[Peace-discuss] Tribune Article on Ali Abunimah

[David Green]

Arab advocate still speaks up -- and often
  
By Raoul V. Mowatt
Tribune staff reporter
Published August 29, 2002

Ali Abunimah is sitting in the CNN studio in Chicago,
waiting for the debate over the Middle East to begin
on yet another talk show.

Staring into the camera's glass eye, he outlines in
his mind his talking points, and how they will reflect
on the Palestinian cause.

The son of a former Jordanian ambassador, Abunimah has
found his own form of diplomacy. He frequently appears
on television programs and writes op-ed pieces on the
Middle East. He lobbies media organizations when he
thinks their coverage has been unfair. And from his
Hyde Park home, he helps maintain
www.electronicintifada.net, a Web site that attempts
to tell the story of the Middle East from a
perspective he and others say is overlooked.

"When you get behind the headlines, you do change
people's minds," Abunimah says. "There are a lot of
voices that are silent, and I try to point people to
these voices."

Alex Safian, associate director of the Committee for
Accuracy in Middle East Reporting in America (CAMERA)
describes Abunimah as "talented," with a British
accent that may give him an air of sophistication to
American audiences. But in terms of the issues, Safian
says, "I think his message is straining credulity, and
I think that shows."

Abunimah, 30, counters that he researches everything
for his appearances and on his Web site, and visitors
and viewers can judge for themselves. Abunimah adds
that he feels obligated to act as an Arab advocate
because there are so few out there, and because he
thinks the official ones have not realized they need
to spend more time making their case directly to the
American people rather than to government officials.

It's not for the money

Abunimah says he's sure not in it for the money.
Occasionally, the shows on which he appears have
reimbursed his parking costs and similar expenses, but
generally, he says, most do not pay. The Web site is
run mostly on volunteer labor and has a budget of a
couple of thousand dollars, says Nigel Parry, another
of its organizers. All in all, Abunimah adds, it's a
non-profit endeavor with low costs -- except perhaps
emotionally.

"I see this as a necessity, not a career," he says.
"Mentally it's very, very draining. It's also very
repetitive. When you do X interviews about a subject,
you find yourself saying the same things over again
and again."

Essentially, those same things include that he and
most Palestinians condemn terrorism against Israelis,
that the Israeli occupation is the equivalent of a
military dictatorship in which Palestinians are
stripped of their rights and that the mainstream media
often downplays that.

"It's a constant struggle, because when people see
violence they think that all Palestinians support
violence or because some Palestinians use despicable
methods that that means the Palestinian cause isn't
just," he says. "At the same time, there's this
complete denial of the suffering inflicted on
Palestinians."

By profession, Abunimah works as a senior researcher
at the University of Chicago's Chapin Hall Center for
Children. "I'm interested in social policy," Abunimah
says. "There's no place in which social policy has
more impact than the lives of children."

He says he's careful to keep his advocacy separate
from his job. In part, it's because he does not want
the university to suffer a backlash. In part, he says,
it's because he wants a refuge from thinking about the
Middle East 24 hours a day.

A typical day begins at 5 a.m., when Abunimah, who is
single, wakes up and scans the Web for information
about the Middle East. After his job, he returns home
and works on the Web site. It features links to
stories about the conflict, accounts from people in
the occupied territories, tips for other would-be
advocates and a place to make tax-deductible
contributions.

Many nights, Abunimah participates in talk shows or
other discussions about the Israeli-Palestinian
conflict.

Among the outlets that have quoted Abunimah or
published his opinion pieces in just the last year:
the Tribune, the Los Angeles Times, the New York
Times, Salon.com, the Philadelphia Inquirer and the
Village Voice. He has appeared on "Hardball With Chris
Matthews," "Chicago Tonight" and "Hannity and Colmes."

Joel Kaufman, coordinating producer for prime-time
programming at Fox News Channel, says Abunimah stood
his ground quite well against Sean Hannity, a
supporter of Israel.

Abunimah is "extremely articulate and the accent
doesn't hurt," Kaufman says. "He's got really great
energy. He's certainly someone you can count on to be
controversial as well. He's someone you can always
count on to have the courage of their convictions."

Michael Kotzin, executive vice president of the Jewish
Federation of Metropolitan Chicago, thinks of Abunimah
as eloquent and sophisticated.

`A serious absence'

But Kotzin says he is troubled that he has not heard
Abunimah, who pointedly deplores terrorism, state that
he supports the continued right of Israel to exist
alongside a future Palestine. "I'm not asking him to
come up with the formula to get there," Kotzin says.
"I think you just have to give the positive,
especially when the thrust is so heavily critical of
Israel. I think that's a serious absence."

Abunimah says he has repeatedly asserted "my firm and
unwavering conviction that Israelis and Palestinians
should live alongside each other in full peace,
complete equality and profound democracy."

Growing up, Abunimah moved to many diplomatic postings
as one of three children of Hasan Abu-Nimah. (He says
he stopped hyphenating his name after his records were
often misfiled at Princeton University, where he
graduated in 1993 with a bachelor's degree in
politics. He earned a master's degree in political
science in 1995 from the University of Chicago.) He
knew members of the Jordanian royal family and went
hunting many times with Prince Mohammad, the elder
brother of the late King Hussein.

Off camera, he's polite and soft-spoken. On camera, he
bumps up the aggression level -- out of necessity, he
says.

"They throw you in a pit with a bunch of people who
disagree with you strongly," he says. "If you can't
make a case, if you can't hold your own, the audience
will know it."

Abunimah recalls an instance in which he was
embarrassed when his debating opponent pointed out
that he was using information from a reporter who had
been discredited for using composite characters and
other journalistic breaches.

"I didn't like . . . being taken by surprise,"
Abunimah says. "I usually am better prepared than my
opponent, or I try to be."

Jeffery Dvorkin, ombudsman for National Public Radio,
says Abunimah has proven "a persistent critic with
excellent knowledge of the region."

Dvorkin adds. "He's as credible as much as an advocate
. . . can be."

But there are times when Abunimah is left exasperated
by being a top-talking head.

"I hope," Abunimah says, "the day will come when I
don't have to do this at all."


Copyright © 2002, Chicago Tribune 


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