If you wonder why the internet is gaining power, and the MSM are losing it, consider the politics of our Middle East policy (going back to Iraq) and the fact that the NY Times today runs the disgraceful Op-Ed by Israel lobbyist Efraim Karsh telling the Palestinians to fold, take any deal Israel offers, because no one in the Arab world cares about them, and it therefore falls to Huffington Post to correct Karsh’s misrepresentations with a great piece by James Zogby. This is a pattern. The newspapers echo rightwing/conventional wisdom on the issue; the internet offers balance, thoughtfulness. Zogby:
Karsh is dead wrong. His problem begins with his abuse of a "bad poll" that was not a poll at all. In al Arabiya’s defense, they never called it a poll and never vouched for its scientific accuracy. It was an "online vote" — like those sponsored by news networks and websites worldwide in an effort to engage readers and viewers. That’s hardly a poll, and certainly not deserving of either [columnist Saleh] Qallab’s lamenting or Karsh’s gloating.
Karsh’s next error was in not checking the survey language. The actual question makes no mention of "Palestine" or "Palestinians." Rather, it asks respondents about their level of interest in the "Middle East peace process" — to which 71 percent indicate "no interest." Given the lack of results and the repeated disappointments and frustrations experienced during just the last two decades of the so-called "Middle East peace process," this lack of interest displayed by respondents in the al Arabiya website question is hardly surprising. But to go from this result to Qallab’s alarming conclusion or Karsh’s broader argument is both unwarranted and dangerously wrong.
In fact Arab public opinion remains riveted on the Palestinian question. In my forthcoming book Arab Voices: What They Are Saying to Us and Why It Matters I present results of recent polling we have conducted across the Arab world, making clear that the issue of Palestine and the rights of the Palestinians are priority concerns for Arabs from Morocco to the Arab Gulf States. While Arab opinion had great hopes in the ability and commitment of President Obama to help Palestinians realize their rights, widespread disappointment in the U.S. now exists across the region.
