi. Makan, speaking through an interpreter, speaks of Neda's last day alive, of finding out about her death and of his subsequent arrest. Makan describes how Agha-Soltan “was involved in the protests from the beginning” and how he “never believed in this protest and did not believe we could get anything from it.” The most interesting part came at the film's end, when he finished out the documentary with descriptions of torture in Iran's Evin Prison: “They hit me more on my left side, because my right side was to the wall. They said the damage was irreparable and that I faced four counts of executions. Some counts may be dropped but I would definitely face one of them. They told me I would be executed.” Hejazi gives some of the film's most compelling testimony. In the published transcript for the PBS version213: Neda was among the crowd, was standing there among the crowd in front of the riot police. She was there with an older man, and she was very close to us, so I noticed her. Sometimes she shouted, "Death to dictator" or something. And her music teacher was trying to convince her that she should stay back, while she didn't really, she was very curious. [...] And when we moved back into the alley, she and her music teacher started walking with us towards the end of the alley, 10 to 15 minutes before she was shot. [...] That was when we hear the blast and from in front of us. And I- everybody was just a bit shocked. I asked, "What was that? Was it a gunshot?" Another friend all of a sudden told me that, "Look at this girl. She's vomiting blood." And I saw that she wasn't vomiting blood, it was blood gushing out of her chest. [...] The extent of the blood- the bleeding and the pressure of the bleeding indicated instantly to me that her aorta was shot, and her lung, as well, because the blood had been flowing through her nose and mouth, as well. So her lung was shot, as well, and she died very quickly. Other interviewees in the film provided context for the chaos of the post-election demonstrations and even served as apologists for the Iranian government. The aforementioned Faranak, who speaks English with a
213"A Death in Tehran," Frontline, PBS, November 2009, http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/tehranbureau/deathintehran/etc/script.html (Accessed February 19, 2010).
59 fluent American accent, describes attending the demonstrations, seeing official brutality towards protesters and her subsequent decision to leave Press TV. Sazegara makes explicit comparisons to both the 1979 and 1906 Constitutional revolutions – though the latter one is not explained for listeners. Mokhtari serves as a devil's advocate as one of the film's lone pro-regime voices: “A bunch of people just broke away from the main demonstration of people who were asking for reform and started attacking this station, the 117th Basij station, a volunteer force station, with Molotov cocktails and tried to set it alight. You imagine someone trying to set fire to a military base in the middle of London, you know, you can imagine the reaction from the security forces.” “An Iranian Martyr” implies Mokhtari is justifying Agha-Soltan's death by that statement. In the film's narrative of Agha-Soltan's death and the ensuing storm, the most frequent framing device used is that of exile. Hejazi is in exile, so is Makan, so are Tavekoli and Sazegara, so are others. The price of dissent in Iran, the film seems to imply, is exile. Outside observers, such as the New York Times, also noted that the documentary emphasizes what it sees as the ephemerality of the post-election dissent movement in Iran214: “Others in the program who talk about the shooting and the protests have also fled Iran, including Ms. Agha-Soltan’s boyfriend, Caspian Makan. He laments having to leave his country, but also having to leave her resting place. It’s a regret that might be shared, in a sense, by anyone watching this program who saw the video back in June and thought big changes were imminent. It feels as if we’ve left that version of Neda Agha-Soltan behind and relegated her to being just another casualty of oppression.” Subsequent BBC coverage of Iran's post-election political challenges for the remainder of 2009 continued largely to use the same framing devices as prior. However, the majority of Iran coverage in this time period was devoted to more recent stories such as the continuing Iranian nuclear program and geopolitical tensions between the Islamic Republic and the United Kingdom. One story that briefly entered the news cycle was the detainment of several British sailors participating in a yachting competition on behalf of Bahrain who were alleged to have strayed into territorial waters by the Iranian government215. Bahrain and Iran have tense foreign relations, with the Islamic Republic suspected of involvement in an attempted Shi'i coup d'etat in 1981 and Iran occasionally making territorial claims on the small nation216. The framing of Iran and the United Kingdom in a representative article from that news story, December 2, 2009's “British Yachtsmen Held For a Week Freed By Iran,” is telling. The sailors are referred to as “yachtsmen” (presumably a more prestigious title) in the headline and opening paragraphs, with a switchover to “sailors” in the seventh paragraph. The fourth paragraph contains a sarcastic use of quotation marks in reference
214Neil Genzlinger, “Frontline – A Death in Tehran,” The New York Times, November 16, 2009, http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/17/arts/television/17death.html?_r=2&scp=8&sq=iran&st=cse (Accessed January 26, 2010). 215For an example of the BBC's coverage of the issue, see “British Yachtsmen Held for a Week Freed By Iran,” BBC News, December 2, 2009, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8389946.stm (Accessed January 28, 2010). 216Ali Younes, “Iran, Bahrain and the Arabs,” Al-Arabiyya English, March 3, 2009, http://www.alarabiya.net/views/2009/03/03/67617.html (Accessed January 28, 2010).
60 to the Iranian Revolutionary Guard: “A statement by the Revolutionary Guard said interrogations had revealed their "illegal entry" had been "a mistake". Relatives have told of their relief.” The bulk of the center portion of the article describes the reaction of families and friends of the British sailors and the accompanying diplomatic effort to release them by David Miliband and others. The article concludes with a recounting of previous naval clashes between Great Britain and Iran that have resulted in the detainment of British sailors. BBC discourse and framing related to the post-election unrest made a return in late 2009 with the Ashura protests and the deaths of both Seyyed Ali Mousavi, nephew of Mir Hossein Mousavi, and the highly influential Iranian cleric Grand Ayatollah Hossein Ali Montazeri. A report on the arrest of Iranian opposition figures in late December 2009217, for instance, repeats several of the tropes found in coverage of Agha-Soltan's death and the post-election civil unrest in Iran. The 1979 Islamic Revolution, again, is held as a benchmark. The BBC states that “intermittent protests in Iran following President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's controversial re-election in June have represented the biggest challenge to the government since the 1979 Islamic revolution” - presumably, in BBC eyes, the Iran-Iraq War caused less of a challenge to the government than the recent demonstrations. Similarly, the bulk of the article contains information gathered from citizen journalists and new media sources such as websites. Cited sources in the piece include the websites Norooz and Parlemannews, which are cited as authoritative news sources along with BBC TV and the official IRNA news agency. One more similar example of post-Neda framing of Iranian events continuing on the BBC can be found in an Ashura piece from December 27, 2009. In a demonstration of the BBC's embrace of user-generated content for Iranian coverage, the network rounded up citizen footage from Tehran Ashura demonstrations218. Four videos were shown, several containing explicit violence. A 0:45 video shows people labeled as “protesters” “cornering members of the Basij militia and taunting them.” Another 51 second video contains footage of Basij motorbikes being burned by a crowd, with a translation of the crowd's slogan of “Don't be frightened, we are all together” accompanying it. A third video shows an attack upon a Tehran police station. The 76 second long video is described as: “A group of protesters gathered outside a small police station in Tehran's Vali Asr square. An injured man was carried away from the police station by the protesters. The protesters appear to ransack the police station, and flames can be seen to the left of it.” This video is accompanied by a banner warning viewers of “Disturbing Images.” Heavy blood is shown streaming from the head of a bearded man who appears to be momentarily dazed at the start of the video and who then recovers and melts into the crowd by :14. A crowd of mostly young and male demonstrators then
217“Iran Opposition Figures Arrested After Protests,” BBC News, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8432297.stm , December 28, 2009 (Accessed January 28, 2010). 218“Iran Ashura Clashes: Your Videos,” BBC News, December 27, 2009, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8432037.stm (Accessed January 28, 2010).
61 attacks a small police substation. Numerous individuals can be seen on-camera photographing and filming the assault – another indicator of how pervasive filming was in all of the Iranian events. The police station then catches fire as the crowd claps and chants. However, the description of the fourth video has the BBC making explicit, yet again, their comparison between 1979 and 2009: “After a clash between protesters and the Basij security forces, the crowds set alight motorbikes of retreating forces. This confrontation is on Enghelab Street, near Hafez Bridge in central Tehran. The protesters are shouting "Don't be frightened, we are all together". Large disturbances took place on exactly this spot 30 years ago, on the traditional Shia day of mourning, Ashura, in 1979, the year of the revolution.” That slogan, also rendered as “Don't be afraid, we are all together,” was one of the most popular of the 2009 demonstrations. All in all, the most notable fact about the BBC's coverage is their intentional transformation of Agha- Soltan into a martyr whose story would be easily digestible by Britons. A full picture of her life was presented in the Ronachan documentary, but news reports about Agha-Soltan constructed a martyrology narrative steeped in a typically liberal, British sensibility. Most pictures portrayed her without a headscarf. The words of Hejazi, an Iranian who speaks fluent English and chose to make his home in Britain, became the source of the predominant soundbites used by the network. Agha-Soltan is invariably described as a “young woman.” Although the BBC avoided the worst excesses of the mawkish newspapers of the United Kingdom, who called her the “Angel of Iran,”219 their portrayal was still flawed by an overly-heavily reliance on interviews with Hejazi and Rostami- Motlagh that stripped Agha-Soltan's life and death of complexity or subtlety.
219Courtney.
62 Al Jazeera English
Al Jazeera English was remarkably early in reporting the Agha-Soltan story. The network's first mention comes in a round-up of deaths related to the Iranian election. Entitled “Deaths Confirmed in Iran Unrest”220,the article was released on June 21, 2009 at 12:39 GMT. This indicates that Al-Jazeera had reported on the existence of an Agha-Soltan video, amazingly, less than 24 hours after it was first posted to Facebook. The description of Agha-Soltan's death is buried in the story's fourteenth paragraph. Agha-Soltan is referred to only as “Neda”; the network claims that it is unable to verify the video. Tellingly, the importance of user-generated content to the Iranian situation is mentioned as well: “Reports on community-driven websites such as Twitter claim a number of protesters were killed by police in the clashes. One video uploaded to YouTube on Saturday alleged to show a teenage girl - being called Neda - dying on the street after being shot by police. Al Jazeera was unable to verify the authenticity of the video or other reports of violence due to an official ban on independent reporting in the capital. However, on blogs and social-networking websites, Neda was being held up as a symbol and a martyr for the protesters.” The 800-word article describes a variety of incidents in Tehran and elsewhere. Early on, the official count of casualties is based on Iranian state media sources. Events taking place in Tehran are described as “unrest”; participants are referred to as “protesters.” The reason for the events taking place is “fallout from the disputed Presidential election.” It is mentioned that the Iranian government is blaming “rioters” and “terrorist groups” for the incidents. Despite the article's nominally focus on Iranian casualties, space is given to the political context. Ahmadinejad is quoted as criticizing the United States and United Kingdom and mention is made of the widespread belief by foreign governments that election fraud occurred. Al Jazeera mentions German Chancellor Angela Merkel's demand for a full recount. Also quoted is Mohsen Makhmalbaf, Mousavi's spokesperson. The remainder of the article is given over to the events on the ground. Al Jazeera describes “3000 opposition protesters” on the street and mentions how “security forces responded with live rounds, batons and tear gas, with the pandemonium continuing well into the night.” Other events are mentioned, including a suspected suicide bombing outside Khomeini's tomb. Then, rather than ending the story, even more time is given over to the political situation. A statement made by Mousavi in opposition newspaper Kaleme is quoted at length and an extended explanation of the Guardian Council's role in any possible ballot recount is offered as a conclusion. One of the Agha-Soltan videos was also shown on Al Jazeera the same day. An Al Jazeera segment ported to YouTube entitled “Violence on the Streets of the Iranian Capital,” by correspondent Nazanine Moshiri 221 shows approximately 33 seconds of Video A. Agha-Soltan's face is blurred out and Moshiri tells viewers in a
220“Deaths Confirmed in Iran Unrest,” Al-Jazeera English, June 21, 2009, http://english.aljazeera.net/news/asia/2009/06/200962183455848331.html (Accessed January 28, 2010). 221Nazanine Moshiri, “Violence on the Streets of the Iranian Capital,” Al Jazeera English, June 21, 2009, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mG-loe_VMws (Accessed February 20, 2010).
63 voiceover that: “A young girl lies dying in a Tehran street. The footage is too disturbing to show in its original form. We don't know when it was filmed and cannot confirm it's authenticity. But it was uploaded onto YouTube on Saturday. Twitter and other sites are calling the young girl Neda. We don't know if that's her real name. It doesn't really matter. Now she has become a symbol and martyr.” The segment, which lasts 2:46, devotes 33 seconds to Agha-Soltan (the Video A excerpt, coupled with voiceover). The remainder of the segment shows scenes of unrest in Tehran that is a mix of user-generated content, footage from Al Jazeera Arabic and Iranian state television footage. 57 seconds are dedicated to presenting the Iranian government's narrative of the events – that the participants were “terrorists” - which includes clips of both a pro-Iranian guest on Al Jazeera English and a clip of General Esmaeil Moghadam giving an interview from Iranian state television. Still photos of riot cops and paramilitaries on the street are shown that still have a watermark from their source, Demotix Images - “the home of quality, user-generated news imagery.” 222 After the stills are shown, the report switches to a clip from a press conference by Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki. Then, interestingly, Iranian state television news footage is shown and a statement by Speaker of Parliament Ali Larijani is given in which he acknowledges that “a majority of the people are of the opinion that the actual election results are different than what was officially announced.” One article concerning Agha-Soltan were posted to Al Jazeera's website on June 22. Entitled “Iran's Mousavi Urges More Protests,”223 the piece again does not mention Agha-Soltan prominently. In the twenty- fourth paragraph, the story states: “Reports on community-driven websites such as Twitter claimed that a number of protesters were killed by police. One video uploaded to YouTube on Saturday purportedly showed a teenage girl - referred to as Neda on social-networking sites - dying on the street after being shot by police.” This is essentially the wording used in the story the day before. The remainder of the piece deals with the continuing ambiguous political situation in Iran. Kaleme is quoted once again, as are Iranian state domestic television, Press TV, the International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran and Amnesty International. Photos used for the piece portray demonstrators wearing green masks, injured demonstrators, Rafsanjani and riot police breaking up a demonstration. Notably, the photographs are supplied via Reuters instead of being user-generated. Tehran is described as in “virtual lockdown” and violence is described as “several clashes between protesters and police.” It is mentioned that “reports emerged of police attacking a vigil by about 100 people outside the offices of the United Nations in Tehran.” Again, the rioters/”terrorist group” dichotomy is mentioned when analyzing the government framing of events. Notably, it is mentioned early on in the article that foreign reporters from Al- Arabiyya, the BBC and American magazines have been the subject of expulsions or Iranian government suspensions – a fact mixed in with descriptions of actual casualties.
222Demotix Images, www.demotiximages.com (Accessed February 10, 2010). 223“Iran's Mousavi Urges More Protests,” Al Jazeera English, June 22, 2009, http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2009/06/200962212658772171.html (Accessed January 28, 2010).
64 Agha-Soltan is also mentioned on The Riz Khan Show, a talk program. This would be the first of two episodes that would mention her. His June 22 episode, also ported to YouTube224, contains the segment “Iran's Internet Revolution” with guests Ethan Zuckerman of Harvard University/globalvoices.org, writer Soraya Sepahpour-Ulrich and Dokhi Fassihian of the National Iranian-American Council. Agha-Soltan's video is mentioned one minute in. According to Khan: “One particularly disturbing piece of footage that began circulating this weekend, the so-called Neda video, is of a young woman in her twenties who was allegedly shot in the chest. Neda has become a symbol of Iran's escalating crisis from a political confrontation to far more ominous political clashes.” Khan states this in a voiceover as the television screen first shows Video A and then footage of a mass rally in Tehran to accompany the “far more ominous political clashes” line. Again, there Agha-Soltan is identified only as “Neda” and the term “clashes” is used. Other deaths are described on Khan's program, but Agha-Soltan's is the only one explained in detail. The remaining parts of his introductory report describe other events in Iran including civil unrest and Ahmadinejad's statements. The tone of the program can be extrapolated from questions Khan asks guests – questions common in the public sphere at the time of the Iranian post-election events. Among them are “is this a Twitter revolution?,” “what impact has the international community had by not being vocal about what's going on?” and questions of the sustainability of the power of new media in Iran. Neda is mentioned in passing by both Sepahpour-Ulrich and another guest. Guests assail the notion that what is happening in Iran is an “internet revolution” and note that the majority of Iranians lack financial or technical means to use the web or Twitter regularly. Khan repeatedly pushes the notion that the most Ahmadinejad supporters are among the “rural poor” and as so are less likely to be represented on online social networks. User calls and emails featured on the program assail “the readiness by Western media and politicians to accept any criticism spread by Twitter against the Iranian government,” give personal perspectives on 1979 in comparison to 2009 and criticize “the Muslim world's deafening silence on Iran.” In fact, an emailer and caller both accuse the larger Muslim world of forsaking Iran. Between June 23 and September 22, 2009, Al Jazeera's framing of Agha-Soltan's death – and the larger context of the Iranian post-election discord – continued to evolve. 12 Al Jazeera stories discussed her death between June 23rd and September 22nd 2009, out of a total of 99 counted through a Google.com search of english.aljazeera.net for keyword “Iran” filtered to remove duplicate stories and extraneous stories (ie sports stories that mentioned Iran once in passing). Just over 12% of Al Jazeera's Iranian coverage in sum during that 90-day period mentioned Agha-Soltan. These references ranged from short mentions of Agha-Soltan's death (for instance, photographs of Agha-Soltan showing up in unrelated news stories225) to talk shows and full-length 224Riz Khan, “Iran's Internet Revolution,” The Riz Khan Show, Al Jazeera English, June 22, 2009, http://english.aljazeera.net/programmes/rizkhan/2009/06/200962281940160238.html (Accessed January 29, 2010). 225Example: “Protectors Decry Iran Detention,” Al Jazeera English, July 25, 2009, http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2009/07/20097258437330979.html (Accessed January 29, 2010).
65 programs devoted to Agha-Soltan's death. On July 8, 2009, the documentary series People and Power aired a 23-minute film by French journalist Manon Loizeau chronicling the immediate post-election events in Tehran. Entitled Iran: Inside the Protests226, the documentary consists of footage filmed in Tehran between June 12 and June 20, 2009227. This program was cut from a longer 40 minute documentary that first aired on the French state owned network France 2's Envoye Special program on June 25, 2009228. Much of the footage was filmed on hidden camera; a massive protest march on June 15 is filmed that, according to the film, 20 kilometers long. Loizeau's documentary footage includes Basij attacks on university dormitories and first-person testimony from Iranians who were seriously injured during the disturbances. The footage also includes allegations that detained demonstrators were tortured and sexually abused229. In one scene filmed in the latter part of the week, street fighting develop at a previously peaceful demonstration between violent attendees and both police officers and Basij. Live rounds are fired at the crowd and the police officers/Basij begin to assault random members, forcing attendees to scatter for safety. Loizeau is forced to take shelter in a bookstore with fortified windows. Within the bookstore, a random cross-section of demonstration attendees can be seen that range in age, economic class and gender. The effect is strangely reminiscent of the June 20 demonstration footage showing Agha-Soltan and her teacher taking refuge in whatever street corner or secure area becomes available. On June 23, Al Jazeera English broadcast an interview with Makan that appears to have been given by telephone; the credits identify Makan as still being in Tehran. The 112-second segment was ported directly to YouTube and Al Jazeera English's website230. The description of the interview tells how “Neda Soltani was allegedly killed by a Basij militia volunteer in Tehran as residents protested over the June 12 presidential election” and promises viewers that “Caspian tells her story.” Strangely, the interview begins with Makan speaking in understandable English. At the :06 mark, he switches to speaking in Iranian; an interpreter is dubbed over Makan's voice and explains: “Neda was with her music teacher in a place far from where people were clashing with police. They were caught in a heavy traffic jam for an hour. It was hot and Neda was tired so she went out of the car to get some fresh air and rest. Unfortunately, shortly afterwards, she was shot. The bullet hit her heart and part of her lungs. A few minutes later, she passed away on the
226“Iran: Inside the Protests,” People and Power, Al Jazeera English, July 8, 2009, http://english.aljazeera.net/programmes/peopleandpower/2009/07/20097811282729500.html (Accessed January 29, 2010). 227Manon Loizeau, personal correspondence. 228“L’Iran au Coeur de la Contestation,” Envoye Special, France 2, June 25, 2009, http://envoye-special.france2.fr/index- fr.php?page=reportage-bonus&id_article=1586 (Accessed February 2, 2010). 229In some cases, more. The film also describes cases where detained protesters were subjected to “acts of sexual degradation” in custody and video of dead protesters (albeit from a less camera-friendly angle than Agha-Soltan) can be clearly made out by the viewer. 230“Fiance Tells of Neda's Last Moments,” Al Jazeera English, June 23, 2009, http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2009/06/20096234329424968.html (Accessed February 2, 2010).
66 way to the hospital. She was killed at a place where there were known clashes. Unfortunately, this was done by forces belonging to the Basij. She had previously taken place in some silent demonstrations, but was not affiliated with any of the parties – neither Ahmadinejad or Mousavi. Her goal was only one thing – it was freedom for people. […] the reason we believe Basij did this is because in our country, people do not have the right to bear arms as in some other countries, such as the United States. Besides, the person who shot her was seen by people and he was wearing plain clothes. If that person was a police officer, than according to the laws of our country, the police wear uniforms. During these demonstrations it was only the Basij who were wearing plain clothes and were also carrying guns. Besides, ordinary people do not carry guns and shoot an innocent girl. If she was shot by ordinary people, then why three days after her death did the government take no measures to find out who killed her? The government knows that she was shot by their own forces and that is why there was no funeral or any commemoration of her death, at her mosque or even at her family house.” Since the interview was held by telephone, the accompanying images begin with a picture of Makan on the left side and a map of Iran on the right. At :09, a bumper states “Neda Aghan Sultan (sic) was reportedly shot by security forces in Tehran on Saturday.” At :11, video is shown from YouTube that shows both Agha Soltan and Panahi in the crowd at a demonstration. At :23, the footage shifts to Video A. Agha-Soltan's face is blurred out by Al Jazeera's censor. At :36, the screen shifts back to the still of Makan and the map of Iran. Once the video ends, the bumper changes to read “Neda's fiance blames Iran's feared Basij militia for her killing on Saturday.” The bumper changes again at :43 to read “Iran's Revolutionary Guard has warned against protests over election dispute.” Then the screen reverts to the :09 bumper. At :57, video shifts to still photographs of Makan and Agha-Soltan. Four images are shown, with three of them appearing to have been taken while on vacation. Agha-Soltan is not wearing a scarf in any photos except for the last, non-vacation one. However, Agha- Soltan's hair is visibly coming out of the loosely-worn scarf in that photograph. By 1:16, the image shifts back to Makan. At 1:25, the tells viewers that “Days of protests in Iran against June 12 elections have left at least 19 dead.” At 1:30, video footage (not credited to any site) appears on-screen showing Basij on motorcycles parading through the streets of Tehran. At 1:34, the screen shifts to rooftop footage taken of Basij in Tehran assaulting and beating demonstrators. At 1:43, a new video is shown of someone (presumably a Basij) wielding an automatic rifle out of a window. The interviewer's voice is not heard during the Makan interview, which suggests it was heavily edited even before translation was overdubbed. At no time was the incompatibility of Makan's suggestion that Agha- Soltan was just “driving through” and the clear video showing Agha-Soltan and Panahi in the exact same outfits at a demonstration mentioned. Again here, Al Jazeera refers to Agha-Soltan repeatedly in bumpers as “Neda.” The martyr narrative seems to be at work here, given Al Jazeera's choice of the adjective “feared” to describe the Basij, along with the replay of the Revolutionary Guard warning. Released the same day, the article “Iran Body Rules Out Poll Annulment” also mentions Agha-Soltan231.
231“Iran Body Rules Out Poll Anullment,” Al Jazeera English, June 23, 2009, http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2009/06/200962374448861297.html (Accessed February 2, 2010).
67 This story concludes with a quote from Iranian activist Hadi Ghaemi saying that her death has become a symbol of the protesters. Ghaemi tells Al Jazeera that “the pictures of her very last moments will become a huge symbol of these protests […] It will become the collective memory of the Iranian people for what happened over the past few days.” The article is illustrated with a Reuters photograph of protesters, with one in the foreground clearly wielding a mobile camera phone. The sidebar shows Agha-Soltan and Makan and links to the Makan interview mentioned prior. June 24th's lone Al Jazeera piece on Agha-Soltan, “Iran's Neda Killing 'Was Illegal',”232 develops the network's narrative further by being built around an interview with Nobel Peace Prize winner Shirin Ebadi. Ebadi's comments are interspersed with descriptions of the Agha-Soltan video and descriptions of the situation in Tehran. An offer is made by Ebadi to legally represent Agha-Soltan's family against “the people who ordered the shooting and those who fired at her.” Ebadi also states that “Neda had not participated in the rally but, even if she had, they did not have the right to shoot her.” The article mentions that Agha-Soltan “has become a symbol for people protesting against the disputed reelection of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.” Her death video is described as “recorded on a mobile phone show[ing] what appeared to be people attempting to save her life after she was apparently hit by a sniper's bullet.” Agha-Soltan is again referred to by her first name repeatedly and violence by the Iranian authorities against demonstrators is graphically described. Ebadi contrasts Agha-Soltan's right to free assembly and the Iranian constitution's promise of the right to peaceful rallies and demonstrations with the behavior of the Islamic Republic. A sidebar on the article asks readers to send their user-generated videos and pictures from Iran. Agha-Soltan was only briefly mentioned on Al Jazeera in the next week. A June 25 piece on pro- Mousavi university professors being detained233 briefly covers anti-regime protests that were taking place in Tehran. A plan by protesters to release thousands of balloons saying “Neda You Are Still in Our Hearts” is described, and Al Jazeera notes that her death has become an iconic image for protesters. Several days later, on June 29, Al Jazeera describes how Ahmadinejad's reelection was confirmed by the Guardian Council234. In this piece, it is noted that Ahmadinejad “asked a leading judge to investigate the killing of Neda Agha Soltan, a young woman who became an icon of Iran's opposition after video capturing her bleeding to death on a Tehran street was circulated worldwide.” The following paragraphs describe how Ahmadinejad stated Agha-Soltan was killed by “enemies of the nation” on his website but rebuts that fact with a mention of Hejazi's BBC interview where he blamed a Basij member. Again, here, mention is made of Agha-Soltan's iconic status. This article breaks with Al Jazeera precedent by referring to her by her last name instead of first upon second mention.
232“Iran's Neda Killing 'Was Illegal',” Al Jazeera English, June 24, 2009, http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2009/06/200962484755543950.html (Accessed February 2, 2010). 233“Iran University Professors 'Held',” Al Jazeera, June 25, 2009, http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2009/06/200962533640849336.html (Accessed February 2, 2010). 234“Iran Recount Gives Ahmadinejad Win,” Al Jazeera, June 29, 2009, http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2009/06/2009629151258105455.html (Accessed February 2, 2010).
68 Al Jazeera does not mention Agha Soltan much in the next month, but she begins to be mentioned in stories around the time of her Arbaeen mourning ceremony. On July 25, an article entitled “Protesters Decry Iran Detentions”235 is illustrated with a picture of two older women, wearing hijabs, holding photographs of Iranians killed in the post-election unrest. One of the photographs is of Neda, while the other is of a man wearing a black jacket who is shown bloody and injured in a photograph immediately below. The next day, an article entitled “Iran Opposition to Mourn Protesters” was published236. Agha-Soltan is mentioned as one of the protesters to be mourned; she is described as “a 26-year-old music student, who was shot on June 20, as protesters clashed with riot police and members of the pro-government Basij militia in Tehran.” The article also mentions that Agha- Soltan's mother was planning to take part in the protests. Again in this article, Agha-Soltan is referred to on second mention only as “Neda.” The next day, an article entitled “Iranian Police Clash With Mourners” was posted237. Violent attacks on mourners by the Iranian police are described. A witness is quoted as telling Reuters that “hundreds have gathered around Neda Agha-Soltan's grave to mourn her death and other victim's deaths.” Al Jazeera adds that Agha- Soltan has become “a symbol of the opposition.” She is described in this case as “a 26-year-old music student, [who] was shot as protesters clashed with riot police and members of the pro-government Basij militia in Tehran.” The remainder of the article consists of descriptions of rifts between conservatives and reformists in the opposition and mentions of the Iranian government's claim that opposition group the People's Mujaheddin was behind recent demonstrations. Sources quoted in the story mostly question Ahmadinejad's ability to retain power in Iran. These were the last news stories Agha-Soltan was mentioned in during 2009. However, her name was bought up in two analysis pieces printed to Al Jazeera's website. On August 1, James Madison University professor Bernd Kaussler wrote an essay asking if the Islamic Republic was nearing an end238. While primarily discussing reformist hermeneutics and the influence and repercussions of Ayatollah Mohammad-Taqi Mesbah Yazdi's influence on Ahmadinejad, he also notes the regime's harsh response to Agha-Soltan's mourners. According Kaussler, “Basij units used taser guns against protesters as well as marking them with paintballs in order to identify them at a later point” at her mourning ceremony. Although the main photograph accompanying the piece is a generic photo of Ahmadinejad from the Getty agency, a second smaller photograph shows a placard at a demonstration reading “Down With the Islamic Republic!” accompanied by the caption “Iran's Revolutionary Guard Has Become Increasingly Powerful.” The next month, in September 2009, American Civil
235“Protesters Decry Iran Detentions,” Al Jazeera English, July 25, 2009, http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2009/07/20097258437330979.html (Accessed February 2, 2010). 236“Iran Opposition to Mourn Protesters,” Al Jazeera English, July 30, 2009, http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2009/07/20097306505961426.html (Accessed February 2, 2010). 237“Iranian Police Clsh With Mourners,” Al Jazeera English, July 31, 2009, http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2009/07/2009730113037944759.html (Accessed February 2, 2010). 238Bernd Kaussler, “Iran: The End of The Republic?,” Al Jazeera English, August 1, 2009, http://english.aljazeera.net/focus/2009/08/20098171953790365.html (Accessed February 2, 2010).
69 Liberties Union fellow Alexander Abdo wrote an analysis piece supporting the release of American atrocity pictures from the Iraqi prison of Abu Ghraib239. While mostly focusing on the internal American debate on releasing the photographs, Abdo makes an explicit comparison of the Abu Ghraib pictures to the Agha-Soltan video: “It was the iconic picture of a man, hooded, wired and balanced on a cardboard box at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq, that signaled to our nation that our counter-terrorism policies had strayed far from our core values. Just weeks ago, the president himself recognised the transformative power of pictures. While addressing the post-election unrest in Iran, he noted that he had seen the amateur video of an Iranian woman – Neda – dying after being shot in the chest. The video has come to symbolise Iran's oppressive response to recent political protest. President Obama was moved by what he saw: "It's heartbreaking. And I think that anybody who sees it knows that there's something fundamentally unjust about that." Again, here, is the characterization of Agha-Soltan by her first name and mention of her video's iconic nature. But in this case, Agha-Soltan is being juxtaposed to emotionally painful images resulting from the brutality of another power – the United States. Agha-Soltan was also the subject of two Al Jazeera talk shows ported to the internet during this period. The first was another episode of The Riz Khan Show, titled “Iran's Bitter Political Divide.”240 Khan's guests, Fassihian and Global Interfaith Peace founder Kaveh Afrasiabi primarily discuss Ahmadinejad's plans for his second term, the role of women in the opposition and Iran's political future. The show's introduction mentions that “the fatal shooting of Neda Agha Soltan became the most defining image of the demonstrations.” 40 seconds in, Khan compares the violence of 2009 to that of 1979 as clips of demonstrators in Tehran are shown. The show's first mention of Agha-Soltan is at :46, when Khan mentions how Agha-Soltan's death video became an iconic image of the protests over footage from Video B. Fassihian takes the anti-regime position while Afrasiabi is the devil's advocate for Ahmadinejad. At 5:53, Fassihian claims that over 300 people were killed by the Basij and she says that the United States would never do this to protesters, in response to Afrasiabi offering a scenario where supporters of Al Gore could have rioted in 2004 and the American government would have been justified in opening fire on them. Afrasiabi confidently states his belief in the trope that foreign governments were behind Tehran rioting. SMS messages sent into the program are scrolled on the bottom of the screen and consistently support a pro-Ahmadinejad, anti-Mousavi position. The second show goes into much greater detail about Agha-Soltan, with a contrarian position that fits into the alleged pan-Arab and pan-Muslim biases of Al Jazeera discussed by Rinnawi and Cherribi. Media criticism program The Listening Post ran an August 21 episode that claimed to delve into “double standards” in the Western media, with Agha-Soltan as its subject241. According to the network's description of the program:
239Alexander Abdo, “Fight to Release Abu Ghraib Images,” Al Jazeera, September 8, 2009, http://english.aljazeera.net/focus/2009/09/200992112214934570.html (Accessed February 2, 2010). 240The Riz Khan Show, “Iran's Bitter Political Divide,” Al Jazeera, August 6, 2009, http://english.aljazeera.net/programmes/rizkhan/2009/08/200985134516516621.html (Accessed February 2, 2010). 241“Corporate Media Wars,” The Listening Post, Al Jazeera English, August 21, 2009, http://english.aljazeera.net/programmes/listeningpost/2009/08/200982195238394421.html (Accessed February 2, 2010).
70 “The Listening Post's Salah Khadr reports on the murder of two Muslim women, but how only one of caught the Western media's attention. Both were young Muslim women standing up for their right to free expression, whose murders caused outrage throughout the Arab and Muslim world. But only Neda Sultan, whose dying moments during a Tehran street protest were broadcast on televisions and computer screens, made news the world over. Marwa el-Sherbini was a pregnant 32-year- old Egyptian pharmacist living in Dresden, Germany. She was savagely stabbed to death in front of her husband and three- year-old son, in a court of law, by the man who she was prosecuting for making racist slurs against her. The murder of El- Sherbini received all kinds of coverage in the Arabic and Muslim media, but limited and tepid coverage in the West. The Listening Post trys (sic) to answer why only one of them has been turned into a martyr by the Western news media and the other virtually ignored.” Despite the great tragedy of El-Sherbini's death, this description fails to note that Al Jazeera was as responsible as any other “Western” news organization for the portrayal of Agha-Soltan as a martyr. In the introduction at 12:51, host Richard Gizbert talks about a woman who died “standing up for their right for free expression.” Behind Gizbert, a photograph of Agha-Soltan sans scarf can be seen. Gizbert goes on to explain that “this is not the iconic, whose dying moments during an Iran street protest in June were broadcast on television and computer screens the world over.” With that, he gives an introduction to the tragedy of Marwa El-Sherbini. The Egyptian pharmacist was stabbed in a Dresden, Germany courtroom by a neighbor against whom she had filed harassment charges after he threatened her over her headscarf. The neighbor, Alex Wiens, was a mentally ill Russian-German who stabbed her at least 16 times in the courtroom before anyone intervened. When El- Sherbini's husband Elwi Ali-Okaz, a doctoral researcher at the Max Planck Institute, rushed to her aid, he was stabbed multiple times in the chest and shot by a police officer who was called into the courtroom for assistance. The police officer apparently mistook the husband for the attacker. El-Sherbini died at the scene and Ali-Okaz was critically wounded242. Khadr begins the segment by discussing Agha-Soltan's death over clips from Fox News and NTV (Turkey). He tells viewers that “the image of Neda Soltan's last moments in the streets of Tehran got the attention of audiences all over the world. Her story dominated global news reports.” Clips from even more television news channels are shown. Khadr continues his narration over footage from both Video A & Video B with an explanation of El-Sherbini's death that begins “And yet, less than two weeks after the media storm surrounding Neda's death, a pregnant young Egyptian woman, Marwa El-Sherbini, was killed inside a German courtroom.” Footage from a BBC News story on El-Sherbini's death is then shown and Listening Post lets the narrative from the BBC explain the tragedy: the BBC's presenters mention the pregnancy, the courtroom and the bloody multiple stabbings. Then the video switches to footage of a large Arab demonstration calling for justice for el-Sherbini as Khadr tells viewers that “while Neda's death has become emblematic of such much, Marwa's tragic fate went
242Abdel-Moneim Said, “Footnotes on Marwa's Murder,” Al-Ahram Weekly, July 16, 2009, http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/2009/956/op1.htm (Accessed February 2, 2010).
71 almost unnoticed in the Western media.” Raza Kazim of the Islamic Human Rights Commission then comes on screen for a soundbite243 where he discusses El-Sherbini's death in the courtroom and asks rhetorically why there has been so little coverage of her death. Jamal Dajani of Link TV (incidentally, the main repackager of Al Jazeera English in the United States) offers another soundbite. He discusses the lack of coverage of El-Sherbini's death in the United States vis a vis Germany. Dajani mentions a colleague who was unaware of El-Sherbini's death, but “was very familiar with the murder of Neda Soltan in Iran. After all, his network provided wall to wall coverage of the recent election controversy.” Khadr asks if El-Sherbini's tragedy was “simply missed” by the media or if it was ignored. On screen is a female protester, wearing an abaya, holding a sign reading “Marwa al- sherbini's martyrdom revealed the nature of Western and European human right (sic).” In order to address his question, Khadr segues into a soundbite by Maleiha Malik of Kings College. She says that “it surprises me, given that the facts were so clear in the Marwa case, that there wasn't a greater discussion in the way in which Islam has been constructed post-9/11. There is tendency for the media, in most Western countries, to represent Islam as the aggressors and perpetrators of violence. When in fact Muslims are the victims of hate crimes or racism, there isn't an actual language to express that within the European media.” El-Sherbini's death coverage is then contrasted unfavorably to death coverage of non-Muslim Dutch filmmaker Theo Van Gogh in 2004 , who was killed by Dutch Muslim Mohammed Bouyeri. Dajani and Kazim then appear on screen as clips of death coverage from Van Gogh are shown. At 4:13, when Marwa footage is shown again, the person talking is a Muslim – Press TV's Yvonne Ridley, appearing on the BBC. Khadr then criticizes BBC and CNN coverage of El-Sherbini's death, calling it “the exception rather than the rule.” He then explains that the “avalanche” of Agha-Soltan coverage was due to “the western media sharing her cause.” Khadr tells viewers afterwards, at 4:39, that there was a wider context to “the Marwa story.” Dajani's voice is then heard onscreen in a voiceover over television clips of both Agha-Soltan and el-Sherbini. Dajani says that “Neda Soltan was made into the symbol of the Iran atrocities and the crimes perpetrated by the Iranian regime against its own people. Marwa's death, on the other hand, was blamed on a deranged outcast – a lone wolf.” Footage of massive demonstrations inside Egypt and around the Muslim world are then shown to prove the righteousness of her death. Most of the female demonstrators are visibly religious Muslims; in the footage, very few women not wearing a hijab or abaya are shown. Voiceovers from all three guests are then heard attacking structural faults in the Western media over footage of both women. When Khadr appears on screen again at 6:00, he asks “what does the lack of depth and sporadic coverage of Marwa's death compared to Neda's say about the lack of independent media in the Western world,
243The Islamic Human Rights Commission is a British advocacy group whose mission statement, as defined on its website (http://www.ihrc.org), says that “our inspiration derives from the Qur'anic injunctions that command believers to rise up in defence of the oppressed.” Incidentally, the IHRC has been accused by secularist British-Asian organization Awaaz South Asia Watch of extensive financial subsidization by the Iranian government (http://www.awaazsaw.org/awaaz_pia4.pdf).
72 and Europe in particular? Especially when it comes to representing the ethnic minorities.” Malik is then heard on screen stating that the media has a duty to break down prejudice as footage from German demonstrations is seen. By 6:43, Khadr explains that “there are complex factors that effect whether news stories make it to air, or, as if in the case of Marwa's death, hardly get any airtime at all.” Malik then explains how, in her view, the lack of clarity in the events of Agha-Soltan's death meant “those who in the media who make decisions about how to represent the case got more discretion about how they were going to use the story to promote different agendas.” Dajani then gives the next voiceover, explaining how Iranian television stations “took the murder of Marwa and ran with it, exploiting the theme of Iranophobia in Europe. Perhaps as revenge for all the negative publicity the Iranian regime received for the murder of Agha-Soltan.” Footage is then shown of a reporter for Press TV asking if “the silence would have been so deafening” if El-Sherbini was Christian instead of Muslim. Khadr closes the segment at 7:30 by stating that “there were two young women and two brutal murders. And two news stories where reporters stopped being reporters and became activists.” This segment is then followed up by a regular feature on Listening Post entitled “Global Village Voices” where users send comments on stories into the program via webcam. One of the guests, an American medical student identified as “Hannah H.,” offers up the explanation that Agha-Soltan's death received more coverage because it was captured on video. Another viewer, Briton Mohammed Shafiq, who is identified as chairman of the Ramadhan Foundation, is then shown. Shafiq states that the lack of coverage of El-Sherbini's death is an example of an anti-Muslim bias in the Western media and that what coverage there was was biased. He then states that the Western media contributed to El-Sherbini's murder and “should hang their heads in shame.” The program then ends. Al Jazeera's coverage of Agha-Soltan's death is primarily colored by the interplay between the generally Western or Westernized impulsizes of Al Jazeera English's staff (which is, however, emphatically not American; the self-proclaimed “Voice of the Global South” is much more Europeanized) with the complicated realities of Al Jazeera's Qatari roots. As detailed in the conclusion, Mohammed Al-Kasim and others have produced fascinating evidence that Al Jazeera's Iran coverage was intimately tied to Qatari foreign policy and the need to keep good relations with the Islamic Republic. Conscious and unconscious anti-Persian biases among the large Arab contingent at Al Jazeera English also play a part, though to a far smaller degree than at their Arabic- language parent channel. For Al Jazeera, it is less a question of the “2009-as-1979” motif than of finding a narrative presentable to a wide-ranging, left-leaning international audience that simultaneously pleases the network's corporate hierarchy.
73 RT
Coverage of the ongoing Iran situation was sparse and underreported on RT/Russia Today in the June 20 – June 22, 2009 time period. Only five stories (including both original online content and ported television footage) appeared on RT's website. Out of the three networks profiled, RT was the only not to have aired even a single mention of Agha-Soltan in this time period. A search of RT's Iran coverage between June 20 – June 22, using google.com to search the site rt.com for keyword “Iran” cross-indexed with a site search directly at rt.com uncovered five stories directly related to Iran. Of these five stories, none were news stories covering the protest; two consisted of online-only columns or blogs. On March 20, a column on conspiracy theories surrounding the September 11th events was posted to RT's website by Evgeny Belenkiy of Turkish publication EurasiaCritic. Entitled “The War on Terror as a Spin of Imagination,”244 Belenkiy's column posits a scenario in which Israeli intelligence services learned of an attack on the World Trade Center in advance “with a minimum time margin” that allowed them to warn Israeli nationals working in the Twin Towers but did not give them the opportunity to alert anyone else. In the course of the column, most of which delineates various conspiracy theories circulating around September 11th, Iraq, Afghanistan and al-Qaeda, Belenkiy mentions the possibility (repudiated by him in the piece) that the United Sates might target Iran strictly for its oil. The same day, a blog post was written on rt.com by Russian-American Alexey Sazonov describing the situation in Iran and entitled “Which Direction is Iran Headed?”245 (sic). Sazonov, an economics student at the University of Illinois in Chicago, puts forth the thesis that Khameini had no choice but to defend the 2009 reelection of Ahmadinejad. In his piece, he states a possibility that Ahmadinejad engaged in vote fraud, but advocates Iranian governmental stability at all costs in order so the Islamic Republic will serve as a regional rival to the United States. Strangely for the network, Sazonov at one point asks if Iran's regime “will prove to be as violent and oppressive as the Sheikh who was overthrown by the infamous Iranian Revolution that defied Western ambitions in Persia.” It is unclear whether his referral to the late Shah as a “Sheikh” was a rhetorical point or a typo. Sazonov claims that any mass civil unrest in Iran would lead to civil war with the United States having a “heavy influence.” The column ends with a call for the Iranian government to make concessions to the Tehrani protesters in the name of stability. On June 21, RT ported to their website a video segment entitled “The Resident: NYC Speaks Out on Iran's Protests”246 by New York-based video producer Lori Harfenist. The 3:20 segment consists of a series of
244Evegeny Belenkiy, “The War on Terror As a Spin of Imagination,” RT, June 20, 2009, http://rt.com/Politics/2009-06- 20/The_War_on_Terror_as_a_Spin_of_Imagination._Part_3._Conspiracies..html (Accessed Feburary 3, 2010). 245Alexey Sazonov, “Which Direction is Iran Headed?,” RT, June 20, 2009, http://rt.com/About_Us/Blogs/With_words_we_govern_men___Disraeli/2009-06-20.html (Accessed February 3, 2010). 246Lori Harfenist, “The Resident: NYC Speaks Out on Iran's Protests,”RT, June 21, 2009, http://rt.com/Top_News/2009- 06-21/NYC_speaks_out_on_Iran_s_protests.html (Accessed February 3, 2010).
74 street interviews with New Yorkers filmed around Times Square on the subject of the Iranian post-election events. Harfenist asks in the introduction, “why are some people considered protesters and others considered rioters? Why are some people allowed to incite violence and not others?” At :17 seconds, a bumper flashes across the bottom of the screen announcing “New Yorkers: Too Easy to Cross the Line Between Protests and Riots,” setting the predominant tone for the remainder of the piece. The interviewees are all quoted to the effect of saying there is a thin line between protesting and rioting, with one interviewee saying that the idea of “protesting” in itself is bad. At 2:01, Harfenist asks an interviewee why the United Sates is not paying any attention to protests in Georgia. Out of the ten people interviewed in the segment, only three mention Iran at all. Two stories mention Iran on June 22. The first is a report on honor killings among Muslim emigres in Europe247 that interviews an Iranian-Swede named “Fatima” who went into hiding after her father threatened to kill her for having Swedish friends. The second program is a documentary program that goes into much greater detail about Iran. Aired on the In Context program, the episode is titled “Iran's Street Democracy”248 and is hosted by Peter Lavelle. Iran only takes up four minutes of the program; the remainder of the 25-minute documentary is devoted to discussing the BRIC (Brazil, Russia, India, China) conference, Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu's stance on a proposed Palestinian state and current events in Belarus. The Iranian segment, titled “Tainted Victory,” begins with an introduction that asserts “the Western world has never thought of Iran having a form of democracy,” and describes Ahmadinejad as being adored by many average Iranians and “controversial, even hated by some who demand greater modernization of the Islamic Republic.” Lavelle points out contradictions in the character of the Islamic Republic and cites a speech given by Ahmadinejad. The show then gives an admirably detailed and complex description of the Iranian political system, with the nature of “Islamic democracy” explained for viewers as footage of Tehran protests is shown. Afshin Molavi of the New America foundation is interviewed; Molavi tells RT that “a more hardline second generation is trying to expunge the old guard, pragmatic, mellowing conservatives from power.” Molavi goes on to say that the post-election events comprise a crisis of legitimacy for the Islamic Republic. In a voiceover, Lavelle states that “in my humble opinion, Washington is hoping that Iran will fall into chaos.” Footage of violence in Tehran and ambulances streaming through the streets is then shown. Ahmadinejad is then shown on screen saying that it is, in fact, the United States that is “consumed by chaos.” Lavelle then explains that the Iranian people and paranoid and scared of the West. Iranian interior minister Sadeq Mahsouli is quoted approvingly. The segment then ends as Lavelle explains that what is happening in Iran is not a “Velvet Revolution,” but rather a battle for the direction of the Islamic Republic. The next day, RT ran a segment hosted by Washington correspondent Dina Gusovsky that continues the
247“Muslim Girls Fall Victim to Honor Killings,” RT, June 22, 2009, http://rt.com/Top_News/2009-06- 22/Muslim_girls_fall_victim_to_honor_killings.html (Accessed February 3, 2010). 248“Iran's Street Democracy,” In Context, RT, June 22, 2009, http://rt.com/About_Us/Programmes/in_context/2009-06- 22/484485.html (Accessed February 3, 2010).
75 intentionally post-Ahmadinejad framing of the Iranian post-election events. Titled “How Western Media Backs the 'Green Revolution' in Iran,”249 the piece alleges that a conscious conspiracy by American and British media outlets existed to help instigate a revolution inside Iran. This story also marks the first time Agha-Soltan was mentioned (although fleetingly). At :23 seconds in, a series of clips from American cable news stations are played. First is a clip from Fox News, then CNN, then MSNBC, whose host Keith Olbermann is shown announcing that “if every revolution has its martyr, the Iranian revolution uprising seems to have found its own” over a still photograph of what appears to be Agha-Soltan. Gusovsky states in an accusatative tone that Barack Obama opened his news conferences at the time by answering reporters' questions about Iran. A clip from a prior interview with pro-Ahmadinejad journalist Jalal Ghazi is then shown in which he dismisses accusations of voter fraud in the Iranian election. Footage of street violence in Tehran is then shown while the presenter asks “why the American media overlooks that fact.” An interview clip with American economist Paul Craig Roberts is shown in which he states that the American media serves as a “propaganda ministry” for his government. That is followed by another interview clip with American journalist Wayne Madsen, where the interviewee claims that the Western media – specifically American news channels such as CNN, MSNBC and Fox News - are engaged in “a coordinated and concerted effort to stir things up.” Video footage of the Tehran demonstrations in the immediate days following the election are shown and then the screen cuts to footage of mass demonstrations in Kiev from the days of the “Orange Revolution” of 2004 and 2005. The presenter then asks if the Iranian events are “another American attempt to foment a 'color revolution' in the Middle East, as it had done in Eastern Europe before.” Madsen is then shown alleging that “there is a tendency now to take advantage of what is an internal problem with the present Iranian government, in which we see some of the same hallmarks in Tehran today as we saw in the Ukraine, Georgia and these other themed revolutions.” The screen then cuts to Roberts, who confidently states that “the CIA has been conducting a destabilization plan within Iran for the last two years; it is well known and has been widely reported in the American and British press. We are seeing the fruits of an orchestrated protest.” Gusovsky then asks if the American media is “ignoring” foreign involvement in the events in Iran as she is shown on camera standing in front of the former Shah-era Iranian Embassy in Washington, DC. While in front of the ornately decorated building, she asks “if perhaps the United States has not abandoned its ambitions in Iran itself. As Western media coverage continues to paint the same pictures, one has to wonder whether or not there is more to the story then the eye can see.” RT seems to interpret the events on the ground in 2009 Tehran as a repeat of the 1953 American- sponsored coup d'etat against Mossadegh in Iran. The transcript of the story posted on RT's website also includes an additional interview snippet which did not appear in the video provided, in which Madsen alleges that the Iranian events were funded by Hungarian-American entrepreneur George Soros. From the transcript : 249“How Western Media Backs the 'Green Revolution' in Iran,” RT, June 23, 2009, http://rt.com/Politics/2009-06- 24/How_Western_media_backs_the__green_revolution__in_Iran.html (Accessed February 4, 2010).
76 “George Bush funneled $400 million to George Soros’ Open Society Institute and National Endowment for Democracy (NED) institutions to influence this opposition movement against the Iranian government,” Madsen claims. “Every time you hear about revolutions it is George Soros and the Open Society Institute.” Hidden inside the RT page for the story is a second piece alleging a Western media conspiracy behind the Iranian post-election events. This story was not posted to the main list of RT stories and is only shown as an embedded video within the transcript of the “How Western Media Backs the 'Green Revolution' in Iran” piece, though it was also uploaded under account name RussiaToday to YouTube250. This piece, entitled “Meddling Media,” accuses foreign media of involvement in the Tehran protests in an even more explicit tone. The presenter states at :12 that the Iranian government has criticized both the BBC and Voice of America for fueling violence. At :25, it is explained that “Western web services” such as Google, Facebook and Twitter are popular in Iran as footage is shown of young Iranians trying to access facebook.com and dealing with Iranian firewalls. Roberts is then shown making his CIA allegations . Then, Madsen is bought on for a live interview. The presenter asks Madsen if the videos of Iranian violence being posted on YouTube are putting any pressure on the regime. Madsen replies: “I think what we have to worry about is the blowback effect. We already seen Iran limiting technology access; what's known as a 'technology blockade' which has the opposite effect of what many of these outside Western influences may have wanted to see. I do believe that there is a tendency now to take advantage of what may be an internal problem of the present Iranian government between the Expediency Council and Assembly of Experts, which is influenced by Rafsenjani who supported Mousavi the opposition candidate, and the Guardian Council of the Supreme Ayatollah. But there are these outside influences which are trying to make the best, or the worst in this case, of something that should best be left to the Iranian government and opposition to handle. I would note that President Obama is under intense pressure to get involve but as of yet is not succumbing to this neo-Conservative pressure, most of it coming from Republicans in Congress.” The presenter then announces that he wants to explore this “conspiracy theory” more in-depth with Madsen. He claims that Kenneth Timmerman of the Foundation for Democracy in Iran thought up the “Green Revolution” motif on his website the day before the Iranian election took place251. Madsen is asked if “that suggests anything suspicious”: “Absolutely. When we hear things like the 'Green Revolution' and the 'Twitter Revolution' – The 'Twitter Revolution,' of course, was tried in Moldova and failed as a result of their recent election, this has all the markings of the Open Society Institute of George Soros and also the National Endowment for Democracy where George Bush funneled about $400 million into this operation to influence the opposition movement against the Iranian government. So, any times you hear about these themed revolutions, it's George Soros, the Open Society Institute, which promotes civil society, but in fact, as we see in the streets of Tehran, promotes civil strife.” The presenter then tells Madsen that “some commentators have seen similarities between the Green Mousavi opposition in Iran and those color revolutions,” referring to the various political events in the past few
250ibid. 251Ibid.
77 years in Georgia and the Ukraine. Madsen, of course, agrees and also accuses George Soros of having a hand in these. For good measure, Madsen then explains how Wolf Blitzer of CNN is an associate of Timmerman and how, as a result, “CNN had trouble prying itself away from coverage of the demonstrations in Tehran to cover what was a terrible Metro accident here in Washington.” Madsen ends his interview by explaining that CNN, Fox News and MSNBC are engaged in a “conscious effort” to perpetuate a Green Revolution framing of the post-election events in Iran. Madsen and Roberts both serve as frequent interview guests for RT, routinely offering positions on everything from why “Washington should listen to Putin”252 to reports that Iraqi hackers affiliated with the anti- American insurgency infiltrated Pentagon computer systems253. RT claims to broadcast an alternative perspective to viewers; some of the positions taken by the pair fall far outside of the spectrum of positions broadcast by the BBC and Al Jazeera English. Both actively claim that the September 11, 2001 attacks in the United States were the result of a government conspiracy – a position RT has also given airtime to on several occasions. Madsen has advocated claims that American president Barack Obama was actually born in Kenya254 and that the H1N1 virus was artificially created in a laboratory255. Roberts, who previously served as Assistant Secretary of the Treasury, has claimed that John McCain would have led the United States into a nuclear war with Russia over Georgia if elected president256 and has complained that “pro-Zionist Jews have a disproportionate influence” over American media257. The next mention of Agha-Soltan on RT occurred again on The Resident, in an episode entitled “Is the Media Fair on Iran?”258 Host Harfenist asks random individuals off the street in Manhattan various questions regarding the coverage of the Iranian situation by American media in a 2:51 segment. In the introduction, she asks viewers whether Iran coverage is “fair and balanced” (in a jab at the slogan of Fox News) or “even moral?” At 1:53, Harfenist asks a pair of women “Do you think they're crossing any lines, like showing that girl dying?” The women reply that it has to be shown. Harfenist then asks “why do we have to go there?” and one of the women replies that the Agha-Soltan video should be aired “in order to show people how important it is.” Following that, a man on the street is asked “if he had watched the video of that girl Neda dying?” The
252“Washington Should Listen to Putin,” RT, January 30, 2009, http://rt.com/Top_News/2009-01- 30/_Washington_should_listen_to_Putin____Paul_Craig_Roberts.html (Accessed February 4, 2010). 253“Iraqi Insurgents Hack Pentagon's Surveillance,” RT, December 18, 2009, http://rt.com/Top_News/2009-12-18/hack- pentagon-iraq-drones.html (Accessed February 4, 2010). 254Wayne Madsen, “GOP Dirty Tricks Machine Readies a Charge That Obama is Not Eligible to be President,” Online Journal, June 9, 2008, http://onlinejournal.com/artman/publish/article_3349.shtml (Accessed February 4, 2010). 255Wayne Madsen, “New Swine Flu Feared to be Weaponized Strain,” Online Journal, Apri 27, 2009, http://onlinejournal.com/artman/publish/article_4631.shtml (Accessed February 4, 2010). 256Jason Bermas, “Nuclear Armaggedon: Jason Bermas Interviews Paul Craig Roberts,” infowars.com, August 27, 2008, http://www.infowars.com/nuclear-armaggedon-jason-bermas-interviews-paul-craig-roberts/ (Accessed February 4, 2010). 257Paul Craig Roberts, “What We Know and Don't Know About 9/11,” vdare.com, August 16, 2006, http://www.vdare.com/roberts/060816_what_know.htm (Accessed February 4, 2010). 258“Is The Media Fair on Iran?,” The Resident, RT, June 28, 2009, http://rt.com/Top_News/2009-06- 28/Is_the_media_fair_on_Iran.html (Accessed February 4, 2010).
78 interviewee then tells Harfenist that “It's a shame. 16 years old (sic). Why do they have to turn everything around like she was a bad person or something?” A woman is then asked if she thinks it was moral for the media to air the Agha-Soltan video. She replies that “they went a little far, I think, by showing something quite that graphic.” The interview then cuts to another woman, who responds that “absolute power corrupts absolutely. You know, it's human nature to want to hold onto that power. You want to keep that status quo and you don't want to report what is going on.” With that, Agha-Soltan disappeared from RT for the rest of 2009. The demonstrations at the time of her arbaeen, the massive spread of her videos, her adoption as an icon of the Iranian situation by people around the world all went unnoticed by RT. But what RT did notice was Iran's nuclear program and Russia's role in it. Out of the 142 RT stories about Iran between June 23 and December 31, 2009, more than half centered around Iran's nuclear program and a proposed American-Israeli alliance against Iran's nuclear program. While a full listing of RT articles focusing on Iran's nuclear ambitions cannot be included due to space considerations, the network ran four articles on the Islamic Republic during the week of Agha-Soltan's arbaeen. One was an interview with American-Israeli political consultant Mitchell Barak in which he advocated an Israeli strike on Iran259, another interview with American libertarian Karen Kwiatkowski that accused the American government of planning military intervention in Iran260, a feature piece on Palestinian Sunnis in Gaza becoming Shi'is with implied Iranian support261 and a tribute piece to the 1979 Islamic Revolution262. In the following month of August 2009, out of 7 stories published on Iran, four focused on Iran's nuclear program or proposed American-Israeli ambitions towards the country263. RT's Iran coverage is representative of the network's programming. While presenters and guests provide views that offer greater political and historical context than the BBC or (sometimes) Al Jazeera, it is within an explicitly pro-Russian framework that often tends towards conspiratorial explanations of world politics. The network's explanations of Anglo-American involvement in the 1953 coup and of the 1979 revolution are refreshing, but it is unsurprising that the Soviet Union's involvement in the overthrow of the first Pahlevi shah goes unmentioned. The lack of coverage of Agha-Soltan is important in and of itself, given the sheer volume of press dedicated to her throughout the world – and not just on the BBC and Al Jazeera. Coverage of Ahmadinejad
259“Possible Israeli Strike on Iran is the Lesser of Two Evils,” RT, July 27, 2009, http://rt.com/Politics/2009-07-27/- possible-israeli-strike-on-iran-is-the-lesser-of-two-evils-.html (Accessed February 4, 2010). It should be noted that the segment is a departure from the majority of RT programming, which takes a notably pro-Iranian government line, unless the goal was to portray Israel as the belligerent. 260“No Change Seen in Obama's Foreign Policy,” RT, July 28, 2009, http://rt.com/Politics/2009-07-28/-no-change-seen-in- obama-s-foreign-policy-.html (Accessed February 5, 2010). 261“Shi'ism Comes From Iran to Sunni Gaza,” RT, July 30, 2009, http://rt.com/Top_News/2009-07-30/shiism-iran-sunni- gaza.html (Accessed February 5, 2010). 262“10 World's Greatest Power Takeovers,” RT, July 30, 2009, http://rt.com/Politics/2009-07-30/10-worlds-greatest- power.html (Accessed February 5, 2010). 263For example, “Israeli President Points Finger at 'Iranian Threat'” (http://rt.com/Politics/2009-08-18/israeli-president- finge-iran.html ), “'US Should Assist Israel if it Attacks Iran' – Bolton” (http://rt.com/Top_News/2009-08-06/bolton- israel-attack-iran.html ).
79 himself is fawning, with his supporters referred to by RT as “Iranian patriots”264; a humor piece the network also ran described a St. Petersburg child named after the Iranian President265..
264“Iranian Patriots Have Always Been Labeled by the West,” RT, August 5, 2009, http://rt.com/Politics/2009-08- 05/iranian-patriots-ahmadinejad-labeled.html (Accessed February 5, 2010). 265“St. Petersburg Boy Named After Iranian President,” RT, July 14, 2009, http://rt.com/Top_News/2009-07- 14/St_Petersburg_boy_named_after_Iranian_president.html (Accessed February 5, 2010).
80 Conclusion
The portrayal of Agha-Soltan's death across all three networks were effected primarily by unconscious bias (the "2009-as-1979" effect) and by the unpredictable dissemination patterns of the internet, several analytical methods were used. Due to the fact that Video A and Video B spread rapidly across the internet through Facebook, Twitter and YouTube and that traditional news networks aired the footage as secondary sources, control of the narrative was lost by the traditional news networks. To put it bluntly, the general public found themselves unintentionally writing the mass media narrative of the Iranian post-election events. This definition of the “public” includes both the Iranians posting to web services and their audience around the world. While the Iranians served as primary sources, they were equal partners in the creation of the narrative with their worldwide audience. Coverage of Agha-Soltan's death and the Iranian post-election events in general underwent divergent framings on the BBC, Al Jazeera English and RT/Russia Today that drew equally on geopolitical considerations, cultural considerations and the perceived worldviews of audiences while offering chronologically similar narratives. While coverage or the lack thereof on RT was subject to framing that took place within an explicit pro-Russian government narrative that prized the authoritarian-parliamentary political structure both Iran and Russia share, neither the BBC nor Al Jazeera was free of ideologically, politically and/or culturally biased framings. But the framing of Agha-Soltan and the post-election events took a different form from that expected.
Comparison of Agha-Soltan/Iran News pieces discussing Agha- News pieces discussing Iran in total, Total percentage of Iran stories pieces by network, June 20-22, 2009 Soltan, June 20-22, 2009 June 20-22, 2009 featuring Agha-Soltan by network Al Jazeera 4 16 25.00% BBC 1 45 0.45% RT 0 5 0.00%
Comparison of Agha-Soltan/Iran News pieces discussing Agha- News pieces discussing Iran in total, Total percentage of Iran stories pieces by network, June 23- Soltan, June 23-September 22 June 23-September 22 featuring Agha-Soltan by network, September 22 June 23-September 22 Al Jazeera 12 99 11.88% BBC 23 229 10.04% RT 2 134 1.49%
Comparison of Agha-Soltan/Iran News pieces discussing Agha-Soltan News pieces discussing Iran in total Total percentage of Iran stories pieces by network, June 20 – featuring Agha-Soltan by network September 22, 2009 Al Jazeera 16 115 13.91% BBC 24 274 8.76% RT 2 139 1.44%
81 At the core of the differing narratives offered are two primary actors – the events in Iran themselves and the all-encompassing panopticon of mobile camera phones among Iranians in Tehran (including both natives of the city and Iranians who traveled there to attend demonstrations). Both the rallies, demonstrations, riots and allegations of vote fraud offered the ingredients for the construction of multiple framings in accordance with Goffman's definition of social framing266. In Goffman's analysis, “social frames” resulting from the sum of experiences of past events are the primary contributing factor towards framing by individuals or institutions. The sum of experiences of past events in contemporary Iran for the western media (and despite the self-proclaimed third worldist stance of Al Jazeera, one must not forget that the bulk of their English-speaking staff was either born or educated in the West) largely starts with rose-tinted memories of the Shah, fast forwards to the events of the 1979 Islamic Revolution and the subsequent hostage crisis, continues on through the dimly remembered Iran-Iraq war, stops to take in ayatollahs with archaic views and memories of the repression of citizens filtered through Persepolis and Reading Lolita in Tehran before winding up with Ahmadinejad and his various statements on the United States and Israel/Zionism. Anglo-American involvement in the 1953 coup d'etat, the various non-Islamist streams in the 1979 revolution and the experiences of Iranians under the Islamic Republic go largely unnoticed on the surface except for the odd talking head on Al Jazeera. The panopticon of cameras in 2009 Tehran also colors Iranian coverage. Two videos alone exist of Agha- Soltan's death, shot from different angles. In Video B, the presumed cameraman of Video A is himself caught on camera. Agha-Soltan and Panahi themselves are caught on camera, marching or walking, in multiple videos of the June 20 Iranian demonstrations as cited prior. Rather than being the result of a conspiratorial scenario a la Press TV where Agha-Soltan's death was plotted by a western power, the wealth of footage of Agha-Soltan and Panahi are testament to the omnipresence of mobile camera phones in Tehran's streets. In the numerous user- generated videos of demonstrations ported to the BBC's website between June 20-22, one of the most common site is individuals waving their arms over the crowd – mobile camera phone in hand – to jostle for the best shot. Most of these impromptu journalists are young men. A few are young women. A handful are old; the bulk are of a younger generation that grew up with (or at least was old enough to quickly adapt to) mobile phones. The widespread popularity of the internet in Iran, the existence of a middle class to serve as early technological adapters in Tehran and several other large cities, the links between Iranians and the diaspora and the early role of the internet as a “safe space” relatively free from government intrusion all combined to guarantee that these videos would soon find their way from mobile phones onto the internet. This is no surprise. As of 2009, roughly 60 percent of Iran's population is under 30 years old. A staggering 72.9 percent of the Iranian population falls within the 15-64 bracket, with 21.7 percent under 14267 – and it is easy to imagine some of the braver 13 and 14-year-olds joining the protests. The median age of an
266Goffman. 267Central Intelligence Agency, “Iran,” CIA World Factbook, February 4, 2010, https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/ir.html (Accessed February 21, 2010).
82 Iranian is 27 years old, compared to a median age of 41.7 for Belgium, 34.1 for China or 38.4 for Russia. While this population spike is in keeping in larger trends within the greater Middle East (for instance, the extremely young median ages of both Syrians and Turks), it has unique consequences for countries dealing with internal challenges. This has taken different forms throughout the region. While the role of the population spike in Iraq's post-2003 political state or in Egyptian Islamist movements falls outside of the scope of this paper, it's role in Iran is critical. In short, a critical mass of young people existed to both attend post-election events and to then port footage of them to the internet. This critical mass was so large in size that nearly all public events taking place in Tehran for a period of several days following the 2009 election managed to find their way onto the internet. The technologically adept nature of young Tehranis swayed news coverage of Agha-Soltan's death on the BBC and Al Jazeera. With crackdowns on foreign journalists forcing the old Iran hands to either leave the country or stay far away from demonstrations – unless shooting surreptitiously like Loizeau, which when unsuccessful led to detainment under dangerous conditions. As a result, these networks began to rely asymmetrically on user-generated content to depict the events in Tehran. Patterns of coverage on these two networks largely replicated prior research conducted during the 2008 Mumbai siege by Thussu268, which demonstrated that news networks would make use of high-quality user-generated content (video, audio, Twitter/Facebook/blog updates) once cursory fact-checking was conducted – and that viewer/reader reaction would be vehemently negative in the event of low-quality fact-checking resulting in quantifiable errors.. Despite their pretensions to neutrality, neither the BBC nor Al Jazeera is free of bias and preconceptions. Both networks are state funded broadcasters, despite the differences in their relationships to their mother country. The BBC is a publicly owned corporation that operates under a government charter and whose day-to- day operations are headed up by 12 state-appointed Governors. A rich variety of literature of varying grades of credibility exists alleging systematic biases at the “Beeb.” As mentioned prior, much of this literature focuses on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict; coverage of other divisive events has also been questioned such as the Sri Lanka conflict269 and the Northern Irish conflict270 (where, ironically enough, the BBC has been accused of a systemic anti-Unionist bias). But the most compelling argument for non-neutrality and bias on the part of the BBC remains their foreign services. A list of the BBC World Service's foreign language broadcasts/web presences reads like a rundown of areas and cultures in which the United Kingdom is politically or economically involved 271: Albanian, Arabic, Azeri, Bangla, Burmese, “Caribbean” (which, strangely, the BBC lists as a language272), 268Daya Thussu, “Turning Terrorism Into a Soap Opera,” British Journalism Review 20, no.1: 13-18, 2009. 269Bernard Gabony, “Truth, bias and the BBC,” BBC News, May 16, 2006, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/4986748.stm (Accessed February 10, 2010). 270“BBC 'biased towards Republicans,” BBC News, October 27, 2009, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/northern_ireland/8328247.stm (Accessed February 10, 2010). 271BBC World Service, http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/languages/index.shtml (Accessed February 10, 2010). 272BBC Caribbean, http://www.bbc.co.uk/caribbean/ (Accessed February 10, 2010).
83 Chinese, French, Hausa, Hindi, Indonesian, Kinyarwanda, Kirundi, Kyrgyz, Macedonian, Nepali, Pashto, Persian, Portuguese (with separate services for speakers of European and Brazilian Portuguese), Russian, Serbian, Sinhala, Somali, Spanish, Swahili, Tamil, Turkish, Ukrainian, Urdu, Uzbek and Vietnamese. The highly selective curation of the BBC's foreign language services invites questioning. There is no Korean service to reach North Koreans. Broadcasts in non-Russian languages of the former Soviet Union are limited to Azeri, Kyrgyz, Pashto, Ukrainian and Uzbek. Separate services exist for the mutually intelligible Rwandan languages of Kinyarwanda and Kirundi. Portuguese is divided into two separate services while a single service, BBC Mundo273, broadcasts to the entirety of the Hispanophone world. In the former Yugoslavia, the BBC Serbian service is exclusively directed at Serbs despite the language's mutual intelligibility with Bosnian, Croatian and Montenegrin; a separate service exists for Macedonian-speakers while Slovenes are left out entirely. No BBC service exists in Hebrew, while services exist in Arabic, Persian and Turkish. The BBC's Iranian-language service is described with the archaic but politically loaded signifier “Persian” rather than Farsi or Iranian. Foreign services exist for Indonesian, while Malay and Tagalog are left in the dust. Needless to say, the BBC – and indeed, almost every broadcaster – does not incur the expenses of setting up foreign language services altruistically. In fact, the BBC's decision in 2005 to cease broadcasting in Bulgarian, Croatian, Czech, Greek, Hungarian, Kazakh, Polish, Slovak, Slovene and Thai in order to finance their Arabic and Persian television services are testament to this274 - a theory also proposed by Seib275 It stands to reason that goals amenable to the BBC's funding source, the British government, are accomplished through the BBC's various international services. Al Jazeera, meanwhile, is primarily funded by Qatari Emir bin Khalifa and is headed by another member of the Qatari royal family. The network is based in the Qatari capital of Doha and only receives approximately 40% of funding from advertisers. As mentioned prior, the exact relationship between Al Jazeera and the Qatari government remains unclear. However, it has been established beyond a reasonable doubt that the network exercises self-censorship on topics of interest to the Qatari royal family (ie, Al Jazeera's astounding lack of Qatari coverage). Testimony by former Al Jazeera English employees suggests that similar self-censorship takes place for English-language broadcasting as well276. Miles and Iskandar have both analyzed the various theories on how Al Jazeera benefits both the Emir and Qatar in general. As Miles noted, Sheikh Hamad al-Thani was the Qatari Deputy Minister of Information before assuming the chairmanship of Al Jazeera and foreign governments have treated the network as an extension of the Qatari government277. There is always the possibility that Al Jazeera's Iranian coverage may have been colored by external 273BBC Mundo, http://www.bbc.co.uk/mundo/ (Accessed February 10, 2010). 274“BBC East Europe Voices Silent,” BBC News, December 21, 2005, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/4550102.stm (Accessed February 10, 2010). The BBC Polish service's final broadcast was “The End” by American rock band The Doors. 275Al-Jazeera Effect, 31. 276Campbell. 277Miles, 347.
84 Qatari foreign policy demands vis a vis Iran. The Islamic Republic suspended Al Jazeera's operations in 2005 following coverage by Al Jazeera Arabic of violent protests by ethnic Arabs in Khuzestan province278. During the 2009 post-election events, Al Jazeera was not expelled from Iran but merely faced the same restrictions as other foreign broadcasters279. Mohammed al-Kasim has argued that Al Jazeera was able to broadcast from Iran thanks to both Qatar's good relations with Ahmadinejad and the Arabic network's continued positive portrayals of him280. The pseudonymous author “Rob” of media analysis blog Arabic Media Shack has also argued cogently that the combination of positive relations with the Iranian government and an aggressive policy of seeking out Arabic-speaking Iranian guests for talk shows have colored Al Jazeera Arabic's Iran coverage281. David Pollock and Mohammed Yaghi, meanwhile, allege Al Jazeera “tries to have it both ways” with their Iran coverage: close- ups of Iranian demonstrators and anti-Ahmadinejad editorials were posted to Al Jazeera English, while Al Jazeera Arabic consistently “gave pride of place to Iranian government allegations of foreign media [interference]” during the 2009 post-election events282. Qatari relations with the Islamic Republic are complicated and are largely interconnected with the emirate's attempts to play it off with the United States. Although a formal ally of the United States (an American military presence exists in Qatar, the emirate takes place in US-led security exercises and as of 2005, American military contractor DynCorp maintained a presence there283), Qatar has strived to maintain positive relations with Tehran. This is in keeping with the emirate's traditions; following an 1867 treaty with Great Britain that effectively turned Qatar into a protectorate284, a succession of al-Thani emirs managed to play Britain, Persia and the Ottoman Empire off of each other. In 2009, Iranian state broadcaster Press TV boasted of the emirate's “close relations”285. Months after the Iranian elections, Emir al-Thani became one of the most vocal (and, some would say, loneliest) proponents of the Iranian nuclear program in the Arab world thanks to an expensive pro-Iranian conference in Doha286. On June 23, 2009, during the immediate post-election events, Emir bin Khalifa made
278“Iran bans Al Jazeera after riot,” BBC News, April 19, 2005, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/4459033.stm (Accessed February 10, 2010). 279“Iran Holds Pro-Government Rallies,” Al Jazeera English, December 31, 2009, http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2009/12/20091230104542881809.html (Accessed February 10, 2010). 280Mohammad al-Kassim, “Iran Violence Coverage Reflects Spectrum of Arab Media Bias,” World Focus, December 31, 2009, http://worldfocus.org/blog/2009/12/31/iran-protest-coverage-reflects-spectrum-of-arab-media-bias/9058/ (Accessed February 10, 2010). 281“Iran Coverage at Al-Jazeera,” Arabic Media Shack, June 24, 2009, http://arabicsource.wordpress.com/2009/06/24/on- iran/ (Accessed February 10, 2010). 282David Pollock and Mohammed Yaghi, “Saudi Media Take the Lead Against Iran's Regime,” Washington Institute for Near East Policy, June 26, 2009, http://www.washingtoninstitute.org/templateC05.php?CID=3083 (Accessed February 10, 2010). 283Qatar Facilities, Global Security, April 26, 2005, http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/facility/qatar.htm (Accessed February 10, 2010). 284Miles, 6. 285Press TV, “Qatar-Iran Ties Raise Arab Hackles,” April 1, 2009, http://www.presstv.com/classic/detail.aspx? id=90189§ionid=351020101 (Accessed February 10, 2010). 286Borzou Daraghi, “A Show of Sympathy for Iran at a Qatar Forum,” Los Angeles Times, November 13, 2009, http://articles.latimes.com/2009/nov/13/world/fg-iran-debate13 (Accessed February 10, 2010).
85 public statements hailing Iran as a “democratic country” as opposed to the Arabic states287. Nonetheless, foreign minister Sheikh Hamad bin Jasim bin Jabr al-Thani expressly called the United States his emirate's “first consideration” in 2002288. Russia Today/RT is an altogether more complicated story. Hachten and Scotton have proposed a taxonomy of conceptions of the press' role into “Authoritarian,” “Western,” “Communist,” “Revolutionary” and “Developmental” categories289. RT's target audience, as indicated by their advertising campaigns described prior, is primarily in the United States and United Kingdom. These countries strictly follow the Western model, which is characterized primarily by “the right of the press to report on, comment on, and criticize its own government without retaliation or threat of retaliation from the government.”290 However, RT aims to provide these Western audiences with content that – while frequently interesting and unique – runs on a distinctly non-Western model. Using the taxonomy described prior, RT would be considered “Authoritarian” in contrast to the Western model of both the BBC and Al Jazeera English despite the fact that their content is nationalistic and jingoistic above all. Neither the BBC nor Al Jazeera is explicitly pro-British or pro-Qatari. However, RT consciously propagates a pro-Kremlin worldview that colors nearly all content produced by the network. This bias even slips into stories having nothing to do with Russia at all. In the Iran stories not related to Agha-Soltan described prior, the post- election crisis takes place in a world filled with dark conspiracies propagated by foreign powers. Frequently used interview guests such as Paul Craig Roberts and Wayne Madsen propagate the theory that the situation after the Iranian election was the fault of everyone from the United States to Israel to George Soros. The use of the term “Green Revolution” by an American neo-Conservative in a posting on a right-wing website is used as proof of a foreign plot to destabilize Iran. The Anglo-American coup d'etat of 1953 that removed Mossadegh from power is freely mentioned by anchors and guests, but the Anglo-Russian occupation of Iran in World War II is strangely never brought up. Despite the fact that Agha-Soltan's death was one of the largest news stories of the year thanks to the factors described prior, she barely made a dent in RT's Iranian coverage. Apart from a few fleeting mentions and two person-in-the-street segments hosted by an American freelancer – that incidentally portrayed Agha-Soltan in a negative light – she barely existed for RT. However, as mentioned, Iran's tensions with Israel, the Iranian nuclear program and Russia's positive relations with Ahmadinejad were mentioned extremely frequently. While Owen praises Russia Today's alternative viewpoint on world news291, the sheer oddity of that alternative in its fondness for overreaching conspiracy theories appears to be an obstacle in the network's propagation of Russian public diplomacy in the Anglophone world.
287Pollock, Yaghi. 288Miles, 10. 289William Hachten, James Scotton, The World News Prism: Global Information in a Satellite Age (Wiley-Blackwell, 2006), 16. 290Ibid., 19. 291Owen and Purdey, 114.
86 Seib has previously cited the confused portrayal of the United States by Russian television during the 2003 invasion of Iraq292 and this seems to be the case in 2009 as well. While Russia is required to share good relations with the United States due to the latter's hegemony on the world stage, Russia is rapidly regaining the influence they lost following the implosion of the Soviet Union and the Russia-dominated Soviet sphere of influence. Their Iran coverage is indicative of this in its negative view of the protesters and positive view of Ahmadinejad as opposed to both the BBC and Al Jazeera English. RT's role in Russian public diplomacy is inescapable. Brown has documented RT's aggressive hiring of foreign public relations consultants for Russia Today's 2005 launch293 and the massive amount of funding devoted to RT294 - along with the launch of their Russian and Spanish channels - is testament to the importance Putin and Medvedev place on them295. It is no surprise that Agha-Soltan's death was captured by multiple cameras and was quickly disseminated across the internet. The Tehrani panopticon captured dozens of deaths in the days after the Iranian election that were posted online. But out of all of them, only Agha-Soltan's become the iconic image of the post- election events. The fact that Agha-Soltan was a photogenic young woman certainly had something to do with this. However, she was not the only attractive female Iranian whose death was captured on camera. The swiftness and aggressiveness of authorities in Tehran in repressing any disturbances resulted in a high body count296. Because the bulk of these deaths took place in public, in the camera's gaze, Facebook and YouTube were soon flooded with atrocity videos. Those demonstrators – and, despite the confused narrative of the Agha-Soltan case, she was one of them – had the ironic “good” luck to die in public. The demonstrators who passed away while in Iran's police stations, jails, prisons and hospitals died out of the camera's reach and, in the eyes of the BBC and Al Jazeera, were that much more anonymous. Two separate photographers that we know of chronicled Agha-Soltan's dying moments. Neither the BBC, Al Jazeera, nor RT seems to have recognized that. These two cameramen, filming from separate angles and with relatively cheap mobile camera phones, captured her final moments with unsurpassed clarity. Agha-Soltan's death occurred on a sunny summer day at 7:05PM297, in the last hours of daylight in Tehran. The resolution of the mobile camera phones used was only clear because of the close range (< 20 feet) with which Agha-Soltan's death was captured. Had she been shot two hours later, as twilight descended on Tehran, circumstances would have
292“Hegemonic No More,” 609. 293Brown, 180. 294Parsons. 295Cull. 296Charlie Strom, Rob Francis, Maseh Zarif. “Unrest in Iran: Incident Statistics and Map for Protests, Arrests and Deaths,” American Enterprise Institute, July 31, 2009, http://www.irantracker.org/analysis/unrest-iran-incident-statistics-and-map- protests-arrests-and-deaths (Accessed February 19, 2010). No definitive source for Iran casualty figures exists. However, this list right-wing American Enterprise Institute thinktank offers references and verifiable footnotes from legitimate sources for their claim of 32 corroborated deaths and 152 uncorroborated deaths in demonstrations from June 13 – July 31, 2009. 297“hamedfrt,” YouTube.
87 been much different. These two cameramen, presumably untrained, captured Agha-Soltan's death as any civilian pressed into capturing a historic event would. The cameras are jerky and the angles change suddenly. Sometimes a finger slides over the lens. You can see the photographer jostle for a clearer view of a dying woman. The individual efforts are basic and improvised, without any polish. But collectively the twin cameras capture a multiplicity of images of a violent death rife with symbolism. The bullet that killed Agha-Soltan pierced her lung. Her mouth and nose became flooded with blood as a result. Agha-Soltan's dying moments must have been pure agony. Not only did blood flow from her bullet wound; it flowed down her face as well. The twin cameramen captured an extraordinarily bloody death, replete with a doctor trying frantically to assist her. The listener can hear people in the background shouting for Agha- Soltan. Agha-Soltan lies still, in pain, while the action swirls around her. For a viewer steeped in any number of Muslim or Christian traditions of martyrdom iconography, the resulting image is stunning. Most of the other death videos from Tehran were blurry and of poor quality. Unlike Agha-Soltan's, the majority of Tehran's public deaths in the post-election events appear to have occurred as the result of beatings or close-range bullet wounds. Amateur mobile phone camera users had to keep a distance out of necessity; this resulted in poor image quality for the bulk of the Tehran death videos. Because the apparent Basij who shot Agha-Soltan fired from some physical distance away from her, seemingly unprompted, and then departed the immediate vicinity (while, as we have seen, being trapped in the area), it became physically safe to video Agha- Soltan at a reasonable range. Dissemination of Agha-Soltan's death videos was quick and worldwide. The factors listed above guaranteed that they would be quickly used by news agencies. Using the consensus timeframe that both Video A 298 and Video B299 first appeared on the internet on during what was the evening of June 20, 2009 in Iran and late afternoon GMT, the implications are staggering. Al Jazeera's first mention of Agha-Soltan occurred less than 24 hours after the first upload of the videos and the BBC's first mention occurred approximately 26 hours later. In the days, weeks and months that followed, multiple narratives of Agha-Soltan's life were constructed. Her name was spelled variously as Agha-Soltan, Agha Soltan, Agha-Soltani and Soltani. At various times she was a music student, a philosophy student and a travel agent. Sometimes she was a teenager and sometimes she was a 27 year old. The fact that she was divorced was rarely reported. Neither was the fact that her boyfriend, Caspian Makan, who suffered dearly at the hands of Iranian authorities, was much older. Neither were her difficulties as a divorcee from a lower middle-class socioeconomic background in Tehran. According to the BBC, through the news reports and documentaries they chose to air, Agha-Soltan was a martyr. A full picture of her life was presented through the Ronachan documentary, but news reports about Agha- Soltan constructed a martyr narrative steeped in a liberal, British sensibility. Most pictures portrayed her without 298ibid. 299 “LastFreedomNet,” YouTube.
88 a headscarf. The words of Hejazi, an Iranian who chose to make his home in Britain and who speaks fluent English, became the source of the predominant soundbites used by the network. Agha-Soltan is invariably described as a “young woman.” Although the BBC avoided the worst excesses of the mawkish newspapers of the United Kingdom, who called her the “Angel of Iran,”300 their portrayal was still flawed by an overly-heavily reliance on interviews with Hejazi and Rostami-Motlagh. In the narrative promoted by Al Jazeera, Agha-Soltan was caught between pan-Muslim, pan-Arab and third worldist framings. The network's coverage of the “music student”'s death was interpreted and reinterpreted through – at various times – Rinnawi's pan-Arab formulation and Cherribi's pan-Muslim formulation. As the El Sherbini episode of The Listening Post, the Riz Khan episodes and the Abdo analysis proved, Al Jazeera's portrayal of Agha-Soltan was just as filtered and tailored towards its perceived audience as the BBC. The reframings and reformulations of the Agha-Soltan death video ultimately bring to mind Michel Foucault's description of photography as “the normalizing gaze” of society – a “surveillance that makes it possible to qualify, to classify and to punish. It establishes over individuals a visibility through which one differentiates and judges them.”301 While Foucault's words were intended for a history of prisons, they apply equally to the impromptu universally-accessible surveillance created by the multiplicity of mobile camera phones in 2009 Iran. For Agha-Soltan, a woman who was caught up in one of the most important events in her country's history, she ended up gaining ultimate visibility only through death.
300Courtney. 301Michel Foucault, Discipline & Punish: The Birth of the Prison (New York: Vintage, 1995), 25.
89 Appendix Table BBC-1: Iran Stories From news.bbc.co.uk, June 20-22, 2009
06/20/09 06/21/09 06/22/09 “Iranians Send BBC Demo Footage” “Huge Rally Defies Ayatollah” “Riot Police Break Up Tehran Rally” http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81112 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81111 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle 33.stm 23.stm _east/8113982.stm
“In Pictures: Tehran Unrest” “Protest Held Over Iran Elections” “BBC – Today” http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81111 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_ne http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/to 87.stm ws/england/west_midlands/8111 day/newsid_8112000/8112232.st 757.stm m “BBC Eyewitness: 'Security Everywhere'” “'Ten Killed' in Iran Clashes” “New Questions Over Iran Results” http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81111 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81115 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/video_ 52.stm 04.stm and_audio/8113068.stm “BBC – Today” “Miliband Denies Iran 'Meddling'” “Embassy Staff Families Leave Iran” http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/to http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_ne http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_ne day/newsid_8110000/8110558.st ws/politics/8111558.stm ws/8113353.stm m “Key Excerpts: “Khamenei Speech” “The Consequences of Engaging Iran” “Death Video Woman 'Targeted By Militia'” http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middl http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middl http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/811355 e_east/8110623.stm e_east/8111290.stm 2.stm “Q&A: Tehran Unrest” “Iran Video Shows Protest Fires” “Iranian Views: Tension Rising” http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81110 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81114 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle 65.stm 46.stm _east/8112909.stm “From Our Own Correspondent: Iranian Protest “Reporter's Log: Iran Upheaval” “Analysis: Iran Splits Widen” Parallels With 1979” http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81052 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/progra 07.stm _east/8113077.stm mmes/from_our_own_correspon dent/8109101.stm “Your Reaction to Iranian Protests” “Video Shows Fierce Iran Clashes” “Iran Intercepting Mobile Calls” http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/talkin http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81116 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/811400 g_point/8111009.stm 70.stm 2.stm
“US Urges Iran to End 'Violence'” “Freedom Craving 'Fueling Iran Unrest'” “West 'Seeks Iran Disintegration'” http://news.bbc.co.uk/mobile/i/b http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middl http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/811234 bc_news/mid_east/811/81112/sto e_east/8111695.stm 1.stm ry8111242.shtml “Iran Police Warn Against Protests” “Iran TV Says 10 Die in Protests” “Examining Footage From Iran” http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middl http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81113 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/811204 e_east/8110899.stm 52.stm 9.stm
“Obama Says World is Watching Iran” “Bahrain Closes Paper in Iran Row” http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middl http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle e_east/8110441.stm _east/8112993.stm “Riot Police Tackle Iran Protests” “Police Break Up New Tehran Rally” http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middl http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/811281
90 e_east/8111098.stm 2.stm “Suspicions Behind Iran Poll Doubts” “Iran Silences Street Protesters” http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middl http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/811203 e_east/8110877.stm 6.stm
“Iran Police Clash With Protesters” “Q&A: Iran Election Aftermath” http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81105 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle 82.stm _east/8101621.stm “Tear Gas Fired at Iran Protest” “Hi-Tech Helps Iran Monitoring” http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middl http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technol e_east/8110993.stm ogy/8112550.stm “Iran Asks BBC Reporter To Leave” http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/811163 8.stm
Table BBC-2: Stories Featuring Neda Agha-Soltan from news.bbc.co.uk, June 23 – September 22, 2009 Key: “Cursory” - Mentions of Agha-Soltan in one or two sentences. “Medium” - At least one paragraph devoted to Agha-Soltan “In-depth” - Article centers around Agha-Soltan
Article Name, Date & URL Portrayal of Agha- Sample Description Soltan “Cool Reception for New Speaker” (Newsbrief), Medium “The Independent calls Neda Agha-Soltan, shot dead in Tehran on Saturday, June 23, 2009 "the face of the Iranian revolution".” http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_ne ws/8114108.stm “End Iran Violence, UN Chief Urges,” June 23, Medium “The fiance of Neda Agha-Soltan, the young woman whose violent death 2009 during clashes in Tehran on Saturday was recorded on video and uploaded to http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middl the internet, has described the events leading up to her shooting in an interview for BBC Persian TV.” e_east/8114085.stm “Iranian Views: 'Critical Times',” June 25, 2009 Cursory “Another email to BBC Persian reports that Iranian news is claiming Israelis http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middl killed Neda Agha Soltan, the woman who was shot dead in Tehran protests on Saturday.” e_east/8118616.stm “'She Died in Less Than a Minute',” June 25, In-depth “Dr Arash Hejazi told the BBC's Rachel Harvey he had been standing very 2009 close to Neda when she was shot, and he had never seen an injury like it.” http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81197 41.stm “The Man Who Tried to Save Neda,” June 25, In-depth “One of the stand-out images of the protests in Iran is of a young woman 2009 dying from gunshot wounds on the streets of Tehran. Neda Soltan was shot http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81196 while attending a protest, and the footage shows her lying on the ground in a pool of blood and two men trying to save her.” 58.stm “Iran Doctor Tells of Neda's Death,” June 25, In-depth “Video of Ms Soltan's death was posted on the internet and images of her have 2009 become a rallying point for Iranian opposition supporters around the world.” http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81197 13.stm
91 “Iran Views: Anger Remains,” June 29, 2009 Cursory “This regime is unbelievably brutal against its own people. It gunned down 19 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europ people just for protesting peacefully against an election. Innocent people, like Neda, shot dead.” e/8121392.stm “Ahmadinejad Calls for Neda Probe,” June 29, In-depth “Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has called for an investigation into 2009 the death of a young woman who has become an icon of opposition protests.” http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middl e_east/8125181.stm “The Buzz: Neda: A Case of Mistaken Identity,” In-depth “Neda has also become a trending topic - one of the most repeated words on July 3, 2009 Twitter - and on Facebook there are many groups dedicated to the woman who http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/progra has been dubbed the "Angel of Iran".” mmes/newsnight/8129083.stm “Ahmadinejad Riles Powerful Allies,” July 27, Cursory “Thursday will be the anniversary of the death of Neda Agha-Soltan, the 2009 young Iranian woman who has become a symbol of the protest movement.” http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81713 84.stm “US Urges Iran to Free Prisoners,” July 29, 2009 Cursory “Among the graves they intend to visit is the burial site of Neda Agha-Soltan, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81757 a young women who became an icon of the opposition movement after video of her death was posted on the internet.” 02.stm “Today: Thursday 30 July 2009,” July 30, 2009 In-Depth “The mourning ceremony of Nedha Soltan, who was killed in opposition http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/to protests following the election in Iran, is to take place.” day/newsid_8175000/8175771.st m “Mother's Tribute to Shot Iranian Woman,” July In-Depth “The mother of a young woman who was killed during post-election protests 30, 2009 in Iran has paid tribute to her daughter, saying she was ''not political'' and did http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81760 not belong to any party or group.” 53.stm “Digital Planet: The Rise of Iran's Citizen Medium “It has been 40 days since Neda Agha-Soltan, a young Iranian woman, was Journalists,” July 30, 2009 (originally aired July killed during an anti-government protest in Tehran.” 28, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81769 57.stm “Neda's Mother Talks of Her Heartbreak,” July In-Depth “The mother of Neda Soltan says she's waiting for her daughter's killer to be 30, 2009 brought to justice.” http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/video _and_audio/8176029.stm “Iran Police Clash With Mourners,” July 30, 2009 Medium “So the opposition leaders said they would join Neda's family at her graveside http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81757 at the Behesht-e Zahra cemetery.” 64.stm “Interview: Mother's Tribute to Neda,” July 30, In-Depth “The mother of Neda Agha Soltan, the 27-year-old Iranian protester whose 2009 death on 20 June was captured on mobile phone video, has spoken at length to http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81760 the BBC World Service.” 98.stm “Iran Witnesses: Neda Memorial,” July 31, 2009 In-Depth “Three Iranians describe police attempts to break up demonstrations at a http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81769 cemetery in Tehran, 40 days after the death of Neda Agha-Soltan.” 61.stm “Iran Puts 100 Protesters on Trial,” August 1, Cursory “Clashes have continued since his election, most recently during mourning to 2009 mark 40 days since the death of Neda Agha Soltan who was shot as she http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81794 watched protests on 20 June.” 70.stm
92 “In Pictures: Iran's Election Crisis,” August 5, Cursory “At the end of July state TV said police used tear 2009 gas to disperse crowds from the grave of Neda Agha Soltan, a young woman http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81849 whose death became a symbol of post-election unrest.” 28.stm “Profile: Neda Agha Soltan,” July 30, 2009 In-Depth “Neda Agha Soltan's death during a Tehran street protest, graphically captured http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/mobile/ on a mobile phone, transformed her into a global symbol of Iranian opposition.” middle_east/8176158.stm
Table BBC-3: Formatting of Agha-Soltan and Iran Coverage
Key: “News” - Straightforward news story, “Feature” - Feature/expository story, “Op-Ed” - Opinion Piece, “Interview” - Interview-based piece w/ two or more participants, “Photo Gallery” - Still-photo based collection of visual news, “User-generated news” - Content consisting exclusively of edited information received from social media, “Hybrid” - Multi-genre mixture with specific explanation noted, “Other” - Miscellaneous with specific explanation noted.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8111233.stm (Iranians send News BBC demo footage, June 20, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/8110993.st News m (Tear gas fired at Iran protest, June 20, 2009)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8111187.stm (In Pictures: Photo gallery Tehran protest, June 20, 2009)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8111152.stm (BBC User-generated news eyewitness: 'Security everywhere', June 20, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/today/newsid_8110 Interview 000/8110558.stm (Today: Saturday 20 June 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/8110623.st Miscellaneous (Excerpts from Jumu'ah sermon by Ayatollah Sayyed Ali Khameini of June 19, 2009) m (Key Excerpts: Khamenei Speech, Saturday, June 20, 2009)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8111065.stm (Q&A: Tehran Feature unrest, June 20, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/from_our_ Op-Ed own_correspondent/8109101.stm (Iranian protest parallels with 1979, June 20, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/talking_point/8111009. User-generated news stm (Your reaction to Iranian protests, June 20, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/mobile/i/bbc_news/mid_eas News t/811/81112/story8111242.shtml (US urges Iran to end 'violence', June 20, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/8110899.st Interview m (Iranian police warn against protests, June 20, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/8110441.st News m (Obama says world is watching Iran, June 20, 2009)
93 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/8111098.st News m (Riot police tackle Iran protests, June 20, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/8110877.st News m (Suspicions behind Iran poll doubts, June 20, 2009)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8110582.stm (Iran police News clash with protesters, June 20, 2009)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8111123.stm (Huge rally News defies Ayatollah, June 20, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/west_ News midlands/8111757.stm (Protest held over Iran election, June 21, 2009)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8111504.stm ('Ten killed' in News Iran clashes, June 21, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/politics/81115 News 58.stm (Miliband denies Iran 'meddling', June 21, 2009 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/8111290.st Op-Ed m (The consequences of engaging Iran, June 21, 2009)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8111446.stm (Iran video User-generated news shows protest fires, June 21, 2009)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8105207.stm (Reporters' log: Miscellaneous (Group blog by London- and Tehran-based BBC correspondents) Iran upheaval, June 21, 2009)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8111670.stm (Video shows User-generated news fierce Iran clashes, June 21, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/8111695.st Op-ed m (Freedom craving 'fuelling Iran unrest', June 21, 2009)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8111352.stm (West 'seeks News Iran disintegration', June 21, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/8113982.st User-generated news m (Riot police break up Tehran rally, June 21, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/today/newsid_8112 Interview 000/8112232.stm (Obama has 'accentuated Iran's internal rifts', June 22, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/video_and_audio/8113 Interview 068.stm (New questions over Iran election results, June 22, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/8113353.stm News (Embassy staff families leave Iran, June 22, 2009)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8113552.stm (Death video Interview woman 'targeted by militia', June 22, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/8112909.st User-generated news m (Iranian views: tension rising, June 22, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/8113077.st Op-ed m (Analysis: Iran splits widen, June 22, 2009)
94 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8114002.stm (Iran Feature intercepting mobile calls, June 22, 2009)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8112341.stm (West 'seeks News Iran disintegration', June 22, 2009
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8112049.stm (Examining User-generated news footage from Tehran, June 22, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/8112993.st News m (Bahrain closes paper in Iran row, June 22, 2009)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8112812.stm (Police break News up new Tehran rally, June 22, 2009)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8112036.stm (West 'seeks News Iran disintegration', June 22, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/8101621.st News m (Q&A: Iran election aftermath, June 22, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/8112550.st Feature m (Hi-tech helps Iran monitoring, June 22, 2009)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8111638.stm (Iran asks BBC News reporter to leave, June 22, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/8114108.stm Miscellaneous (Roundup of headlines in British newspapers) (Cool reception for new speaker, June 23, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/8114085.st News m (End Iran violence, UN chief urges, June 23, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/8118616.st User-generated news m (Iranian views: 'Critical Times', June 25, 2009)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8119741.stm ('She died in Interview less than a minute', June 25, 2009)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8119658.stm (The man who Interview tried to save Neda, June 25, 2009)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8119713.stm (Iran doctor Interview tells of Neda death, June 25, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/8121392.stm User-generated news (Iran views: Anger remains, June 29, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/8125181.st News m (Ahmadinejad calls for Neda probe, June 29, 2009 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/newsnight Feature /8129083.stm (The buzz: Neda – a case of mistaken identity, July 3, 2009)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8171384.stm (Ahmadinejad News riles powerful allies, July 27, 2009)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8175702.stm (US urges Iran News to free prisoners, July 29, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/today/newsid_8175 Interview 000/8175771.stm (Today: Thursday 30 July 2009)
95 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8176053.stm (Mother's Interview tribute to shot Iranian woman, July 30, 2009)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8176957.stm (The rise of Feature Iran's citizen journalists, July 30, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/video_and_audio/8176 Interview 029.stm (Neda's mother talks of her heartbreak, July 30, 2009)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8175764.stm (Iran police News clash with mourners, July 30, 2009)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8176961.stm (Iran witnesses: User-generated news Neda's memorial, July 31, 2009)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8176098.stm (Interview: Interview Mother's tribute to Neda, July 30, 2009)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8179470.stm (Iran puts 100 News protesters on trial, August 1, 2009)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8184928.stm (In pictures: Photo gallery Iran's election crisis, August 5, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/mobile/middle_east/81761 Feature 58.stm (Profile: Neda Agha Soltan, July 30, 2009)
Table BBC-4: Framing of Agha-Soltan and Iran Coverage
Key: First column - “Pro” - Narrative overtly sympathetic to either Agha-Soltan, participants in the Iranian street events of June 2009, or both. “Neutral”- Narrative neutral to either Agha-Soltan, participants in the Iranian street events of June 2009, or both. “Against” - Narrative overtly hostile to either Agha-Soltan, participants in the Iranian street events of June 2009, or both. Second column – Representative keywords or key phrases from story used to make this determination.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8111233.stm (Iranians Neutral “Protests," “disputed election result” send BBC demo footage, June 20, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/811099 Neutral “"Protesters demonstrating," "Iran's election result" 3.stm (Tear gas fired at Iran protest, June 20, 2009)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8111187.stm (In Neutral "Unrest," "demonstrators, "rigged presidential election results," "clashed," "big rally," "supporters of defeated candidate Mir Pictures: Tehran protest, June 20, 2009) Hossein Mousavi," "protesters,""demonstrators defied an ultimatum"
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8111152.stm (BBC Pro "Massive security operation to prevent opposition protests over disputed election results,""Basijis - militamen who look like eyewitness: 'Security everywhere', June 20, 2009) street toughs," "men with clubs who lounged in thick groups," "all this was happening against the background of a city open for business," "demonstration," "demonstrators," http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/today/newsid_8 Neutral "Protest leaders," "rallies, 'disputed election results" 110000/8110558.stm (Today: Saturday 20 June 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/811062 Neutral "Unrest," "disputed election results" 3.stm (Key Excerpts: Khamenei Speech, Saturday, June 20, 2009)
96 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8111065.stm (Q&A: Neutral "Unrest," "opposition supporters," "rally," "bitterly-contested presidential election result," "crackdown," "demonstrations," Tehran unrest, June 20, 2009) "protesters" http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/from_o Pro "Unprecedented mass protests," "demonstrators," "crowds with their green ribbons," "liberal, middle-class, Westernised people ur_own_correspondent/8109101.stm (Iranian protest joined in the marches.” parallels with 1979, June 20, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/talking_point/81110 Neutral "Protesters," "crackdown," "demonstration against the reelection of President Ahmadinejad," "protest," "rally" 09.stm (Your reaction to Iranian protests, June 20, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/mobile/i/bbc_news/mid_ Neutral "Clashes," "protesters," "rallies" east/811/81112/story8111242.shtml (US urges Iran to end 'violence', June 20, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/811089 Neutral "Protesters," "rallies" 9.stm (Iranian police warn against protests, June 20, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/811044 Neutral "Post-election demonstrations," "protest leaders" 1.stm (Obama says world is watching Iran, June 20, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/811109 Pro "Protests," 'running battles," "demonstrations", "Iranian government knows creating martyrs is counterproductive" 8.stm (Riot police tackle Iran protests, June 20, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/811087 Pro "Opposition supporters say the election numbers do not add up," "Mr. Mousavi's largely young, technically savvy supporters" 7.stm (Suspicions behind Iran poll doubts, June 20, 2009)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8110582.stm (Iran Pro "Protesters," "security forces," "Basijis wore riot helmets and carried big clubs," "He alleged the vote [...] was rigged" police clash with protesters, June 20, 2009)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8111123.stm (Huge rally Neutral "Huge crowds," "demonstrate," "protest" defies Ayatollah, June 20, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/w Neutral "Protest," "demonstrators" est_midlands/8111757.stm (Protest held over Iran election, June 21, 2009)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8111504.stm ('Ten Pro “"Protests," "clashes," "heavy restrictions have been placed on the BBC and other foreign news organisations in Iran" (Pro based killed' in Iran clashes, June 21, 2009) on presenter's body language on camera) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/politics/81 Neutral "Protests," "disputed elections," "protesters," "disputed presidential elections," cites 'terrorist groups' and 'rioters' in 11558.stm (Miliband denies Iran 'meddling', June 21, 2009 quotation marks from Iranian state television http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/811129 Pro "Demonstrators," "feared Basij paramilitary," "protesters" 0.stm (The consequences of engaging Iran, June 21, 2009)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8111446.stm (Iran video Neutral "Protests," "The latest video shows a bus on fire and what appears to be a stand-off between protesters and security forces shows protest fires, June 21, 2009) on motorbikes."
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8105207.stm (Reporters' Pro "Turmoil," "disputed results," "relentless pressure on journalists," "crisis" log: Iran upheaval, June 21, 2009)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8111670.stm (Video Neutral "Clashes," "protesters" shows fierce Iran clashes, June 21, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/811169 Pro "Velvet rebellion," “The only people I saw 'stirring' violence were the riot police and the volunteer Basiji militia," "baton-wielding 5.stm (Freedom craving 'fuelling Iran unrest', June 21, 2009) riot police"
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8111352.stm (West Pro "Iran's most serious internal conflict since the 1979 Islamic Revolution," "activists," "protest leader and defeated presidential 'seeks Iran disintegration', June 21, 2009) candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi," "brief graphic video clip appearing to show a teenage girl dying from a wound, has fueled
97 anti-government feeling," http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/811398 Neutral "Opposition rally," "unapproved rallies" 2.stm (Riot police break up Tehran rally, June 21, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/today/newsid_8 Neutral "Situation in Iran" 112000/8112232.stm (Obama has 'accentuated Iran's internal rifts', June 22, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/video_and_audio/81 Neutral No keywords (Radio presentation by Thomas Rintoul of University of St. Andrew's) 13068.stm (New questions over Iran election results, June 22, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/8113353.st Neutral "Political unrest," "mass unrest," "protests," "alleging vote- rigging" m (Embassy staff families leave Iran, June 22, 2009)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8113552.stm (Death Pro "Young Iranian woman," "allegedly shot by pro-government militia" video woman 'targeted by militia', June 22, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/811290 Pro "Opposition supporters" (Pro based on choice of user-generated content in story) 9.stm (Iranian views: tension rising, June 22, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/811307 Pro "Street protests," "protest," "demonstrations," "demonstrators," "irregularities" 7.stm (Analysis: Iran splits widen, June 22, 2009)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8114002.stm (Iran Neutral “Iranian regime” intercepting mobile calls, June 22, 2009)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8112341.stm (West Neutral No keywords 'seeks Iran disintegration', June 22, 2009 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8112049.stm Neutral “Pro-reformist protesters" (Examining footage from Tehran, June 22, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/811299 Neutral "Iran's election crisis" 3.stm (Bahrain closes paper in Iran row, June 22, 2009)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8112812.stm (Police Pro "Opposition rally," "protesters," "unapproved rallies," "protests," "street protests" "Neda Agha-Soltan, the young woman whose break up new Tehran rally, June 22, 2009) violent death during clashes in Tehran on Saturday was recorded on video and uploaded to the internet"
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8112036.stm (West Neutral “Mass protests," "disputed election," "believe the election was rigged," "protesters and police clashed," "protesters" 'seeks Iran disintegration', June 22, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/810162 Pro "street protests," "protesters," "protests," “ Millions of Iranian simply did not believe the result,” “the way 1.stm (Q&A: Iran election aftermath, June 22, 2009) the result was announced was very unusual” http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/8112550 Pro "Iran is well known for filtering the net," "protests," “Iran is effectively reading every message,” “Women's rights activists .stm (Hi-tech helps Iran monitoring, June 22, 2009) arrested in the nation had been shown transcripts of instant messages they had sent”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8111638.stm (Iran asks Neutral "Protests about the presidential election" BBC reporter to leave, June 22, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/8114108.st Neutral "The face of a young woman killed during the protests in Iran is the main picture on some front pages" m (Cool reception for new Speaker, June 23, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/811408 Neutral "Threat and use of violence by authorities in Iran," "rally," "post- election violence," "protesters,""Neda Agha-Soltan, the young 5.stm (End Iran violence, UN chief urges, June 23, 2009) woman whose violent death during clashes in Tehran," "clashes" http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/811861 Pro "Iranian authorities' clampdown on protests," "those still prepared to demonstrate," "separate accounts create a picture of the Iranian
98 6.stm (Iranian views: 'Critical Times', June 25, 2009) authorities regaining control of the streets through fear and violence," "pro-reform demonstrations"
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8119741.stm ('She died Pro "Protester," "shot protester Neda Soltan in Tehran," "Neda" in less than a minute', June 25, 2009)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8119658.stm (The man Pro "Protests," "young woman dying from gunshot wounds," "Neda Soltan was shot while attending a protest, and the footage shows who tried to save Neda, June 25, 2009) her lying on the ground in a pool of blood and two men trying to save her"
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8119713.stm (Iran Pro “Bled to death on a street in Tehran," "ran to Neda Agha-Soltan's aid after seeing she had been shot in the chest," "Video of Ms. doctor tells of Neda death, June 25, 2009) Soltan's death was posted on the internet and images of her have become a rallying point for Iranian opposition supporters around the world" http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/8121392.stm Pro “Protesters” (Pro based on choice of user-generated content in story) (Iran views: Anger remains, June 29, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/812518 Neutral "Death of a young woman who has become an icon of opposition protests," "He urged Iran's judicial authorities to bring to justice 1.stm (Ahmadinejad calls for Neda probe, June 29, 2009 those responsible for the shooting of Neda Agha-Soltan," "Mr Ahmadinejad said there were many fabricated reports in the foreign media about the shooting of the 26-year-old," "Eyewitnesses reportedly said a member of a government militia had shot her” http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/newsni Pro "Neda Agha Soltan, has turned into an internet phenomenon after mobile phone footage of her bleeding to death was published and ght/8129083.stm (The buzz: Neda – a case of mistaken shared all over the world," "on Facebook there are many groups identity, July 3, 2009) dedicated to the woman who has been dubbed the 'Angel of Iran'" http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8171384.stm Pro "The row over Iran's disputed election," "election row," "there are many in Iran who see Mr Ahmadinejad's re-election as a coup (Ahmadinejad riles powerful allies, July 27, 2009) d'etat, in which the real winners were the Revolutionary Guards," "opposition supporters," "Neda Agha-Soltan, the young Iranian woman who has become a symbol of the protest movement"
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8175702.stm (US urges Pro "Post-poll protests," "political prisoners," "people detained during the protests," "Neda Agha-Soltan, a young women who became Iran to free prisoners, July 29, 2009) an icon of the opposition movement after video of her death was posted on the internet," "reforminst candidates say the June poll was rigged" http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/today/newsid_8 Pro "Mourning ceremony of Nedha Soltan, who was killed in opposition protests following the election in Iran, is to take 175000/8175771.stm (Today: Thursday 30 July 2009) place," "significance of the death that was seen by millions of people around the world after a video of her death was posted on the internet"
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8176053.stm (Mother's Pro "Young woman who was killed during post-election protests in Iran," "opposition leaders" tribute to shot Iranian woman, July 30, 2009)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8176957.stm (The rise Pro "Neda Agha-Soltan, a young Iranian woman, was killed during an anti-government protest in Tehran," "disputed election results" of Iran's citizen journalists, July 30, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/video_and_audio/81 Pro "The mother of Neda Soltan says she's waiting for her daughter's killer to be brought to justice" 76029.stm (Neda's mother talks of her heartbreak, July 30, 2009)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8175764.stm (Iran Pro "Post-election violence," "Neda Agha Soltan, whose death became a symbol of post-election unrest," "the crowd," police clash with mourners, July 30, 2009) "demonstrators," "opposition protests," "political demonstrations," "That is exactly what happened during the Islamic Revolution 30 years ago in a cycle that helped lead to the downfall of the Shah"
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8176961.stm (Iran Neutral "Demonstrations," "Neda Agha-Soltan - the young woman who has become a symbol of the opposition cause in Iran" witnesses: Neda's memorial, July 31, 2009)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8176098.stm (Interview: Pro "Protester," "Neda Agha Soltan, the 27-year-old Iranian protester whose death on 20 June was captured on mobile phone video" Mother's tribute to Neda, July 30, 2009)
99 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8179470.stm (Iran puts Pro "Post-election violence," "opposition reform movement," "allegations of vote-rigging," "opposition leaders," "protests," 100 protesters on trial, August 1, 2009)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8184928.stm (In Pro "Supporters of all sides," "claiming the vote was rigged, protesters took to the streets," ""large protests," "days of violence pictures: Iran's election crisis, August 5, 2009) and the death of at least 30 people," "amateur footage emerged showing pro-government militia apparently firing at opposition demonstrators in Tehran," "protests," "Neda Agha Soltan, a young woman whose death became a symbol of post-election unrest," "the crisis" http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/mobile/middle_east/81 Pro "Neda Agha Soltan's death during a Tehran street protest, graphically captured on a mobile phone, transformed her into a 76158.stm (Profile: Neda Agha Soltan, July 30, 2009) global symbol of Iranian opposition," "Neda died within seconds, her final moments filmed by a passer-by on a mobile phone," "images of Neda's death were being beamed around the world"
Table BBC-5: Sourcing of Agha-Soltan and Iran Coverage
Key: First column – Explicitly stated sources used for written/spoken narrative in each individual piece of content.. Second column – Sources and description of graphic/video imagery in each individual piece of content. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81112 No non-BBC sources cited Six user-generated clips of mobile phone footage from Tehran “demonstrations” sent to BBC 33.stm (Iranians send BBC demo footage, Persian June 20, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middl No non-BBC sources cited User-generated video sent to BBC Persian with cameraperson's narration in Persian audible e_east/8110993.stm (Tear gas fired at Iran protest, June 20, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81111 No non-BBC sources cited 4 unattributed images, 1 from Agence France Presse. Images are of protesters massed on a 87.stm (In Pictures: Tehran protest, June 20, Tehran street, uniformed/helmeted men on red 2009) motorbikes, stone-throwing "demonstrators," bus burning in Tehran http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81111 Testimony by unnamed BBC correspondent AFP image of “demonstrators” 52.stm (BBC eyewitness: 'Security everywhere', June 20, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/to Interview with Jon Leyne No graphics/images/video day/newsid_8110000/8110558.st m (Today: Saturday 20 June 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middl Translation of a sermon at Friday prayers on June No graphics/images/video 19 by Khamenei e_east/8110623.stm (Key Excerpts: Khamenei Speech, Saturday, June 20, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81110 Jon Leyne answers emailed questions from No graphics/images/video readers 65.stm (Q&A: Tehran unrest, June 20, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/progra John Simpson Getty image of protester with a green ribbon and tape-covered mouth holding photo of protesters, mmes/from_our_own_correspon Getty image of a demonstration, AP image of dent/8109101.stm (Iranian protest Ahmadinejad, AFP of Khamenei and AP image of Tianemen square. parallels with 1979, June 20, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/talkin Unverified reader emails from "people who say Unattributed image of police in Tehran on they were there" motorbikes g_point/8111009.stm (Your reaction to Iranian protests, June 20, 2009)
100 http://news.bbc.co.uk/mobile/i/b Unnamed BBC reporter in Tehran and Jon Unattributed image of protester Donnison in Washington cited bc_news/mid_east/811/81112/sto ry8111242.shtml (US urges Iran to end 'violence', June 20, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middl Interview with Tehran Province Police Chief Video of Ahmad Reza Radan Ahmad Reza Radan e_east/8110899.stm (Iranian police warn against protests, June 20, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middl Statement by Barack Obama to CBS, Robert Unattributed stock image of Obama and Getty Gibbs, Amnesty International, Jonathan Beale, image of protest e_east/8110441.stm (Obama says world Khamenei sermon is watching Iran, June 20, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middl Jon Leyne-hosted video report BBC video of police/militia in the street, opposition protester injuries, Basij attacking cars, e_east/8111098.stm (Riot police tackle live rounds fired on protesters, various protest Iran protests, June 20, 2009) scenes http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middl Khamanei, Mehdi Khalaji of Washington Institute 2 AFP images of protesters, AFP image of voters, for Near East Policy, journalist Ali Pahlavan, Juan graphic of election results province by province e_east/8110877.stm (Suspicions behind Cole, Arshin Adib Moghaddem of SOAS, poll by Iran poll doubts, June 20, 2009) Terror Free Tomorrow http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81105 Unnamed BBC correspondent, user-generated User-generated video of tear gas being fired at a video of tear gas being fired at a protest, Obama, protest, map of Tehran protests 82.stm (Iran police clash with protesters, June Mousavi and Khamenei, Associated Press, Iranian 20, 2009) state television http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81111 User-generated video of massive protests User-generated video of massive protests 23.stm (Huge rally defies Ayatollah, June 20, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_ne Iranian state television, Jon Leyne cited No graphics/images/video ws/england/west_midlands/8111 757.stm (Protest held over Iran election, June 21, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81115 Iranian state television, Jeremy Bowen, alleged Still images from user-generated video of Tehran eyewitness reports emailed to BBC cited protests 04.stm ('Ten killed' in Iran clashes, June 21, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_ne David Miliband, Manoucher Mottaki, Khamenei, BBC image of Miliband Iranian state television cited ws/politics/8111558.stm (Miliband denies Iran 'meddling', June 21, 2009 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middl Obama CBS interview, John Kerry, Philip AFP image of Iran protest with English-language Crowley, unnamed Iranian-American diplomat, posters e_east/8111290.stm (The consequences Karim Sadjadpour (Carnegie Endowment for of engaging Iran, June 21, 2009) International Peace) cited http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81114 User-generated video of fires in Tehran User-generated video of a bus on fire and demonstration violence 46.stm (Iran video shows protest fires, June 21, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81052 24 hour liveblog by BBC reporters Getty image of Iran demonstration 07.stm (Reporters' log: Iran upheaval, June 21, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81116 User-generated video of protesters clashing w User-generated video of protesters clashing w military military 70.stm (Video shows fierce Iran clashes, June 21, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middl Commentary by Hugh Sykes with interviews of AP image of Iran demonstration anonymous Iranians cited
101 e_east/8111695.stm (Freedom craving 'fuelling Iran unrest', June 21, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81113 Jeremy Bowen, Iranian state television, Reuters, Still image from Neda video A, image of Jeremy Al-Arabiyya, Newsweek, Reporters Without Bowen, AP image of burning car at 52.stm (West 'seeks Iran disintegration', June Borders, AFP, Press TV, anonymous Iranians, demonstration, user-generated video of protests 21, 2009) Ahmadinejad cited http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middl User-generated video claiming to show riot police User-generated video claiming to show riot police breaking up an opposition rally in central Tehran breaking up an opposition rally in central Tehran e_east/8113982.stm (Riot police break up Tehran rally, June 21, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/to Interview with Iran analyst Kraim Sajadpour No graphics/images/video day/newsid_8112000/8112232.st m (Obama has 'accentuated Iran's internal rifts', June 22, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/video Interview with Thomas Rintoul of University of No graphics/images/video St Andrews _and_audio/8113068.stm (New questions over Iran election results, June 22, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_ne Foreign and Commonwealth Office AP image of street protests ws/8113353.stm (Embassy staff families leave Iran, June 22, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81135 Interview with Caspian Makan User-generated images of Agha-Soltan and alleged mass graves 52.stm (Death video woman 'targeted by militia', June 22, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middl Unverified emails sent by Iranians to BBC Unattributed image of a lone protester Persian and BBC News confronting riot cops e_east/8112909.stm (Iranian views: tension rising, June 22, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middl Jeremy Bowen, Mousavi cited AP image of street protests and AP stock image of Khamenei e_east/8113077.stm (Analysis: Iran splits widen, June 22, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81140 Rory Cellen-Jones report citing Nokia Siemens Video report by Rory Cellen-Jones 02.stm (Iran intercepting mobile calls, June 22, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81123 Statement by Hassan Qashqavi Video report on Qashqavi statement 41.stm (West 'seeks Iran disintegration', June 22, 2009 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81120 User-generated video sent to BBC Persian and Video report by Rana Rahimpour analyzing user- BBC News generated content 49.stm (Examining footage from Tehran, June 22, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middl Article in Akhbar al-Kaleej by Saira Rajab and AFP image of Akhbar al-Kaleej Bahraini Journalists Association cited e_east/8112993.stm (Bahrain closes paper in Iran row, June 22, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81128 User-generated video, eyewitness statements, Unattributed image of Agha-Soltan and user- emails received by BBC Persian, Revolutionary generated video claiming to show a rally near 12.stm (Police break up new Tehran rally, Guards statement posted to website,Caspian Shiroudi Stadium and video of Iranian police June 22, 2009) Makan interview, unnamed academics at St arresting protesters Andrew's University and Chatham House cirted http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81120 Reporters Without Borders, Mousavi's website, AP image of protester unnamed analysts, Jeremy Bowen cited 36.stm (West 'seeks Iran disintegration', June
102 22, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middl Article by BBC Iranian affairs analyst Sadeq AFP image of riot policemen confronting Saba protesters e_east/8101621.stm (Q&A: Iran election aftermath, June 22, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/techno Report by Rory Cellan-Jones citing Nokia Unattributed image of woman with a loose hijab Siemens, OpenNet initiative interviews using a camera phone in front of a Mousavi poster logy/8112550.stm (Hi-tech helps Iran monitoring, June 22, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81116 Video interview with Jon Leyne, Iranian Video interview with Jon Leyne government statement, Nabil al-Khatib of al- 38.stm (Iran asks BBC reporter to leave, June Arabiyya cited 22, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_ne Roundup of articles in UK dailies Stock image of UK newspapers ws/8114108.stm (Cool reception for new Speaker, June 23, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middl Ban Ki-moon, Press TV, reports generated via User-generated video of rally near Siroudi unverified eyewitnesses/social media Stadium and Iranian police making protests, e_east/8114085.stm (End Iran violence, Revolutionary Guard website, BBC Persian unattributed photo of Agha-Soltan UN chief urges, June 23, 2009) interview with Caspian Makan, Guardian Council, analysts from st Andrews University and Chatham House cited http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middl User emails to BBC Persian, Twitter postings and User-generated video of protesters chanting translation of a satirical poster held at an Iran Allahu akbar, user-generated image of satirical e_east/8118616.stm (Iranian views: gathering cited Persian-language poster found at rally 'Critical Times', June 25, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81197 Interview of Arash Hejazi by Rachel Harvey Video interview of Arash Hejazi by Rachel Harvey 41.stm ('She died in less than a minute', June 25, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81196 Interview of Arash Hejazi by Rachel Harvey Video interview of Arash Hejazi by Rachel Harvey 58.stm (The man who tried to save Neda, June 25, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81197 Interview of Arash Hejazi by Rachel Harvey Video interview of Arash Hejazi by Rachel Harvey, unattributed image of Agha-Soltan, Getty 13.stm (Iran doctor tells of Neda death, June image of a western "I Am Neda" protest 25, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europ User emails to BBC from Iranians "Behrooz, User-generated video of June 28 protests at a Student, Tehran" and "Sisyphus, 26, Student, Tehran mosque on June 28, unattributed image of e/8121392.stm (Iran views: Anger Shiraz" boy releasing green balloons in Tehran remains, June 29, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middl Ahmadinejad, Agha-Soltan videos, statement by AFP image of an Agha-Soltan shrine and user- Gordon Brown, reports on social media cited generated video appearing to show arrests in e_east/8125181.stm (Ahmadinejad calls Tehran protests for Neda probe, June 29, 2009 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/progra Report by Siobhan Courtney citing BBC Unattributed image photo comparing headshots of Newsnight, Twitter, Facebook, blogger Dr Amy L Neda Agha-Soltan and Neda Soltani mmes/newsnight/8129083.stm Beam, The Guardian (The buzz: Neda – a case of mistaken identity, July 3, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81713 Report by Jon Leyne citing Iranian television, AP image of Ahmadinejad, AFP image of Mohammad-Hossein Saffar-Harandi, Tehran Esfandiar Rahim Mashaie, AFP image of Gholam 84.stm (Ahmadinejad riles powerful allies, Emrouz newspaper, Khabar newspaper, Ali Hossein Mohseni Ejeie, AP image of Western July 27, 2009) Kordan, an unnamed Iranian MP and social media Agha-Soltan protest http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81757 Hillary Clinton, unnamed opposition leaders, Repackaged video statement by Hillary Clinton unnamed BBC correspondents, Ahmadinejad, 02.stm (US urges Iran to free prisoners, July reformist journalist Hanif Mazroei speaking to 29, 2009) BBC Persian cited
103 http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/to Interview of Hajar Rostami Motlagh by Jon No graphics/images/video Leyne day/newsid_8175000/8175771.st m (Today: Thursday 30 July 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81760 Interview of Hajar Rostami Motlagh by Jon No graphics/images/video Leyne 53.stm (Mother's tribute to shot Iranian woman, July 30, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81769 Report by Dave Lee citing Twitter, Facebook, Azi Unattributed image of Iran protests and Khatiri of BBC Persian, journalist Bill Thompson unattributed image of fires at protests 57.stm (The rise of Iran's citizen journalists, July 30, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/video Interview of Hajar Rostami Motlagh by Jon No graphics/images/video Leyne _and_audio/8176029.stm (Neda's mother talks of her heartbreak, July 30, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81757 Iranian television, unverified emails from Unattributed image of Agha-Soltan, repackaged eyewitnesses, Mousavi, opposition statements, user-generated video of violence in Tehran 64.stm (Iran police clash with mourners, July unverified witness reports, AFP, US State 30, 2009) Department, Mehr News Agency cited http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81769 Unverified emails from eyewitnesses User-generated video of Arabyeen protests 61.stm (Iran witnesses: Neda's memorial, July 31, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81760 Interview of Hajar Rostami Motlagh by Jon AFP image of a shrine to Agha-Soltan Leyne (Leyne identified only as “BBC”) 98.stm (Interview: Mother's tribute to Neda, July 30, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81794 Iranian television, Mosharekat party statement, Unattributed video of protesters on trial and Fars news agency, BBC's Kasra Naji, social AP/AFP images of Mohammad Ali Abtahi, 70.stm (Iran puts 100 protesters on trial, media cited Mohsen Mirdamadi and Behzad Nabavi August 1, 2009) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/81849 No non-BBC sources cited 8 AFP images, 3 AP, 2 Getty, 2 unattributed. Images are of stylishly dressed protesters, voters 28.stm (In pictures: Iran's election crisis, in chadors, Khameini, Mousavi, Ahmadinejad August 5, 2009) supporters, graphic Tehran violence and trial of protesters http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/mobile/ Motlagh interview, Hejazi interview, social media Unattributed image of Agha-Soltan protest in the cited West middle_east/8176158.stm (Profile: Neda Agha Soltan, July 30, 2009)
Table AJ-1: Iran Stories From english.aljazeera.net and YouTube (AlJazeeraEnglish), June 20-22, 2009
06/20/09 06/21/09 06/22/09 “Disputed Election Divides Iranian Clergy” “Tehran Clashes 'Left 13 Dead'” “Iran Council 'Admits Poll Flaws'” http://english.aljazeera.net/news/ http://english.aljazeera.net/news/ http://english.aljazeera.net/news/ middleeast/2009/06/2009620167 middleeast/2009/06/2009621142 middleeast/2009/06/2009622635 50666262.html 8164598.html 3443698.html “Iranians Hold Mass Rally in Paris” “Iran Condemns West's 'Interference'” “Iran Protesters Defy Warning” http://english.aljazeera.net/news/ http://english.aljazeera.net/news/ http://english.aljazeera.net/news/ europe/2009/06/2009620174443 middleeast/2009/06/2009621131 middleeast/2009/06/2009622185 971513.html 039448390.html 433984922.html “'Suicide Bomber Hits Tehran Shrine” “Deaths Confirmed in Iran Unrest” “Iran's Guards to 'Crush' Protests” http://english.aljazeera.net/news/ http://english.aljazeera.net/news/ http://english.aljazeera.net/news/ middleeast/2009/06/2009620132 asia/2009/06/200962183455848 middleeast/2009/06/20096221191
104 947283202.html 331.html 7155481.html
“Q&A: Tweeting From Tehran” “Journalists Held In Iran Crackdown” “Iran's Mousavi Urges More Protests” http://english.aljazeera.net/focus/ http://english.aljazeera.net/news/ http://english.aljazeera.net/news/ 2009/06/2009620111022959219. middleeast/2009/06/2009621182 middleeast/2009/06/2009622126 html 348210316.html 58772171.html
“Iran Police 'Clash With Protesters'” “Iran's Mousavi Urges Defiance” “Riz Khan: Iran's Internet Revolution” http://english.aljazeera.net/news/ http://english.aljazeera.net/news/ http://english.aljazeera.net/progra middleeast/2009/06/2009620964 middleeast/2009/06/2009621191 mmes/rizkhan/2009/06/20096228 4441364.html 831403557.html 1940160238.html “Police Crack Down on Iran Protests” “Violence in the Streets of the Iranian Capital” “Crime Charges Against Iran Sought” http://english.aljazeera.net/news/ http://www.youtube.com/watch? http://www.youtube.com/watch? middleeast/2009/06/2009620184 v=mG-loe_VMws v=1hvHja_yi8w 151643728.html “Mobile Bulletin – 1405 GMT” http://www.youtube.com/watch? v=2BIO_HlK8q8 “Mobile Bulletin – 1935 GMT” http://www.youtube.com/watch? v=cUlijebKzWU
Table AJ-2: Stories Featuring Neda Agha-Soltan From english.aljazeera.net , June 23 – September 22 2009 Key: “Cursory” - Mentions of Agha-Soltan in one or two sentences. “Medium” - At least one paragraph devoted to Agha-Soltan “In-depth” - Article centers around Agha-Soltan
Article Name & Date Portrayal of Sample Description Agha-Soltan “Fiance Tells of Neda's Last Moments,” June 23, 2009 In-Depth “Caspian Makan, the fiance of the Iranian woman shot dead last week, tells http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middl Al Jazeera of her last moments.” eeast/2009/06/20096234329424968.ht ml “Iran Body Rules Out Poll Annulment,” June 23, 2009 Medium “"Neda [Soltani] and the pictures of her very last moments will become a http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middl huge symbol of these protests," he said, referring to an online video which alleges to show an Iranian woman dying after being shot by a member of the eeast/2009/06/200962374448861297.h Basij militia.” tml “Iran's Neda Killing 'Was Illegal,'” June 24, 2009 In-Depth “The woman, named as Neda Agha Soltan on social-networking websites, has http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middl become a symbol for people protesting against the disputed re-election of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.” eeast/2009/06/200962484755543950.h tml “Iran University Professors 'Held',” June 25, 2009 Cursory “Protesters have said that they plan to continue their protests on Friday by http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middl releasing thousands of balloons imprinted with the message "Neda you will always remain in our hearts" - a reference to the young woman killed last eeast/2009/06/200962533640849336.h week whose image has become an icon of the protests.”
105 tml “Iran Recount Gives Ahmadinejad Win,” June 29, 2009 Medium “Ahmadinejad has asked a leading judge to investigate the killing of Neda http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middl Agha Soltan, a young woman who became an icon of Iran's opposition after video capturing her bleeding to death on a Tehran street was circulated eeast/2009/06/2009629151258105455. worldwide.” html “Protesters Decry Iran Detentions,” July 25, 2009 Cursory Photo of Agha Soltan shown. http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middl eeast/2009/07/20097258437330979.ht ml “Iran Opposition to Mourn Protesters,” July 30, 2009 Cursory “Neda, a 26-year-old music student, was shot on June 20, as protesters http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middl clashed with riot police and members of the pro-government Basij militia in Tehran.” eeast/2009/07/20097306505961426.ht ml “Iran Police Clash With Mourners,” July 31, 2009 Medium “Neda, a 26-year-old music student, was shot as protesters clashed with riot http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middl police and members of the pro-government Basij militia in Tehran.” eeast/2009/07/2009730113037944759. html “The Riz Khan Show: Iran's Bitter Political Divide,” Medium “Women played a tremendous role in the protests and the fatal shooting of August 5, 2009 Neda Agha Soltan became the most defining image of the demonstrations.” http://english.aljazeera.net/programme s/rizkhan/2009/08/2009851345165166 21.html “Iran: The End of the Republic?,” August 1, 2009 Cursory “During the most recent gatherings and demonstrations mourning the death of http://english.aljazeera.net/focus/2009/ Neda Agha-Soltan at Tehran's main cemetery, it is reported that Basij units used taser guns against protesters as well as marking them with paintballs in 08/20098171953790365.html order to identify them at a later point.” “The Listening Post: Corporate Media Wars,”August 21, In-Depth “Only Neda Sultan, whose dying moments during a Tehran street protest were 2009 broadcast on televisions and computer screens, made news the world over.” http://english.aljazeera.net/programme s/listeningpost/2009/08/200982195238 394421.html “Fight to Release Abu Ghraib Images,” September 8, 2009 Cursory “While addressing the post-election unrest in Iran, [Barack Obama] noted http://english.aljazeerAa.net/focus/200 that he had seen the amateur video of an Iranian woman – Neda – dying after being shot in the chest.” 9/09/200992112214934570.html
Table AJ-3: Formatting of Agha-Soltan and Iran Coverage
Key: “News” - Straightforward news story, “Feature” - Feature/expository story, “Op-Ed” - Opinion Piece, “Interview” - Interview-based piece w/ two or more participants, “Photo Gallery” - Still-photo based collection of visual news, “User-generated news” - Content consisting exclusively of edited information received from social media, “Hybrid” - Multi-genre mixture with specific explanation noted, “Other” - Miscellaneous with specific explanation noted. http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2009/ News 06/200962016750666262.html (Disputed election divides
106 Iranian clergy, June 20, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/news/europe/2009/06/2 News 009620174443971513.html (Iranians hold mass rally in Paris, June 20, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2009/ News 06/2009620132947283202.html ('Suicide bomber' hits Tehran shrine, June 20, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/focus/2009/06/200962 Interview 0111022959219.html (Q&A: Tweeting from Tehran, June 20,2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2009/ News 06/20096209644441364.html (Iran police 'clash with protesters', June 20, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2009/ News 06/2009620184151643728.html (Police crack down on Iran protests, June 21, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2009/ News 06/20096211428164598.html (Tehran clashes 'left 13 dead', June 21, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2009/ News 06/2009621131039448390.html (Iran condemns West's 'interference', June 21, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/news/asia/2009/06/200 News 962183455848331.html (Deaths confirmed in Iran unrest, June 21, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2009/ News 06/2009621182348210316.html (Journalists held in Iran crackdown, June 21, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2009/ News 06/2009621191831403557.html (Iran's Mousavi urges defiance, June 22, 2009) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mG- News loe_VMws (Violence on the streets of the Iranian capital, June 21, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2009/ News 06/20096226353443698.html (Iran council 'admits poll flaws', June 22, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2009/ News 06/2009622185433984922.html (Iran protesters defy warning, June 23, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2009/ News 06/200962211917155481.html (Iran's Guards to 'crush' protests, June 22, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2009/ News 06/200962212658772171.html (Iran's Mousavi urges more protests, June 22, 2009)
107 http://english.aljazeera.net/programmes/rizkhan/2 Interview 009/06/200962281940160238.html (Riz Khan: Iran's Internet Revolution, June 23, 2009) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1hvHja_yi8w Interview (Crimes charges against Iran sought, June 22, 2009) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2BIO_HlK8q8 News (Mobile Bulletin - 1405GMT - 22 June 09) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cUlijebKzWU News (Mobile bulletin - 1935GMT - 22 June 09) http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2009/ Interview 06/20096234329424968.html (Fiance tells of Neda's last moments, June 23, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2009/ News 06/200962374448861297.html (Iran body rules out poll annulment, June 23, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2009/ Interview 06/200962484755543950.html (Iran's Neda killing 'was illegal', June 24, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2009/ News 06/200962533640849336.html (Iran university professors 'held', June 25, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2009/ News 06/2009629151258105455.html (Iran recount gives Ahmadinejad win, June 29, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2009/ News 07/20097258437330979.html (Protesters decry iran detentions, July 25, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2009/ News 07/20097306505961426.html (Iran opposition to mourn protesters, July 30, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2009/ News 07/2009730113037944759.html (Iranian police clash with mourners, July 31, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/programmes/rizkhan/2 Interview 009/08/200985134516516621.html (Riz Khan:Iran's bitter political divide, August 6, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/focus/2009/08/200981 Op-ed 71953790365.html (Iran: The end of the Republic, August 1, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/programmes/listeningp Hybrid (Opinion/Feature/Interview) ost/2009/08/200982195238394421.html (Listening Post: Corporate media wars, September 12, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/focus/2009/09/2009921 Op-ed 12214934570.html (Fight to release Abu Ghraib images, September 8, 2009)
108 Table AJ-4: Framing of Agha-Soltan and Iran Coverage
Key: First column - “Pro” - Narrative overtly sympathetic to either Agha-Soltan, participants in the Iranian street events of June 2009, or both. “Neutral”- Narrative neutral to either Agha-Soltan, participants in the Iranian street events of June 2009, or both. “Against” - Narrative overtly hostile to either Agha-Soltan, participants in the Iranian street events of June 2009, or both. Second column – Representative keywords or key phrases from story used to make this determination. http://english.aljazeera.net/news/mid Pro "Post-election protests," "Some ayatollahs say the election was a sham" dleeast/2009/06/2009620167506662 62.html (Disputed election divides Iranian clergy, June 20, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/news/eur Neutral "Iranians protesting over the reelection of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad," "Opposition," "Widespread irregularities" ope/2009/06/2009620174443971513 .html (Iranians hold mass rally in Paris, June 20, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/news/mid Pro "Many people would believe the explosion was 'a government conspiracy'," "Protesters," "Disputed reelection" dleeast/2009/06/2009620132947283 202.html ('Suicide bomber' hits Tehran shrine, June 20, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/focus/200 Pro “'Information uprising' in Tehran", "Iranian elections," "What needs to change in Iran?" 9/06/2009620111022959219.html (Q&A: Tweeting from Tehran, June 20,2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/news/mid Pro "People gathering to protest against the disputed re-election of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad," "Protesters" dleeast/2009/06/2009620964444136 4.html (Iran police 'clash with protesters', June 20, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/news/mid Neutral "People attempting to protest over the disputed presidential election," "Rally," "Supporters of Mir Hossein Mousavi, a defeated reformist candidate," dleeast/2009/06/2009620184151643 "Protesters" 728.html (Police crack down on Iran protests, June 21, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/news/mid Neutral "Protesters," "Disputed presidential election," "Clashes," "People who took to the streets," "Gatherings," "Opposition protesters" dleeast/2009/06/2009621142816459 8.html (Tehran clashes 'left 13 dead', June 21, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/news/mid Neutral "Mass protests," "Protests," "The tens of thousands of people who have taken to the streets," "Claims of voting irregularities during the election," "Protesters" dleeast/2009/06/2009621131039448 390.html (Iran condemns West's 'interference', June 21, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/news/asia Neutral "Unrest," "Rioters," "Claims of election fraud," "Anti-government demonstrators," "Protesters," "One video uploaded to YouTube on Saturday /2009/06/200962183455848331.htm alleged to show a teenage girl - being called Neda - dying on the street after being l (Deaths confirmed in Iran unrest, June 21, 2009) shot by police." http://english.aljazeera.net/news/mid Pro "Protests," "Disputed re-election of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad" dleeast/2009/06/2009621182348210
109 316.html (Journalists held in Iran crackdown, June 21, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/news/mid Neutral "Opposition movement," "Protests," "Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the conservative incumbent president, was declared the winner of the June 12 election with a dleeast/2009/06/2009621191831403 landslide victory, but Mousavi and another challenger have complained that it was 557.html (Iran's Mousavi urges defiance, June 22, rigged," "Protesters," "One video uploaded to YouTube on Saturday alleged to show a teenage girl - referred to as Neda on social networking sites - dying on the 2009) street after being shot by police. " http://www.youtube.com/watch? Pro "Iranians continue to protest against an election they believe was stolen," "Clashes," "Disturbing images of a teenager dying on the streets of Tehran have v=mG-loe_VMws (Violence on the streets of appeared on the internet. It is not possible to confirm what happened to the girl the Iranian capital, June 21, 2009) known as "Neda," "she (Neda) has become a symbol and martyr to the protesters" http://english.aljazeera.net/news/mid Pro “Some irregularities occurred in the disputed June 12 presidential election," "Allege(d) voter fraud," "Rallies," "Protest" dleeast/2009/06/2009622635344369 8.html (Iran council 'admits poll flaws', June 22, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/news/mid Neutral "Anti-government protesters," "Protesters," "Rallies," "Unrest and street protests," "Some irregularities occurred during the election" dleeast/2009/06/2009622185433984 922.html (Iran protesters defy warning, June 23, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/news/mid Against "Protests," "Gathered," "Opposition supporters," "Rallies" dleeast/2009/06/2009622119171554 81.html (Iran's Guards to 'crush' protests, June 22, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/news/mid Neutral "Opposition movement," "Protests," "Take to the streets," Protesters," "One video uploaded to YouTube on Saturday purportedly showed a teenage girl - referred to dleeast/2009/06/2009622126587721 as Neda on social-networking sites - dying on the street after being shot by 71.html (Iran's Mousavi urges more protests, June police" 22, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/program Neutral "Mass protests," "Disputed presidential election" mes/rizkhan/2009/06/200962281940 160238.html (Riz Khan: Iran's Internet Revolution, June 23, 2009) http://www.youtube.com/watch? Pro "Post-election violence" v=1hvHja_yi8w (Crimes charges against Iran sought, June 22, 2009) http://www.youtube.com/watch? Neutral "Iran in Crisis," "Protesters," "Gathering" v=2BIO_HlK8q8 (Mobile Bulletin - 1405GMT - 22 June 09) http://www.youtube.com/watch? Neutral "Iran unrest," "Protesters," "Mousavi supporters" v=cUlijebKzWU (Mobile bulletin - 1935GMT - 22 June 09) http://english.aljazeera.net/news/mid Pro "The Iranian woman shot dead last week," "Neda Soltani was allegedly killed by a Basij militia volunteer in Tehran as residents protested over the June 12 dleeast/2009/06/2009623432942496 presidential election," "Neda's fiance" 8.html (Fiance tells of Neda's last moments, June 23, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/news/mid Neutral "Disputed June 12 presidential election," "Voting discrepancies," "Unrest," "Street protests," "Demonstrators," "An online video which alleges to show an Iranian dleeast/2009/06/2009623744488612 woman dying after being shot by a member of the Basij militia"
110 97.html (Iran body rules out poll annulment, June 23, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/news/mid Pro "A young woman shot dead during a protest in Tehran," "The woman, named as Neda Agha Soltan on social-networking websites, has become a symbol for dleeast/2009/06/2009624847555439 people protesting against the disputed re-election of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the 50.html (Iran's Neda killing 'was illegal', June 24, Iranian president," "A video recorded on a mobile phone showed what appeared to be people attempting to save her life after she was apparently hit by sniper's 2009) bullet" http://english.aljazeera.net/news/mid Neutral "Disputed re-election of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad," "Demonstrators," "Protesters," "Protesters have said that they plan to continue their protests on Friday by dleeast/2009/06/2009625336408493 releasing thousands of balloons imprinted with the message 'Neda you will 36.html (Iran university professors 'held', June 25, always remain in our hearts'” 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/news/mid Pro "Disputed presidential election," "Neda Agha Soltan, a young woman who became an icon of Iran's opposition after video capturing her bleeding to death on dleeast/2009/06/2009629151258105 a Tehran street was circulated worldwide." 455.html (Iran recount gives Ahmadinejad win, June 29, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/news/mid Pro "Activists," "Critics of the government," "Opposition supporters" dleeast/2009/07/2009725843733097 9.html (Protesters decry iran detentions, July 25, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/news/mid Neutral "Protesters," "Disputed presidential election," "Claimed the vote was rigged," "Neda Agha-Soltan, a protester who was killed on June 20 and has since become dleeast/2009/07/2009730650596142 a symbol of the opposition," "Neda, a 26-year-old music student, was shot on 6.html (Iran opposition to mourn protesters, July June 20, as protesters clashed with riot police and members of the pro- government Basij militia in Tehran," "Unrest" 30, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/news/mid Neutral "Hundreds of people who gathered," "Protesters," "One of the protesters killed, Neda Agha-Soltan, has since become a symbol of the opposition," "Neda, a 26- dleeast/2009/07/2009730113037944 year-old music student, was shot as protesters clashed with riot police and 759.html (Iranian police clash with mourners, July members of the pro-government Basij militia in Tehran" 31, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/program Pro "Controversial presidential election," "Violent protests," "The fatal shooting of Neda Agha Soltan became the most defining image of the demonstrations" mes/rizkhan/2009/08/200985134516 516621.html (Riz Khan:Iran's bitter political divide, August 6, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/focus/200 Pro "Electorate's collective feeling of injustice and rage," "State sponsored violence against its own citizens," "Mourning the death of Neda Agha-Soltan" 9/08/20098171953790365.html (Iran: The end of the Republic, August 1, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/program Neutral "The murder of two Muslim women, but how only one of caught the Western media's attention," "Only Neda Sultan, whose dying moments during a Tehran mes/listeningpost/2009/08/2009821 street protest were broadcast on televisions and computer screens, made news the 95238394421.html (Listening Post: world over" Corporate media wars, September 12, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/focus/200 Pro "Amateur video of an Iranian woman – Neda – dying after being shot in the chest. The video has come to symbolise Iran's oppressive response to recent political 9/09/200992112214934570.html protest" (Fight to release Abu Ghraib images, September 8, 2009)
Table AJ-5: Sourcing of Agha-Soltan and Iran Coverage
Key: First column – Explicitly stated sources used for written/spoken narrative in each individual piece of
111 content.. Second column – Sources and description of graphic/video imagery in each individual piece of content. http://english.aljazeera.net/ Report by Nicole Johnston citing "unconfirmed Video filmed in Qom reports", Nazenin Ansari of Kayhan Weekly and news/middleeast/2009/06/2 Hossein-Ali Montazeri statement 00962016750666262.html (Disputed election divides Iranian clergy, June 20, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/ National Council of Iranian Resistance leader Maryam AFP image of Parisian rally Radjavi statement, organizer Alireza Jafarzadeh and news/europe/2009/06/2009 "agencies" 620174443971513.html (Iranians hold mass rally in Paris, June 20, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/ Hossein Sajedinia statement to Mehr news agency, Al AFP image of Khomeini's shrine Jazeera correspondent Teymoor Nabili, former news/middleeast/2009/06/2 diplomat Mehrdad Khonsari, “local news agencies,” 009620132947283202.html "agencies" ('Suicide bomber' hits Tehran shrine, June 20, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/f Report by Kathleen McCaul interviewing a Twitter Image of screen capture of Twitter account user known as 'Shahrazad' @shahrzadmo ocus/2009/06/20096201110 22959219.html (Q&A: Tweeting from Tehran, June 20,2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/ Deputy national police commander Ahmadreza AFP image of masked "protesters" at a demonstration Radan, Al Jazeera correspondent Alireza Ronaghi, news/middleeast/2009/06/2 Iranian state television, Khameini sermon 0096209644441364.html (Iran police 'clash with protesters', June 20, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/ Unverified emails and statements from witnesses, AP image of fire in the streets of Tehran user-generated content, Ronaghi, Iranian television, news/middleeast/2009/06/2 Obama statement, Al Jazeera correspondent Nick 009620184151643728.html Spicer, Mousavi statement in Kalameh (Police crack down on Iran protests, June 21, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/ Iranian television, Ronaghi, Khamenei statement, AFP image of fires in central Tehran and EPA stock Mohsen Makhmalbaf interview, statement by image of Rafsanjani news/middleeast/2009/06/2 International Campaign for Human Rights, Twitter, 0096211428164598.html YouTube, Amnesty International's Drewery Dyke, Montazeri's website, Mehr news agency (Tehran clashes 'left 13 dead', June 21, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/ ISNA news agency, Manouchehr Mottaki statement, AFP image of stone-throwing Tehran proteste Angela Merkel statement, David Miliband statement, news/middleeast/2009/06/2 Journal du Dimanche, Bernard Kouchner statement 009621131039448390.html (Iran condemns West's 'interference', June 21, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/ Iran television, ISNA, Merkel statement, Mohnsen AFP image of stone-throwing protesters and masked Makhmalnaf statement, Ahmadinejad statement, demonstrators being chased by Basijis on motorbikes news/asia/2009/06/2009621 Twitter, YouTube, unspecified blogs and social 83455848331.html (Deaths networking websites, IRINN television, Kalameh, Obama statement, Abbas Ali Kadkhodaei statement confirmed in Iran unrest, June 21, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/ Reporters Without Borders statement, Newsweek AFP image of BBC's Jon Leyne (with name statement, Iranian radio, Fars News Agency, BBC misspelled as John) news/middleeast/2009/06/2 statement, Mohammed al-Khateeb of Al-Arabiyya 009621182348210316.html statement (Journalists held in Iran crackdown, June
112 21, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/ Mousavi statement on Kalameh's website, Iranian Getty image of fires in the streets of Tehran and EPA television and radio, Makhmalbaf interview, witness image of Rafsanjani news/middleeast/2009/06/2 interviews, International Campaign for Human Rights, 009621191831403557.html Twitter, YouTube, Amnesty International, Iranian television, Montazeri statement, Khatami statement (Iran's Mousavi urges defiance, June 22, 2009) http://www.youtube.com/w Nazanine Moshiri report with Neda Video A footage Edited footage of video A, IRINN riot footage, 4 still obtained from YouTube, Twitter, unverified user- images (w/ watermark) from Demotix Images, still atch?v=mG-loe_VMws generated content, unidentified television networks, image of Ali Larijani (misidentified as 'Al' Larijani), (Violence on the streets of the Iranian Iranian television, Gen. Esmaeil Moghadam Mousavi footage, Youtube footage of riots capital, June 21, 2009) statement, Mottaki interview, Ali Larijani statement http://english.aljazeera.net/ IRIB radio, Guardian Council statement, Hassan AFP image of riot cops watching a fire in central Ghashghavi at Foreign Ministry statement, Iranian Tehran news/middleeast/2009/06/2 radio, interview with Ahmadinejad advisor Alireza 0096226353443698.html Zaker-Esfahani, Mousavi statement in Kalameh, Reporters without Borders (Iran council 'admits poll flaws', June 22, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/ Revolutionary Guard website, anonymous unverified AFP image of Tehran riot police, unattributed image witnesses at Haft-e Tir square, Ban Ki-moon of Makan and Agha-Soltan, "user-supplied image" of news/middleeast/2009/06/2 statement, Iranian radio, Zaker-Esfahani interview, sign reading 'This is Selection Not Election' 009622185433984922.html statement by Abbas-Ali Kadkhodaei of Guardian Council to IRIB, Iranian journalist Ghanbar Naderi, (Iran protesters defy warning, June 23, Mousavi statement to Kalameh, anonymous Mousavi 2009) supporter named 'Atoosa' http://english.aljazeera.net/ Revolutionary Guards website, Iranian radio, Fars AFP image of Tehran riot police, "user-supplied news agency, Zaker-Esfahani interview, Abbas-Ali image" of sign reading 'This is Selection Not news/middleeast/2009/06/2 Kadkhodaei, Mousavi statement in Kalameh, Election' 00962211917155481.html Reporters Without Borders (Iran's Guards to 'crush' protests, June 22, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/ Mousavi statement in Kalameh, anonymous AFP image of riot police attacking Iranians, EPA unverified reports, Iranian government statements, stock image of Rafsanjani, Reuters image of bloodied news/middleeast/2009/06/2 Press TV, Iranian TV, Mousavi spokesperson Mohsen protester, Reuters image of green-masked protesters 00962212658772171.html Makhmalbaf, International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran, Twitter, YouTube, "local news (Iran's Mousavi urges more protests, June agencies," IRINN, Amnesty International, Mehr News 22, 2009) Agency http://english.aljazeera.net/ Guest Ethan Zuckerman of Harvard University's Television talk show Berkman Center for Internet and Society, Facebook, programmes/rizkhan/2009/ Twitter, Flickr 06/200962281940160238.h tml (Riz Khan: Iran's Internet Revolution, June 23, 2009) http://www.youtube.com/w Former UN war crimes prosecutor Payam Akhavan Graphic user-generated footage of Basij/police violence at Tehran protests, protest violence, atch?v=1hvHja_yi8w (Crimes Iranians being beaten by police charges against Iran sought, June 22, 2009) http://www.youtube.com/w Mousavi statement, Iranian government statement, Zaker-Esfahani interview footage and user-generated Italian government statement and Zaker-Esfahani footage of Tehran protests atch?v=2BIO_HlK8q8 quote (Mobile Bulletin - 1405GMT - 22 June 09) http://www.youtube.com/w Ronaghi narration, Zaker-Esfahani Ronaghi footage, Zaker-Esfahani interview footage, user-generated footage of Tehran protests, footage of atch?v=cUlijebKzWU (Mobile unidentified Al Jazzeera corresp bulletin - 1935GMT - 22 June 09) http://english.aljazeera.net/ Caspian Makan interview Split screen of Makan's face and Iranian map, footage of demonstration Agha-Soltan attended,
113 news/middleeast/2009/06/2 footage of Video A and video B, unattributed images of Makan and Agha-Soltan together, user-generated 0096234329424968.html footage of Basij in streets of Tehran and post-election (Fiance tells of Neda's last moments, June unrest 23, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/ Abbas Ali Kadkhodaie of Guardian Council interview, Reuters image of Iranian filming protest with mobile Ban Ki-Moon statement, Hassan Qashqavi statement phone, unattributed image of Makan and Agha- news/middleeast/2009/06/2 cited from ISNA, Gordon Brown, Iranian interior Soltan together 00962374448861297.html ministry, Revolutionary Guard website, statement by Ebrahim Raisi of Iranian judiciary on state radio, (Iran body rules out poll annulment, June Ronaghi, unnamed Mehdi Karoubi aide cited by 23, 2009) Reuters, Hadi Ghaemi of the International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran http://english.aljazeera.net/ Interview with Shirin Ebadi EPA image of Ebadi news/middleeast/2009/06/2 00962484755543950.html (Iran's Neda killing 'was illegal', June 24, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/ Mousavi statement on Kalameh, Press TV, statement User-generated picture of police confronting by Montazeri to AFP cited, Iraqi author Baqer Moin, protesters news/middleeast/2009/06/2 Ahmadinejad statement 00962533640849336.html (Iran university professors 'held', June 25, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/ IRIB television, Hillary Clinton statement, Naderi, AFP image of Western pro-Green protesters and AFP Press TV, Afsin Molavi of New America Foundation, image of Khamenei at press conference news/middleeast/2009/06/2 Ahmadinejad's website, Hejazi interview with BBC, 009629151258105455.html Hassan Qashqavi of Foreign Ministry, Gordon Brown statement (Iran recount gives Ahmadinejad win, June 29, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/ Ex-political prisoner Ardeshir Gholipour statement to AFP image of Western pro-Green protesters Associated Press cited, Aaron Rhods of United for news/middleeast/2009/07/2 Iran, joint statement on Mousavi's website by 0097258437330979.html Mousavi/Karroubi/Khatami, separate Karroubi statement from his website cited via Reuters, Kian (Protesters decry iran detentions, July 25, Mokhtari (Iranian political commentator) 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/ Joint statement on Mousavi's website by AFP image of Mousavi and Karroubi Mousavi/Karroubi/Khatami, "media reports," Iranian news/middleeast/2009/07/2 prosecutor Saeed Mortazavi, Eternad Melli 0097306505961426.html newspaper (Iran opposition to mourn protesters, July 30, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/ Witness quote cited via Reuters, Ronaghi, Mortazvi, AFP image of Mousavi and Karroubi qMoghaddam, quote from Rasool Montajebnia of news/middleeast/2009/07/2 Etemad Melli, interview with Karim Sadjadpor at 009730113037944759.html Carnegie Endowment for International Peace (Iranian police clash with mourners, July 31, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/ Guests Kaveh Afrasiabi of Global Interfaith Peace and Television talk show Dokhi Fassihian of National Iranian American programmes/rizkhan/2009/ Council, user-generated footage, Twitter 08/200985134516516621.h tml (Riz Khan:Iran's bitter political divide, August 6, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/f Op-ed by Bernd Kaussler of James Madison Getty stock image of Ahmadinejad, Getty image of a University/University of St Andrews "Down With the Islamic Republic" poster, Getty ocus/2009/08/20098171953 image of masked protesters 790365.html (Iran: The end of the Republic, August 1, 2009)
114 http://english.aljazeera.net/ Television magazine segment hosted by Salah Khadr Television magazine show citing YouTube, Twitter, blogs programmes/listeningpost/2 009/08/2009821952383944 21.html (Listening Post: Corporate media wars, September 12, 2009) http://english.aljazeera.net/f Op-ed by Alexander Abdo of the American Civil Getty image of mural depicting Abu Ghraib, AP Liberties Union image of Abu Ghraib ocus/2009/09/20099211221 4934570.html (Fight to release Abu Ghraib images, September 8, 2009)
Table RT-1: Iran Stories From rt.com, June 20-22 2009
06/20/09 06/21/09 06/22/09 “The War on Terror as a Spin of Imagination. Part “The Resident: NYC Speaks Out on Iran “Muslim Girls Fall Victim to Honor Killings,” 3. Conspiracies,” Protests,” http://rt.com/Top_News/2009-06- http://rt.com/Politics/2009-06- http://rt.com/Top_News/2009- 22/Muslim_girls_fall_victim_to_ 20/The_War_on_Terror_as_a_Sp 06- honor_killings.html in_of_Imagination._Part_3._Con 21/NYC_speaks_out_on_Iran_s_ spiracies..html protests.html “Which Direction is Iran Headed?” “In Context: Iran's Street Democracy,” http://rt.com/About_Us/Blogs/W http://rt.com/About_Us/Program ith_words_we_govern_men___D mes/in_context/2009-06- israeli/2009-06-20.html 22/484485.html
Table RT-2: Formatting of Agha-Soltan and Iran Coverage
Key: “News” - Straightforward news story, “Feature” - Feature/expository story, “Op-Ed” - Opinion Piece, “Interview” - Interview-based piece w/ two or more participants, “Photo Gallery” - Still-photo based collection of visual news, “User-generated news” - Content consisting exclusively of edited information received from social media, “Hybrid” - Multi-genre mixture with specific explanation noted, “Other” - Miscellaneous with specific explanation noted. http://rt.com/About_Us/Blogs/With_words_we_g Op-Ed overn_men___Disraeli/2009-06-20.html (Alexey Sazonov: Which direction is Iran headed?, June 20, 2009) http://rt.com/Top_News/2009-06- Interview 21/NYC_speaks_out_on_Iran_s_protests.html ('The Resident': NYC speaks out on Iran's protests, June 21, 2009) http://rt.com/About_Us/Programmes/in_context/2 Hybrid (Television newsmagazine with interview, feature elements) 009-06-22/484485.html (In Context: Iran's street democracy, June 22, 2009) http://rt.com/Politics/2009-06- News 24/How_Western_media_backs_the__green_revol ution__in_Iran.html (How Western media backs the 'Green
115 Revolution' in Iran, June 24, 2009) http://rt.com/Top_News/2009-06- Interview 28/Is_the_media_fair_on_Iran.html ('The Resident': Is the media fair on Iran?, June 28, 2009) http://rt.com/Politics/2009-08-05/iranian-patriots- Op-Ed ahmadinejad-labeled.html (Iranian patriots have always been labelled by the West, August 5, 2010)
Table RT-3: Framing of Agha-Soltan and Iran Coverage
Key: First column - “Pro” - Narrative overtly sympathetic to either Agha-Soltan, participants in the Iranian street events of June 2009, or both. “Neutral”- Narrative neutral to either Agha-Soltan, participants in the Iranian street events of June 2009, or both. “Against” - Narrative overtly hostile to either Agha-Soltan, participants in the Iranian street events of June 2009, or both. Second column – Representative keywords or key phrases from story used to make this determination. http://rt.com/About_Us/Blogs/W Against "Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has no choice but to defend the elections," "Will the government prove ith_words_we_govern_men___D to be as violent and oppressive as the Sheikh (sic) israeli/2009-06-20.html (Alexey who was overthrown by the infamous Iranian Revolution that defied Western ambitions in Sazonov: Which direction is Iran headed?, June Persia?" "Iran will collapse if protests turn into 20, 2009) violence" http://rt.com/Top_News/2009- Neutral “The Iranian government in turn says it faces not demonstrations, but riots," "clashes," "taken to the 06- streets," "Do you think they're crossing any lines, 21/NYC_speaks_out_on_Iran_s_ like showing that girl dying?" protests.html ('The Resident': NYC speaks out on Iran's protests, June 21, 2009) http://rt.com/About_Us/Program Pro "The Western world has never thought of Iran having a form of democracy," "In my humble mes/in_context/2009-06- opinion, Washington is hoping that Iran will fall 22/484485.html (In Context: Iran's street into chaos" democracy, June 22, 2009) http://rt.com/Politics/2009-06- Against "It was an election that was snatched from the Iranian people – or at least that's the impression 24/How_Western_media_backs_ being given by Western media outlets," "As the the__green_revolution__in_Iran. protests continue, some experts still believe there is interference from outside of Iran," "The real html (How Western media backs the 'Green story behind the media in Iran is that of Revolution' in Iran, June 24, 2009) instigating a 'green revolution'" http://rt.com/Top_News/2009- Neutral "The tension in the wake of Iran’s election," "(quoted) It's a shame. 16 years old (sic). Why do 06- they have to turn everything around like she was a 28/Is_the_media_fair_on_Iran.ht bad person or something?" ml ('The Resident': Is the media fair on Iran?, June 28, 2009) http://rt.com/Politics/2009-08- Against "Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s uncompromising policies are what makes the Western media 05/iranian-patriots-ahmadinejad- portray him in a negative way” labeled.html (Iranian patriots have always been labelled by the West, August 5, 2010)
116 Table RT-4: Sourcing of Agha-Soltan and Iran Coverage
Key: First column – Explicitly stated sources used for written/spoken narrative in each individual piece of content.. Second column – Sources and description of graphic/video imagery in each individual piece of content. http://rt.com/About_Us/Blogs/W No sources disclosed RT headshot of author ith_words_we_govern_men___D israeli/2009-06-20.html (Alexey Sazonov: Which direction is Iran headed?, June 20, 2009) http://rt.com/Top_News/2009- New Yorkers interviewed in Times Square AFP still photo of protests, footage of New Yorkers 06- 21/NYC_speaks_out_on_Iran_s_ protests.html ('The Resident': NYC speaks out on Iran's protests, June 21, 2009) http://rt.com/About_Us/Program Interview with Afshin Molavi of New America Unattributed footage of Tehran protests foundation, Iranian interior minister Sadeq mes/in_context/2009-06- Mahsouli cited 22/484485.html (In Context: Iran's street democracy, June 22, 2009) http://rt.com/Politics/2009-06- BBC cited, Voice of America cited, journalist AFP footage of Tehran protests Jalal Ghazi of Neew America Media, Paul Craig 24/How_Western_media_backs_ Roberts interview, Wayne Madsen interview the__green_revolution__in_Iran. html (How Western media backs the 'Green Revolution' in Iran, June 24, 2009) http://rt.com/Top_News/2009- New Yorkers interviewed in Times Square AFP footage of fires at Tehran protests 06- 28/Is_the_media_fair_on_Iran.ht ml ('The Resident': Is the media fair on Iran?, June 28, 2009) http://rt.com/Politics/2009-08- Kian Mokhtari interview Unattributed footage of Ahmadinejad 05/iranian-patriots-ahmadinejad- labeled.html (Iranian patriots have always been labelled by the West, August 5, 2010)
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121 רשימת נספחים
נספח ב'.ב'.ס.-א: סיפורים על איראן (news.bbc.co.uk/ב'.ב'.ס'.), 20 יוני 2009 – 22 יוני -2009 84 נספח ב'.ב'.ס.-ב: סיפורים על איראן עם נדה אגא-סולטן (news.bbc.co.uk/ב'.ב'.ס'.), 23 יוני 2009 – 22 ספטמבר 2009 – 85 נספח ב'.ב'.ס'-ג: פורמט של סיפורים על איראן ונדה אגא-סולטן (news.bbc.co.uk/ב'.ב'.ס'.) - 86 נספח ב'.ב'.ס'-ד: הפרשנוט של סיפורים על איראן ונדה אגא-סולטן (news.bbc.co.uk/ב'.ב'.ס'.) - 88 נספח ב'.ב'.ס'-ה: המקורות של סיפורים על איראן ונדה אגא-סולטן (news.bbc.co.uk/ב'.ב'.ס'.) - 92 נספח א'ג'-א: סיפורים על איראן (english.aljazeera.net/יוטוב), 20 יוני 2009 – 22 יוני -2009 95 נספח א'ג'-ב: סיפורים על איראן עם נדה אגא-סולן (english.aljazeera.net/יוטוב), 23 יוני 2009 – 22 ספטמבר 2009 – 96 נספח א'ג'-ג: פורמט של סיפורים על איראן ונדה אגא-סולטן (english.aljazeera.net/יוטוב) – 96 נספח א'ג'-ד: הפרשנוט של סיפורים על איראן ונדה אגא-סולטן (english.aljazeera.net/יוטוב) – 98 נספח א'ג'-ה: המקורות של סיפורים על איראן ונדה אגא-סולטן (english.aljazeera.net/יוטוב) – 100 נספח רט-א: סיפורים על איראן (rt.com/רט), 20 יוני 2009 – 22 יוני -2009 102 נספח רט-ב: פורמט של סיפורים על איראן ונדה אגא-סולטן (rt.com/רט) - 103 נספח רט-ג: הפרשנוט של סיפורים על איראן ונדה אגא-סולטן (rt.com/רט) – 103 נספח רט-ד: המקורות של סיפורים על איראן ונדה אגא-סולטן (rt.com/רט) - 105
6 תוכן העניינים
הקדמה – 3 המבוא – 5 המתודולוגיה – 15 הקודם ספרות – 19 ניתוח של ה-ב'.ב'.ס. - 41 ניתוח של אל ג'זירה אנגלית – 57 ניתוח של רט – 68 המסקנה – 75 הנספחים – 84 הביביליוגרפיה – 105
5 נגד הממשלה האיראנית". תוכנית אירוח נוספת המשודרת ברשת, תוכנית ביקורת התקשורת The Listening Post, שידרה קטע שהאשים את התקשורת המערבית ב"מוסר כפול" על רקע סיקורם המעריץ את אגה-סולטן – ולעומתו היעדר כמעט כל סיקור בנושא מרווא אל-שרביני ( Marwa el-Sherbini), האזרחית המצרית שנהרגה בהתקפה גזענית על בית-משפט גרמני.
הסיקור של אל ג'זירה הסתמך אמנם פחות מאשר זה של הבי.בי.סי. על קטעי וידאו שהעלו משתמשים לאינטרנט, אך גם שם ניכרה היקסמות מהטכנולוגיה החדישה. הסיפורים הנוגעים למותה של אגה-סולטן בשנת 2009 נוקטים בטון סימפתטי, אך ניכרת הרבה פחות אידאליזציה של דמותה מאשר בסיקור של הבי.בי.סי. ראיון עם כלת פרס נובל לשלום שירין עבאדי (Shirin Ebadi) מוכיח כי "הריגת נדה היתה 'בלתי חוקית'". אל ג'זירה ראיינה אף היא את מקאן; והשתמשה במסגור דומה לזה של הבי.בי.סי. עם זאת, "ארזה" את הראיון בהרבה פחות פורמאטים.
בהשוואה לכך, מתגלה סיקור רשת RT את מותה של אגה-סולטן כדליל ביותר, ספקני ואף עויין. אחד האזכורים היחידים למקרה אגה-סולטן התרחש בתוכנית ראיונות שנערכה בשכונת טיימס סקוור שבניו יורק, במסגרתה מופנות שאלות אל "האיש ברחוב". התוכנית הזכירה לצופים שתושבי ניו יורק חושבים ש"קל מדי לעבור את הקו המפריד בין מחאה למהומות". מהתבוננות בסיקור הערוץ את איראן באופן כללי עולה שהוא מתקרב לאיזורי תיאוריית הקונספירציה, כולל האשמת התקשורת המערבית בערעור השלטון באיראן ואזכור מתמיד של התפקיד המכריע שמילאו אמריקה ובריטניה בהפיכת השלטון באיראן בשנת 1953.
4 הצעיר, קיימת פחות כתיבה אקדמית על שתי הרשתות. עם זאת, אני בוחן את ספריהם של היו מיילס (Hugh Miles), מארק לינץ' (Mark Lynch), מוחמד אל-נאוואווי (-Mohammed Al Nawawy), סייב ואחרים, המנתחים את השידורים בערבית של אל ג'זירה. אני דן גם במחקריהם של ג'ון אוון (John Owen), טוני בורמן (Tony Burman) ואל-נאוואווי, המנתחים הסיקור האנגלי של אל ג'זירה, ובספרות המחקרית הענפה-פחות בנושא ערוץ RT, בכתיבתם של מחברי המרכז לדיפלומטיה ציבורית באוניברסיטת דרום קליפורניה ואחרים.
ההתבוננות בסיקור הבי.בי.סי את מות אגה-סולטן במסגרת ההקשר הרחב-יותר של ההפגנות האלימות שנערכו בטהראן מעלה נראטיב ארוך-טווח במסגרתו מתחלפים מאמצי הרשת הראשוניים למסגר את האירועים בסגנון "אירועי-1979-בשנת2009-" בעיסוק עיסוק ילדותי באפשרויות שמציע השימוש בקטעי וידאו שהעלו משתמשי-הרשת לצורך כיסוי אירוע חדשותי בקנה-מידה עולמי. אחרי שהממשלה האיראנית הורתה לעיתונאי הבי.בי.סי, ג'ון ליין (John Leyne), לעזוב את המדינה, החל הערוץ להסתמך יותר ויותר על קטעי וידאו שהעלו משתמשים לרשת לצורך סיקור האירועים בטהראן. ב72- השעות שאחרי מותה של אגה-סולטן, רוב הסיקור החדשותי של הירי מטעם הערוץ הגיע כחבילה יחד עם ראיון מתורגם עם ארוסה, כספיאן מקאן ( Caspian Makan), ששודר לראשונה בערוץ בי.בי.סי בפרסית. בימי בראשית הללו, תוארה אגה- סולטן כסמל להתאכזרות השלטון האיראני כלפי מפגינים צעירים ואידיאליסטיים.
במהלך שאר שנת 2009, שידרה הרשת סיקור מתמשך נרחב של מותה של אגה-סולטן. הסיפורים הללו קושרו הן למבזקי חדשות רלוונטיים – כגון טקס הארבעים למותה – והן לפיצ'רים רטרוספקטיביים. ראיון שנערך עם אראש חג'אזי (Arash Hejazi), הרופא שטיפל באגה-סולטן אחרי הירי, זכה לשלל "אריזות" ומסגורים. אני מנתח את הפורמאטים השונים של ראיון זה, כמו גם של סרט תיעודי בנושא אגה-סולטן ששודר באינטרנט ושל מספר ראיונות עם כמה דמויות אחרות, ובהן רוסטאמי מוטלאר (Rostami Motlagh), אמה של נדה אגה-סולטן. ההתבוננות בתקופת-זמן זו חושפת דגם עקבי, לפיו הבי.בי.סי שואף באופן אקטיבי למסגר את מותה של אגה-סולטן באופן "מרטירי", וזאת בצורה ההופכת אותה לסמל הדמוקראטיה האיראנית. הן הראיון עם חג'אזי והן הראיון עם מוטלאר מדגישים את המחיר שתבע מות אגה- סולטן מהסובבים אותה: במקרה של חג'אזי – גלות מאיראן והתנכלות-לכאורה מצד השלטונות; ובמקרה של מוטלאר – חוסר היכולת להתאבל כראוי על מות בתה.
סיקור דומה שודר גם באל ג'זירה. עם זאת, נשאר הערוץ נאמן לאופן בו הוא רואה את ייעודו- העצמי: "קולו של הדרום הגלובאלי". תיאורה של אגה-סולטן בערוץ זה היה לא פחות סימפתטי מאשר בבי.בי.סי, אך הבדל ניכר הוא שהיא ממוסגרת פעמים רבות בהקשר פאן-מוסלמי. במהלך אחת השיחות בתוכנית האירוח של ריז קאהן (The Riz Kahn Show), השתמשו מספר מאזינים וכותבי אימייל בסיפור מותה של אגה-סולטן ככלי להאשמת העולם המוסלמי בכך שזנח את איראן ולניגוח "מוכנות התקשורת והפוליטיקאים המערביים לקבל כל ביקורת המופצת בטוויטר
3 בלתי-חד-משמעית הנוגדת שידור ייצוגי אלימות.
הפרק בנושא "הספרות הקיימת" בוחן מחקרים קודמים בנושאי הבי.בי.סי, ערוץ אל ג'זירה אנגלית (ועמו ערוץ-האם בשפה הערבית) ו-RT/Russia Today, בנוסף למחקרים אקדמיים הנוגעים לתקדימים למותה של אגה-סולטן. הפרק עושה שימוש נרחב במחקריו של פיליפ סייב ( Philip Seib), מנהל המרכז לדיפלומטיה ציבורית באוניברסיטת דרום קליפורניה, שכתב בהרחבה אודות אל ג'זירה ואודות מסגורם-מחדש של חומרים מתקשורת ההמונים באינטרנט. תולדות ביקורת הסיקור הזר במזרח התיכון מאוזכרת בקצרה, ותשומת-לב מיוחדת מוענקת לכתיבתו של אדוארד סעיד ולתמורות שחלו בסיקור המזרח בתיכון לפני עידן האינטרנט ובמהלכו.
תקדימים אפשריים לסיקור מותה של אגה-סולטן – ולקטעי הווידאו עצמם – מופיעים במגוון מחקרים, ובהם מחקרו של הל גרדנר (Hall Gardner) בנושא השפעת רדיו הטרנזיסטור הנישא על סיקור אירועי כיכר טיין-אן-מן בשנת 1989; הטקסטים של אדריאן ראסל בנוגע להשפעות המדיה החדשה על סיקור המהומות בפרברי פריז בשנת 2006; ניתוחו של מארק דז (Mark Deuze) את תפקיד הטלפונים הסלולאריים בעלי יכולות צילום הוידאו בהפיכת "מתבוננים" ל"יצרנים"; ומחקרים נוספים אחרים בנושא תפקיד המדיה החברתית ותוכן-המשתמשים בסיקור הפלישה לעיראק בשנת 2003.
בשלב זה מוזכרים גם מחקרים בני-זמננו בנושאי השפעת נושאי המגדר, היופי, הנשיות והפמיניזם על סיקור התקשורת את מות אגה-סולטן. סיקור הבי.בי.סי, אל ג'זירה אנגלית ו-RT אמנם מעולם לא הגיע לרמת גסותו של אותו העיתון הבריטי שכינה את אגה-סולטן "המלאך מאיראן"; אבל בחרתי בכל זאת לבחון את כתיבתם של מחברים כגון פגי דרקסלר (Peggy Drexler) וגולברג באשי (Golbarg Bashi), בנסיון לבחון את השאלה המורכבת, כיצד השפיע מגדרה של אגה-סולטן על סיקור מותה.
כמו-כן אני מסכם את ההיסטוריה העשירה של המחקר בנושא הבי.בי.סי. בשנים האחרונות התפרסמו מחקרים רבים בנושא אגפי איסוף החדשות, המולטימדיה והדיפלומטיה של הערוץ. סייב ומוחמד עייש (Mohammed Ayish) חקרו, למשל, את יחסי הערוץ עם האיזור במסגרת שירותיו השונים בערבית ובפרסית ושידוריו בשפה האנגלית. אני מתייחס גם למחקרו הסמכותי של פיליפ שלזינגר (Philip Schlesinger) ולמחקרי אחרים בנושא פעולותיו הפנימיות של הערוץ. מוזכרים גם מחקרים פנימיים של הבי.בי.סי. עצמו בנוגע לשימוש במדיה החברתית בתוך רשת השידור. לבסוף, אני עורך סקירה כללית של ההאשמות בסיקור מוטה שהופנו נגד הערוץ – ושל יישומן האפשרי לסיקור הערוץ את מות אגה-סולטן.
אני מסכם גם את הכתיבה האקדמית הקיימת בנושא אל ג'זריה אנגלית ו-RT. מטבע גילן
2 תקציר
תזה זו בוחנת את הכיסוי התקשורתי העולמי של מותה של נדה אגה-סולטן (-Neda Agha Soltan), האזרחית האיראנית בת ה26- שנורתה למוות בטהרן במהלך ההפגנות שנערכו שם אחרי הבחירות בשנת 2009. לפחות שני צלמים תיעדו את מותה, צילומיהם שודרו בחדשות הטלוויזיה בכל רחבי העולם, והירי הפך לאחד הדימויים המזוהים ביותר עם ההפגנות. התקשורת הבינלאומית באיראן הסתמכה רבות על תוכן-המשתמשים שהעלו המתבוננים באירועים לרשת. השימוש בחומרים אלה הפך לצורת סיקור נוחה עבור גופי תקשורת אלה, בייחוד כאשר כמה מעובדיהם גורשו מאיראן. זמינותם הרבה של טלפונים סלולאריים בעלי יכולות צילום וידאו התגלמה במבול צילומי וידאו של ההפגנות והעצרות, שחלקן הידרדרו לאלימות קשה.
נטלתי סיקור ספציפי משלוש רשתות שידור: הבי.בי.סי, אל ג'זירה אנגלית ו-RT ) Russia Today), ערוץ חדשות בינלאומי בשפה האנגלית במימון ממשלת רוסיה. התזה מתרכזת בסיקור החדשות האינטרנטי של שלוש הרשתות – בנושא אגה-סולטן בפרט והאירועים באיראן בכלל. הסיקור כולל טקסטים, קטעי וידאו ואודיו המוזרמים באתריהן וצילומי טלוויזיה ששודרו גם באתר יוטיוב (Youtube). מסגרת הזמן לניתוח הסיקור בתזה זו: מה20- ביוני, 2009 (מועד מותה של אגה-סולטן) ועד ה31- בדצמבר , 2009. מסגרת-זמן זו מחולקת לשלוש תת-תקופות: ה20- ביוני עד ה22- ביוני (הסיקור הראשוני של מות אגה-סולטן); ה23- ביוני עד ה22- בספטמבר (סיקור נרחב, אירועים נוספים וניתוח חדשותי בששת החודשים שאחרי מות אגה-סולטן); וה23- בספטמבר עד ה31- בדצמבר (חדשות כלליות בשנת 2009 וסיכומי סוף השנה).
התזה פותחת בשחזור מותה של אגה-סולטן, בתאריך ה20- ביוני, 2009, וזאת לפי שני קטעי וידאו ("קטע א'" ו"קטע ב'") המתעדים את רגעיה האחרונים. בשני הקטעים ניתן אמנם לראות צלמים רבים, אך מדובר בשני הקטעים היחידים שהועלו לאינטרנט עד היום. תיאור מותה של אגה-סולטן מגובה בשחזור המידע הכלול בשלושה קטעי וידאו נוספים שהועלו על-ידי משתמשים לרשת, והמתעדים את הימצאותה-לכאורה בטהרן באותו היום. הן בקטעי "המוות" והן בשלושת קטעי הוידאו מטהרן, מופיעה אגה-סולטן בחברת מורה למוסיקה, חאמיד פאנאהי (Hamid .(Panahi
המבוא ממשיך בהסבר שילוב הגורמים הייחודי שהוביל להפקת קטעי וידאו רבים כל-כך בטהרן ביוני 2009: זמינותם הרבה של טלפונים סלולאריים בעלי יכולות צילום וידאו, השימוש באתרי רישות חברתי מסוג טוויטר (Twitter), פייסבוק (Facebook) ויוטיוב, והיחסים בין אזרחי איראן לחברי הפזורה האיראנית. התזה מנסה למקם את הפצת קטעי הווידאו של אגה-סולטן לאורך ציר-זמן; ולהסביר את אחד ההיבטים המסבכים את הסיפור: העובדה שכמה קטעי וידאו ראשוניים על אגה-סולטן נמחקו מאתר יוטיוב (וזאת כחלק ממחיקתם של רוב קטעי הווידאו שסיקרו את האירועים האלימים ביוני 2009), אתר שניסח בעת מותה של אגה-סולטן מדיניות
1 אוניברסיטת בן גוריון בנגב - הפקולטה למדעי הרוח והחברה המחלקה ללימודי המזרח התיכון
ניתוח תיאורים של מות אגא-סולטאן ומהומות הבחירות באיראן באמצעות של טקסטים חדשותיים באנגלית, שמממונים בידי המדינה
חיבור זה מהווה חלק מהדרישות לקבלת התואר "מוסמך למדעי הרוח (M.A) "והחברה
מאת: ניל אונגרלידר בהנחיית: ד"ר חגי רם בהנחיית: ד"ר טל סמואל-עזרן
חתימת הסטודנט: ______תאריך:______חתימת המנחה: ______תאריך:______חתימת המנחה: ______תאריך:______חתימת יו"ר הועדה המחלקתית: ______תאריך:______
123 אוניברסיטת בן- גוריון בנגב הפקולטה למדעי הרוח והחברה המחלקה ללימודי המזרח התיכון
ניתוח תיאורים של מות אגא-סולטאן ומהומות הבחירות באיראן באמצעות של טקסטים חדשותיים באנגלית, שמממונים בידי המדינה
חיבור זה מהווה חלק מהדרישות לקבלת התואר "מוסמך למדעי הרוח (M.A) "והחברה
מאת: ניל אונגרלידר בהנחיית: ד"ר חגי רם בהנחיית: ד"ר טל סמואל-עזרן
תשרי 5771 ספטמבר 2010
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