September 11, 2001 – a cutting point on the war against terrorism. The whole world was shocked to see a Boeing-767 ramming the second tower live on TV. Three hijacked airplanes hit the US on that day. Within hours, Islamic group Al-Qaeda, was blamed for the tragedy which killed more than 3,000 innocent people. The media frenzy continued for weeks and the search for the real attackers is still on-going. Months later, Afghanistan was attacked by the US and its allies in their counter terrorism efforts. Ironically, only the Muslims are to be blamed for everything that has happened over the years. The same goes for Communism. I remember when we, the school kids, were at a very young age, we were told about the ugly things about Communist. We were told that they, the communists, would harm us, and our family. They would burn down houses, kill people, and destroy crops and other amenities.

The 13th May 1969 tragedy, and the height of the Vietnam War, strengthened those notions. In one incident in 1972, in my school in Sabah, rumours spread fast that the ‘Communists’ would be coming to school during recess time and conduct medical check-ups, which include an injection into the eyes! Fearing for our safety, almost half of the school ran back home before recess time! Over the years, my perception towards Communism took an about turn. I ask myself; why did we hate or scared of the Communist so much? It looked Islamic to me. Its ideology calls for equality, classless society. Everybody gets the same thing, wears the same cloth, eats the same food, stays in the same ‘standard’ of houses. Everything is the same. What’s wrong with that? Then I realized that the very reason for these ‘scary movie’ perception was the so called capitalist’s way of ensuring that they would get what ever they want in this world.

The capitalists, the ‘champion’ for democracy, advocators for ‘free trade‘ and ‘openness’ are the real culprit in this ‘havoc’. All they want is just to ensure the ‘gate’ is opened for them. If Communism prevailed, their chances of securing the power and wealth won’t be realised. They don’t care about us in the ‘Third World’. All they want is our wealth. To ensure that they control and enjoy the available wealth, the western media, owned and controlled by the capitalists, would constantly hype the weaknesses of Communism. Constant ‘bad image’ portrayal of the Socialist / Communists had been embedded in the minds of the people through the media.

Cuban President, Fidel Castro, one of the longest reigning leaders in the world, had been in power since 1959, following the Cuban revolution and the overthrowing of the dictatorship of Fulgencio Batista. A believer of Marxist-Leninist ideology, Castro had been sending anti-American messages to the Cuban masses since his involvements with radical groups in his university. Once in power, the sentiments continued and the Americans, in retaliation, used the media to portray Castro as an evil dictator. Fontaine (1988, p.18-19) describe Castro as a ‘bastard’, an illegitimate son of a rich landowner. By implying Castro as such, would give an indication to readers that the President was, from the very beginning, as ‘dirty’ as he is today.

Almost every US President, from Truman until now, would always have something bad to say about Castro. Dorril (2004, p.108) stated that US President John F. Kennedy, had used satellite picture through the press, to show the world that Cuba indeed had nuclear firearm during the Cuban Missile Crisis. Castro stood firm against media attack and even coined the term ‘Media Terrorism’ on the 1st of June, 2002 in one of his many fiery speeches in Cuba, for the many manipulation of the media, ‘the terrorist’. against him. . In fact, personally, whoever has the nerve to defy the US, will always be my Hero. Castro was actually concerned with the well-being of his people. Marshall (1987, p.41) wrote how the Castro, the young lawyer, gave a five-hour speech on the reality on the condition of the people of Cuba at that time and he proposed an outline of how to bring back the people out of poverty and slump. Marshall (1987, p.127) also added that the medical care during Batista’s time was big business with the rich having their own physicians and 64% of them located in Havana alone whilst it was almost non-available in the countryside.

So, when both towers were hit, the usage of the word ‘Terrorists’ came into ‘light’. In fact, it came out as “Muslims Terrorist’ after the bombing of the Federal Building in Oklahoma City on the 19th of April, 1995, but when the authority discovered that it was done by an American, the ‘name calling’ stopped but it resurfaced again, in full force, after suicide bombings by Palestinian fighters and the Twin Tower attack and now, the Muslims, are terrorist!

In November 1999, a group of Cuban refugees, took a small boat from Havana and headed towards Miami but along the way, the boat capsized and a few of them died in the tragedy, including the mother of a 6-year-old boy. The boy, Elian Gonzalez, was fished out by a fisherman and was sent under the care of his distant families in Miami (TIMEasia April 17, 2000, p. 11). On the 6th of April 2000, after being send off by Fidel Castro, Elian’s father, Juan Miguel, came to America to ask the Cuban there to hand over Elian to him. The relatives refused. The ‘tug-of-war’, for the kid, was used by the media to denounce Castro (TIMEasia 17 January, 2000, p. 11). Elian was shown happily playing and enjoying his stay with his distant cousins in Miami whilst at the same time, more ‘bad’ stories about the Cuban ‘bad boy’, Castro, was splashed.

The media frenzy heated-up when Federal Agents, under the order of US Attorney-General Janet Reno, ordered the ‘capture and release’ of Elian from his ‘human-shield’ of distant families and had him sent back to his father in Cuba (TIMEasia May 1, 2000, p. 52-60). More media denouncing on the handling of the Elian affair and the decision to send him back to the’ dungeon’ continued for few months until it slowly faded away towards the end of 2000 when the US Presidential Election was towards its peak. Now, only during the annual remembrance of the issue, we get to hear about it again (TIMEasia December 18, 2000, p. 59).

During these media hype, those in control used several strategies to ensure power and wealth. Believing, and using the notion that democracy will ensure profitability in the open market, the capitalist had been placing fear to communism advocates. Communism, based from the word ‘common”, entails equality among the people, community and society. Depicting the ideology from Karl Marx and Friederich Engels’ ‘The Communist Manifesto’ published in 1848 and the ‘Bolshevik Revolution’ in 1917, the socialist countries such as the USSR, China and the Eastern Europeans were ruled by their central committee of the communist party such as the ‘Pulitburo’ which the capitalist considered as ‘authoritarian’. When everything is supposed to be shared equally, those who wanted to make bigger gains in terms of wealth and power, will find it difficult to do that. So, to make sure they get what they want, the capitalist used the media to show the world how bad communism can be.

A lot of political, economy and social ‘marketing’ strategies were used over the years to instill fear towards communism. Through the media, Communism is portrayed as an uncivilized and mean doctrine, which is ‘evil’ towards community. The capitalist, especially the US tried to stop the spread of communism by going to war, openly or under pretext, against countries that proposed these ideologies such as Korea, Vietnam, Afghanistan and several other ‘nationalist uprising’ over the second half of the last century. So far, the capitalist strategy had bear fruit with the fall of Communism, symbolized by the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, and the acceptance of pro-democracy movement all over the world. With Communism out of their way, the capitalist are free to do anything to scrap away the world’s wealth and power.

The same goes for their denouncing of Muslims all over the world. Al-Qaeda, Abu Nidal, Hamas, Al-Ma’unah, Chechen Rebels, to name a few, are all considered terrorist groups - ‘Muslim Terrorist’. Since the bombing of the Federal Building in Oklahoma City by Timothy McVeigh, the ‘tag’ had been used by the media to reflect the notoriety of Muslims. After the arrest of McVeigh the ‘name calling’ stopped for a while but it continued again when Palestinians suicide bombers continued with their retaliation against the Jewish Authorities. 33 out of the first 50 terrorist groups listed in Terrorism.com[1], are Muslims groups. The top 28 of the most wanted by the FBI are Muslims[2].

When David Koresh, a Branch Davidian cult leader, together with 80 other followers died in a fiery mass suicide in Waco, Texas on April 19, 1993, he was referred to as a ‘Cult Leader’ not ‘Christians Terrorist’ or ‘Jewish Terrorist’. Public attacks on innocent people by the Irish Republican Army (IRA) in Northern Ireland and England over the years were also not referred by the media as attacks by Christians. More than 900 followers of Rev. Jim Jones committed suicide by drinking cyanide-laced grape punch in Jonestown, Guyana on November 18, 1978 but no mention of their original beliefs in the media. Any attacks, bombings, mass suicide or other criminal act of terror by the Christians or Jewish has never been referred to as the term discussed but whenever a Muslims or group of Muslims did any of the act, they will always been referred to as Muslim Terrorist even though they were just suspected of doing it[3].

The Israelis, the actual controller of the media, according to Miller (2001), had been doing all kind of acts of terror towards Muslims, especially the Palestinians ever since getting the land provided by the League of Nations under the British mandate in May 14, 1948. Their occupation of Palestinian lands, Arab-Israel 6-day-war on June 5th, 1967, the destruction of houses and other accommodations and land, the mass killing of innocent people in the refugee camps of Sabra, Shatila and Jenin, and other atrocities had gone without any action by the United Nations (UN). Any UN resolution against Israel will always been vetoed by the US, for they are in control of the country. The technique used to cultivate the mind of audience is repetition of images which over time will make it a definite valid truth. Karim (2002, p.101) noted that pictures of the Twin Towers being hit by airplanes were repeated over and over again as to convince the audience on the reality of the event and to highlight the sufferings of the Americans but when it comes to the sufferings of the Muslims, only glimpses were shown.

The visual of a father and his son, Mohammed Al-Durra, asking the Israel soldiers not to shoot them, was ignored and they were fatally shot in front of a camera was only shown, to my count, three times over CNN (2000). Zelizer (2002, p.48) wrote that the frequent, systematic and repetitive circulation of photographic images in the prints, has a vast impact to its readers. The repetition of images has created a worldwide sense of ‘Islamophobia’ among non-Muslims towards Muslims. In France and Singapore, scarf wearing female students were not allowed to schools. Woman wearing ‘hijab’, were scrutinized at entry points by immigration officers in the US and in other western countries. Names with ‘bin’ in the middle were given ‘special treatment’ by the authorities. Malaysian male Indians also faced similar treatment when their name comes with ‘A/L’ (Anak Lelaki), which those westerners, indicates an Islamic word, AL. All these total checks are for security reasons to ensure that no more such attacks will ever happen again in the US. Even a Sikh guy was shot dead for wearing the turban, which was required by his beliefs.

Repetition of phrases used to indirectly portray certain countries as an ‘Axis of Evil’ by US President George W. Bush, had managed to underline the fear of the people who are still dumbfounded by the plane crashing event. Iran, Iraq and North Korea were named at the frontline of the axis whilst Libya, Syria and Cuba were second. With two-third of the front liners were Muslim countries; the fear towards Muslims and the assumption of them of being terrorists had a great impact into the relations between Muslims and people of other religion and beliefs.

At the same time, the media were also blamed by certain quarters for giving ‘free publicity’ to terrorist groups. Paletz and Boiney (1992, p.10) said the media were accused of facilitating the terrorists’ objectives and their reporting of incidents of terrorism were blamed for damaging effects. The terrorists according to Schaffert (1992, p.2) used violence to shock or intimidate wider groups for their political purposes. Video and audio playbacks, claimed to be recorded by the terrorist, were aired by several TV stations especially Al-Jazeerah. In the video, the group’s representative would make claims of victory or responsibility on recent attacks or incidents.

Recent videos of beheading of captured prisoners have opened the debate on freedom of speech, human rights and the rights to be heard. Web surfers and TV viewers were also able to watch such images at their discretion. They are afraid that airing of such videos would bring sympathy to the groups or relaying of secret codes or message to the other members for further attacks. Even CNN and other group of journalists were embedded with the marines during the attacks of Iraq as a measure to ensure that the enemy, Saddam Hussein, would not be able the trace the position of the marines. The real reason for it might to control the information for not wanting the world to know the actual atrocities done by the US and its allies.

Through the media, globalization activities by the developed countries, has changed the way people lived in the developing countries. These new way of life has bring the world closer together in a lot ways. Global activities in the fight against AIDS/HIV have proven that the world can work together towards a better and healthier life. The use of condoms to prevent actual contact during intercourse was promoted as one of the ways to prevent the epidemic. These measures were being applauded by many, but to Muslims it is still the wrong way of handling it. The masses were still encouraged to commit adultery, one of the biggest sins in Islam or any other religion, for that matter. What they should have done was not to encourage sex outside marriage. Only then the malady can be reduced and eliminated.

According to historians, King Richard ‘The Lionheart’ was heard saying that “the Muslims cannot be destroyed physically but through their faith, they can be”. The Jewish and Christians, according to the Holy Qur’an, will do whatever they can to weaken the faith of the Muslims. The Muslims celebrate the first day of the fasting month on the 1st of Ramadhan, Aidilfitri on the 1st of Syawal and the birth of the Prophet (PBUH) on the 12th of Rabi’ul Awal but when it comes to their own birthday, they celebrate it according to the Gregorian calendar. Sadly, some even celebrated their birthday in a not very Islamic way. Blowing of candles, toasting of wines are some of the western ways of celebrating, which are being followed ‘full heartedly’ by some Muslims. The same goes when celebrating Valentine’s Day where some Muslims all over the world would celebrate it and even pick the day as their wedding day!

Unknowingly to the Muslims, the Jewish agenda of misleading the faith of Muslims continued with asking the Muslims to joint together during their night vigil by holding lighted candles and have a minute of silence. During the September 11, aftermath, pictures of Muslims holding candles during these vigil all around the world have made those with the ‘hidden agenda’ to have a satisfactory smile of achievement. Even in sports, the supplier of the Euro 2004 official balls, ADIDAS, came out with a design with the cross on the balls used for the tournament. The jersey worn by the English football team also has crosses on both side of the shoulder. By using and wearing these attires, the Muslims unexpectedly are making a mockery of their own religion and slowly it will self degrade their own faith.

The Syariah Law’s of stoning to death for adultery committed by married couples was criticized as inhumane by those who opposed capital punishments. Even our country does not obey the Syariah Law and only punished those convicted to pay only a few thousand ringgit. This small punishment does not help in the fight against adultery which is one of the reasons for the spread of AIDS / HIV. The slaughter ritual of animals by Muslims before it is considered halal to eat was also criticised by animal lovers. All these criticism will definitely be followed by the implementation of rules which will forbid the implementation of the Syariah and in the end the destruction of the faith of Muslims in the world.

During the last hours of the life of Pope John Paul II, CNN, in a special program Journey, a spokeperson of Vatican glorified the Pope for being the man of peace who reached to the all religion whereas it was hard for Christians to reach out to the Muslims for not they not sure which group to approach. The Christians had the Pope as their Spiritual Leader or representative but the Muslims didn’t such leaders. The spokeperson also added that they were not about to approach Al-Qaida for its atrocities and by saying these, the spokeperson was hinting that the Muslims were indeed being represented by Al-Qaida, the so-called terrorist group. The Pope was also reported to have forgiven his would-be assassin whom he met few years later (27 Dec 1983) after the shooting. Another Vatican spokeperson who recalled the meeting stressed on the attire worn by the Pope, a white robe compared to the jeans and sneakers, worn by Mehmet Ali Agca. Even Cuba’s reaction to the news of the death of the Pope was also reported as ‘hastily’ held by the Cuban (CNN 2005).

Globalisation has brought the world together in various things and has reduce the time and space between humans. Sharing of information between the people all over the world has made the interaction in casual and business nature to be made within seconds but the control of information by the Jewish for their economic and political gain has changed the world scenario to become over zealous in protecting only those related with them. The media manipulation, as we can see throughout this article, does not only just benefited those in power and in control of it, but also those who don’t even have any type of ownership of the media. The beheadings of captured foreigners by Iraqi insurgent groups and the ‘parade’ videos shown all over the world through television and also through the Internet had realized the groups’ target of achieving free publicity for their cause. Most of the videos are meant for seeking identity recognition rather than meeting their political demands. The more space given to them, the more visual gags are made available by these publicity seekers. On the other hand, if they didn’t use the available and popular media, the world won’t know of their plight and missions.

Denouncing Castro by portraying him as an evil man by the media, showed that those in control and power of the media are doing the actual ‘evil’ thing. Cuba, under Castro, according to Rogers (2004, p. 142) had managed to become an advanced country in the production of biomedical and supplies pharmaceuticals and vaccines to countries throughout the south. The declaration by a group of Cuban doctors in 1968 that they were doing the best to give better service with a more humane ways showed that Castro painstakingly tried his best to bring up the dignity of his country even with the embargo imposed by the US. The West, especially the US, violated human rights by declaring those captured during their war against terrorism were considered ‘enemy combatant’ and they would not have proper civil or military trial, something which they made noise of, when our government detained several people under the ISA, several years ago.

The hunger for information had led to the ‘commoditization’ of information, which led to the control of the media by certain quarters. In our local scenes, the media, both print and electronic had been under the jurisdiction of the government, the opposition and also several NGOs. Mainstream media such as The New Straits Times, Berita Harian, Utusan, The Star, Harakah, Roket and several broadcast stations such as RTM, TV3, ntv7, Astro are fully or partly connected to political parties in Malaysia. These controlled strategies were being utilized by those in power, all over the world at every level of the community and brought to surface the true colours of the western media in dictating the mind of the world. With the fall of Communism and with the free hand to ‘colonise’ the world, the ‘media terrorism’ used by the capitalists were almost unstoppable.

References

1 http://www.terrorism.com/modules.php?op=modload&name=TGroups&file=index

2 http://www.fbi.gov/mostwant/terrorists/fugitives.htm

3 http://www.csj.org/studyindex/studycult/suicides.htm

Calabresi, Massimo (2000, April 17), “Fighting For Their Children” TIMEasia, Time Inc. p. 11

Cohen, Adam (2000, January 17), “Who Gets The Kid?” TIMEasia,

Time Inc. p. 11

Dorril, Stephen (2004), Spies and Lies: Miller, David (eds), Tell Me Lies – Propaganda and Media Distortion in the Attack on Iraq, Pluto Press, London, pp. 108

Fontaine, Roger W (1988), Genesis - Fidel’s First Taste of Terrorism, Terrorism: The Cuban Connection, Crane Russak Company, New York., pp. 18-19

Karim H. Karim (2002), “Making Sense Of The ‘Islamic Peril’”, Journalism as cultural practice: Zelizer, Barbie and Allan, Stuart (eds), Journalism After September 11, Routledge, London and New York, pp. 101

Kuhn, Rick (2004, May 20) “Manifesto of the Communist Party 1848”, (ANU.edu.au), Available: http://www.anu.edu.au/polsci/marx/classics/manifesto.html

(Accessed: 2004, December 10)

Lacayo, Richard (2000, May 1), “What Can a Kid Decide”? TIMEasia,

Time Inc. p. 52-60

Marshall, Peter (1987), “The Pseudo Republic”, CUBA LIBRE Breaking the Chains?, Unwin Paperbacks, London, pp. 41

Marshall, Peter (1987), “The Pseudo Republic”, CUBA LIBRE Breaking the Chains?, Unwin Paperbacks, London, pp. 128

Miller, Mark C. (2001), What's Wrong With This Picture?, (The Nation),Available: http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20020107&s=miller

Paletz, David L. & Boiney, John (1992), “Reseachers’ Perpective”, Terrorism and The Media, Sage, California, pp. 10

Rogers, Paul (2004) A widening axis; Winning or Losing?, A WAR ON TERROR, Afghanistan and After, Pluto Press, London, pp. 142

Schaffert, Richard W. (1992), “In Pursuit Of A Definition of Political Terrorism”, Media Coverage and Political Terrorists – A Quantitative Analysis, Praeger, New York, pp. 2

Zelizer, Barbie (2002), “Photography, Journalism, and Trauma”,

Journalism After September 11, Routledge, London and New York, pp. 101

(2000, December 18), “The Best and Worst of 2000”, TIMEasia, Time Inc. p. 59

Research Staff of National Vanguard Books; Strom, Kevin A. (media director) (2004), “Who Rules America? The Alien Grip on Our News and Entertainment Media Must Be Broken”, National Vanguard Books, Inc., West Virginia

http://www.natall.com/who-rules-america/

“Palestinian children moved by boy's killing” (2000, October 9), (CNN.com), Available:

http://edition.cnn.com/2000/WORLD/meast/10/09/palestinian.children.reut/ (Accessed: 2004, November 25)

“World mourns Pope John Paul II” (2005, April 3), (CNN.com), Available:

http://edition.cnn.com/2005/WORLD/europe/04/02/world.reax/index.html

“Would-Be Assassin Mourns Pope” (2005, April 3), (CBSNEWS.com), Available:

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2005/04/03/world/main685125.shtml(Accessed: 2005, April 5)

[1] http://www.terrorism.com/modules.php?op=modload&name=TGroups&file=index

[2] http://www.fbi.gov/mostwant/terrorists/fugitives.htm

[3] http://www.csj.org/studyindex/studycult/suicides.htm

Saturday, April 16, 2016

BAU KERTAS

Sunday, April 10, 2016

KE-3

Saturday, April 9, 2016

AIR GAS

GENDANG GERHANA

Monday, January 12, 2015

MEDIA TERRORISM

1 http://www.terrorism.com/modules.php?op=modload&name=TGroups&file=index

Fontaine, Roger W (1988), Genesis - Fidel’s First Taste of Terrorism, Terrorism: The Cuban Connection, Crane Russak Company, New York., pp. 18-19

[1] http://www.terrorism.com/modules.php?op=modload&name=TGroups&file=index

[2] http://www.fbi.gov/mostwant/terrorists/fugitives.htm

Sunday, July 31, 2011

Salam Ramadhan 1432H

it's been a while

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