see also: How the US military "Deny, Degrade, Destroy" unfriendly information.... The new TV service for Iraq was paid for by the Pentagon. In keeping with the philosophy of information dominance it was supplied, not by an independent news organisation, but by a defence contractor, Scientific Applications International Corporation (Saic). Its expertise in the area - according to its website - is in "information dominance".
http://www.guardian.co.uk/analysis/story/0,3604,1118096,00.html
U.S. closes Shiite paper; angry Iraqis flood streets
http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/world/8302703.htm
By Jeffrey Gettleman
Mon, Mar. 29, 2004
New York Times
BAGHDAD, Iraq - U.S. soldiers shut down a popular Baghdad newspaper Sunday and padlocked the doors after the occupation authorities accused it of printing lies that incited violence. Thousands of outraged Iraqis protested the closing as an act of U.S. hypocrisy, laying bare the hostility many feel toward the United States a year after the invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein.
``No, no, America!'' and ``Where is democracy now?'' screamed protesters who hoisted banners and shook clenched fists in a hastily organized rally against the closing of the newspaper, Al- Hawza, a radical Shiite weekly. The rally drew hundreds and then thousands by nightfall in central Baghdad, where masses of angry Shiite men squared off against a line of U.S. soldiers who had arrived to seal off the area.
The closing of the newspaper reflected the struggle by U.S. authorities to strike a balance between their two main goals: encouraging democracy and maintaining stability, as the days wind down to the June 30 target date for handing sovereignty back to the Iraqi people. But security seems increasingly elusive. Sunday, the Iraqi public-works minister narrowly escaped an assassination attempt in the northern city of Mosul, and two foreign workers were shot to death nearby in front of a power plant.
Many Iraqis said closing down a popular newspaper at such a critical time would not curtail anti- occupation feelings but only inflame them.
``When you repress the repressed, they only get stronger,'' said Hamid al-Bayati of the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq, a prominent Shiite political party. ``Punishing this newspaper will only increase the passion for those who speak out against the Americans.''
U.S. authorities said Al-Hawza may reopen in 60 days. The paper's editors, however, said they had been essentially put out of business.
``We have been evicted from our offices, and we have no jobs,'' said Saadoon Mohsen Thamad, a news editor, as he stared at a padlock hanging from the front gate. ``How are we going to continue?''
Among Iraqi journalists, Al-Hawza was known for printing wild rumors, especially anti-American ones. The paper is considered a mouthpiece for Moqtader al-Sadr, a fiery Shiite cleric and one of the most outspoken American critics.
The letter ordering the paper closed, signed by L. Paul Bremer, the top administrator in Iraq, cited what the U.S. authorities called several examples of false reports in Al-Hawza, including a February dispatch that said the cause of an explosion that killed more than 50 Iraqi police recruits was not a car bomb, as occupation officials had said, but a U.S. missile.
Under a law passed by occupying authorities in June, a news organization's license can be revoked if it publishes or broadcasts material that incites violence or civil disorder or ``advocates alterations to Iraq's borders by violent means.''
But the letter outlining the reasons for taking action against Al-Hawza did not cite any material that directly advocated violence. Several Iraqi journalists said that meant there was no basis to shut Al-Hawza down.
``That paper might have been anti-American, but it should be free to express its opinion,'' said Kamal Abdul Karim, night editor of the daily paper Azzaman.
Tom Rosenstiel, vice chair of the Committee of Concerned Journalists, a non-profit organization based in Washington, said there was a basic irony in Americans practicing censorship in Iraq.
``If you're trying to promote democracy in a country that has never had it, you have to lead by example,'' Rosenstiel said. ``I'm not in Iraq. But it's hard for me to see how the suppression of information, even false information, is going to help our cause.''
Many Iraqi journalists said they feared that closing Al-Hawza paper would only increase the support for Sadr, the 31-year-old son of a revered Shiite cleric who was assassinated in 1999 by killers working for Saddam Hussein.
In the preparation for the June 30 transfer of power, Sadr has been increasingly abrasive, issuing statements denouncing Americans and any Iraqis who work with them.
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