Al-Jazeera: Too Close to Terrorists?

Newsweek ^ | 9/22/03 | Michael Isikoff and Eric Pape

[TastyManatees]

Al-Jazeera: Too Close to Terrorists?

By Michael Isikoff and Eric Pape
NEWSWEEK

Sept. 22 issue — How does Al-Jazeera keep getting scoops like last week’s Osama bin Laden video? Editors at the Qatar-based Arab TV network won’t say.

“IF I TOLD YOU we received the tape by e-mail, then they’d start tapping all of Al-Jazeera’s e-mails tomorrow,” says one top editor. But questions persist about just how tight some of the network’s correspondents may be with terrorists: an investigation in Spain has led to the imprisonment of a top reporter on charges that he conspired with some of that country’s most notorious Qaeda suspects. The reporter, Tayssir Alouni, a native of Syria, gained brief fame two years ago when, as Al-Jazeera’s Kabul bureau chief, he got the first interview of bin Laden taking responsibility for 9/11. (Alouni says he scored the interview after being led, blindfolded, to a bin Laden hideaway.) But internal Spanish police documents obtained by NEWSWEEK show that Alouni, 48, has been under scrutiny since at least early 2000, when phone wiretaps revealed he was in “frequent and continuous” contact with Imad Eddin Barakat Yarkas, the suspected leader of Al Qaeda’s Spanish cell. Before moving from Granada to Afghanistan in January 2000 to open up the Al-Jazeera bureau, Alouni called Yarkas to let him know he was leaving. “It sounded like he was informing this fact to a superior in a hierarchy,” reads one report. Yarkas talked to Alouni about carrying cash to Mohamed Bahaiah—a fellow Syrian whom Spanish authorities consider a key Qaeda moneyman. Bahaiah was well known to Alouni: two years earlier, according to the report, when Bahaiah was seeking to renew his residency permit in Spain, Alouni “covered up” for him, allowing Bahaiah to list Alouni’s home address and phone number.

Last week Spanish investigating Judge Baltasar Garzon charged that Alouni took a total of $4,500 to terrorists in Afghanistan on two occasions. Alouni’s lawyers say he did take smaller sums to Syrians abroad—”a common practice in the Arab world,” says Al-Jazeera editor Ibrahim Helal. But some of the most damning evidence against Alouni, according to the police reports, is what happened when he returned to Spain from Afghanistan in July 2001. Alouni contends he was returning to visit his wife in Granada. The police reports say he very quickly had two visitors: Yarkas and Mahmoun Darkanzanli, a German-based businessman who Western intel officials have long believed was a key financier for the Hamburg cell that included 9/11 ringleader Muhammad Atta. Helal insists that Alouni is being persecuted by the Spanish because he refused to cooperate when Western intel agencies asked him to become an informant against Al Qaeda. “They got fed up with him” because he refused to help them, Helal says. Other ex-colleagues say he never expressed the slightest sympathy for Al Qaeda. “He told me that Al Qaeda’s actions were an error and a barbarity,” says Spanish journalist Carlos Hernandez. But Judge Garzon doesn’t buy it. Last week, after interrogating Alouni, he ordered he be held indefinitely in a maximum-security prison.

[TastyManatees]

Masters of the Obvious.

Tasty Manatees

[Recovering_Democrat]

Al-Jazeera's reporters overtly help Al Qaeda, while those of CBS, NBC, ABC, CNN and PMSNBC covertly aid Al Qaeda.

[livius]

I read several articles in the Spanish press on this matter this morning. (I'll post one later.)

One of the interesting things is that Alouni received a phone call from an Atta in Germany shortly before 9/11 - the Spanish believe it was Mohammed Atta, but Alouni says it was his brother, Emir Atta. Curiouser and curiouser.

[Sender]

If you haven't visited the Aljazeera.com site lately, check out the featured cartoons. You can usually judge the orientation of a news source by the content of its editorial cartoons.

One has realistic footage of the WTC towers collapsing in flames, only to be replaced by two giant gasoline pumps labeled "Iraq". The rest show a calm and immovable Arafat in various stages of attempted removal by Sharon and Abbas who are depicted as bumbling buffoons.

Do ya see any shred of 'fair and balanced' ideology here? Nope. Aljazeera may be packaged as an impartial news source but it is anything but.

[Peach]

ping in connection to your comment about CNN's reporter Amanpour.

[PBRSTREETGANG]

Is "up their butts" too close?

[mikegi]

“IF I TOLD YOU we received the tape by e-mail, then they’d start tapping all of Al-Jazeera’s e-mails tomorrow,” says one top editor.

"Start" tapping email? Ha! You can bet we've been tracing every electron heading into AJ since 9/11.

[Miss Marple]

Hmmm. I now wonder if Ms. Amanpour was also under surveillance, especially since she is married to a Clintonista who used to work for the State Department.

Very interesting details here.

[pointsal]

Duh.... does someone really need a short-list of folks to watch and accounts to monitor?

[Helms]

"Masters of the Obvious."

As well as making a small fortune televising to the so called Arab street, otherwise known as the Human Zoo.

[BabsC]

I saw Amanpour on CNN yesterday. She was harping about how "THIS" administration was bullying the media. That stations like FOX were foot soldiers for Bush. The FOX coorespondents reponse was that is was better to be a foot soldier for Bush than a spokeswoman for Al-Queida.

CNN had no response.

[careermarine]

You should know that aljazeera.com has NO affiliation with Al Jazeera the network. In Arabic al jazeera means either the island or the peninsula. AJ Television sued in the international intellectual property court and recently lost, because it's such a common word and the .com site had the name first. Al Jazeera's actual web site is much less inciteful and far more responsible. It is: engligh.aljazeera.net. Note that there is NO 'www' and it is '.net'. Cheers.

[Red6]

(opinion)

Why is it that Al-Jazzier is on site and set up to tape before some attacks? They get tipped off.

AJ in Iraq or Afghanistan = Heightened security, be cautious.

What I “believe” happens a lot is that they get tipped off about future enemy operations. They keep this secret and set up to capture it on tape.

The insurgent wants media coverage! Preferably positive media coverage. AJ has its agenda and these stories sell well too. It’s a symbiotic relationship. AJ probably gets hundreds of thousands of viewers for no other reason than they get a lot of the footage of IEDs, air OBL tapes etc.

Red6