Al jazeera Vs CNN

In fact, American audiences are seeing and reading about a different war than the rest of the world. The news coverage in Europe, the Middle East, and Asia, reflects and defines the widening perception gap about the motives for this war. Surveys show that an increasing number of Americans believe this is a just war, while most of the world's Arabs and Muslims see it as a war of aggression. Media coverage does not necessarily create these leanings, say analysts, but it works to cement them.

"The difference in coverage between the US and the rest of the world helped contribute to the situation that we're in now,'' says Kim Spencer, president of WorldLink TV, a US satellite channel devoted to airing foreign news. "Americans have been unable to see how they're perceived."

For example, most Americans, watching CNN, Fox, or the US television networks, are not seeing as much coverage of injured Iraqi citizens, or being given more than a glimpse of the antiwar protests now raging in the Muslim world and beyond.

At the Kuwaiti Ministry of Information, an official reckons they receive 100 visa requests daily from the international media. Advance teams of news producers have laid siege to the hotels of Kuwait City and rooms are becoming hard to find. The roof of the landmark Sheraton Hotel, long a favorite of visiting businessmen, has been transformed by a cluster of satellite transmitters and elaborate camera positions. CNN has taken over another hotel which boasts a better backdrop of Kuwait's' famous spiked-ball water towers. Fox and Sky News have the roof of the Marriott.

Much of the talk wherever journalists gather in Kuwait is about 'embedment': how many places will be allotted, when it will begin and which divisions have agreed to accept 'embeds'. The Third Infantry Division is reckoned to be a good bet as reporters who claim to have inside knowledge confide: "The Third ID will be going all the way to Baghdad." Media teams fear drawing a short straw and being 'embedded' with a construction battalion far in the rear of any real action.

The largest press contingent is in Baghdad, where reckless camera crews have been involved in road accidents with convoys of UN weapons inspectors. Companies with exceptionally deep pockets have separate encampments on roof tops in Tel Aviv on 'Scud watch'.

The vehicles tend to be at least 10-years-old and mechanically neglected. But they are in demand; it's a seller's market and not for the squeamish. Journos can expect to pay around $30,000 for a Hummer and another $5,000 to bring it up to scratch.

Some topics in this essay:
Mogul Baghdad, Guard Army, Hummer King, Europe Asia, US-allied Kuwaiti, Tel Aviv, Bahrain Qatar, Middle East, Sheraton Hotel, Arabs Muslims, middle east, rest world, al jazeera, media organizations, front lines,