Six months of disorders during which curfew confined Palestinians to their homes have started the residents of the Holy Land on the way to becoming radio-conscious.
It was just before the outbreak that Palestine’s new Government broadcasting system opened. Now Stephen Fry, young energetic program director of the Palestine Broadcasting Service, has plans to make every Arab peasant and Jewish farmer know that radio has come to the Holy Land.
The first ambitious project will be the broadcasting of the opening concert of the Palestine Symphony Orchestra under Arturo Toscanini from Jerusalem on Dec. 30.
Mr. Fry, who declares he will put Palestine on the radio map before he is finished, intends to educate the public to appreciate good programs. He wants to develop latent musical and dramatic ability among the inhabitants and put them on the air.
In addition, he plans to publish a weekly illustrated magazine on the model of the British Broadcasting System and Egyptian radio journals to inform the public about programs and the people who make them. Now, the P.B.S. issues only a weekly leaflet of programs.
Indicative of the growing interest in radio among rural dwellers is the fact that a young resident of Ramallah, the town where the P.B.S. transmitter is located, is picking up a tidy sum selling cheap crystal sets to peasants and Bedouins.
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The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
