The Jordanian Telecommunications Regulatory Commission (TRC) on Sunday ordered local Internet service providers (ISPs) to block websites that did not have licenses. The order originated from a memo by Fayez al-Shawabkeh, head of the government’s Department of Press and Publications, on Saturday.

“Censoring 300 websites makes Jordan’s talk of political reform seem hollow,” said CPJ Middle East and North Africa Coordinator Sherif Mansour. “Authorities should immediately rescind this order and uphold King Abdullah’s stated support for political reform and media freedom.”

It is not clear to what extent the ISPs have followed the government’s orders. The news website Al-Bawaba reported on Sunday that several websites had already been blocked, but that its site, which is also on the list, remained accessible.

As each ISP responds individually to the government’s orders, some websites will be blocked for some users but remain available to others. The government’s memo did not list specific URLs for many of the websites.

The memo cited Article 49 of Jordan’s Press and Publications Law, which was amended amid considerable debate last year to require local and international websites to register with the government, placing them under the same strict regulations as print publications. Websites were given a deadline of January 17 to comply, news sources reported.

“The idea of licensing news websites is contrary to the Jordanian constitution, international commitments, and public statements by the King and government,” said Daoud Kuttab, founder of AmmanNet and a recipient of CPJ’s 1996 International Press Freedom Award. AmmanNet is one of the sites listed in the memo. “It’s also a punishment to the Jordanian public, because they are blocking these sites only in Jordan while the rest of the world can see the contents of these websites,” Kuttab said.

The information minister, Mohammed Momani, said that media regulation aimed to enhance “professionalism and credibility” as a “key component of Jordan’s political reform efforts,” The Associated Press reported today. CPJ has called the amendments “a huge step backward in Jordan’s press freedom record.”

Till now, the Arab states were heavily involved in the economic prosperity of many Arab news organizations. They were able to apply pressure in several ways, most notably through ownership or advertising. An example is Al-Jazeera, which was funded by the Qatar’s royal family, and which avoids any broadcasts critical of Qatar’s royals. A similar example can be found in Egypt, where the Al-Ahram newspaper is the country’s strongest paper in circulation, and was owned by President Hosni Mubarak’s regime.

In the Middle East, pressure on the media is exercised also via the purchase of advertisement, but to a more significant degree than in the West. If not following the directives of the government, publications can suddenly find themselves without their largest client, and be effectively put out of business. An example comes from the United Arab Emirates, where major newspapers might not be owned outright by the regime, but receive heavy government subsidies, and need to honour such generosity, demonstrating respect of it.

The result of this situation isn’t simple at all. As Noam Chomsky states in Manufacturing Consent, “censorship is never over for those who have experienced it. It is a brand on the imagination that affects the individual who has suffered it, forever.” If this stands, the Arab countries need a period of transition from the present state to more democratic regimes; only then journalists will feel free to properly investigate on topics now felt untouchable.

There is hope for this. Nowadays, a mechanism of great impact has been put into motion in the Middle East; in spite of every possible pressure, citizen-reporters send out bits of what is investigative journalism in its most embryonic form. As a result, the mainstream media try to reinvent themselves, because they cannot ignore the value of these forms of news coverage.

As expected, the space in which Arabs reporters seem to be more comfortable to post information as they please is the cyber space. In Egypt this has become a well-known form of factual narrative output, and the government has been watching it for a long time. As a result, bloggers have been arrested, detained, interrogated; their activity in reporting rallies, politics as commented upon on the road, and the actions of the labour movement in Egypt, has become a thorn in the side of the old regime.

Egyptian journalist Hossam el-Hamalawy stated in a video interview, taken by WorldFocus  in 2008, that his career as a journalism-blogger was built by writing about the factual, standing with one foot in cyberspace and the other on the road. Unfortunately, this kind of career in Egypt involved a routine of arrests, questioning and torture. Today, el-Hamalawy is recognized as a prominent journalist, activist and blogger. However, this does not signify a change of major relevance in the way journalists are perceived in his country. As he reports in the article for The Guardian, ‘In Egypt, Mubarak’s repression machine is still alive and well’ (16 May 2012), a mechanism of censorship continues to function in his country.

Another Egyptian journalist, Nora Younis, whose career was launched by her courage as a prominent blogger using new media tools – for which she was awarded the Human Rights First Award in New York (2008) – joined AlMasry AlYoum in the same year. She is currently the head of a qualified multimedia desk team, which works closely with reporters, photographers and caricaturists to bring news to her people in the most informative way. She is monitoring the state of investigative journalism and oversees citizen journalism pages as well, in the understanding that much has to be done to obtain freedom for the media.

The question remains: how long will take to the Arab world to give life to independent investigative journalism? And which shape will it take in the near future?

The matter is pressing, especially as Arab governments continue to control the media through licensing, or not, the right to record events, take pictures, and enter archives. What is more, Arab journalists must often obtain government permits to work, losing them if they get too pushy; and deal with the Arab media charters, introduced in 2008, which consolidated Arab states’ grip on information.

Watching the Arab fight for media freedom gives a great sense of hope to the many Arabs living in Greece. Their vision for a democratic Middle East is mesmerizing, and much can come from it. Hopefully, it will also bring some great pieces of investigative journalism, written by courageous and determined Arab journalists.

In the last two years, dailyGreece.net is delivering the truth to its Members and it will continue to do so in a passionate way. This constitute a very specific task most Greek journalists mix with obligations to “other truths”, dictated by their close relationship with political parties or advocated by various centres of power that mix extreme nationalism with financial post-bankruptcy benefits. Delivering the truth requires cleaning information flow from the occasional nonsense produced by political short-termism as well as intentional propaganda.

In our view, there are three steps to put Greece on track; simple steps that derive from common sense most politicians have come to despise, mainly because it turns their arguments into gibberish. First, tell the truth to ourselves and our EU partners, second, clean our house fast track, third, explore our (many) competitive advantages. We do not need to describe these into detail. Everybody is aware about the problems and all these three actions are self-evident. What we need is to act on them, implement the plan, and deliver the results.

So, in our opinion, we should not rush into rebranding strategies, at least not until we put things in order.

Even in its worst, Greece is branding itself across the globe quite effectively. Indeed, investors will continue to curse us for as long as we remain an uncertainty factor, CDS holders will carry on predicting destruction for obvious reasons. On the other hand, people around Europe are picketing for our country, the French dance syrtaki an masse and tourists will return this season, despite the hard time we give them each time they set foot on Greek soil.

Beyond the symbolism, the connotations and the necessary promotional material deriving from specialists who wish to position themselves in the national restart, the real effort will come from Greeks themselves. They have to regroup, fight with their unproductive stereotypes and look forward. They have to reinvent themselves, especially in terms of their ability to create new GDP, a skill that was put asleep many years ago, when civil service became the absolute employment dream.

Therefore, rebranding Greece should begin as an inner soul-searching process that could raise the spirit of Greece’s inhabitants and lead to actual results and justify the repositioning of the country at an international level. Premature reputation management efforts could even undermine the problem solving process, since we have flirted with our very own Hell’s kitchen but we haven’t found our way out yet.