A Quick Word
I dreamt of being a journalist when I was only ten years old; all I wanted to do was to ask questions and dig for the truth.
Unfortunately, where I come from, the truth is not warmly welcomed; the truth can cut you into pieces sometimes.
I recently moved to the USA, started my production house, hoping to reveal the other halves of thousands of stories that I have witnessed in the Middle East.
Coming from a nation that completely lost its mind, I believe I am finally at the right place.
I love America, bluntly!
A Little More
I’m a TV journalist with over two decades of broadcast
experience in the Middle East hosting such top-rated shows as From Iraq, which was watched by 20 million Arabs weekly.
I also hosted Frankly Speaking, a weekly show interviewing world leaders, which when featuring guests such as David Petraeus attracted over thirty million Arab viewers.
Other especially notable guests on Frankly Speaking included President George W. Bush, UK Prime Ministers Tony Blair and Gordon Brown, Israel’s Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni, Pakistan’s President Pervez Musharaf, Iraq's President Jalal Talabani, Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmedinejad, US Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, and US General Raymond T. Odierno.
My championing American values of free speech, vigorous debate, and honest government made me a target of violent oppressors—such as the Syrian occupying forces in Lebanon that closed down the Murr TV network in 2002 with
soldiers and tanks while I was on the air; and an Al Qaeda-affiliated terrorist group that declared “Elie Nakouzi is No. 1 on our hit list” and sent a suicide bomber in 2004 to assassinate me. (He missed me, but blew up my news building and killed seven of my colleagues...)
At the same time, my insistence on fiercely fighting with words instead of arms has made me a household name in the Middle East.
I now aim to develop media projects based around the Middle East designed to reduce hatred and terrorism, enhance the free flow of information and ideas for Arabs, and increase Arab appreciation for US values—and to do so employing the same standards as top American television.
