“English source text translations presented in this dissertation reveal the role and extent these three causes of #translation infidelity impact international journalists’ translations in the #English­-#Arabic #language pair. This language pair was chosen due to linguistic misunderstandings that contributed to igniting the first two major wars of the 21st century—The War on #Terror and The War in #Iraq.” —Allen Clark, 2009 PhD dissertation, Ohio State University.

“Awkward English sentence structures, unclear ideas, rudimentary use of rhetorical devices, poor diction, and errors in punctuation are evident even with a cursory glance at translations of most any terrorist messages, which are by nature complex, sophisticated, and intertextualized due to their religious underpinnings.” Ibid.

“One principle factor seems to be responsible for distorting the meaning of al Qāida's communiqués in #translation: it is possible that the international news agency manipulates the wording, and consequently the purport, of the communiqué to appease its readership and subsequently enhance sales (Lippmann, 1965), but it continues to rely on b. Lādin's credibility/notoriety to provoke interest. This possibility enters into a type of translation that is driven by ideological motives.” —Ibid.