Celebrations of the September 11, 2001 attacks
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The September 11, 2001 attacks occasioned small [1] outbreaks of public celebration in some Arab communities in and around the Palestinian territories. In response the Palestinian leadership and Muslim groups, including many from the USA, vocally distanced themselves from such behavior and also condemned it.[2]
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[edit] World reaction
Official reaction was almost universal in condemning the attacks, including from countries considered hostile to the U.S. such as Libya, North Korea and Syria.[3] In Iran for example thousands participated in candlelit vigils, while a minute's silence was held at Tehran's football stadium.[4] The sole exception was Iraq, which said of the attacks that "The American cowboys are reaping the fruit of their crimes against humanity."[5] Saddam Hussein would later offer sympathy to the Americans killed in the attacks.[6]
[edit] Reports
Reports and images of Palestinians from East Jerusalem and the West Bank taking to the streets in jubilation, chanting 'Allāhu Akbar' (God is (the) greatest), passing along sweets, honking car horns, holding up the V sign for victory and holding up Palestinian flags were broadcast around the world. In addition, many newspapers, magazines, Web sites and wire services ran photographs of the festivities.[7][8]
On the day of the attacks, The Times (British) and Fox News (American) reported that 3,000 celebrants were pouring into the streets of Nablus and dozens of people were celebrating in the traditional gesture of handing out sweets. The Times notes that in traditionally Arab East Jerusalem, there was a smaller gathering of about two dozen people.[9] FOX News adds that in Ein el-Hilweh (Lebanon), where about 75,000 Palestinians live, and also in Rashidiyeh camp south of Tyre, revelers fired weapons in the air.[10]
The Times also quoted Nawal Abdel Fatah, a Palestinian woman (age 48) saying she was happy because "America is the head of the snake, America always stands by Israel in its war against us". Her daughter Maysoon (age 22), expressed hopes that the next attack would be against Tel Aviv.[9]
[edit] Palestinian reactions
The Palestinian Authority, which had immediately condemned the September 11th attacks, moved to censor further reports of public celebrations, with Palestinian information minister Yasser Abed Rabbo stating that "a few kids" were unrepresentative of the Palestinian people.
Palestinian police were reportedly trying to prevent demonstrations of joy, with limited success with the Jerusalem Post reporting that Palestinians forcibly confined foreign journalists to a Nablus hotel on September 11 evening, guarded by armed Palestinians while festivities took place in the streets outside.[12]
As a result AP decided not to release a tape reportedly showing Palestinian policemen celebrating and shooting into the air, in addition to civilians dancing.[citation needed] AP and Reuters followed by limiting their coverage to a small number of still pictures and videotapes[citation needed] with Rahman's statement prompting a formal protest from the AP bureau chief, Dan Perry.[13][8]
The Palestinian media promptly condemned the celebrations that were televised around the world as unrepresentative of mainstream Palestinian public opinion, suggesting that the imagery was being exploited to vilify the Palestinian people. The lead editorial in Al-Hayat Al-Jadida (PA official paper), for example, wrote:
Those ignorant few who did that [celebrate] do not represent our public opinion. In fact, such ignorant behavior might have happened in other parts of the world, but unfortunately the cameras did not reach them..." [14]
This opinion was joined by Hanan Ashrawi, who condemned the attacks as an "unconscionable... blow to humanity as a whole."[5] Ashrawi characterized the attacks as "evil": "We feel your pain, we feel your sorrow, we will do everything we can to help".[5]
In the week after the attacks, Yasser Arafat appeared on television, purportedly donating blood in a symbolic gesture, to the victims of the attacks,[15] Arafat's gesture was criticized by The Weekly Standard as staged and insincere.[16]
Hamas leader Sheikh Ahmed Yassin asserted that the attacks were "a result of injustice the U.S practices against the weak".[5]
[edit] Authenticity
[edit] Rebroadcast footage
There was an urban legend that the footage of some Palestinians celebrating the attacks was stock footage of Palestinian reactions to the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait, a decade prior to 2001.[17] This rumor was proven false shortly afterwards,[18] and CNN issued a statement to that effect.[19]
[edit] Germany's Panorama
Annette Krüger Spitta of ARD's (German public broadcasting) TV magazine Panorama claimed that while the footage was indeed correctly dated, reporters may have partly staged one of the scenes and that viewers should keep some distance from what is spread by journalists on images of conflict. The German weekly Der Spiegel repeated this news report and noted about the mistaken circulation that the footage was from 1991.[17]
The Panorama report from September 20, 2001 has Medium Professor Martin Löffelholz explaining that in the images you see jubilant Palestinian children and several adults but it is impossible to know if they are necessarily pleased about the attack reports; and he does not assume this and ignores the way it has been reported.
Krüger Spitta notes that inspection of the untelecasted complete tape shows the street around the celebration is quiet and a man in a white T-shirt is noticeable for inciting the children and is fetching new people again and again. The woman who is remembered for her cheering (Nowel Abdel Fatah) stated afterwards that she was offered cake if she celebrates on camera, and that she was frightened when she saw the pictures on television and that she never expected it would be noticed to the USA.
Krüger Spitta expresses that it is impossible to know if these images -- which were wildly sent worldwide under the title: Palestinians celebrate in Jerusalem -- are truth or a production and that, as Professor Löffelholz says, in crises and war situations due caution should be observed when relying upon journalists who sometimes make errors.[20]
[edit] References
- ^ Palestinians Cool To Embrace From Al-Qaida Leader, Palestinians Ambivalent About Embrace From Al-Qaida's Leader, Fearing Taint To Their Cause - CBS News
- ^ 'Statements regarding the tragedy of September 11th' by Study of Islam section at American Academy of Religion
- ^ September 11 News.com - International Reaction - The 09-11-2001 Attacks on the USA With Archived News, Images, Photos, & Newspapers from the September 11, 2001 Terrorist Attacks on New York City & the Pentagon
- ^ BBC NEWS | World | Middle East | Iran's gulf of misunderstanding with US
- ^ a b c d CNN.com - Attacks draw mixed response in Mideast - September 12, 2001
- ^ Saddam Hussein emails American citizen | World news | The Guardian
- ^ BBC: In pictures: Atrocities' aftermath
- ^ a b 'Palestinian Officials Quash Pictures of Arab Celebrations' by Catherine Donaldson-Evans (FOX News)
- ^ a b 'Attacks celebrated in West Bank' by The Times (freedomdomain.com mirror), Access date: 1 April 2008.
- ^ 'Arafat Horrified by Attacks, but Thousands of Palestinians Celebrate; Rest of World Outraged' (FOX News)
- ^ 'Palestinian Authority celebrates 9-11 terror attacks' by Itamar Marcus and Barbara Crook (PMW)
- ^ 'Reporters group protests interference at anti-US rallies' By Arieh O´Sullivan, JERUSALEM POST October 10, 2001
- ^ 'Palestinians Suppress Coverage of Crowds Celebrating Attacks' by Lee Hockstader (Washington Post)
- ^ Hafiz Barghouti, “Palestinians and Americans share the same grief,” Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, September 13, 2001.
- ^ 'Analysis: Arafat's changed world' by James Reynolds (BBC)
- ^ Scott W. Johnson (2008-02-04). "He Didn't Give at the Office". Weekly Standard 13 (20).
- ^ a b 'The power of the TV-pictures, What is the truth?' by by Lisa Erdmann (Der Spiegel) (Google Translated), (translation original) - (source article)(German)
- ^ 'Claim: CNN used old footage to fake images. Status: False.' (Snopes.com)
- ^ CNN statement about false claim it used old video, CNN.
- ^ 'Pictures, reports, embarrassment - the media and the disaster' by Annette Krüger Spitta for Panorama (ARD, Germany) (Babelfish translated), (Google translated), (source article)(German)
