The Other War

Since its founding, Israel has generally prevailed (or had the capacity to prevail) in wars with its Arab neighbours, but recently a new front has been opened in this long struggle, a front where rifles, helicopters and missiles are of little use. Here a war of words and images is fought for world opinion rather than military objectives. And Israel has been out-flanked on this new battlefield by the nimbler and more effective Palestinians.

To understand why Israel is losing the media war, Stephanie Gutmann, who lived in the Middle East as a teenager, returned to Jerusalem and the war zones of the West Bank to observe up-close the modern news-gathering processes, which often resemble a digital bazaar where freelance photographers, camera crews and journalists offer their most dramatic stories and footage to the highest bidder. The Other War documents the way political and military realities in the region are twisted into novel shapes before they reach the newspapers and television screens of Europe and the United States. Gutmann presents a fascinating gallery of the combatants in this other war.

Daniel Seaman, director of Israel's Government Press Office, had an epiphany at a bloody suicide bombing and risked the censure of the UN, powerful bureau chiefs and even the Israeli courts to conduct a one-man campaign against reporters he believed were being unfair to Israel. Reporter Khaled Abu Toameh got death threats from fellow Arabs for his insider coverage of the brutal way Arafat's regime silences internal critics. Gutmann also introduces us to the 'parachuters': reporters who drop in to cover the intifada for a day and then are off to cover drug cartels in Colombia.

Reported from the front lines, The Other War is a riveting insider's look at a battlefield we never see on the nightly news.