- (AP) - "Fahrenheit 9/11," Michael Moore's film
critique of the Bush administration's war policy, has provoked strong reaction
in the Arab world: Kuwait banned the movie. Jordan tried to edit it. Saudi
commentators are denouncing it. Syria hasn't decided what to do.
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- Many moviegoers said that "Fahrenheit" made
their bad impression of the United States worse and showed Americans what
their own news media did not.
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- In Moore's portrayal, "Baghdad was happy and safe
until cowboys Bush and Blair came," complained Saudi columnist Reem
al-Saleh, writing in a Kuwaiti newspaper. "He ignored 30 years of
muscle-flexing invasions, villages massacred by chemical weapons . . .
millions of bodies and mass graves. He has no right to hide the full truth."
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- As a matter of fact many Arabs are seeing the film. Gianluca
Chacra, whose Dubai-based company released "Fahrenheit" in the
Middle East, said attendance is at blockbuster proportions - despite obstacles.
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- In the United Arab Emirates, the information minister,
in an unusual step, asked to see the film first, then approved it.
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- In Jordan, censors wanted the Saudi content cut, but
"higher authorities" approved the movie in full, Chacra said.
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- Kuwait banned the film.
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- Lebanon and Israel showed the movie. Syria is still considering
the matter. Egypt will premiere it later this month.
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- Radwan Rizk, 47, a gym owner in Lebanon, thinks that
the effect of Moore's movie was double-edged: It shook his idea of American
democracy.
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- In Cairo, Noha Sayed Al-Ahl, 28, who runs an arts advocacy
group, said Moore "really cares about America and the foreign policies
of America and is brave enough to speak his mind."
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- In a Beirut gym, two women in their 40s discussed "Fahrenheit"
during their exercises.
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- "I loved the movie because it showed that Bush was
a partner in terrorism, said Sana Rafeh, a preschool teacher.
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- Her gym partner, housewife Rabab Itani, said the movie's
take on terrorism was too narrow: "There are Arabs and Muslims dying
from America's policies every day."
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- http://www.aljazeera.com/cgi-bin/news_service/middle
_east_full_story.asp?service_id=3101
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