U.S. Satellite Channel Offers Unfiltered Views From the Middle East
"We feel we are telling a counter-narrative to what Americans are bombarded with," said David Michaelis, director of current affairs for WorldLink TV, a nonprofit satellite channel based here that re-broadcasts news programs, with English voice-over, from the Muslim world for satellite TV subscribers in the United States.

"There are no coded messages from the Middle East," Mr. Michaelis said. "It is very much in your face. These broadcasters are constantly questioning the supremacy of the United States."

Mr. Michaelis, a journalist from Jerusalem, and his colleague, Jamal Dajani, a Palestinian-American producer born in the same city, have been scrutinizing the broadcasts of Middle East countries since last November. They use the material to produce a daily news program for WorldLink called Mosaic. Except for the English translations, the programming is left in its original form, with no introductions or analyses from the San Francisco staff.

Mr. Dajani said the hands-off approach was central to Mosaic's purpose of providing Americans with a different and unfiltered window to the Middle East.

"Since Sept. 11, we have had the story of the victim and the accused," Mr. Dajani said. "Every American is making the link to the Middle East, so it is very relevant to see what they are saying there. We are looking at the attitudes of roughly 280 million people in 22 countries."

During this past week, the Mosaic program was expanded from its normal half-hour slot to one hour to keep up with the intense news coverage of the Sept. 11 anniversary and President Bush's speech to the United Nations. Still, the images broadcast on Mosaic were nothing like those seen on most American channels.

Little attention was given to the formal remembrances at ground zero. Instead, the programming focused on the fallout — considered largely negative — of the Sept. 11 attacks for Muslims, including those living in the United States.

Al Manar TV in Beirut reported about discrimination against Arab Americans. A segment from Iraqi State TV criticized American media coverage of the 9/11 commemorations, suggesting that it was intended to create fear and panic.

Though much of the programming would be considered anti-American, Mr. Dajani and Mr. Michaelis said their representative sample of what is being shown in the Middle East invariably included other viewpoints. On Wednesday and Thursday Mosaic presented a report from the Palestine Broadcast Company that opened with the words "No to terrorism." It went on to show interviews with Palestinian children who said they felt the pain of Americans on Sept. 11 because of their own encounters with terrorism at home.
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/09/16/international/middleeast/16SATE.html