Samir Khader
Iraqi journalist
Samir Khader is a Senior Producer at Qatar-based broadcaster Al Jazeera.
- Between us, if I'm offered a job at Fox News, I'll take it. Instantly. I will send my children to go to America after highschool, I will pay for them to go, to exchange the Arab nightmare for the American dream. [1]
- Khader: "No. They can’t help it, because they don’t agree with the justification for the war — WMD, ‘Saddam Hussein represents a danger for the whole international community, he has ties with al Qaeda,’ etc. Nobody believes in that."
Interviewer: "But they agreed with the result, in the sense that they wanted him deposed."
Khader: "Yes, but they would have preferred that the result should have come from within Iraq." [2] - As long as we reported on Iraqi casualties the Americans were quiet. But when we showed American prisoners and the dead, U.S. authorities went crazy. They were trying to show their people that this is a clean war. When we showed American prisoners, they said Al Jazeera is violating the Geneva Convention. That’s just not true. But when they showed the dead bodies of the sons of Saddam, they said that was all right because how else are the Iraqi people going to know that the danger has ended.
- If the West is genuinely interested in democracy then they will have to suffer hundreds of Al Jazeeras. There is Abu Dhabi television, Al-Arabiya (but that is under Saudi patronage), and there is a channel out of Lebanon (but they are politically close to Hezbollah). They are all very good as journalists but they are all part of the state.
- The Internet is an American creation and it is now being used by an enemy of America. I would like to ask someone at the FBI why are they not able to catch Al Qaeda when they upload a message? [3]