Understanding Al Jazeera

Would it surprise you to learn that Al Jazeera is highly controversial in the Arab world? Is this new type of Arab media a threat to the peace and stability of the Middle East? Is it a threat to the West? Read on to understand what Al Jazeera is and what it can do.

by Cecil Maranville

Like most Westerners, I became aware of Al Jazeera during the Iraq War of 2003. I knew it was an Arab news service that reported on the war to Arab peoples throughout the region. Perhaps you first became aware of it with many others when Al Jazeera shocked the Western world by repeatedly displaying graphic pictures of dead Coalition soldiers. Its coverage often seemed unfavorable to the Coalition.

Not all of their reports put the West in a bad light. Early in the war, Al Jazeera correspondents had the advantage of being able to enter any Iraqi city or village, whereas the Western press pool received its briefings from the Coalition's Central Command in Qatar. At one point when Western journalists' reports talked of a possible uprising in Basra, Al Jazeera's correspondent reported from inside the city that everything was calm.

Al Jazeera describes itself as balanced, but its war coverage appeared weighted toward Saddam Hussein and the Baathist Party. A postwar scandal did not help. In May of 2003, The Sunday Times (London) reported that Hussein's intelligence agency had successfully recruited the director-general of Al Jazeera, Mohammed Jassem al-Ali, along with two other employees. Although unproven, the allegations forced al-Ali to resign his position and reinforced the suspicion that the satellite television and Internet news service was anything but balanced.

Later in the summer, when Al Jazeera ran video clips and audio recordings from Osama bin Laden and other al-Qaeda leaders, its reputation in the West sank even lower. And in the fall, Spanish antiterror police charged Al Jazeera's top war correspondent, Tayseer Allouni (also spelled Taysir Alouni) with being connected with al-Qaeda.

Shortly after that, Iraq's Governing Council (IGC) banned Al Jazeera (and Saudi Arabian Al Arabiya) from covering its activities, as well as from official press conferences. Both those organizations were charged with "giving too much prominence to anti-US attacks, and of providing a forum for backers of ousted president Saddam Hussein" (AFP, "Al-Jazeera Banned From Iraq," Sept. 24, 2003). Of course, this action was largely symbolic, for the IGC couldn't "ban" the satellite television-Internet news from broadcasting.

Read the full article at www.wnponline.org/wnp/wnp0403/aljazeera.htm

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