Middle East Unrest Biggest in Cable News

Last week’s turmoil in the Middle East registered as the biggest international story in the past four years—surpassing any coverage of the Iraq war, the Haiti earthquake and the conflict in Afghanistan.

From January 31-February 6, the Mideast saga, driven by televised images of the protests and power struggle in Egypt, filled 56% of the newshole studied by the Pew Research Center’s Project for Excellence in Journalism. Not only was that easily the biggest overseas story in a single week since PEJ began its News Coverage Index in January 2007. It registered as the fourth-biggest story of any kind—trailing only two weeks in the 2008 presidential campaign and the aftermath of the January 8, 2011 Tucson shooting spree. Until now, the biggest international story of any single week (43%) was the Iraq war from September 9-14, 2007. And most of that was driven by the domestic policy debate over the war—including General David Petraeus’ progress report to Congress and a speech by President George W. Bush. The Haiti earthquake that killed as many as an estimated quarter million people filled 41% of the newshole from January 11-17, 2010. The closest parallel to the Egyptian unrest last week in the last four years were the widespread protests that followed the disputed Iranian elections—and they accounted for only half as much coverage (28%) from June 15-21, 2009 as the Egyptian protests did last week. The biggest week of coverage of the war in Afghanistan in the past four years (27%) occurred from November 30-December 6, 2009 when President Obama announced a surge of 30,000 additional troops.