Iran News Coverage

Since Iran held its presidential election June 12, early accusations of vote-rigging have given way to large-scale protests that many are calling a direct challenge to Iran's system of government. Our community has tracked the developments in Iran day by day, comparing news stories and looking for the best journalism on this now global event. Last week's top stories suggest that even as the Iranian government violently cracked down on protesters and expelled many foreign reporters, news coverage remained timely and increasingly journalists are providing more context on the unrest in the country.

Understanding the Actors
Several news organizations, some lacking feet on the ground to report breaking news, profiled the actors in the Iranian election aftermath. The New Yorker ran a special report (NT review) on the plain-clothes Basij militias, loyal to Iran's leadership, who have clashed with protesters in Tehran. Their role as a civilian paramilitary force can be traced back to the 1979 Revolution, the magazine reported.

In 'In Iran, an Iron Cleric, now blinking,' (NT review) the New York Times analyzed Ayatollah Ali Khameini's backpedaling on early election results -- Khameini, the Times said, "may have opened a serious fissure in the face of Islamic rule, one that may prove impossible to patch over." Karim Sadjadpour, a leading Iran analyst, said as much in an interview (NT review) with the Council on Foreign Relations: "It's very difficult to see how the status quo ante could prevail no matter what happens," he told CFR.

The Guardian reported (NT review) less hopeful views from the street on Monday, as the arrest, beating and killing of protesters appeared to have disrupted rallies across Tehran. Breaking news from the scene of anti-government demonstrations was otherwise scarce among our top stories. 

The Use of Social Media
The Iranian opposition's use of social networks to communicate and coordinate efforts also remained a major subtext of the events in Iran. Atlantic Monthly blogger Andrew Sullivan has emerged as one of the leading Western journalists covering Iran from afar on his blog the Daily Dish. Last week he ran what amounted to an apologia (NT review) of his 'round the clock blogging, in which he praised the Iranian opposition for creating a "whole new paradigm for world politics" through their use of these technologies:

this is the central event in modern history right now. The forces of democracy have marshalled in Iran for accountability, transparency and fairness. Wherever they marshall, we should stand with them, especially in the blogosphere, where our Iranian brothers and sisters built the foundation for this movement.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton also remarked on the role of social networks in the Iranian opposition movement, the LA Times reported (NT review). Defending U.S. efforts to deliver Twitter services to Iranians, Clinton said the network was key to allowing people to share information at a time when the Iranian government had shut down other lines of communication.

As Iranians continue their demands for a freer, more democratic society, we'll be tracking the developments here on NewsTrust. Check out our Iran topic page for updates, and keep submitting great stories on Iran.

Iran: top rated stories (full list)
Iran: most recent stories (full list)

-- Derek Hawkins, with Fabrice Florin, Kaizar Campwala and Joey Baker

Iran's Disputed Election

Despite the wide media attention the Iranian election and subsequent demonstrations have received, little agreement exists over the question at the core of the events: Was Iran's election rigged? 

Our community has been reviewing worldwide news and opinion on the Iranian election since Friday, when it grew overnight from a regional event to a global media phenomenon. Many publications and observers have pointed to evidence that suggests fraud, but the only consensus we've identified -- even now that the Iranian government has ordered a partial recount -- is one of uncertainty.

The dispute began just hours after polls closed Friday night. When the results came in earlier than expected, the New York Times ran a high-profile story on President Mahmoud Ahmaddinejad and challenger Mir Hussein Moussavi both claiming victory. A landslide victory of Ahmadinejad called so soon raised questions of foul play, the Times reported:

Fraud has been a prominent concern for Mr. Moussavi’s campaign, with many of his allies warning that Mr. Ahmadinejad could use the levers of state — the military, the Revolutionary Guard, and the Basij militia — to cajole or intimidate voters, or even engage in outright fraud. In 2005, Mr. Karroubi, who is also a candidate in this election, accused the Basij of rigging the vote in Mr. Ahmadinejad’s favor.

As Iranian officials reported record turnouts, the possibility of voting irregularities became a topic of intense focus over the weekend. Abbas Barzegar called it "wishful thinking" in an op-ed in the Guardian. Citing a Western misconception of the deeply religious nature of many Iranians, Barzegar said that if Moussavi were a significant threat to Ahmadinejad he would have been barred from running at all. William Owney praised it for its nuance: "The writer articulates a useful context born of an in-depth comprehension of the social structures at play," he said. "This is so much more than the thin veneer that characterizes much of contemporary reportage."

Juan Cole of the Global Americana Institute called Iran's election "stolen" in a blog post on Informed Comment. He listed six pieces of evidence to support his view, including Ahmadinejad's unlikely victory in Tehran and the Election Commission's premature announcement of the results.

The Economist took a neutral view. Without commenting extensively on the likelihood of fraud, the news magazine said any outcome would have had little impact on Iranian foreign policy.

As ambiguity over the results gave way to large-scale anti-government demonstrations, others weighed in on the reality behind the numbers -- with little success. A Washington Post news blogger, Jon Cohen, questioned a guest op-ed in his newspaper that cited a poll showing Ahmadinejad well ahead of Moussavi in mid-May. While the poll offered reason to be skeptical of the opposition's claims, he said, it left too many -- 52 percent -- unaccounted for to be definitive. Both stories were rated highly on NewsTrust -- but Dan Kennedy noted that the polling blog FiveThirtyEight had called the May poll unreliable. Wired, too, attempted to crunch the numbers on Iran's election, but drew few conclusions, citing circumstantiality of evidence.

Speculation about the results continued this week, but gave way to widespread coverage from the streets of Tehran and other centers of public protest. Global Voices rounded up citizen reports from Twitter, Flickr and YouTube of the demonstrations and the violence accompanying them, and Al Jazeera and the BBC featured video of pro-Moussavi rallies. The Iranian government has since backpedaled on its initial proclamations and ordered a partial vote recount, while at the same time ejecting most Western journalists from the country.

Throughout the week, we'll continue to look for the best coverage of events surrounding this disputed election in Iran. You can find the most recent stories on our Iran topic page.

Top rated stories on Iran (full listing)

Most recent stories on Iran (full listing)

-- Derek Hawkins, with Farbrice Florin and Kaizar Campwala

Obama's Cairo Speech: A Look Back

Last week the NewsTrust community focused on President Obama's visit to the Middle East. We compared stories from different news publications covering his address to the Muslim world, the reactions from around the world -- and how this impacts U.S. Foreign Policy. Here are the results from last week's news comparisons.

The Speech
Billed as an olive branch to the Islamic world, President Obama's speech from Cairo University Thursday morning received much attention from news media around the world, mainstream and independent. But despite a high volume of analysis and opinion on the event, many of the stories we reviewed tended to repeat the same "deeds not words" message -- that to improve the United States' reputation in the Middle East, Obama must match rhetoric with policy.

A news analysis from the Los Angeles Times and another from the Washington Post were our top rated post-speech stories. The L.A. Times took the view that Obama's speech "didn't provide enough concrete solutions" to fully win over his audience, but was enough to cast him as a "conciliator, not a warrior." The Post, notably more positive, focused on how Obama used "new language" -- which included quoting from the Koran, Bible and Talmud -- to demonstrate a sensitivity to both sides of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The L.A. Times remarked briefly on the same, but was less impressed, saying, "Obama will need to recite more than holy text to convince his audience that his words will be followed by change."

The New Republic compared Obama to former presidents Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush and criticized the speech for its lack of detail; the Christian Science Monitor praised Obama's "candor" toward the Arab-Israeli peace process; and the New York Times commented on how Obama's remarks to Muslims echoed those of his predecessor.

Arab and Israeli Reaction
Reactions to the speech from Cairo proved generally difficult to pinpoint; some publications were more successful than others at identifying a trend or shared view for a particular group. New America Media focused specifically on how Syrian Muslims, from shopkeepers to activists, responded to Obama's words, finding that while many saw it as a change in U.S. attitude, quite a few remained skeptical of a shift in policy. The BBC, meanwhile, rounded up a dozen op-eds and editorials from Israeli newspapers, all of which cast the speech to some degree as a "marking a clear shift in ties between the U.S. and Israel." Al Jazeera interviewed a handful of Arab intellectuals after the speech and called them "unsurprisingly split" over Obama's sincerity.

Political Freedom in Egypt
Earlier in the week, as Egypt made the final preparations for Obama's arrival, a number of publications ran stories on the hypocrisy of Obama delivering a message of conciliation and democracy in a country where political and social freedoms are repressed and one man has been president for nearly three decades. Stories on the lack of political freedom in Egypt -- and on Cairo University campus -- from McClatchy, the Washington Post and the Daily News Egypt were rated highly by our community.

Other issues that arose leading up to the speech included debate over Obama's call for Israel to cease construction of new settlements in the Palestinian territories and polling on rising U.S. approval ratings in the Middle East.

Top Stories on Foreign Policy
Most of the stories above were featured on our U.S. Foreign Policy topic page. Here are our full listings of top rated stories from that week, ranked by rating and by date.

• Top Stories by Rating (most trusted)  

• Top Stories by Date (most recent)  

This Week: U.S. Congress
This week we're comparing news stories about the U.S. Congress. Although Democrats control the House and Senate, President Obama has made clear that he plans to engage Congress differently than his predecessor. We're looking for quality news and opinion from across the political spectrum on the relationship between Congress and the White House. Help us find the best journalism on this topic: review (or submit) related stories on our U.S. Congress topic page.

-- Derek Hawkins, with Fabrice Florin and Kaizar Campwala

NewsTrust Survey Results

Last month we invited our community to guide our next steps, and take a survey about our new services we are considering for NewsTrust.net. This online survey took place between May 14 and 21, and focused on six new service ideas for our site -- as well as a redesign of our home page and review form. 

The results are in, and are summarized below. 

We sought input from NewsTrust members and non-members, as well as from our board of director and advisors. They were invited by email to complete an online survey, which took between 5 and 15 minutes to complete. Two different survey versions were offered -- a full survey for members and a quick survey for non-members. Our full survey was completed by about 189 members and our quick survey by 25 new visitors, for a total of 214 completed responses.

Overall Direction

When asked about the overall direction of NewsTrust, most respondents thought we could improve our service by focusing our efforts on making the site:

• more informative
  
• easier to use 
  
• more educational

Asked to choose three of eight options, about 52% of members and 62% of non-members favored making NewsTrust more informative. Making NewsTrust more professional ranked highly among non-members (39%) but not members (25%). Making the site more personal, fun and social ranked low in both groups, while improving the site visually ranked in the middle.

New Home Page and Toolbar

We asked participants for their feedback about a new version of the home page and a new toolbar for our review form. The response was very favorable to both of these new designs: 61% respondents said they liked the new home page and 66% liked the new toolbar and review form.

New Services

In both surveys we asked respondents which two of the following new services would make NewsTrust more interesting:  

• News Comparisons - see how different sources cover the same story
• My News - personal news feeds that match your interests
• Groups - recommendations from friends, editors, political groups
  
• Smart Feeds - top links from trusted sources on Twitter, Facebook 
• My Stats - track your media diet and news literacy
  
• My Score - earn points for your contributions 

News Comparisons ranked highest for both groups, with 40% of members (including reviewers and editors) and 49% of non-members (visitors) saying the feature would make NewsTrust more interesting. My News ranked second, with 17% of members and 27% of non-members, followed by Groups, with 14% and 10%. There was less interest for My Stats and My Score, though it's worth noting that reviewers showed more interest than other respondents for these last two features, which reward active participation on our site.

News Comparisons

Respondents were overwhelmingly supportive of News Comparisons in their open-ended comments on the survey. "Exciting idea on several levels: builds expertise and expands visibility--especially for partnerships--while creating educational opportunities to enhance news literacy," said NewsTrust community editor Marsha Iverson. "A grand idea!" 

"This could be very valuable in both news literacy instruction as well as writing courses where students need to find opposing viewpoints," said Aimee DeChambeau. "This would provide solid examples, and even help students in their research."

David Dawson agreed. "It's easy to find the same point of view on sites like TPM and Huffington Post," he said. "Diversity of perspectives really appeals to me." 

Other respondents were more skeptical, worrying that the process could be time consuming. 

"This would give me additional viewpoints, so I'm all for it," said Carol Heidman. "However, would I have time to take advantage of this?" 

David Cohn, a NewsTrust advisor and founder of Spot.Us, said News comparisons go "right to the heart of NewsTrust," but wondered about implementation. "Reading the three stories is a lot to ask," he said. "Having them come back and click even just one more button might be too much."

My News

My News was also fairly well-received. More than one-third of respondents said they were interested in the service, but many said they wouldn't want to be limited in their news consumption. 

NewsTrust community editor Kristin Gorski liked the feature. "If people begin to use NewsTrust as their own news homepage, this could definitely increase traffic," she said. "It makes sense to have this feature since the site is about news."

"I like the idea but I don't want to be too narrow in my interests," said Karen Hertz. "I want to be stretched & challenged to consider alternative view points and I would like to broaden my subject interests."

"I'm interested in the content being personalized for me by content or topic, but not by my politics or by matching only with content that 'shares my values,'" said Mark Steele. 

Groups and Smart Feeds

Although they posted low percentages in the survey, Groups and Smart Feeds had some strong supporters. Groups were enticing to Rich Rodecker. "Taking into consideration my previous comments, I do like the idea of groups," he said. "People with interests close to my own will find me news stories I'm interested in faster and more often then some super-user pushing out articles on a wide variety of topics."

NewsTrust advisor and social media expert Howard Rheingold advocated Smart Feeds. "I see social filtering (smart feeds) as the wave of the future," he said. 

Donations

At the end of the survey, we asked respondents if they would consider making a donation to support these new services. About 18% answered yes, while 34% said no and 48% were not sure. Not suprisingly, members were more likely than non-members to make a donation.

For more info, check our full survey results from our members (note this raw data and there are some slight variations from the summary above, which is more accurate). 

Thank you!

We'd like to thank all of you who took the time to guide our next steps by answering this survey! Your generous advice and wonderful insights are invaluable to us, and will help inform our development for these new services. Expect to see a new home page and toolbar later this summer, and some of these new services in coming months. We'll be sure to let you know  when they launch. 

-- Derek Hawkins, Fabrice Florin and Kaizar Campwala 

Latest News Comparisons

In our latest round of News Comparisons, last week we compared how media across the political spectrum cover current news stories. From May 26 to June 1, our community reviewed a wide range of breaking news and opinion, focusing on how different sources reported the day's major events. 

Judge Sotomayor

We devoted the first half of the week to stories on Judge Sonia Sotomayor's nomination to the U.S. Supreme Court, which President Obama announced early Tuesday. Our top story for this comparison came from Slate's Dahlia Lithwick, who argued that right-wing attacks on Sotomayor are ill-founded and hypocritical. "Instead of wading into a bruising identity politics war they cannot possibly win, conservatives -- even the angriest conservatives -- should wade into Sotomayor's vast legal writings," she wrote. "Let's have this confirmation battle on the merits, rather than the sinkhole of unfounded character attacks." 

A story from The Root went further, praising Sotomayor's jurisprudence and personal history as essentially impervious to Republican criticism. SCOTUSblog, meanwhile, predicted the four major lines of attack the GOP will take against the nominee, and the Daily Beast argued that the only way Congressional Republicans can stop Sotomayor from being confirmed is to show she is "dangerously unqualified" for the job.

Israeli Settlements

Mid-week we examined the dispute between the Israeli government and the Obama Administration over Obama's calls for a freeze on Israli settlements in the Palestinian territories. In 'Challenge of Israeli Settlements' the BBC captured what several reviewers thought was a level of attention to the Palestinian perspective not regularly seen in the Western press. That story portrayed settlements as a major obstacle to peace in the region; the Jerusalem Post, on the other hand, focused almost exclusively on how Israel will negotiate Obama's position on the settlements, which differ from his predecessor's. And an opinion in Al-Ahram Weekly was optimistic that Obama's plan could help move Palestine toward statehood. 

Gay Rights

We ended the week comparing stories on same-sex marriage rights and the legal and social battle over California's Proposition 8. On Tuesday, California's Supreme Court upheld the 2008 ballot measure banning gay marriage in the state. Miller-McCune ran an interview with a law professor that shed light on the legal complexities surrounding Prop 8 and offered some new potential solutions for those pushing for marriage equality. The Washington Post reported on the Mormon church's efforts to oppose same-sex marriage, and Mother Jones profiled Ted Olson, the conservative attorney who plans to challenge Prop 8 in federal court.

This Week: News Comparisons on Foreign Policy

This week we're featuring News Comparisons on Foreign Policy. As President Obama makes his much anticipated trip to the Middle East, we're looking for quality news, analysis and opinion on his relations with the Islamic world. Can you help us find good journalism on this important topic? Please review (or submit) related stories on our Foreign Policy topic page. 

Survey Results

Check the results of our recent survey to hear what our community thought of new services we're considering for NewsTrust. The favorite new service by far was News Comparisons, which led us to start experimenting with this service right away, featuring it every day on our home page. What do you think of News Comparisons so far? What do you like most? least? How can we improve on this first prototype. Please share your insights on our Feedback page. Thank you!

-- Derek Hawkins, with Fabrice Florin and Kaizar Campwala