Fast Food And A Bloody Table

Michael Hedges October 22, 2018 - Follow on Twitter

October has been a grim month for attacks against media workers. Or it is just another grim month. From mobsters to dictators, impunity again rules. Press freedom and human rights advocates howl and wail to little avail. News organizations hire security. The public seems, largely, detached, perhaps malnourished.

A year ago this month Malta journalist and corruption investigator Daphne Caruana Galizia was murdered, blown to bits by a car bomb. Government officials, including prime minister Joseph Muscat, promised a prompt and thorough investigation. Though three suspects have been named, the case remains open.

The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) (October 19) finds “the lack of progress on finding the mastermind so disturbing.” Several press freedom groups, including CPJ, Reporters sans Frontieres (RSF) and PEN International, called on Malta officials last week and attended the informal memorial. Moments of silence and vigils were held in Berlin, Brussels, London and at the War Reporters Memorial at Bayeux, France.

An independent group of news organizations and investigative reporters, The Daphne Project, was assembled to take up various corruption leads uncovered by Ms Caruana Galizia as well as investigations into her death, widely viewed as the consequence of her corruption investigations. Much of this has been published through the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP). Italian daily La Repubblica and UK daily The Guardian have contributed to the reporting.

“Since her assassination, a memorial that was erected as a protest for justice in her case has been repeatedly demolished by government workers,” wrote acclaimed novelist Margaret Atwood, representing PEN International, published in The Guardian (October 16). “There are endless attacks on her reputation, as those who harassed her in life seek to erase her memory in death. When a journalist is murdered, all of society suffers. We lose our right to know, to speak, to learn.”

Considerable attention, rightly, has been given this month to the convoluted tale of Jamal Khashoggi’s death. He was a Saudi Arabian citizen, permanent resident of the United States, critic of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman and a Washington Post columnist. He had once been editor of Saudi Arabian newspaper Al Watan. Mr. Khashoggi walked into the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, Turkey October 2nd to obtain marriage documents. He did not depart alive.

Saudi officials confessed that he died during a “fist fight” while being interrogated, after first denying all knowledge of his whereabouts, and those responsible “tried to cover it up.” Prosecutors and investigators in Turkey had been releasing - sometimes officially and sometimes through media reports - ghastly details, largely impossible to confirm. There was an audio recording, maybe video. In the latest Saudi version, his body was “wrapped in a rug” and given to a “local contractor” for disposal. Authorities in Turkey say they have more evidence but, for now, it is being withheld.

Mr. Khashoggi’s final Washington Post column was posthumously published October 17th. “The Arab world is facing its own version of an Iron Curtain, imposed not by external actors but through domestic forces vying for power,” he wrote. “The Arab world needs a modern version of the old transnational media so citizens can be informed about global events. More important, we need to provide a platform for Arab voices.”

Washington Post Global Opinions editor Karen Attiah hired Mr. Khashoggi about a year ago. She referred to the latest Saudi version of events as “utter bullshit,” quoted by CNN (October 20). "The Saudis cannot be allowed to fabricate a face-saving solution to an atrocity that appears to have been directed by the highest levels of their government," said publisher and chief executive Fred Ryan, promising endless news coverage.

At a campaign rally in the US state of Montana, president Donald Trump congratulated candidate Representative Greg Gianforte as “my kind of guy,” reported CNN (October 18). He was referring to Mr. Gianforte’s assault on Guardian reporter Ben Jacobs last May. “Any guy who can do a body slam… he’s my guy,” prompting laughter from the rally audience. Mr. Gianforte told local police at the time Mr. Jacobs had attacked him first; something about asking a question. He recanted, paid a small fine and won a special election the next day.

“To celebrate an attack on a journalist who was simply doing his job is an attack on the First Amendment (which enshrines press freedom in the US Constitution) by someone who had taken an oath to defend it,” wrote Guardian US editor John Mulholland, in a statement. “In the aftermath of the murder of Jamal Khashoggi, it runs the risk of inviting other assaults on journalists both here and across the world where they often face far greater threats. We hope decent people will denounce these comments and that the President will see fit to apologize for them.”

“The truly powerful feed ideology to the masses like fast food while they dine on the most rarified delicacy of all: impunity.” Naomi Klein The Shock Doctrine (2007)

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