Methodological appendix

Summary

This appendix includes a list of the interview schedules and coding sheets that were used in the course of this research. All interviews were carried out using a semi-structured type of format. While a core set of questions was used to guide every interview, new questions and ideas emerged within the course of each session. It was also sometimes necessary to skip some questions because of a lack of time. Interviews usually lasted between an hour and an hour and a half and all were taped and then transcribed. All interviewees were promised anonymity.

The appendix is organized in the order of the chapters in which each method was first utilized.

CHAPTER 2: THE INITIAL STAGES OF OSLO

The research on the role of the news media in the Middle East peace process began in the summer of 1994, about nine months after the first major breakthrough at Oslo. A central source of data for this research comes from forty-one in-depth interviews that were carried out from that summer until December 1995, about a month after Prime Minister Rabin was assassinated. Interviews were carried out with representatives from the Rabin/Peres governments (seven interviews), the Israeli opposition parties (eight interviews), the Palestinian authority (six interviews), and the Palestinian opposition (seven interviews) and journalists (thirteen interviews). The major criterion for political actors being interviewed was that the individual had an ongoing relationship with the Israeli press concerning the Oslo peace process.