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Why Middle East Reporting Shouldn't Always Be About War

Visiting journalists give perspectives on reporting in the region

Nasim Fekrat's photograph of buzkashi, the national Afghan sport. Fekrat's photos emphasizes the daily life of his country.

At a time when reporting on the Middle East and Afghanistan focuses on war and conflict, where is there going to be room for journalism about people's daily lives? And what would happen if the West got such images?

In a panel discussion Thursday, visiting journalists from the DeWitt Wallace Center for Media and Democracy suggested that a broader perspective on reporting might help American readers understand the people and the conflicts better and help imagine a different future for the war-torn region.

The reporters discussed how war has changed journalism in the region, both for good and bad, but when freelance Afghan photographer Nasim Fekrat began talking, he said he wanted to start with some images of his country that he had taken.

The photos showed children, a wedding, families and other everyday images. Fekrat said that was on purpose.

"The news you see of Afghanistan in the West is of war,war, and more war," said Fekrat, who has won several awards for his advocacy for free press in his country. "You don't see images of our society. I wanted to present Afghanistan in a better way."

This isn't a simple denial of the reality of the war. At a time when many stories from the region describe age-old conflicts that seem hopeless to solve, pictures of everyday life can send a message that the present didn't have to be this way, and the future can be different.

Yazeed Kamaldien, a free correspondent for South African national daily The Times who has traveled through the Sudan, Ethiopia and was in Gaza for the recent conflict, had a similar thought. He showed photos he took of daily life in Ethiopia.

"I wanted to show the cultural side of life," Kamaldien said. "This is less journalistic material."

Kamaldien's revelation that he entered Sudan and Gaza not with journalism credentials but as an employee of aid organizations started a discussion about journalism ethics in time of war. In Gaza, Kamaldien photographed children and civilians who were injured in the fighting.

"The basic fact is journalists were not given access to these areas [the Sudan and Gaza]," Kamaldien said. "Because I was with an aid agency, I got more access to people, and people were more open to me."

In Gaza, he was hired by an aid agency to document their work. When questioned about how it affected his relationship with the people he interviewed, Kamaldien said every person he talked to or photographed knew that he was a journalist and that their discussion could be published.

A third foreign correspondent, Michel Moutot, a 25-year reporter covering the Middle East with Agence France Presse, was an expert on al-Qaeda and terrorism. He said the West too often gets a narrow perspective on terrorists and said the first step to defeating these groups is "to know the enemy."

"We have to know who these people are and what they want," Moutot said. "Osama Bin Laden isn't a religious guy. He's a guy who uses religion for a political agenda."

The panel was hosted by the Duke Islamic Studies Center and Duke's DeWitt Wallace Center for Media and Democracy. All three panelists are 2009 DeWitt Wallace Media Fellows. While at Duke, fellows study public policy, politics, international affairs, environment, economics, history, business, law and new media technologies.