20 March 2007
Arab Media Watch endorses today's 24-hour strike by the Palestinian journalists' union in protest against the abduction on March 12 of BBC Gaza correspondent Alan Johnston, as well as yesterday's sit-in in Ramallah by Palestinian and foreign journalists.
AMW also backs yesterday' appeal by the BBC for his release, and has responded to yesterday's call by international media watchdog Reporters Without Borders and posted a banner on our homepage demanding that he be freed.
AMW welcomes the Palestinian unity government's repeated condemnations of the abduction, in particular Information Minister Mustafa Barghuti's description of it yesterday as an "unacceptable criminal act."
AMW also echoes the words of Johnston's father. "Holding Alan is not doing the Palestinian people any favours, quite the opposite. It's no way to treat a friend of the Palestinian people," he said yesterday.
"While AMW condemns all forms of attacks, harassment and censorship of the media, the particular absurdity of this abduction is that Alan, as one of the few Western journalists still based in the Gaza Strip, has brought much-needed attention to the deteriorating situation in the territory over the past three years, and provided valuable and insightful perspectives that are often lacking among other media outlets," said AMW chairman Sharif Hikmat Nashashibi.
"AMW has consistently made the case that there are nowhere near enough correspondents based in the occupied Palestinian territories, and that this hampers the depth and objectivity of coverage. Alan's reports often have a qualitative edge because he is based at the heart of the conflict he is covering, rather than the relative comfort, safety and detachment of Israel," Nashashibi added.
"As such, his abduction severely hinders our efforts at promoting greater, more in-depth and balanced coverage of the plight of the Palestinian people, whose interests his kidnappers are actively harming. Our thoughts and prayers are with him and his family, we hope he is being treated well, and we demand his immediate and unconditional release."