Ideally, the world's cooperative online encyclopedia, Wikipedia, would host a collegial, lively, and globally communal discussion about the truth in things, starting, certainly, with current events and histories. Presumatly, those of us who have followed stories like the siege of Nahr al-Bared from the Sunday bank robberies (alleged) and the raid on an apartment close to the camp about three months ago through to yesterday's evacuation of the 25 women and 38 children who comprised the families of Fatah al-Islam fighters would pipe in with the "facts" as they were relayed to us through either primary or secondary information sources.
Lesson learned and still in process: journalism and scholarship demand energy, focus, and time, enough at minimum, I feel, to have a physical folder in an office with news clip print-outs supported by independently produced interviews with government and military officials as well as representatives of camp residents and others.
I would say the same of Lal Masjid in Pakistan, another singular, history-making event.
Such coverage may not be doomed to ambiguity and argument in perpetuity, no matter the political motivations of the contributors: truth will out. Founded in factual data and observation from multiple angles, stories will find their equilibrium. Neither the vanquished nor the victorious will write history anymore.
For the moment, however, a couple of small details--and not so little depending on who, specifically, may be doing the writing and reading--recently got to me on accounts about Nahr al-Bared.
For example, Wikipedia's entry for "Nahr al-Bared" states: "The Lebanese Army is banned from entering all Palestinian camps under the 1969 Cairo Agreement." [2]
There is now an alternative statement in the "2007 Lebanon conflict" article: "But, under a 1969 Arab accord, later annulled by the Lebanese Parliament in the mid-1980's[4]but maintained in principle, the government has been reluctant to enter the camps." [1]
The second version (of history) is there becase I put it there based on a July 15 Reuters article in which I had read the following: "A 1969 Arab agreement banned Lebanese security forces from entering Palestinian camps. The agreement was annulled by the Lebanese parliament in the mid-1980s but the accord effectively stayed in place." [3]
One presumes, perhaps at peril, that Reuters' journalist Nazih Siddiq has actually a folder containing the 1969 Cairo Agreement on Lebanon's Palestinian camps as well as the annulment documents from the 1980's, not that any army worth its salt would care much to reflect on legal papers with enemy sniping at it as well as launching rockets from secure positions against citizens defended by it.
Still, the annulment of a cogent part of the Cairo Agreement has been missed in both articles, but the second caught my attention first and got its correction on that account.
Other slights of hand involved in Wiki's coverage of Nahr al-Bared:
- Mention of and character and facts having to do with the alleged bank robberies;
- Confirmation and location of the apartment "safe house" raided by police, possibly down to the apartment's number;
- Egress to or positioning of Fatah al-Islam militants at the gates of Nahr al-Bared or elsewhere.
From one journalist-scholar to another--whoever stumbles across this blog--one wants the story of the precipitating event told factually, honestly, and verifiably.
Which of us, however, has the resources--access to primary accounts; energy and time--to both build and then protect such an entry over time?
Answering that will be hard on the part of volunteers and suspect on the part of "think tank" and other professionals or invested personalities who have their various axes for grinding.
Of the two accounts on Wikipedia today, "Nahr al-Bared" and "2007 Lebanon conflict", the latter strikes me as the more immediately complete and factual in light of the story as told through Reuters and The Daily Star, also Al Jazeera, the more prevalent of publications that come up in my searching for information on the battle, which, not coincidentally, goes on as I type.
# # #
1. "2007 Lebanon conflict." Wikipedia, as viewed August 26, 2007, 12:20 EDT.
2. "Nahr al-Bared." Wikipedia, as viewed August 26, 2007, 12:30 EDT.
3. Siddiq, Nazih. "Lebanon army advances into camp." Reuters, July 15, 2007.
Correspondence and Permissions: James S. Oppenheim
