Cross-posted from The Global Sociology Blog.

I know Robert Fisk is controversial. But he lives and breathes the Middle East and has intimate knowledge of it. In his latest column for the Independent, he reports on the restraint that Al Jazeera has shown considering the amount of atrocities on tape it receives:

""We've trained ourselves not to go to the maximum in our feelings when we see terrible things like this," Ayman Gaballah, Al Jazeera's deputy chief editor, says bleakly. And I can see why. There are other tapes, other outrages too terrible to show. George Bush wanted to bomb the station's headquarters in Doha but staff have shown great sensitivity with what they show the world from Iraq. There is no proof that any of Al Jazeera's reporters was ever tipped off about anti-American attacks before they happened – in Iraq, I investigated these claims in 2003 and 2004 – but plenty of proof that some things are too awful to see.  Read more…