ME Pol Newspaper Assn 2 2005

POLS 272 - MIDDLE EAST POLITICS, SPRING 2005

Newspaper Assignment Round 2

Dailies

The Daily Star - Lebanon www.dailystar.com/lb

Ha'aretz - Israel www.haaretzdaily.com

Non-Dailies

Al-Ahram Weekly - Egypt www.ahram.org.eg/weekly

Palestine Report (monthly; limited free access) www.palestinereport.org

Only about half of the articles on the Palestine Report website are available to non-subscribers. The "Weekly Picks" category on the left-hand side of the home page, and the articles in "Issues in the News" are generally free to non-subscribers. "Issues in the News" is a collection of feature articles written over the last several months; for the purposes of this assignment only use articles in this section that are written during the period between March 14 and April 21.

Assignments

You will read your papers for 26 days between M Mar 14 and W Apr 13. Your paper is due in class Th Apr 21. By the end of the 26 days you should have read somewhere between eighty and 100 articles; you don't have to read your papers every day, but you should do so at least four days a week. (Note: several of these newspapers do not keep back copies of the paper on their site, so don't expect to go to the papers' websites a week before your paper is due and download all the back issues to read all at once; you won't find them.) Editorials should account for at least half of your reading; editorial cartoons should be included in your analysis where relevant. Several of these papers carry both editorials written by Arab authors living in the Middle East and editorials written contributed by Western authors; you should focus almost exclusively on editorials written by Arab authors living in the region (editorials written by writers from outside the region will have a paragraph at the end of the editorial saying where the writer is from or what Western newspaper the article is reprinted from).

In making your arguments in your paper you need to refer specifically to as many articles as you can, citing the article’s name, newspaper and date either in parentheses within the text or as footnotes/endnotes. Similarly, since you won't be able to go back and find the articles later on the sites, you should print out articles that you read so that you can refer back to them as specifically as possible when writing your paper; you MUST include copies of any articles that you specifically cite in your paper with your paper when you hand it in.

Papers will lose 5 points (1/2 grade) per late day unless your dean provides proof of exceptional circumstances which have prevented you from turning the paper in on time. Anything more than a very small number of spelling and/or grammatical errors will result in points being deducted from your final grade, so proofread carefully.

A) Ha'aretz, al-Ahram Weekly, and Palestine Report - three students

1) What are the key points of difference between the Palestinian, Egyptian, and Israeli papers in their coverage of Palestinian/Israeli or Arab/Israeli affairs? Do they cover the same events as news items? Do there seem to be unspoken assumptions/presumptions which underlie the coverage and editorials in each paper? What are they?

2) Part of the Oslo process which was supposed to bring a final peace accord between Palestinians and Israelis was the creation of the Palestinian Authority (PA), a governing entity for those areas of the West Bank and Gaza from which the Israelis withdrew. This PA had two parts - a presidency, initially held by Yasser Arafat, and a parliament called the Palestine Legislative Council (PLC); elections for both were held in January 1996. Arafat prevented the PLC from having real power and held almost all power for himself; the re-occupation of most of the West Bank and Gaza after 2001 meant that the PA had very little control over anything in any case. More room for political participation now seems to be opening up: Palestinians have elected a new president who may share more power with the parliament, last week members of parliament refused to accept the prime minister's attempt to create a cabinet full of Arafat supporters presumed to be corrupt, and municipal elections were held which were won overwhelmingly by Hamas. What are the major developments in internal Palestinian politics right now; do things seem to be moving in the direction of more democracy? (Some of the answers to this question may come from the "Palestinian Politics" articles in The Jerusalem Report's "Issues in the News" section.)

B) Ha'aretz, al-Ahram Weekly, and Palestine Report - three students

2) One of the key issues in Palestinian-Israeli affairs over the next several months will be whether, and how, the removal of settlers from some settlements in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank proceeds. Most settlers in the Gaza Strip, many of whom moved to their settlements because they believe Gaza is part of the Biblical land of Israel and that their religion commands Jews to settle there, are strongly opposed to this removal plan. How are settlers responding to the planned removal, and what power do they and opponents of the removal have in the Israeli political system (obviously, Ha'aretz will be the major source here).

C) Ha'aretz, al-Ahram Weekly, and Palestine Report - three students

2) For the last two decades the Egyptian political system has been dominated by a president who ran for election (and re-election) in a referendum in which people could only vote yes or no for him, with no other candidate allowed to run. This weekend President Mubarak announced that this year's presidential elections will allow several candidates to run. However, the last two months have been marked by increasing state violence against people calling for truly free and competitive presidential elections, particularly as represented by the arrest of Ayman Nour, the head of an opposition party who had been especially outspoken about the need for competitive elections. What are the major developments in democratization in Egypt this month, including in the upcoming presidential elections. Does it appear that these elections will be truly competitive, and how are Egyptians calling for more democracy being treated by the regime?

D) Ha'aretz and The Daily Star - three students

1) What are the key points of difference between the Israeli and the Lebanese papers in their coverage of Palestinian/Israeli or Arab/Israeli affairs? Do they cover the same events as news items? Do there seem to be unspoken assumptions/presumptions which underlie the coverage and editorials in each paper? What are they?

2) As we've noted in class, Lebanon has the freest political institutions in the Arab world, and would be considered a democracy were it not for Syria's external control of Lebanese politics. In the aftermath of the assassination of Rafik Hariri, a critic of Syria's involvement in Lebanon, there have been huge demonstrations calling for Syria to leave Lebanon. Does it appear that Syria will do this, and that there will be more room for the Lebanese to control their own political affairs? What role has Hizbullah, the Islamist political party which holds seats in parliament, been playing in Lebanese politics more generally?