Fouda to make 'Al-Jazeera' better than 'CNN'
Yogita Tahilramani, The Jakarta Post, London
From the war in Afghanistan, the U.S. has learned that winning the information battle can sometimes be more important than securing a military victory. Yosri Fouda -- Al-Jazeera's London bureau chief and award-winning journalist -- reveals the secret of his success, including his exclusive interview with two of the masterminds of the Sept. 11 attacks on the U.S. and his current interview with Iraqi President Saddam Hussein.
Question: Has Saddam Hussein's claim that he has no weapons of mass destruction acted as a catalyst for the build-up of a possible war against Iraq?
Answer: There is a much stronger, more real build-up today, militarily and media-wise. This build-up is done so with the pretension that no matter what comes out of the (12,000-page) report to the UN or from the UN inspections in Iraq, it (the war) is going to happen. There is a build-up to provoke pressure so that the Iraqi government can perhaps give more concessions regarding the real interests of the U.S. government.
This is, if anything, more about going to war against Saddam than Iraq. It's about toppling him. Behind all the smoke and the headlines, there are strategic interests that the U.S. government has, more than just human rights issues. Interests like the new American vision of the Middle East. In fact, the remaking of the Middle East. There is the matter of oil, and Israel.
Would previous U.S. administrations have carried out matters differently in terms of launching a possible war against Iraq?
In comparison to previous U.S. administrations, the current one is a little bit more hawkish and more non-compromising, particularly after the Sept. 11 attacks. It comes down to the extreme right-wingers within the U.S. administration, because the way it looks now, Iraq is really feeling the heat. I believe that everything should be down to the UN inspectors to decide, otherwise there would be every way of trying to find a pretext to launch a war.
Again, this war, when launched, will have nothing to do with the misconception that George Bush Sr. failed to invade Iraq during the Gulf War. It's got to do with the U.S.'s strategic interests. If at that time they had wanted to take over Iraq, they would have done so. It's no secret that when the Shia Muslim leaders in the south rebelled against Saddam in the days following the Gulf War, it was the Americans who allowed Saddam to use their helicopters to suppress (the rebellion).
In 1991, the Shia Muslim leaders were in fact encouraged by the U.S. to rebel but then were abandoned in the end. If it (the U.S.) really wanted to go all the way, it would have done so. It would come as no surprise to anyone if the U.S. once again tries to woo tribal leaders away from Saddam.
If a war against Iraq is launched, where does Al-Jazeera see itself in the ensuing media war?
We have beaten CNN and the rest of the world during two wars: Desert Fox in Iraq and during the Afghanistan war. We are not an anti-American network that aims to increase animosity toward the U.S. by broadcasting audiotapes of Osama bin Laden. You don't expect him to give them to CNN or an Arab government channel, do you? He gave it to us and we aired them.
In order to communicate better with the Arab people, particularly about what America wants and thinks, every politician I imagine would try to use the Al-Jazeera satellite network. Even though Al-Jazeera was initially founded and financed by the emir of Qatar, the network commits itself to presenting opposing news.
Al-Jazeera, by airing opposing views, has attracted anger from Islamic militants as well. You, for instance, did clandestine interviews with Khalid Sheik Mohammed and Ramzi Binalshibh, two alleged masterminds of the Sept. 11 attacks. Two days after your report, Binalshibh was captured in Pakistan and an Islamic militant website indicated that the capture was the result of treason. Are you not afraid for your life?
I took a calculated risk and I somehow knew that even though I wrote the story, nothing would happen to me. I had not gone looking for them, you see. They contacted me and asked me whether I would be doing anything special for the one-year anniversary of the attacks. When I said no, they asked me if I would be interested in exclusive interviews about the attacks.
They gave me elaborate instructions. I went first to Islamabad, Pakistan, and from there they wanted me to go down to Karachi. I was moved from one car to another, one intermediary to another, until I found myself blindfolded in an apartment where Ramzi and Khalid Sheik were waiting for me.
They told me that bin Laden had picked me for the interviews. They told me that their initial plans were to attack at least a couple of nuclear installations, but that they abandoned this idea, fearing that it would get out of control.
I knew for several reasons that they would not kill me. First, what kind of points would they be scoring by killing a fellow Muslim and how would they justify this to their sympathizers. Second, they wanted me to write the story. They wanted it known that they did it.
Al-Qaeda, I believe, contacted me to prove that the group is still functioning and able to communicate with the outside world.
U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell met with the emir of Qatar, Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al-Thani, and asked him to restrain Al-Jazeera, citing specifically the channel's rebroadcast of an 1998 bin Laden interview and charging that the station gave airtime to anti-American guests. Despite all of this, CNN and news executives from around the world started pouring in to secure a working relationship with Al-Jazeera. How did all this come about?
This was during the time in Afghanistan, and we were the only station in Afghanistan. CNN realized this and they came to us, and deals were struck for footage and resource-sharing. They are using our correspondents in the south of Afghanistan and we use their correspondents in northern Afghanistan. CNN also has access to key locations like Kabul through the Al-Jazeera correspondent there.