Interesting piece on how the failure of state TV - in this case in Egypt - to cover big but sensitive things like the Taba bombing drives Arabs to the satellite stations (al Jazeera and al Arabiya, or even CNN... never al Hurra) to find out what's going on. This is an old story, but of continuing importance.
Here's some of the story:
""I couldn't believe what I was seeing," said Hossam El- Garahi, a stock exchange analyst. Having learned of the incident from the satellite channel, Al-Arabiya, El-Garahi kept flipping back to Egyptian TV, determined to find out more about what was going on in Taba. "All the channels had the regular stuff going on -- a play here, a video clip there -- it was like this thing wasn't happening in Egypt."
"Millions of other people couldn't believe their eyes as they watched their TV screens late Thursday night. It wasn't just the horrific images emerging from Taba that astounded them, but the seeming oblivion to those events being demonstrated by their local channels.
"On channel 1, a play continued without interruption. On channel 2, a video clip. Channel 3 was airing an interview, as was channel 4, and so on.
"Finally, said a flustered and angry El-Garahi, a news ticker appeared that indicated that an explosion, which might have been caused by a gas leak, had occurred in Taba. "That useless ticker remained unchanged for the next several hours," he said.
"Viewers hungry for information relied more on channels like Al-Jazeera and Al-Arabiya (or CNN, as in El-Garahi's case) that were basically blanketing their coverage with news from Taba, albeit with an annoying lack of new details. In fact, most of that first coverage was basically a continuous reel of an Israeli ambulance leaving the scene, and a wounded blond woman on a stretcher.
"Those images mainly served to further confound Egyptian viewers, who began wondering what Israeli rescue crews were doing in Egypt. Would state-owned and run Egyptian TV help explain the situation, or at least provide an official spin to the surreal goings on? Not for a while yet. As for those who didn't have satellite TV, they were still under the impression that the whole thing might just be a gas leak.
"For many, the "farce" of Thursday's coverage was just more of the same. They had gotten used to getting their news from anywhere but here.
There's a lot more in the article, so go read it if you're interested.
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