Newsletter Home Page

Blogging for Palestine

By the Editors, June 2008

Q In general, the mainstream media suppresses voices that express unfavorable opinions of Zionism and the state of Israel. Are alternative media and the blogosphere more open to these points of view?

A Yes, they're much more open. The mainstream media in the U.S. are almost fanatically "pro-Israel", and while dissenting viewpoints are occasionally given space they are almost completely marginalized. This is primarily because mainstream journalism is to a significant degree shaped by the demands and interests of power, and Israel is viewed by the U.S. establishment as a valuable client state. The internet is a much more open medium, and is far less subject to the constraints imposed on the mainstream media. Alternative media such as Znet, CounterPunch, AntiWar.com, and the Electronic Intifada are free to be as critical of Israel as they want. Similarly, in the blogosphere there are virtually no barriers to entry. Anyone can set up a blog for free and begin writing about whatever they want, expressing their opinions freely. The flipside of this is that the vast majority of blogs have very small readerships, which is a big handicap for those trying to use blogs to campaign for a particular issue. Excellent critiques of Israeli policy are not much use if no one reads them.

There are a few blogs that have sizeable readerships. Daily Kos, for example, reaches a daily audience in the hundreds of thousands. The problem with some of these high-readership blogs is that they start to act a bit like the mainstream media - they don't want to scare away advertisers, they don't want anything too 'extreme' to be displayed, they want to maintain 'respectability', and so on. An additional problem with Daily Kos for those wishing to use it as a platform to discuss the Israel/Palestine conflict from a "pro-Palestinian" perspective is that it is a partisan blog: its openly stated goal is to help elect Democratic candidates. Since there is currently a bipartisan consensus in the U.S. in favor of Israeli expansionism, and since pushing for a more just policy towards the Israel/Palestine conflict is unlikely to help the campaigns of Democratic candidates, the administrators of Daily Kos don't like discussion of I/P very much, and neither do many of the site's members. That said, the advantage to blogging on sites like the Daily Kos is that you're addressing an audience composed primarily of politically active, news-consuming liberals - precisely the people we should be trying to reach.

Q How sizable is the media exposure of blogs? Is this an important new media that activists should be utilizing to advance progressive perspectives on Palestine and other important issues?

A It seems that the traditional media is taking more and more notice of blogs. Big news websites such as CNN now often provide links to 'blog reactions' in their articles, for example, and many mainstream publications now have online blogs or even blog networks of their own. Professional journalists now often create their own blogs - see, for example, 'Fugitive Peace', the blog of the Economist's Israel/Palestine correspondent - presumably because it offers them a space to write more freely or at greater length than what they can publish in their newspapers and journals. However, the media tends to promote blogs that fall within a certain range of opinions; blogs deemed too 'extreme' are unlikely to be linked to or discussed in the mainstream. Since on Israel/Palestine, it seems much of the U.S. press views anything to the left of Kadima and Likud to be too 'extreme', this is a bit of a problem for those hoping to use blogs to springboard into the mainstream on this issue.

Blogs and the internet in general can be very useful for campaigners. Apart from anything else they give you the chance to test out your arguments, and this can enable you to become a more effective activist. Large blogs like Daily Kos, despite their drawbacks, can be used to inform people about the realities of the conflict (which is important, since they're not going to get accurate information from the mainstream media) and persuade them to a more balanced, reasonable point of view.

Q Blogs are supposed to be open discussion forums which should mean that all kinds of opinions and views are welcome. Is there censorship in the blogosphere? If there is censorship on blogs that cover this topic, how fairly is it applied?

A There's certainly censorship in the blogosphere - the person who owns the blog gets to choose what appears and what doesn't. The precise rules and accepted views vary from blog to blog. Some blog owners reject the banning of writers and comment on posts in moderation, while others do both very liberally. The big blogs tend to be relatively lax about censorship, and rely more on community moderation. That may sound polite, but for Zionist bloggers this often means using nasty tactics such as making truly vile insults, bullying and misinformation. Their goal with these tactics is to change the debate, misdirecting it towards ad hominem attacks, and thus away from a rational discussion of Israel's human rights violations, Zionism, Palestinian history and resistance to Zionism. If these tactics don't work, Zionist bloggers will sometimes seek to shut down the debate altogether. But, as long as you put forth a serious and well-reasoned viewpoint, and try to bear in mind the main goal of the site (if there is one - e.g. with Daily Kos it is electing Democrats), then such larger blogs are usually not a problem.

Daily Kos does seem to have a double standard with regards to Israel/Palestine. This presumably stems from its stated purpose - namely, electing Democrats. Since there is bipartisan and quite broad public support for Israel at the expense of the Palestinians, it is not the interest of people trying to get Democrats elected to have lots of diaries and comments decrying Israeli crimes against the Palestinians. This makes administrators less patient with 'troublemakers' (or alleged troublemakers) from the "pro-Palestinian" side than the "pro-Israel" one. This was evident when, last year, the Daily Kos administrators unfairly banned several 'pro-Palestinian' diarists for "offenses" that would have been merely frowned upon if perpetrated by "pro-Israel" diarists. As an example of this double-standard, one blogger was banned for including in her diary a long quote by a member of the Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades (AAMB). Yet if a ‘pro-Israel’ diarist were to quote Olmert, Peretz, Halutz, or Sharon, each of whom bear responsibility for far more destructive terrorism than the AAMB, no-one would bat an eyelid.

Q If I’m interested in contributing to blogs about Palestine/Israel, what are some existing blogs that I can contribute to?

A There's Daily Kos (www.dailykos.com); smaller (and friendlier) sites like Booman Tribune (www.boomantribune.com) and EuroTrib (www.eurotrib.com). For the most part, the blogosphere itself is a wide open space, so theoretically, anyone can start a blog about anything; however, just starting a blog doesn't mean that anyone will read you. There are small blogs that are part of the "I blog for Palestine" network, whereas the big liberal blogs get the most eyeballs, so many critics of Israel have tried to participate on these, with mixed results, either just as members of these blogs or as owners of small blogs who cross-post articles and diaries at larger blogs.

Blogs are also a great help while doing solidarity trips to Palestine as well as when one returns. There, a blog offers a very direct and unfiltered way to reach a wide audience on your experiences, and upon returning (which can often be for years between trips there), it can be a constructive way of contributing to the struggle for Palestinian rights and liberation. However, online activism is no substitute for activism of the traditional kind. It can be a useful addition to it and a facilitator of it, but ultimately no amount of blogging will make up for getting people out on to the streets.

- The Editors