The case of Alan Johnston has nothing to do with his neutrality but with the lawlessness in Gaza. I was on a delegation from the International Press Institute that visited Ramallah and we spoke to many authorities including Hamas ministers (at the time) and President Abbas. They were all against his abduction; no one mentioned his professional work except in praise of it.
The problem is that in times of conflict and instability, there is no enforceable law that protects professional journalists, and even superpowers like the U.S. have done little to seriously investigate cases when their own soldiers have attacked or killed journalists. We need some international conventions with teeth that can protect genuine professional journalists.
In Palestine today there has been a major departure from neutrality and professionalism by many media; the local media have taken sides, the Arab satellite stations have taken sides (or have shown clear bias, with Al Jazeera showing more sympathy to Hamas and Al Arabiya to Fatah and Abbas). State-run media in Palestine have failed to serve as a voice of the people and have been used to attack Hamas; Hamas’s Al Aqsa TV similarly attacks Fatah. Both use derogatory language, and attempts at neutrality or professionalism are totally absent.
The problem is that while supporters of Fatah tend to see and hear a variety of media outlets, fundamentalist supporters of Hamas tend to follow only their own station and take its word as absolute truth.
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