The story about my great grandfather Mashhoor Hadeetha Al-Jazi as told in my photobook got me thinking about war and how war has been photographed. The military has always played a significant part in my family. Nine members of my family have all had a distinguished career in the Jordanian military, but my great-grandfather’s, who was a Jordanian army commander in the Battle of K has always fascinated me and to a large extent influenced me in following in his footsteps. In this essay I will be investigating how war in the Middle East has been documented in photographs. This study will be based around analyzing a set of images from my great-grandfather’s Battle at and compare those images to images of recent conflicts in the region

The Purpose of War Photography:
I am really effected by the way wars have changed over time and how now a days war is much easier due to the industrial revolution some countries can destroy a whole other country from the comfort of an office. And years ago soldiers had to actually go on battle fields and put their lives at risk and that is how I lost my great grandfather.
“If war truly is a force that gives us meaning, photography is a force that gives us a means by which to envision that meaning.” (Bob Duggan,2012:1) Duggan is saying that photography of war is just as important as the war itself or else the war wouldn’t have much meaning.

This is my favorite war photographs, it was taken in 1964 in the Karamah Battle and you can see Mashhour in the front taking the lead. With his great heroic character as seen in the photograph wearing his CO uniform giving him this leader image. This photograph was taken by a war journalist back then when they had to be embedded within a troop risking their life to take these photographs that are the most important aspect of a war to complete its meaning as if there is a war without much photographs not many people will give it their attention, as the sad reality is that what people haven’t seen to them it hasn’t happened. The photographer took this photograph while Mashhour was leading his troop towards the war field and he took it just in time when you can see even though they’re headed towards war Mashhour still had a smile on his face which represent how proud he was to be the one chosen to lead these heroes to bring independence to their country. They were barging through the grass reaching half way their height, off road marching on the desert sands, waiting patiently for something to happen.

The photograph was taken under natural day light where the broad day desert sun light was positioned from above, making the photograph a bit over exposed mean while giving it a good glare. The aperture was made to be a wide range giving the photograph a deep depth of field but due to the poor quality of lenses at that time the photograph was not very focused and gave the image that small blare effect. And high speed shutter speed wasn’t available at that time so it there was a slight motion blur. The chosen shutter speed gave the photograph high grain. More over, the white balance of the camera settings made the photograph quite warm. The combination of the grass and soldiers give the image textural quality that is ‘busy’ to look at. The color of their uniform blends in with the background. And the combination of the dark soldiers with the bright environment gave the image more quality.

This is a recent photograph of a modern day war in Afghanistan taken on November 2001, these american marines where in a country that isn’t theirs and were fighting the locals in it. You can see the difference between this photograph and the old photograph of the Karamah battle, in this photo it represents how much the soldiers had to carry on their back as there is too much evolved technology so war became more competitive with time. These marines look very exhausted as they’re walking through the sunny desert sun with a lot of load on them. Further more, in the Karamah battle photograph the background was just of an old tank which is what they used to use in the old days meanwhile the back ground of this photograph is off a more evolved and technological weaponry vehicle which is a helicopter. And i believe that war now a days is not as much effort taking but if more destructive as to the evolution of weaponry which increased competition between nations.

This photograph was taken using a state of the art camera which is easier to use as its lighter with better quality and finally more settings option. This photograph was taken with the sunlight that’s positioned facing the soldiers as the main source of light, you can see that as the reflection of the light on their faces prove it. And that brightness made the image over exposed with a slight glare. And the advanced lens was more focused with a deep depth of field making it sharp. Due to the option of faster shutter speed with new cameras. The shadow effect on the soldier’s faces contribute to the secrecy of them. The white balance on the photo though made it quite cold. The pattern of the soldiers walking in a single file behind each other on the arid land gave the photograph a good pattern quality.

War photography was harder to achieve good quality photographs in the old times although it was easier to have access to war. Zooms were then clumsy, heavy and of poor optical quality. Meanwhile digital cameras today can automatically adjust the film speed setting to the available light, are much better than film in very low light, have rapid auto focus, and can be used with zooms that give good optical quality across a wide range. With a laptop and a satellite phone, pictures can be adjusted and sent to the publisher within minutes, while in the old times the photographer had to keep his camera safe with them until they reached back to their base, but if they got stuck on the way or died then the photographs will never be published. And unfortunately now a days there is so many restrictions on taking photographs in a war zone mostly because the countries with the greater power don’t want to show the world what they are doing so basically no photographs that show evidence of war is allowed in these countries, which is very discomforting as people are just sitting in their homes doing there daily stuff normally around the world and have no clue about what is actually happening in these countries with war. What is even worse is that now editing photographs is very easily done so countries with more power can just easily edit a photograph that shows something disturbing to show something normal from the comfort of an office.

In conclusion after doing my research on the purpose of war photograph and got deep in it, i found out how important a photographer can be, as if a war didn’t have any photographs it would have much meaning to the people who weren’t there. And then that lead me to questioning how war changed with time and evolution of technology. And the most artist who inspired me but i didn’t mention her a lot was Julian Stallabrass who went and risked her life in the Iraq war to get the finest of war photographs, and used her words through my essay to direct me on the right path of war photograph.

Bibliography
Julian,S.(2013) Photoworks. Grand Parade, Brighton, BN2 9

How it all started:

It all started when Talal’s Jordanian Grandfather Wael got his student visa and went to Bristol to study in college, while he was doing that he met Talal’s English grandmother Sherree in the same college and they fell in love, and had their first child later on which was Talal’s mother “Jumanah. After they had Jumanah, Wael’s student visa ran out so he had to go back to Jordan and left Sherree with two options which were either to stay in England and raise a child on her own or go live with  him in a country she has never been to and barley knows anything about.

So Sherree being just young and in love chose option two and went to Jordan, where she discovered over the time that it’s not easy for an English women to live a normal western life in a middle eastern country, where women’s rights are different and what I like to refer to as “cultural clash” kicked in and created the differences between Sherree and Wael and these differences later on separated them when Jumanah was only 4 years old. So Sherree left and went back to her home country and Wael couldn’t raise a kid on his own so left Jumanah with her auntie and her auntie’s  husband Muhammad Al-Jazi who raised her. So Talal always saw Muhammad as a Grandfather figure because he was practically the one who raised his mother.

Muhammad Al-Jazi and “the knife”

Muhammad (AKA: Abu Ali) was the kind of person who always lived his life on the edge as he was one of the most adventurous people in Talal’s life. So one day he invited Talal to go with him to his small hunting house which was located in Ma’an in Jordan, and that was one of the most traditional places in Jordan with only a few houses and a lot of desert land so they went Jar-boa hunting in the morning then went back to his summer house for lunch and that’s where Talal being his touchy self-wanting to touch and play with anything he can get his hands on, picked up an outstanding antique knife Abu Ali had in the middle of his desk on a fancy stand, out of curiosity Talal opened the case of the knife and while he was doing that Abu Ali just realized what he was doing so screamed: “NO! Talal!”  So Talal got jump scared and dropped the knife on the floor where the lion head on the end of the knife broke into three pieces as it was some type of ceramic. So he looked at Talal and said that this was a really precious thing to him so Talal asked him why was it? and he replied by telling Talal to take it with him back home and to fix it, so he can give it back to Abu Ali as it was before, in order for him to tell Talal the story behind it.

The terrible death of Abu Ali

As they were heading back home to the city Amman they went to see a buggy shop on the way as Abu Ali was curious to see the new buggies they got, so they went inside and as Abu Ali was looking around he found a nice dirt ATV and hopped on it to ask Talal how he looked on it, and he replied by informing him how much it suits him, so he bought it on the spot and they told him that they will deliver it to his farm house next day. So Talal went back home and everything was fine until he woke up next day to the noise of crying coming from his parents room, so Talal instantly thought that his great grandmother passes away because she was very poorly with cancer at that time so it just felt normal to him so he just started crying then his dad came into his room with his eyes all filled up with tears then he asked Talal why was he crying and he told him: “did my great grandma pass away?” And he replied: “no son she’s still fine but a couple of hours ago in the morning your grandpa Abu Ali got an ATV delivered to his farm so he got too excited and took it right away for a test drive, then went on a dirt path at the top of a mountain where he was going down the path and went straight into the valley where two farmers found his body beaten like a rag doll and called the ambulance so a helicopter came and took him right away where he passed away mid-way to the hospital on the helicopter”. And Talal just had the weirdest feeling as he knew it was true but just couldn’t believe it in the same time because his head just didn’t process the information because he was just with him the day before when he was in perfect health.

The story behind the knife

After being in shock behind the story Talal heard he started to process that his grandfather actually passed away a couple of days after the incident. So on the third day of the funeral Talal was with Hamza which is Abu Ali’s eldest son and Talal asked him: “what should I do with the knife because I was supposed to give it back to him after fixing it.” So Hamza was really surprised when he showed him the knife and Hamza said: “that’s a really antique and priceless knife you have there.”, then Talal asked him if he knew the story behind it and he told him all about it.

What Talal learnt about his family history.

After Hamza told Talal about the story behind the knife Talal was left in shock after Hamza informed him that this knife belonged to his great grandfather Mashhour Al-Jazi, who was the command officer of a really important battle in Jordan, which was between Israel and Jordan and Palestine’s combined force. The war was called “Battle of Karameh”. And the knife Talal has was actually the knife Mashhour used in that battle. Mashhour is a really loved and known figure by his country as he did great things for it.

How Mashhour’s accomplishments Inspired Talal

After Talal learnt all about Mashhour’s stories he got really inspired by the world of War and national service, then kept doing all his research about it. And his dream ever since was to join the Jordanian Military service. But unfortunately due to family reasons a couple of years after that Talal had to move away from his family alone to live with his friend in Jersey. But being his stubborn self he didn’t change his mind about joining the national service and still worked with what he had even if it cost him serving a country he wasn’t brought up in. So he joined the Marine Cadets at the beginning where he was exposed to the experience soldiers go through in the Navy, to give him a kind of sense of what he was getting himself into.

Everything was going great for Talal apart from the racism he received at the cadet center due to his different ethnicity which confused him about whether he wants to go through that in the actually navy, because it’s a lot of years of commitment and there’s no going back.