[Imc-newsroom] Proposal to fund a stringer in Palestine . . .

[Andrew C. Kennis]

I sent this already, but it get held up because of the attachment. Here
is the non-attachment version, which I suppose will get through to the
list immediately. Forgive the duplication . . . 

Hello everybody, 

What follows below, is a proposal to fund a stringer in Palestine. I
first became thinking of the idea after my trip to Urbana-Champaign
last week (am in Chicago for now), where I was lucky to meet a very
nice guy who you are very familiar with (Sascha). He suggested to me to
pass on this proposal to you folks and also told me that you would be
meeting this Sunday at 1:15pm. I would be happy to call in at some
point during the meeting, to field any and all questions concerning the
proposal. 

The proposal begins with a simple summary and is followed by a detailed
rundown of proposed activities. I will go ahead and paste it here and
also attach it as a word document. Please feel free to contact me about
any and all concerns you may have. If I don't hear from any of you, I
will go ahead and call the UC-IMC at around 1:30pm to make myself
available for questions. 

                        Funding Proposal for a 
                         Stringer in Palestine

Summary: The following is a proposal to fund a stringer who would
travel to Palestine to file audio reports (and would be available for
live interviews via cellular phone), write stories, conduct interviews
(transcribed and recorded) and organize a panel discussion to be held
at the UC-IMC upon return. The panel discussion could be used as a
fundraising opportunity, that could potentially off-set the costs of
this proposal. 

The funding would be directly used to buy an airplane ticket, which
will cost approximately $600 because of a contact we were lucky to
locate at Al-Italia (the usual cost of the ticket is about $1000). This
proposal is a request for the whole ticket to be paid for by the
UC-IMC, but it is understood that this may not be possible and a lower
amount may have to be allotted instead. 

Reasons for Proposal

It is unnecessary to explain in detail the dire situation in Palestine,
as I am sure all of you are quite aware of the deplorable conditions
over there (and not only for the Palestinians, but for journalists as
well, see Counterspin’s report about as much at:
http://www.webactive.com/webactive/cspin/cspin20020405.html). A quick
check at the recently launched Palestine IMC web page reveals as much
to a horrifying extent, such as the recent invasion of Hebron which
killed at least 9 Palestinians (6 of whom were civilians, a familiar
story, as most of the Palestinian victims of the Intifada have been
civilians). 

At the same time, mainstream media coverage here in the States is
perhaps the worst out of any foreign affairs issue that is reported on.
The media watch group Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting have
documented this trend of inaccurate and bias coverage on Israel and
Palestine (see: http://www.fair.org/international/middle-east.html for
an array of media critiques about as much). Indeed, the lack of
accurate information here in the States is so extreme, that even the
mere mentioning of the phrase “occupied territories,” a basic and
central fact to the conflict, is all but completely blacked out in
mainstream coverage. 

All of these factors only make the need for independent reporting and
investigative journalism that much more pressing. 

A Little Bit About Myself

As the author of this proposal, and the intended recipient of the
funding, I think it is appropriate to tell all of you a little bit
about myself. 

My name is Andrew Kennis and I am from New York City. My permanent
residence is currently in Mexico City, where I am an active participant
in the Mexico City IMC. I have also been active in the New York City
IMC and have participated in IMC convergences at Philadelphia, Los
Angeles, Quebec City, New York City and Washington D.C. During my time
with the IMC for the last two years, I have gained a lot of experience
and knowledge in producing audio reports, in web design and maintenance
and writing articles. 

Aside from my journalism, I teach a college course entitled “Political
Communication.” I taught this course last semester and plan to teach
again in upcoming the fall semester (the syllabus is online at:
http://nyc.indymedia.org/local/DraftSyllabusProposal.html). Right now,
I am working as an independent journalist and as a political science
doctoral student (I do independent study course work in Mexico that I
send to my school in NYC, the City University of New York).  

I am in the midst of a six week trip that has taken me to New York
City, Washington D.C. (where I covered the Palestinian protests) and to
Chicago (where I presently am). Right now, I am quite busy planning a
trip to Palestine where I intend to do all of the activities contained
in this proposal. One of the things I am busy with is seeking financial
support for this trip, as I intend to do a significant amount of
journalistic work. I hope to leave for Palestine by mid-May, where I
would return to Chicago approximately two weeks later. My return ticket
to Mexico City is June 5th from Chicago.

Activities

If the collective decides to support me financially in any way, the
following is a list of activities that I would undertake as a stringer
on behalf of the UC-IMC while in Palestine: 

Panel Discussion
Before, during and after my trip to Palestine, I would organize a panel
discussion to be held at the UC-IMC which would serve as a
“report-back” on my experience in Palestine. I would not be the only
participant though. Other people who have also recently visited
Palestine to witness and report on the conditions out there would
participate as well (there are a variety of candidates for this,
including two people from the organization Voices in the Wilderness,
who gave their own report back in Chicago this past Sunday). As I am in
contact with a variety of Palestinian organizations here in Chicago, I
could also organize Palestinian speakers to be on the panel as well. 

The panel discussion could serve as a great fundraising opportunity
that could offset all of the costs of this proposal. During the report
back from the Voices in the Wilderness event organized here in Chicago,
the approximate 250 people who were drawn to the event donated over
$600 towards the ends of funding people visiting Palestine. There’s no
reason why we could not accomplish the same thing at UC. 

Audio Reports
When in Palestine, I will be able to file raw audio reports on a near
daily basis. Produced reports could be filed on a weekly basis. The
reports will contain news reporting, interviews and on-the-ground
footage (such as recordings of shellings and interactions with the
Israeli Defense Forces).

Interviews (recorded and transcribed)
Interviews will be frequently conducted, recorded and sometimes
transcribed from Palestine. Additionally, I personally will be
available for live interviews that could be broadcast on UC-IMC’s radio
program, as I will be bringing a cellular phone that we will connect
when I get to Israel. 

After the return of my trip, studio based interviews will be conducted
as well, on the Chicago IMC’s radio program and possibly on the
UC-IMC’s radio program as well.  

Articles
News reports will be written, that can be published on the web and/or
in print newspapers. Upon my return, I plan to write a media analysis
comparing the on-the-ground facts and events I collected to the reports
given in the U.S. mainstream media.

Delivering Money
I will hand deliver the $2000 that is trying to be sent to the
Palestine-IMC to save the costs of the wire transfer, which amount to a
considerable sum of money in Palestine (that is, when the dollar is
converted into Palestinian currency, it goes pretty far and thus,
savings from a wire transfer amount to a significant sum of money). 

Writing Samples
My most recent on-the-scene articles have been on the Palestinian
demonstrations in D.C., on the indigenous community of Acteal in
Chiapas and on Guatemala. You can find the D.C. article on the DC-IMC
site and the latter two articles on the Mexico-IMC site. Or, you can
just wait for me to send the links to all of the articles, as I will be
doing as much within the next few days.

Older articles, including an interview I conducted with Noam Chomsky,
can be found on a site of mine at:
http://bari.iww.org/~iww-nyc/CUNY


My Contact Information:
Andrew Kennis
773.293.3659 (home)
773.469.7714 (cell)
Andrew at indymedia.org


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