Islamic militants in Syria released a bizarre video from the war-ravaged city of Kobani with a British photographer John Cantlie, reporting the Islamists victories and blaming the Western media for circulating untrue stories. The latest jihadist video with John Cantlie is seen as the most sophisticated propaganda offensive, ever launched by the Islamists.
Studio guest Sergei Utkin, the head of the Department of Strategic Assessment at the Center for Situation Analysis at the Russian Academy of Sciences, Evgeny Satanovsky, the president of the Institute of the Middle East, and Martin Sieff, the chief Global Analyst at The Globalist Research Center and Editor-at-Large at The Globalist, shared their opinions with Radio VR.
What is your take on John Cantlie’s role in this video and the latest propaganda of the IS?
Sergei Utkin: There are all sorts of motivations that can be behind these actions. I would say that the video we are talking about is actually very poor. He is not strolling the streets of this city. He is standing at some point where you can see the landscape, some houses. You don’t hear shooting, you don’t see the blasts. So, the fighting is not that severe, as it is reported by some Western media. But still, you have an impression that people are afraid of showing you something. They use the cuts in the video just to show you the fragments. They don’t use a single civilian apart from this journalist.
So, when you see one person with the city on the background and do not see any details, this does not produce any real effect. I saw some other attempts by the IS to sort of get more open for the Western public, at the point when they were on the offensive in Iraq and they were quite successful. They really had a chance to show that in the territories they control, they are seen as liberators, as a force of freedom and they are supported by the people. So, I think there will not be any real effect form this particular action of Mr. Cantlie.
What do you think made John Cantlie take this decision to appear in this video?
Evgeny Satanovsky: Maybe, he really trusts what he says. How many people and how many journalists supported Hitler? Why no journalist in the Western world can support radical Islamists, Al Qaeda? In this situation, when Europe starts being a new caliphate, when the radical Islamists occupy the media and universities of Great Britain and continental Europe, it is not surprising.
To what extent it is appropriate to speak about hostages being an important vehicle for the ISIS to promote their goals?
Evgeny Satanovsky: It is business and that is a very old regional style of business. Looking at the history of the Algerian pirates and different hostages in Yemen and so on, the only difference now is that it is a professional business. So, if you have in your hands somebody who has no money and no big corporation that will pay some millions of dollars, he can only be used as an example that some others must pay.
You will demonstratively kill, then there will be some film on the YouTube to let the Americans and Europeans know that these local guys are very serious, and if the next man that has the resources will be taken in their hands the Europeans or Americans will pay. Look at the Turkish situation when 46 guys were taken in Mosul. The Turkish diplomats are free now and all the others are in the hands of the IS.
This video of John Cantlie sparked a global debate on the role of the media. What is your take on that?
Martin Sieff: I think the British reporter at question is clearly a brave and honourable man. He wouldn’t have gone to Syria and taken the risk he did have enough. Clearly, he is not a free agent. He is under the extreme duress by the jihadists. I think he is the prisoner. He is accurately reporting what he sees, he is doing the best job he can.
But he is trading jabs with his colleagues. Is he forced to do this?
Martin Sieff: He is certainly being forced to do it. But the key point, I think, is that this shows the remarkable and continuingly growing media sophistication of the jihadists. These are not the people to underestimate. Even in terms of high-tech sophistication and the international media, they are growing adapt beating Europe, the US and the West in our own game.
But don’t you think that this story reminds all of us of the decade-long debate over the role of the media? During the Vietnam War there was a famous saying of the credibility gap. There are certain red lines for the journalists which should not be crossed under any conditions, even if you find yourself in extreme situation.
Martin Sieff: I agree with you completely. But again, when any Western journalist is caught in that situation, what can they do? I think it is very interesting to see what will become of the British journalist who is being used here. I suspect he will not be executed in the horrific manner that his colleagues before him were. I think the jihadists may have learnt that they do not want to risk a strong international negative reaction by continuing to publically executing the Western journalists who they have captured. Duress and threats will certainly be applied, but in private, I think this is a much more sophisticated use of the captives.
