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DOI: 10.1177/1748048510380801
2010 72: 695International Communication Gazette Shahira Fahmy
Arabic-language press coverage of war and terrorismContrasting visual frames of our times: A framing analysis of English- and
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Article
Contrasting visual framesof our times: A framinganalysis of English- andArabic-language presscoverage of war andterrorism
Shahira FahmyThe University of Arizona, USA
Abstract
By operationalizing visual frames in terms of the human-interest vs technical frame and
the anti-war vs the pro-war frame, and exploring the use of two sets of framing devices:graphic portrayal and emphasis, this framing analysis of 1387 photographs examined con-trasting visual narratives employed by English- and Arabic-language transnational press incovering the 9/11 attack and the Afghan War. For the English-language newspaper, theInternational Herald Tribune, the frames emphasized the human suffering of 9/11 andde-emphasized the civilian casualties and moral guilt of implementing military force inAfghanistan by focusing more on a pro-war frame that showed the complex militaryhigh-tech operations and patriotic pictures. For the Arabic-language newspaper, Al-Hayat, the frames focused less on the victims and more on the material destruction of
9/11 and humanized the victims of the Afghan War. Furthermore, it focused on ananti-war frame by running visuals of anti-war protests and emphasizing graphic visualsportraying the humanitarian crisis in the Muslim country of Afghanistan.
Keywords
Afghan War, Al-Hayat, framing, International Herald Tribune, 9/11, photojournalism,transnational press, visual reporting, war coverage
Corresponding author:
Shahira Fahmy, College of Social and Behavioral Sciences, School of Journalism, Department of Near Eastern
Studies, 845 N. Park Avenue, Marshall Building 325, PO Box 210158B, Tucson, AZ 85721-0158, USA
Email: sfahmy@email.arizona.edu
the InternationalCommunication Gazette
72(8) 695–717
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Since the 2003 Iraq War, discontent around the world with America’s policies has
intensified. European views are decidedly critical of US war policies and the Arab anger
toward the US remains pervasive. With the globalization of the world’s economic,
political and communication systems, news reporting and images provided in US mediavs Arab media have received considerable attention. Top US officials (e.g. US defense
secretary Donald Rumsfeld) repeatedly accused Al-Jazeera and other Arab-language
media outlets of harming the image of the US in the Arab world (see Voice of America,
2005; see also Shapiro, 2005).
As the world becomes increasingly interconnected and dependent on efficient means
of informing politics, economics and social and everyday life, more attention is needed
to the content of news across borders. The transnational Arab media system – bounded
by the Arabic language and Islam – for example, is the product of a commercialized
infrastructure, which transmits massive flows of information among Arabs and Muslims,
regardless of location. It thus expands beyond the confines of the nation-state to promote
collective political understanding of events, rather than the traditional Arab state-centric
interpretation of news (see Lynch, 2006).
The framing analysis in this article investigates the contrasting visual narratives in
English- and Arabic-language transnational press in covering the 9/11 attack and the
Afghan War by exploring two sets of visual frames: the human-interest vs technical
frame and the anti-war fame vs pro-war frame, and two sets of framing devices: graphic
portrayal and emphasis.
Comparing visual coverage in two newspapers of different cultural and political per-
spectives regarding two violent events helps to reveal the critical choices that journalists
subjectively make that would otherwise remain submerged.1 Entman (1991) explains
that comparison reveals that choices are not inevitable but rather are central to the way
the news frame helps establish the interpretation of news events. Neuman and colleagues
(1992: 120) suggest that the media ‘give the story a spin . . . taking into account their
organizational and modality constraints, professional judgments, and certain judgments
about the audience’.
With this perspective, this work examines photographs in the US-owned English-
language newspaper, the International Herald Tribune ( IHT )2 and the Saudi-owned
Arabic-language newspaper Al-Hayat from 12 September 2001, through 15 November 2001. The IHT and Al-Hayat are well-respected elite newspapers that are both transna-
tional in scope, with an approximate circulation of 200,000 each. Both are based in
Western Europe and represent two foreign news organizations catering to both English-
and Arabic-language audiences.
While both newspapers pride themselves on providing western notions of journalistic
objectivity and balanced coverage of events and issues, it is important to note that differ-
ent cultural and political perspectives inevitably filter into the news-making process and
inflect news values and organizational routines. Both newspapers are subjected to differ-
ent cultural perspectives that should give rise to important differences in how they cov-ered the two events under study. In other words, the ethos of journalistic objectivity and
the atypical claims to internationalist and cross-cultural positions suggests that these two
newspapers feature a similar style of reporting; one in which opinion seeps into coverage
by virtue of various factors, such as journalists’ approach to cover each story with an
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angle or a perspective. In Making News, Tuchman (1978), for example, explains that a
perspective is inevitable and is a result of routinized, legitimized and institutionalized
structures that favor certain ways of reporting the news. Thus, because of the tendency
for frame reductionism (see Scheufele, 2004) and by showing which images were con-sistently selected in these two newspapers, this article suggests which dimensions of the
terrorist attack and the Afghan War coverage carried the visual information that com-
prised the narratives. In this way, this article aims to illuminate in some detail the nature
of visual framing in transnational media.
From a theoretical perspective, this research, therefore, expands the study of framing
theory by examining visual frames and the framing devices used in an information war
and the transnational coverage of terrorism and conflict. How different English- and
Arabic-language media visually portray violent events remains a neglected area of sci-
entific inquiry and the proposed research represents a substantive effort to remedy this
deficiency. A review of past studies indicates that little of the work examining the fram-
ing of news events has focused on visual images. In an era of information warfare and
image management, the results of this study, thus, add to the current literature on framing
by exploring differences and similarities of visual reporting in a cross-cultural and trans-
national context. Furthermore, this research helps us speculate upon the interaction
between visuals of violent events and the thinking of English- and Arabic-speaking news
professionals and audiences, and how media coverage continues to reinforce the current
trends toward an increasingly polarized global public opinion.
The theoretical concept of framing
Scholars from differing theoretical and methodological perspectives suggest that media
content plays a particularly important role in constructing, shaping and reinforcing per-
ceptions of news events. However, because of this very interdisciplinary nature of the
communication field, Reese (2007) explains that while theoretical diversity has been
beneficial in developing and understanding the framing process, framing still lacks a
common shared theoretical model and suffers operational problems (see also Scheufele,
1999). Reese (2007) explains that for many scholars framing has represented more of aresearch program than a unified paradigm. Indeed, a review of the literature confirmed
an overall vague conceptualization of framing.
In an effort to clearly define the process, Reese (2001: 11) offered the following
definition: ‘Frames are organizing principles that are socially shared and persistent over
time, that work symbolically to meaningfully structure the social world.’ With this def-
inition he captured the dynamic process of negotiating meaning that occurs in the pro-
cess, while highlighting the relationships within discourse that may undergo changes
over time.
Similar to Reese (2007), Scheufele (2000) explained framing operates on a multi-levelstructure, suggesting a series of interrelated sub-processes. Scheufele (2000) developed an
analytical model that argued for a more careful examination of the three distinctive – yet
related – approaches of agenda setting, priming and framing and further suggested frames
need to be examined across levels of analysis (see Scheufele, 1999).
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Framing studies have been mainly guided by a combination of the cognitive,
constructivist and critical perspectives (D’Angelo, 2002). From the constructive perspec-
tive – on which this study is based – scholars have defined media frames as ‘a central
organizing idea or story line that provides meaning to an unfolding strip of events . . .the frame suggests what the controversy is about, the essence of the issue’ (Gamson and
Modigliani, 1987: 143). And according to the constructive media effects model, public
opinion is shaped when audiences actively operate in the construction of meaning, while
relying on personal experience, social networking and interpretations from the mass
media (see Neuman et al., 1992).
Entman (1993) suggested the use of four framing functions: define a problem; iden-
tify a cause; present a moral evaluation; and suggest a remedy. Within the realm of visual
and political communication, Entman (1991) compared visual frames in the news cov-
erage of the US downing of an Iranian plane to the Soviet downing of a Korean jet in
the 1980s. He found that while the US media emphasized guilt in the Soviet downing
by showing visual messages that humanized the victims, the US media de-emphasized
the shooting down of the Iranian plane by showing messages that focused less on the
victims.
While Entman (1991) looked at how two different events were covered by one
‘source’– that source being the US media (Time, Newsweek , The New York Times, The
Washington Post and the CBS Evening News), the current study compares visual cover-
age of two different ‘sources’ ( IHT and Al-Hayat ) on two events that are, on the one
hand, roughly comparable in that they both involve violence, but, on the other hand, are
very different because one was a calamity on US soil and the other was a war in
Afghanistan. Thus, in Entman’s study, any variation in coverage patterns was within the
source’s ideologically driven approach to framing of different events. This study’s the-
oretical underpinnings, however, suggest that the sources are expected to differ in their
coverage patterns of framing of both events, owing to socially shared and persistent ideo-
logical differences over time in the two sources analyzed. Any variation found in this
study would, therefore come from the connection between source and event – e.g. an
English-language newspaper will cover an attack on US soil differently than would an
Arabic-language newspaper.
The visual framing of news events
Visual framing is both contingent upon, and distinct from, framing that occurs in written
parts of print news, and in written and spoken parts of broadcast news. In contrasting
visual framing to that which occurs in written and spoken news texts, Messaris and Abra-
ham (2001: 220) stated, ‘The special qualities of visuals – their iconicity, their indexical-
ity, and especially their syntactic implicitness – makes them very effective tools for
framing and articulating ideological messages’. Their definitive account of visual fram-
ing in Framing Public Life suggests that these three distinctive qualities of photographsmake visual framing less obtrusive than verbal framing, in such a way that ‘visual fram-
ing may convey meanings that would be more controversial or might meet with greater
audience resistance if they were conveyed through words’ (Messaris and Abraham,
2001: 215).
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In the context of visual framing, the presence (or lack) of an image and the content of
a news photograph help determine the interpretation of a news event (Entman, 1993).
Contrary to common belief, photographs are not neutral (Hulteng, 1985; Tagg, 1988).
Even if images are not staged, they still need to be selected in a frame that cannot be wideenough to capture the complex reality (Messaris and Abraham, 2001), suggesting that
visual journalists inevitably set the framing process in motion. They may follow guide-
lines for objective reporting, but they may yet convey a dominant frame of news events
to their target audience (Entman, 1993). Past studies, for example, found that visual jour-
nalists in times of calamities and wars are expected to bend the rules of objectivity and
support their country’s troops and their government’s position on issues (see Fahmy,
2005a). Thus, in the case here, it is likely that different cultural and political perspectives
filtered into the news-gathering process and inflected news values and organizational
routines. One can thus infer two corollaries from this premise: (1) that different cultural
and political perspectives should yield predictably different types of visual coverage of
events in both newspapers; and (2) that events of international importance, such as war
and terrorism, should amplify the differences in visual coverage and make them more
observable.
The use of frames and framing devices
Based on Scheufele’s (1999) recommendation that framing needs to be examined across
levels of analysis, this section describes how four indicators operate at two differentlevels.
At the first level, lie the framing devices. The first and in some ways the most critical
framing device involves the overall salience and prominence of the events under study.
The literature indicates one of the most powerful framing devices is the frequency with
which a topic is mentioned in the news media. Entman (1993), for example, explains that
by repeating and reinforcing visual messages that reference some ideas and not others,
frames convey constant meanings, rendering ideas more salient and memorable than
others.
Aside from the images used to depict an event, how prominently an event is displayed also indicates the importance of that event (Entman, 1991; Fahmy, 2007; Fahmy et al.,
2007). Garcia (1987) found readers normally look at the largest photograph on a news
page, then the second largest and the third largest and so on. Wanta (1988) also found
larger photographs rather than smaller photographs can cause accompanying stories to
be more salient to the readers. Therefore, the more redundant the visual theme and the
more prominent, the clearer the indication we get about the presence of visual frames.
Attention has also been paid to the use of graphic device in photographs. Scholars
support the notion that graphic visuals capture viewers’ attention and bring viewers
closer to the action, making events more real and shocking (Fahmy and Johnson,2007b; Fahmy at al., 2006; Pfau et. al, 2006; Potter and Smith, 2000; Zelizer, 2004). For
example, a close-up image of a violent act is more graphic than a long shot of that same
act; seeing the image of a dead body from far away is not as graphic as seeing a close-up
of the dead person’s face lying in a pool of blood. Overall, then, the literature indicates
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that the more graphic the photograph, the easier it is to employ visual frames in
developing a congruent interpretation of news events.
The second level of analysis deals with visual frames. The first visual frame examined
is the human-interest vs technical frame. Few studies have looked at coverage of victimsof tragic events to examine whether they were humanized, encouraging identification
with them, or whether they were made less visible with the information less centered
on the humanity they shared with the audience members and thus less likely to evoke
sympathy (e.g. Entman, 1991).
By and large, the literature suggests that media from different cultural and political
perspectives create different images of conflict. For example, while the US media failed
to report human agony and death of Iraqis in the first Gulf War (Herman, 1992), the Arab
media showed graphic images of suffering to gain public support for the Iraqi people
(Ayish, 2001).
In depicting the Gulf Wars, Griffin and Lee (1995) found that only 2 percent of total
images used to depict the first Gulf War showed images of wounded or killed US sol-
diers. Instead, news coverage emphasized material damage, such as bridges blowing
up, property damage and other forms of non-human destruction (Prince, 1993). Further,
the news media over-depicted the use and efficiency of smart bombs (Perlmutter, 1998).
It was only after the war that it was revealed that 70 percent of the bombs dropped in the
Gulf missed their targets (Frank, 1992; Hachten and Hachten, 1999; Winfield, 1992).
More recently, King and Lester (2005) concluded that although journalists in the recent
Iraq War were allowed safer and better access through the embed program (see Fahmy
and Johnson, 2005, 2007a), the images published in US newspapers were overwhel-
mingly pro-military, showing very few pictures of civilian casualties from either side
(see also Fahmy and Kim, 2008).
According to Herman and Chomsky (1988), the framing of suffering occurs in a
dichotomy that makes distinctions between the unworthy victims depicted as enemies
and the worthy victims who suffer. Consider the difference between emphasizing gra-
phic images of human suffering and death of civilians vs emphasizing pictures of mili-
tary arsenal and material destruction that could most likely numb the moral revulsion
that leads societies to see war as a last resort. The difference offers a powerful demon-
stration of how the visual dimension of reporting news events could potentially create ahuman-interest frame vs a technical frame of coverage, specifically in reporting violent
events.
The second visual frame is the anti-war vs the pro-war frame. This frame also belongs
to the selection of visuals of conflict in such a way that images of war could potentially
be placed in categories that conventionally either elicit support or opposition for that
conflict. Past studies indicate an important part of the framing process is the omission
of news (Entman, 1991; Gamson, 1985). Examples of widely publicized omissions
include anti-war demonstrations of the first Gulf War. The war had been widely opposed
in Japan, Spain and North African cities. However, no adequate recognition of the mas-sive public opposition, huge rallies and governmental resignations were present in US
media. The news media failed to provide an adequate sense of the massive worldwide
opposition. Instead, they focused on the support by the United Nations and most of the
world for the war efforts (see Schiller, 1992).
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Consider the difference between de-emphasizing (or omitting) images representing
anti-war demonstrations vs emphasizing graphic images of US patriotism, along with
pictures of US aid efforts for the Afghan people. In the emphasis of patriotic and aid-
effort visuals lies a compelling demonstration of how the visual dimension of reportingthe Afghan conflict could potentially create a pro-war frame of coverage, specifically in
reporting a war that followed the 9/11 attack – one that the majority, at least in the US,
believed was morally justified.
Transnational media: The IHT and Al-Hayat newspapers
Because of the transnational media’s position at the intersection of various cultural,
political and economic environments, they are arguably a crucial forum in which news
outlets compete to establish interpretations and analyses to be accorded serious weight.
The two transnational newspapers were chosen as the medium of study because their
news reaches news consumers worldwide. Virtually unexplored is the way in which the
English- and Arabic-language transnational media visually guide the interpretation of
violent events related to war and terrorism.
The highly respected US-owned IHT is an English-language daily newspaper pub-
lished in Paris for the English-speaking market. It has traditionally published mainly
stories from The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times and The Washington Post
(Merrill, 1991). These US articles are re-purposed for large US and European audiences.
The audience of the IHT is primarily concentrated in Europe (60 percent) and Asia
(35 percent). Nearly two in three readers live outside their country of origin ( New Media
Age, 2005). The readers could be divided into roughly three equal groups. A third are
Americans (tourists and expatriates). A third are expatriates of other countries (e.g.
Danish businessman in Switzerland). And a third are foreign nationals, primarily in Eur-
ope, the Middle East and Asia.3
The second transnational paper, the Saudi-owned Al-Hayat newspaper, is an
Arabic-language daily newspaper published in London for the Arab-speaking market.
It addresses itself to the needs of a pan-Arab audience (Schleifer, 1998). The audience
of Al-Hayat is concentrated in the Arab world (80 percent). Nearly eight in 10 readers
live in Middle Eastern countries. The readers of Al-Hayat are also in Europe (10 percent)and the United States (5 percent).4
It would be, however, improper to generalize to all national and transnational news
outlets from these two newspapers. But the strengths of the findings lie in the fact that
both newspapers pride themselves on being balanced in their coverage of events and
issues, suggesting that a larger database, specifically one based on mainstream national
media available in the United States and the Arab world, could show an even stronger
manifestation of framing than the results of the visual analysis identified here.
The comparison of the two constructed realities of 9/11 and the Afghan War does not
require the assumption that the underlying facts of violent events were analogous. Eventhough this sort of comparison has not been done, based on the literature one can make
solid predictions about visual framing of both events in the two newspapers (see Fahmy
and Johnson, 2009). Both were complicated events open to varying interpretations. For
example, the English-language newspaper would likely cover an attack on American soil
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differently than would an Arab-language newspaper. On the one hand, the IHT , by
focusing on images portraying empathy and highlighting the suffering of 9/11 victims,
could create and incite public opinion to support the US- led ‘war on terror’. On the other
hand, Al-Hayat could focus on Afghan suffering, offering the opportunity to denouncethe United States for what was perceived to be the injustice imposed by bombing a poor
Muslim nation like Afghanistan. In other words, there is nothing inherent that would
compel a similar visual coverage of these two events in the two transnational newspapers
under study.
Method
This work investigates the visual news frames employed by transnational press in cov-
ering the 9/11 attack and the Afghan War. With this goal, the author collected two sets of
photographs from 12 September 2001 through 15 November 2001. The first data set is
from the daily English edition, the IHT newspaper. The second data set is from the daily
Arabic Al-Hayat newspaper. The start date is the day following the 9/11 attack. The end
date is two days after the fall of Kabul – the capital of Afghanistan. The data sets allowed
for the examination of visual news content of connected events produced in a certain
period of time.
Overall, a total of 1387 photographs from the two newspapers were analyzed. The
unit of analysis was the individual photograph. Each photograph depicting events related
to 9/11 and the Afghan War was coded. Borrowing from Griffin and Lee’s (1995) study,each image was coded in terms of visual content and event context.5 This study carefully
distinguished between the two visual frames and the framing devices used to portray
9/11 and the Afghan War. The focus was on the following four indicators.
The emphasis device
Based on past studies, this framing device was measured in terms of both frequency and
dominance. For frequency, each photograph was coded for portraying 9/11, the Afghan
War, or mixed. For example, a photograph of officials and leaders reacting to 9/11 and planning a retaliation war on Afghanistan was coded as mixed. In terms of dominance, a
photograph was coded as either dominant or not dominant. If it was not the largest image
on the front page or it appeared inside, it was coded as not dominant.
The graphic device
Graphic portrayal was measured in terms of the following categories: not graphic,
slightly graphic, graphic and very graphic.6 To be coded as ‘very graphic’ or ‘graphic’,
a photograph had to portray a highly realistic depiction of suffering. Examples of suchimagery included the portrayal of the dead and suffering of 9/11 and Afghan War vic-
tims. The only exception was photographs of the planes crashing into the twin towers.
These images were coded as ‘very graphic’ because they portrayed a moment in which
thousands of civilians were killed. Examples of images coded as ‘slightly graphic’
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included long shots of material destruction. Images of airport security and mug shots
were coded as ‘not graphic’.
The human-interest vs the technical frame
This visual frame examined the ways that the violent events were reported in terms of
human-interest vs technical depictions. Photographs that did not fit into the human-
interest frame and the technical frame categories, such as pictures of political and
military officials, were coded as missing. For the human-interest category, each 9/11
photograph was coded for: victims, citizens mourning and memorializing 9/11, and
pictures of funerals; each Afghan War photograph was coded for: Afghan refugees,
evacuation, casualties and death. As a subcategory, each human-interest photograph was
further coded for the nationality of the subject/s portrayed. Nationality was coded as: US/European or Arab/Muslim.7 For the technical frame, each 9/11 photograph was coded
for: the collapse of the twin towers, the planes crashing into the buildings, the strike
effects on the Pentagon, the Pennsylvania plane crash, mug shots of suspected
terrorists and pictures of overall wreckage due to the 9/11 terrorist attack; each Afghan
War photograph was coded for: combat, weapons, explosions and overall destruction.
The anti-war vs the pro-war frame
To measure this variable, each photograph was coded for the depiction of the anti-war
frame and the pro-war frame. The anti-war frame was coded as: anti-war protests or none.
Examples of anti-war imagery included protests against the Afghan War in the United
States and abroad. The pro-war frame included two subcategories: patriotism and aid
efforts. Each photograph was coded as: patriotic symbols or none; and aid efforts or none.
Examples of patriotic symbols imagery included pictures of citizens waving the US flag
and examples of aid-effort visuals included images of US aid packages in Afghanistan.
Guidelines were used to provide a systematic way in which all photographs were dealt
with. The use of the mixed category allowed the researcher to identify a highly detailed
analysis of the images that strictly portrayed either the 9/11 attack or the Afghan War.
Intercoder reliability was checked for 140 images (10 percent of total). Overall the datareflected an intercoder reliability of 94 percent, based on Holsti’s formula. Reliability
estimates for each variable were calculated by Scott’s pi as follows: emphasis (frequency
99 percent; dominance 99 percent); human-interest vs technical frame 97 percent;
nationality 97 percent; graphic portrayal 95 percent; anti-war frame 95 percent; pro-
war frame (patriotism 96 percent and aid efforts 98 percent).
Findings
Of the 1387 photographs analyzed, the IHT ran 544 photographs and Al-Hayat ran 843 of
the events under study. The sample of photographs from Al-Hayat was larger than the
sample of photographs from IHT for a good reason. The IHT , on average, ran two-
thirds the number of photographs of Al-Hayat (35 vs 55 photographs daily).
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The photographs were first coded as depicting: the 9/11 attack, the Afghan War, or
mixed. Because this study is interested in comparing visual narratives of the two events
between the two newspapers, the images coded as mixed in the theme category were
excluded. Therefore, 292 photographs were removed from the original data set leaving
a total of 1095 photographs to be analyzed. The findings suggest 483 photographs
depicted 9/11 and 612 photographs depicted the Afghan War (see Table 1 for frequencies
and percentages).
The following explores the visual framing employed by English- and
Arabic-language transnational press. For this and the remainder of the analysis, the focus
is on the two sets of frames and two framing devices. Cross-tabs were administered to
test differences between the two sets of photographs for the two newspapers. Further,
measures of framing devices were cross-tabulated with the two visual frames analyzed.
Results showed two findings are apparent in the overall salience and prominence of the
photographs under study. First, after excluding the mixed photographs, comparing the
frequency with which an event was portrayed in the two data sets produced significant dif-
ferences (w2¼ 79.4, p < .001). The IHT published 60.1 percent of its visuals depicting 9/11
and Al-Hayat newspaperpublished 67.1 percent of its visuals depicting the AfghanWar. The
two publications, however, did not differ on how prominently they ran those visuals on the
front pages. Chi-square tests showed no significant differences in the use of dominant photo-
graphs depicting 9/11 and the Afghan War (w2¼ .1, p > .05;w2¼ .095, p >.05 respectively).8
These results, then, indicate that although there is no marked difference between the two
newspapers in how prominently the visuals were displayed, a manifestation is yet noted in the higher proportion of photographs that referenced one event more than the other, ren-
dering that event more salient and memorable to the target audience.
The second framing device focused on the ways the violent events were reported in
terms of providing highly realistic depictions of suffering, making the violent events of
9/11 and the Afghan War more real and shocking. Two statistical outcomes document
the consistent use of graphic devices in Al-Hayat newspaper for both events.
In the visual coverage of 9/11, a chi-square analysis suggested significant differences
between the two publications (w2 ¼ 8.39, p < .05) (see Table 2). The Arabic-language
newspaper published more graphic photographs than its English-language counterpart.While Al-Hayat published fewer photographs of the terrorist attack, overall, and no
images of victims and funerals related to 9/11, this seeming graphic portrayal is traceable
to the numerous depictions of material destruction the newspaper published. Many of
these images included visuals of the planes crashing into the twin towers. Such
Table 1. Frequency and percentages of images depicting 9/11 and the Afghan War in the IHT and Al-Hayat newspapers (N ¼ 1095)
Newspapers 9/11 Afghan War
IHT 271 (60.1%) 180 (39.9%) Al-Hayat 212 (32.9%) 432 (67.1%)Total 483 (44.1%) 612 (55.9%)
w2¼ 79.4, p < .001; d.f. ¼ 1.
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photographs were coded as highly graphic for a good reason. The planes were used as
weapons to kill thousands of civilians.
In the visual coverage of the Afghan War, a chi-square analysis suggested significant
differences between the two publications (w2 ¼ 7.73, p < .05). Al-Hayat published sig-
nificantly more images portraying the graphic nature of war than the IHT . Images coded
as ‘very graphic’ and ‘graphic’ were images of Afghan refugees, casualties and deaths.
For example, as Figure 1 shows, the Arabic-language newspaper ran a photograph
depicting dead bodies of Taliban fighters in the Afghan capital of Kabul.
A few additional points need a mention. First, as shown in Table 2, about 90 percent of
photographs in the two newspapers were coded as ‘not graphic’ or ‘slightly graphic’. Sec-
ond, in covering the 9/11 event, in which approximately 3000 people lost their lives, nei-
ther newspaper published the shocking photographs of people trapped in the top floors of
the World Trade Center, images of people jumping or falling from towers, or images of the
dead and severely injured. Third, the IHT ran no ‘very graphic’ images of the Afghan War.
Specifically, the newspaper ran no images of casualties and death in Afghanistan.
The first visual frame focused on the ways the violent events were reported in terms of
human-interest vs technical depictions. The photographs in both newspapers were com-
plex, and in certain respects the two newspapers shared few identical photographs of
both events.9
But overall, their moral portrayals and their sensitivity about the victimsinvolved in the devastating events were set apart from the visual narratives (Table 3).
In depicting 9/11, the two newspapers differed significantly in reporting the terrorist
attack (w2 ¼ 50.53, p < .000). On one hand, the Arabic-language newspaper ran signif-
icantly fewer images of human suffering and death of civilians as opposed to more pic-
tures of material destruction, creating a technical frame of coverage (technical frame
82.0 percent vs human-interest frame 18.0 percent). The majority of its 9/11 photographs
were of overall wreckage; the plane crashing into the buildings; and mug shots of sus-
pected Arab terrorists. On the other hand, the English-language newspaper humanized
the event by publishing the largest percentage of its photographs depicting 9/11 victimsand citizens mourning, funerals and mug shots of the deceased victims and focused less
on visuals of material loss (technical frame 21.2 percent vs human-interest frame
78.8 percent). Figure 2 shows a photograph that ran in the IHT , depicting emergency
workers helping a woman at the World Trade Center. Al-Hayat newspaper published
Table 2. Frequency and percentages of graphic images depicting 9/11 and the Afghan War in theIHT and Al-Hayat newspapers (N ¼ 1059)
Categories
IHT
(9/11)
Al-Hayat
(9/11)
IHT
(Afghan War)
Al-Hayat
(Afghan War)
Very graphic and graphic 15 (5.5%) 27 (12.7%) 6 (3.3%) 43 (10.0%)Slightly graphic 68 (25.1%) 43 (20.3%) 56 (31.1%) 132 (30.6%)Not graphic 188 (69.4%) 142 (67%) 118 (65.6%) 257 (59.5%)
Total 271 (100%) 212 (100%) 180 (100%) 432 (100%)
w2 for 9/11 ¼ 8.39, p < .05; d.f. ¼ 2 ; w2 for the Afghan War ¼ 7.73, p < .05; d.f. ¼ 2.
Note: For this analysis, so as to maintain reasonable cell sizes, the ‘very graphic’ and ‘graphic’ categories werecollapsed into one category.
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no such image. In fact the portrayal of the attack and material destruction in Al-Hayat
newspaper is outstanding when compared to the absence of photographs of funerals and
victims of the tragic event.
Figure 1. A graphic image showing dead bodies of Taliban fighters in the Afghan capital of Kabul.copyright 2001 AFP.
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That said several additional findings regarding these data are notable. First, Al-Hayat
did publish a few photographs memorializing the terrorist attack. Second, although the
IHT published the image of Palestinians celebrating the news of 9/11 on US targets, it is
important to note that the Arabic-language newspaper published none. Third, the images
of suspected terrorists were downplayed in the IHT (19.9 percent) making the dominance
of mug shots of suspected terrorists in Al-Hayat noteworthy (56.4 percent).
In depicting the Afghan War, as shown in Table 4, both newspapers ran a larger
percentage of images portraying war preparations, weapons and overall destruction due
to the conflict. Overall, however, the two newspapers visually depicted the war differ-
ently (w2¼ 4.14, p < .05). The data indicate the IHT showed a more benign and bloodless
coverage that significantly differed from its Arabic-language counterpart. Al-Hayat
newspaper emphasized the human-interest visuals more than the IHT (43.1 percent vs
31.3 percent respectively). It published, for example, many images depicting casualties
and death. As Figure 3 shows, the Arabic-language newspaper ran a photograph depict-
ing four dead Afghan children and a father crying over the body of his dead baby. It is
quite remarkable that the IHT published no such image of civilian casualty in Afghani-
stan. Considering the evidence of a lack of such visuals, almost immediately it becomesclear that the coverage in the IHT sanitized the conflict, leading to a single dominant
interpretation; one that de-emphasized guilt for the lack of empathy with the civilians
injured or killed; and one that tended to obscure rather than to highlight the realistic and
graphic nature of war. This finding indicates that by and large, Al-Hayat newspaper
humanized the tragedy by focusing on more visuals depicting loss of life and Afghan
refugees, as opposed to the visual coverage that ran in the IHT , which emphasized the
technical frame of coverage.
To gain further insight into this specific human-interest vs technical frame and because
the framing of suffering occurs in a dichotomy of us vs them, it was expected the picturesthat ran in the two newspapers to be less centered on the humanity of the other, and thus
less likely to evoke sympathy. If that were the case, it then seemed probable the coverage
would differ in terms of the nationality of the subjects portrayed in tragedy. With this
perspective, a cross-tab between nationality of the human-interest photographs and the
Table 3. Frequency and percentages of images depicting 9/11 in the IHT and Al-Hayat newspapers(N ¼ 149)
Categories IHT Al-Hayat Total
Technical frame 21 (21.2%) 41 (82.0%) 62 (41.6%)Human-interest frame 78 (78.8%) 9 (18.0%) 87 (58.4%)
Total 99 (100%) 50 (100%) 149 (100%)
w2¼ 50.53, p < .000; d.f. ¼ 1.
Notes: 9/11 pictures that did not fit in these two categories were coded as missing. The technical frame includedimages portraying the following: the collapse of the twin towers, the plane crashing into the building, the strikeeffects on the Pentagon, the Pennsylvania plane crash, mug shots of suspected terrorists and pictures of overallwreckage due to the 9/11 terrorist attack. The human-interest frame included images portraying the following:9/11 victims, citizens mourning and memorializing 9/11 victims and pictures of funerals.
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two newspapers was administered. As expected, the findings indicate significant differ-
ences (w2 ¼ 50.4, p < .001). The IHT depicted the majority of the human-interest photo-
graphs from the western world (75.4 percent). Al-Hayat newspaper depicted the majority
of the human-interest photographs from the Arab and Muslim world (61.8 percent). Inother words, the IHT published proportionally fewer images humanizing the tragedy of
Arabs and Muslims than did Al-Hayat newspaper and vice versa.
One additional point, thus, merits mention. Such findings suggest that audiences did
not have an adequate opportunity to learn all sides of an event and resist any single
Figure 2. In the aftermath of the 9/11 attack, emergency workers help a woman after she wasinjured at the World Trade Center. Photograph by Gulnara Samoilova, copyright 2001 APWorldwide Photos.
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dominant interpretation. In cross-tabulating the above measures of framing devices withthis visual frame, results showed that both frequency10 (w2 ¼ 7.30, p < .01) and graphic
portrayal (w2¼ 10.60, p < .01) were significantly used. Journalists, thus, chose frequency
and graphic portrayal devices to emphasize the human-interest vs technical frame of cov-
erage. For example, in the striking difference regarding the decision to run the graphic
photo of the injured woman at the World Trade Center in the IHT (Figure 2) as opposed
to the graphic photo of dead Afghan children in Al-Hayat (Figure 3) lies a powerful
demonstration of how the human-interest frame promoted contrasting evaluations of the
two events in the two newspapers.
Figure 3. A man cries over the body of his son and neighbors who died in US raids in the Afghancapital of Kabul on 28 October 2001. Ten civilians, eight of them belonging to one family, perishedin one bomb hit, while two more were killed in a mini bus when another bomb landed in themiddle of a main road. Photograph by Sayed Salahuddin, copyright 2001 Reuters.
Table 4. Frequency and percentages of images depicting the Afghan War in the IHT and Al-Hayatnewspapers (N ¼ 359)
Categories IHT Al-Hayat Total
Technical frame 68 (68.7%) 148 (56.9%) 216 (60.2%)Human-interest frame 31 (31.3%) 112 (43.1%) 143 (39.8%)Total 99 (100%) 260 (100%) 359 (100%)
w2¼ 4.14, p < . 05; d.f. ¼ 1.
Notes: Afghan War pictures that did not fit in these two categories were coded as missing. The technical frameincluded images portraying the following: combat, weapons, explosions and overall destruction due to theAfghan War. The human-interest frame included images portraying the following: Afghan refugees, evacuation,casualties and death.
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The second visual frame focused on the ways the events were reported in terms of
eliciting support or opposition for war. The cases suggest that overall Al-Hayat empha-
sized the anti-war frame and the IHT newspaper emphasized a pro-war frame of coverage.
Furthermore, in cross-tabulating measures of framing devices with this frame, frequency(w2¼ 87.81, p < .01) and graphic portrayals (w2¼ 35.637, p < .01) were used significantly.
Results showed the Arabic-language newspaper showed significantly more images of
anti-American/anti-war protests in the United States, Afghanistan and abroad: 10.9 per-
cent vs 6.9 percent of such images that ran in the IHT (w2¼ 5.0, p < .05). In terms of the
pro-war frame, the IHT showed significantly more images of patriotic symbols (w2¼ 9.6,
p < .01) and aid for the Afghan people (w2 ¼ 10.2, p < .001) than its Arabic-language
counterpart. For example, while the English-language newspaper ran images of patriotic
symbols (4.2 percent), such as citizens waving the US flag, the Arabic-language news-
paper published proportionally fewer such images (1.7 percent). Regarding aid efforts in
Afghanistan, the IHT published significantly more images of support, such as US food
packages: 7.3 percent vs 3.1 percent of such images in Al-Hayat newspaper. The major
thrust of these findings, thus, suggests that when pro-war and anti-war frames got
favored over others in the transnational arena, the two newspapers chose frequency and
graphic portrayal devices to emphasize critical visual choices that inevitably became
central to the way this visual frame helped establish support or opposition for the Afghan
conflict.
DiscussionThis study offers a quantitative contribution to a topic that has received mostly anecdotal
discussion. Some critics accuse news reporting and visuals provided in US media vs
Arab media of exploiting political incidents to expand support or opposition and
mobilize public pressure. By operationalizing visual frames in terms of the human-
interest vs technical frame and anti-war vs the pro-war frame, and exploring the use
of two framing devices: graphic portrayal and emphasis (which encompassed frequency
and prominence), this study examined visual narratives employed by English- and
Arabic-language transnational press in covering the 9/11 attack and the Afghan War.
A notable omission of the framing research stream has been the lack of visual framingresearch investigating visual framing of news events in a cross-cultural and transnational
context. It is hoped that this exploratory study will generate hypotheses for examining
the nature of visual frames in transnational media.
Both newspapers operate from Western European countries and both adhere to an
ethos of journalistic objectivity. Nonetheless, both are subject to different cultural and
political perspectives. These different perspectives gave rise to important differences
in how they covered important events of worldwide significance.
Clearly, the results of this study suggest that differences in covering 9/11 and the
Afghan War did not lie in the dominant visuals published on the front pages of the twonewspapers but in how these events were visually emphasized in the newspapers in gen-
eral. The manifestation of visual emphasis was unmistakably noted in the higher propor-
tion of photographs that referenced one event more than the other. The cases suggest
that, overall, readers of the two transnational newspapers did not have an adequate
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opportunity to learn all sides of the 9/11 and the Afghan War events to resist any single
dominant interpretation.
When the human-interest vs technical frames and pro-war vs anti-war frames were
favored over others, journalists significantly used frequency and graphic portrayal devicesin developing congruent interpretations of both events. For example, the Arabic-language
newspaper emphasized the emotion of guilt in the Afghan War by showing proportionally
more visual messages that humanized the victims. Al-Hayat newspaper ran more graphic
images depicting refugees, casualties and loss of life, and thus focused on the humanitarian
crisis in a neighboring Muslim country. It framed the terrorist attack story in a more tech-
nical frame by de-emphasizing visual messages that focused on the victims and emphasiz-
ing images of material destruction and depictions of the planes’ impacts; it published
fewer images of people mourning, no photographs depicting 9/11 funerals and victims
of the tragic event. On a similar level, the English-language newspaper emphasized the
emotion of guilt in 9/11 by showing the largest proportions of its visuals humanizing
9/11 victims. It ran images of citizens mourning, mug shots of the deceased and funerals,
and focused less on depictions of material loss. The IHT de-emphasized the bombing of
Afghanistan by running visuals that focused less on the victims and more on arsenals and
weaponry, thus framing the Afghan War story in a technical frame.
In comparing photographs depicting tragedy, the two newspapers seemed to be less
centered on the humanity of the other, and thus less likely to evoke sympathy. The IHT
newspaper depicted the majority of the victims from the western world and Al-Hayat
newspaper depicted the majority of the victims from the Arab and Muslim world. Fur-
ther, many of the photographs that ran in the two newspapers dehumanized the other by
portraying wide-angle shots of rubble caused by the terrorist attack or US air strikes in
Afghanistan (data not shown).
Data analyses also showed Al-Hayat newspaper emphasized the anti-war frame and
the IHT newspaper emphasized a pro-war frame. The IHT depicted fewer images of
anti-American, anti-war protests and more images of aid and patriotism than Al-Hayat .
For example, unlike Al-Hayat , the IHT ran images of US aid in Afghanistan, trying to
portray a more benevolent coverage of the war. This finding suggests that the visual cov-
erage of the IHT might have shifted the attention and the public sympathy away from the
agony and suffering inflicted upon the Afghans to a new concern, supporting and win-ning the war. Results indicate the IHT dedicated a considerable proportion of its images
depicting war preparations, patriotism and US aid. Meanwhile, the newspaper portrayed
the war as a bloodless event by not publishing a single image of casualty and loss of life
in Afghanistan.
As 9/11 and the Afghan War had far-reaching consequences for international rela-
tions, politics, diplomacy and military action, the contrasting visual framing of the two
violent events by English- and Arabic-language transnational press was expected. The
gap between the two cultures currently runs deep. With the ongoing Afghan and Iraq
conflicts and the unresolved Israeli–Palestinian issue, discontent around the Arab world with US policies has intensified (see Fahmy and Johnson, 2007b). Similarly, in the after-
math of 9/11, high levels of anti-Arab sentiments in American public opinion polls were
reported, in addition to significant stereotyping of Arab Americans, Arabs and Muslims
as terrorist sympathizers (see Nacos and Torres-Reyna, 2003).
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As further evidence for misunderstanding and use of contrasting visual narratives,
the following makes the point best. One of the most controversial images of 9/11 was
the Reuters photograph of Palestinians cheering following the event. Anecdotal evidence
suggests this particular image was highly criticized by the US public (Fahmy et al.,2006). The idea that the attack was celebrated in Arab media is widespread. However,
results here showed that the IHT published the image and the Arabic-language newspa-
per did not. Trying to depict the people’s reaction to 9/11 in Arab and Muslim countries,
Al-Hayat published several images of Arabs and Muslims memorializing the victims.
For example, Al-Hayat ran an image of Iranians chanting anti-terrorism slogans and
holding candles for 9/11 victims and another image of Arab women mourning the
victims in a church in Damascus, Syria (see Fahmy, 2005b). Such images of Arabs and
Muslims, however, were absent in the IHT newspaper.
As for the use of graphic photographs, Al-Hayat consistently ran more graphic images
of both events. This finding suggests the two newspapers might have tailored the visual
coverage to their target readers. Current literature indicates that whereas many
Americans expect the media to be sensitive to graphic images, a recent survey of viewers
of Al-Jazeera found overwhelming support for the use of graphic imagery among the
Arab audience (Fahmy and Johnson, 2007), suggesting, however, that cultural
differences may predetermine any comparison based on this study’s definition of what
constitutes graphic imagery.
Investigating the interaction between visuals and the thinking of English- and
Arabic-speaking news professionals, the author contacted high-ranking editors of both
newspapers.11 For journalists to explain that those differences in visual coverage were
never intentional was to be expected. The literature suggests the concept of framing is
one that could include the intent of the sender, but the motives could also be uninten-
tional (Gamson, 1989). In other words, although journalists may follow guidelines for
objective reporting, different cultural and political perspectives do filter into the news-
making process, leading to a dominant framing of the news event to the target
audience.
Nick Stout, the assistant managing editor of the IHT at the time, explained that there
was no conscious effort by journalists to differentiate between the coverage of the two
events.12 They had simply tried to choose the visuals that told the story in the most objec-
tive way. Based on the differences between the target audiences, editors did not find the
findings surprising.13 Saadawi, the editor at Al-Hayat newspaper, further commented:
The factors that we considered for running 9/11 images in Al-Hayat were to show the mag-
nitude of the horror and its symbolism (vast destruction of buildings considered as icons and
symbols of power and wealth). . . . As for the Afghan War coverage, we concentrated on
two factors: women and children (the most vulnerable) and contrasts between pre-
Taliban and post-Taliban as far as society is concerned.14
Several aspects of these findings, the author believes, are suggestive about the way
transnational papers allowed for different interpretations of news and issues, specifi-
cally those related to war and terrorism. First, the visual coverage introduced contrast-
ing visual frames that limited the two transnational newspapers from replicating the
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complex nature of the two tragic events. Second, the media’s emphasis on these
frames was somehow predetermined, a conclusion the author formed based upon the
predominance of photographs that ran in the two newspapers from identical news
sources: AP, Reuters and AFP (Fahmy, 2005b). The events and aftermath of 9/11 and the Afghan War catalyzed the two newspapers into presenting contrasting visual nar-
ratives of the two complicated events, making them explicitly relate to political and
cultural differences that favor certain ways of seeing. To be specific, regardless of
whether journalists in either newspaper were aware of the news-framing process, the
visual comparison revealed that choices were not inevitable but rather were central to
the way the frames and framing devices were employed to establish contrasting inter-
pretations of war and terrorism.
This raises at least two significant questions for future research. First, the cases sug-
gest the need for more research focusing on audience frames. Audience frames analysis
focuses on how audiences make sense of the news by using mentally stored ideas that
guide information processing (see Entman, 1993). Current literature suggests visual jour-
nalists believe their work can have powerful effects on the public (Fahmy and Wanta,
2007) and that news photographs are particularly powerful in visual agenda setting
(Fahmy et al., 2006) and in evaluating social and political environments (Domke
et al., 2002). On the evidence of the two cases examined, in which contrasting visual nar-
ratives tended to obscure and to highlight certain information, the thinking among the
bulk of the audience of these transnational media are unlikely to learn a comprehensive
view of the events and issues covered.
The second focus for more research is to examine how visual framing may be
influenced by social-structural factors, organizational factors, individual factors and
ideological factors (e.g. Eliasoph, 1988; Gitlin, 1980; Shoemaker and Reese, 1996;
Tuchman, 1978). While the cases examined here suggest the reporting may have
heavily tailored the visual coverage to the target audiences, there is little basis for pre-
dicting or understanding to what extent the visual frames and framing devices were a
revealing component of ownership, and thus a system of production and distribution.
The conditions that promote ideological and organizational control over framing vs
autonomous journalistic control in a transnational context merit research, especially
since transnational media claim to adhere to internationalist and cross-cultural posi-tions and constitute a crucial forum in which news outlets compete to establish inter-
pretations of importance to elite audiences.
Finally, the author acknowledges that the two cases examined do not provide a suf-
ficient basis for determining whether these visual indicators are common to other
transnational media outlets. Moreover, this research did not examine the function of
captions in framing photographs of conflicts. It is possible that different captions for
identical pictures might produce different ways in which images are interpreted.
Indeed, more than in the past, comparative visual research is needed. Findings of this
study suggest that Arabic- and English-speaking audiences most likely do not getexposed to similar visual coverage of war and terrorism. During an information age,
these differences in visual reporting may lead to more critical perceptions of the other ,
and more importantly, reinforce the trend of a progressively more polarized public
opinion worldwide.
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Funding
This research received no specific grant from any funding agency in the public, commercial, or
not-for-profit sectors.
Notes
1. Both newspapers have access to the same western news agencies: AP, AFP and Reuters. The
vast majority (99.3 percent) of photographs of 9/11 and of the Afghan War that ran in the IHT
and Al-Hayat newspapers were from these three western news agencies (Fahmy, 2005b).
2. In 2003 The New York Times acquired full ownership of the International Herald Tribune.
3. Nick Stout, deputy managing editor and chief editor for the International Herald Tribune in
Asia, Hong Kong, personal communication, 18 February 2005.
4. N Itanim, the International Section director of Daralhayat Information Centre, Beirut,
Lebanon, personal communication, 19 February 2006.
5. An important part of the analysis included registering and coding information from accompa-
nying captions. For example, a photograph of people cheering at a sporting event is different
from a photograph of people celebrating victory after winning a conflict.
6. To maintain reasonable cell sizes, the ‘very graphic’ and ‘graphic’ categories were later col-
lapsed into one category.
7. The author is proficient in four different languages – including Arabic – and could read the
captions to help identify the nationality of the subjects portrayed in Al-Hayat newspaper.
8. The IHT ran 4.1 percent and Al-Hayat newspaper ran 3.3 percent of 9/11 images as dominant; the
IHT ran13.9percentand Al-Hayat newspaperran13percentofitsAfghanWarimagesasdominant.
9. Several identical photographs were shared across the news media. Identical photographs in
both the IHT and Al-Hayat newspapers included images of the plane crashing into the building
on the front page and the public relations photograph of Yasser Arafat, the late president of the
Palestinian National Authority, donating blood for 9/11 victims.
10. Because the two publications did not differ on how prominently they ran visuals on the front
pages, dominance was removed from this – and subsequent – analyses that cross-tabulated
framing devices with the two visual frames examined.
11. To familiarize them with the focus of the research, a list of questions was included in the email
messages. The main questions focused upon the gate-keeping process regarding selecting photo-graphs of 9/11 and the Afghan War and whether the process differed based on the news event. The
editors were: Samir Saadawi, the international section editor of Al-Hayat newspaper; Nick Stout,
the 2001 assistant managing editor of IHT ; and Robert McCartney, the 2001 managing editor of
the IHT.
12. Nick Stout, personal communication, 18 February 2005. Nick Stout reported he is currently in
Hong Kong, working as the chief editor for the IHT in Asia.
13. Robert McCartney, personal communication, 25 February 2006. McCartney explained: ‘Our
paper is US owned and we publish for the elite English speaking audience abroad. I am not
surprised then that our newspaper differed from an Arabic-language newspaper, I am not sur- prised the photo choice was also different.’ Robert McCartney is back in Washington, DC, as
the assistant managing editor for continuous news at the Washington Post . He is in charge of
the desk that provides breaking news coverage to washingtonpost.com and serves as the prin-
cipal liaison between the newspaper and the website.
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14. Samir Saadawi, personal communication, 18 February 2005.
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