The history of media in Palestine

During the period 1967-1987, the Palestinian media were restricted and were limited to few local newspapers such as 'Al Quds newspaper', which was established in 1951 and considered to be a moderate daily newspaper that is published till now.

On the other hand, there has been a number of newspapers and weekly magazines that stopped publishing, this  for different reasons, such as Al Sha’b, Al Fajr, Al Nahar, Al Methaq newspapers and Awda and Al Bayader magazines.

The restriction on Palestinian media and especially on newspapers & magazines was another weapon that the Israelis used to put to death freedom of expression and resistance to the occupation; this happened as the different Israeli governments knew the importance and the role of media in influencing the population to resist to the occupation.

Moreover, the Palestinians of West Bank and Gaza strip were denied to own different kinds of publications. Therefore, the newspapers were published only in Jerusalem, while the Palestinians of WB and Gaza tried to issue license for newspapers in the name of Palestinians with Israeli ID.

The media and the media staffs had also to face internal problems and to confront with Palestinians themselves, as the example of the journalist Yousef N.Nasr,  editor of   Al Fajrnewspaper ,who was kidnapped in 1974. Till now no one knows what happened to him.

The second stage in local media history started with the first Intifada:
Global media focused on the Palestinian issue and covered daily news. That encouraged a number of Palestinians and in particular women, to get involved in the field of media, after media were monopolized previously by men.

A number of Palestinian youth also started to study media in international universities which led the local universities to develop a major in media.

In the year 1990, the Palestinian people inside Israel started to establish cable TV stations. That encouraged many Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza strip, to ask for licenses from the Civil Administration.

Most of the requests were rejected at that time, while most of the approved TV stations closed after a short period, despite the fact that these local TV stations were commercial.

In the third stage, after the arrival of the Palestinian Authority, Palestine’s sound Radio,  and Palestine TV, the national TV,  started to broadcast in the year 1994,  according to the Oslo agreement that enabled the Palestinians to have radios channels and TV waves.

At that time, the Palestinians started to ask for licenses from the PA to own TV and radio stations. The PA issued temporary licenses for 32 local TVs (31 in WB and 1 in Gaza) besides the official Palestinian 38 radio stations (31 in WB and 7 in Gaza) and  several magazines and newspapers.

Therefore, the Palestinian media started a new era where the Palestinian people were given the space to talk and watch new channels, different from the Israeli, Jordanian and Syrian ones that they were able to watch usually.

The new local TV stations used to choose to rebroadcast entrainment programs and News, besides to broadcast their own news and programs that discuss internal and local issues.

At this stage also,we could notice a variety in TV programs; still the TV work was weak as they lack  media professionals and  financial means to pay the professional staffs.

The different political parties supporting media became more and more marginalized, while the PA imposed many restrictions taking control  on media field; the PA closed many local TV stations, this many times such as Shepherd’s TV and Watan TV; besides arresting and humiliating many journalists such as Maher Disouqi who worked in Al Hob wal Salam radio and Al Quds educational TV in Ramallah, Daoud Kottab, the Director of Media Academy, Omar Nazal, the director of Watan TV, Hamdi Farraj , the Director of Shepherd’s TV , and Maher al Alami the editor of Al Quds newspaper.

After the second uprising (Intifada), the local TVs and radios became an essential element in Palestinians ' lives, they updated the citizens with the latest news, broadcasted the patriotic songs and programs that helped the Palestinians to resist and secure ,  and alarmed the people with the location of the occupation forces. 
Therefore, the different local TVs and radios were targeted by the Occupation. The Palestinian journalists became target the same as the armed fighters,  and one can’t forget journalists such as Nazih Drouza who lost their lives while covering the violations of Human rights by  the occupation.

All this worsened the situation of the different local stations originally facing the lack of professionalism and funding.

Daily life insecurity in general increased the threat on the Palestinian media in specific;  many journalists and media stations such as Al Jazeera office, Palestine TV and Shepherd’s TV were attacked by unknowns.

Women Media and Development -TAM reported on these attacks and problems faced by the local stations, in the need assessment project that was held in 2004 with the French Consulate and CIFAP partnership.

In this study, TAM operates a statement of the local stations establishment, the problems they faced, the technical equipments they possess and the expertise and job position of their staffs.

In order to measure the level of understanding of the ' gender' concept, TAM conducted a survey and distributed it on 40 men and women who worked in 13 local TV stations in 8 different areas.

The survey was written by a specialist in gender, it contained a number of questions about the gender issue, the obstacles they face at work, and the professionalism of their stations.

Generally, it appears that the target group was not well aware of the gender issue and got never trained on it, only few had an idea about the topic from general discussions.

Finally, the staffs previously aware of gender concept expressed that this issue calls for an  increase of female staffs working in  TV stations, they believe that women should only participate in cooking and entertainment programs.

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