By Kari Lydersen

“I know I’m more guilty for the existence of Saddam Hussein than any Iraqi child I’ve held in my arms,” says Kathy Kelly, co-coordinator of the group Voices in the Wilderness and Nobel Peace Prize nominee. Kelly has spent much time in Iraq—as well as Palestine and other hot spots—helping get the story out about the devastating effect of the US-fueled economic sanctions against Iraq.

“I’m guilty because I live in a country that benefits from the situation there,” she says. “That’s an idea that doesn’t get much play in the media.” There are many facts about the situation in Iraq that don’t get aired in the media, according to Kelly. The media rarely explains the complexity of issues in Iraq, including the role the US has played in creating the misery there.
“They just pound away at the idea that there is only one figure, Saddam Hussein, responsible for all this,” she says.

The demonization of Hussein is key to preparing the US public for war with Iraq, a campaign that officially started with President Bush’s announcement this spring that an attack involving up to 250,000 American ground troops is impending, most likely next winter when the climate is more conducive. The State Department has scrapped as unworkable a previous plan of working with opposition forces, namely Kurdish rebels and dissident Shia and Sunni Muslims, to force a coup. It appears that Bush refuses to be influenced by opposition from European leaders, not to mention much of the Arab world.
Media portrayals of the differing conditions in the north of Iraq, where the UN is operating, and the south under Hussein, are part of the demonization of Hussein trend. “You hear very slanted reports all the time about how much better the situation is in the north,” Kelly says. “The media doesn’t go into the many reasons why this has always been the case. For one thing, the water in the north isn’t as contaminated.”

Media explanations of the oil-for-food program and its implementation are also misleading. The controversial program, which allows Iraq to sell a small amount of oil in order to buy critical food and supplies, is not a workable way to run a country.

“They are not able to get cash, only commodities,” under the program, Kelly says. “That money all goes into escrow in New York, and it can only be accessed by UN workers after the Iraqi government puts in requests for commodities, not cash. There is no cash component. If you think of paying teachers and doctors and people who keep the infrastructure going, if you think of running a school or some institution in the US that way, you’d realize it is an almost impossible situation.”

Media reports often describe the corruption of the Saddam Hussein government in connection with the program. These charges undoubtedly have plenty of truth to them, but they also serve to further justify foreign control of the nation and inhibit plans for more humanitarian infusions of aid and food. Seth Ackerman, a contributing writer to FAIR, catalogues what he sees as a purposeful misrepresentation of the food-for-oil program by the New York Times, in particular reporter Barbara Crossette (read article).

“According to Crossette’s reporting, Saddam Hussein and the Iraqi regime have been deliberately withholding these desperately needed foods and medications from the Iraqi people, in a cynical effort to sabotage the UN’s relief efforts,” Ackerman writes. He documents numerous instances where Crossette misquoted UN and UNICEF officials or manipulated the facts to echo the State Department line and paint a picture of a program failing solely because of Hussein’s corruption.

Among other things, he notes the Times ran many stories on the Iraqi government supposedly “stockpiling” food and letting it go to waste or giving it to political cronies, when this was perhaps a logical tactic to have emergency food supplies.

“Following the State Department, the Times has consistently advanced convoluted and far-fetched interpretations of these reports in an effort to portray straightforward logistical problems as evidence of sinister Iraqi manipulation,” Ackerman adds.

Though she doesn’t subscribe to a conspiracy theory regarding coverage of Iraq, Kelly says she is sure corporate and government interests dictate the tone and scope of US media coverage of the country and the effects of the sanctions.

“We find ourselves increasingly relying on reporters who don’t come from the US,” she says. “It’s not that US reporters are necessarily bad, but they are up against a formidable opponent. We should be talking about not just the military-industrial complex but the military-industrial-media complex.”
While she is still frustrated by mainstream media coverage, she says Voices in the Wilderness and the campaign to end the sanctions have fared very well with the alternative media.

“In 1996 when we started, people weren’t even sure if we were talking about Iraq or Iran,” she explains. “Now it’s hard for us to keep up with [mainly alternative] media and speaking requests. But the New York Times still isn’t calling us.”

According to Kelly, the State Department has publicly admitted that the “public relations battle has been lost” in regards to the sanctions. The Iraq Anti-War link at www.nonviolence.org describes how vocal activists broke into the mainstream media and facilitated a shift in public opinion in 1998. At the time grassroots peace groups had sprung up almost overnight but were virtually ignored by the mainstream news media, says the site. “That changed when some of these activists got into a CNN-sponsored Town Hall meeting that was broadcast live around the world. These activists asked sharp questions of the Clinton Administration officials. The next day, the news media started asking those same questions, breaking the consensus for war.”

However, coverage of the issue is complex with many twists and turns. In December 1998 President Clinton mandated the bombing of Iraq after UN weapons inspectors were denied entry. But in January 1999 the New York Times and other major media confirmed Saddam Hussein’s contention that CIA operatives were heavily present among the UN weapons inspectors, which led Saddam to deny the inspectors access.

With the “war on terrorism” jingoism and hysteria that have risen since 9-11, the media and activists will face an even harder challenge this time around as the State Department continues to push for war. Along with more accurate and complex analysis of the economic and political situation of the country, Kelly says it is crucial to bring US audiences more news and portraits of everyday life and people in Iraq.

“We’d like to see media covering stories of ordinary people, the kind of stories groups like ours can bring back,” she said. “For example, when someone sees that the average Iraqi family’s earning power is 5,000 dinar a year, and in comparison a pair of shoes costs 5,000 dinar, or a bag of blood on the black market costs the equivalent of several years’ wages, then people understand the situation a little more.”

“In hospitals people are particularly communicating feelings of isolation, guilt, impotence, the feeling that whatever they do will be undone by the sanctions or another bombing,” she added. “These are all symptoms of classic clinical depression. People are depressed and terrified to speak up. If you really wanted to help a country move toward democracy, you would build media, communications, social services. But the sanctions have dismantled any of those possibilities. And you don’t really see any sensitivity to these issues in the media.”

Bush must also be hoping to make media coverage of the war a personal campaign tool for a re-election run. USA Today quoted retired Army officer Andy Bacevich as saying, “They have made such a point of regime change, the president can’t run for re-election and have Saddam still in power thumbing his nose at us.”

Kari Lydersen is Associate Editor of StreetWise newspaper and writes for Punk Planet , Clamor magazine, In These Times and The Washington Post.