Al Jazeera 'For Sale' Is a Sad Sign For All

Linda S. Heard

It is been bombed, banned and lambasted. It is been accused of aiding
terrorists
and serving as a mouthpiece for Osama Bin Laden as well as Saddam Hussain.

It boasts huge audiences throughout the Arab world because it reflects
public opinion and yet advertisers treat it like the plague, fearful of
offending the governments it regularly attacks.

I'm referring, of course, to Al Jazeera, the satellite television station
that put tiny Qatar firmly on the international map.In a region where until recently censorship was rife, Al Jazeera's
programming was revolutionary.

Even as terrestrial networks were feeding their viewers a steady diet of
Egyptian soaps, flickering black and white movies and endless scenes of
visiting official dignitaries shaking hands, Al Jazeera startled audiences
with heated political debate and in-depth documentaries.

Its telephone lines red hot with the voices of impassioned callers, it has
been likened to a loose valve on a pressure cooker providing an outlet for
viewers to blow off steam.

Launched in 1996 under the patronage of His Highness Shaikh Hamad Bin
Khalifa Al Thani, the Emir of Qatar, Al Jazeera has become a victim of its
own popularity, enraging the American government due to the influence it
wields.

The United States has accused it of fomenting anti-Americanism and slammed
the station for showing graphic horrors of war. It is no secret that the
Bush administration would like it to disappear.

It had hoped its own Al Hurra satellite channel broadcasting out of the
United States would take Al Jazeera's place in the affections of Arabs but
that creation is viewed with scepticism as an American propaganda-spewing
machine.

According to an article in last Sunday's New York Times, it looks as though
Qatar may bow to American pressure.

Al Jazeera may be up for sale, although buyers may be few and far between,
considering it is still a loss-making enterprise, requiring an annual
financial injection of more than $50 million (Dh183.5 million).

To turn it around financially, a buyer would be obliged to pull its teeth,
which would incense its team of professional journalists, many of whom
formerly worked for the BBC.

The day that Al Jazeera is closed down or sold off will be a sad one.

In the way that Rupert Murdoch's "fair and balanced" Fox News reflects the
views of conservative right-wingers portraying American soldiers in Iraq as
cuddly do-gooders, Al Jazeera doesn't shrink from showing the results of
their handiwork.

This is why it has been banned from reporting in Iraq. Faithful footage of
dead babies and maimed children do little to enhance America's image. At the
same time, Fox along with its jingoistic gung-ho Saudi-bashing presenters
have been shut out of Canada.

When it comes to Al Jazeera the Bush administration's hypocrisy is glaring.
After the network showed captured Marines during the invasion of Iraq,
Pentagon officials, including General John Abizaid, rounded on one of its
reporters for breaching the Geneva Conventions.

Yet the United States had no compunction in publicly parading the corpses of
Saddam's sons or showing the former dictator having his head checked for lice.

Isn't it the height of hypocrisy, too, for a nation, which lauds democracy
as the Holy Grail to strong-arm Qatar into abandoning a forthright,
editorially independent broadcaster? Free speech and an unfettered media are
integral elements of any democracy.

Adding salt to the charge are the American government's media payola
activities. Last Friday, it was forced to admit that it had paid a third
conservative columnist to parrot the party line, while hinting there may be
more.

An outraged Congress has launched its own enquiry. Senators Edward Kennedy
and Frank Lautenberg plan to introduce a bill titled "The Stop Government
Propaganda Act" to the Senate this week.

"It is time for Congress to shut down the administration's propaganda mill,"
said Lautenberg. "It has no place in the United States government."

There is no such indignation over propaganda exported to the Middle East,
though, via Hurra and Radio Sawa. Attempts to brainwash Arabs concerning the
benign intentions of Israel and the United States are fine and dandy, it
seems.

Signs indicate that Al Jazeera, shocked by the bombing of its offices in
Kabul and Baghdad, as well as the arrest of its senior reporter Tayseer
Allouni in Spain for alleged terrorist links, has already toned down the
rhetoric.

The journalist John R. Bradley, in an article titled "Will Al Jazeera bend?"
reports how the station's website pulled "two cartoons deemed inflammatory"
on the same day a US official called to complain.

Bradley also cites a British minister, who after being interviewed on the
network "thought he detected a more balanced tone emerging".

It is thought that Al Jazeera sacked Yvonne Ridley the British journalist
and Muslim convert imprisoned by the Taliban during a daring excursion into
Afghanistan due to her strident pro-Iraq, pro-Palestinian stance.

While in charge of the station's popular English-language website, Ridley
wrote stories of US soldiers tying up women and children during
house-to-house searches and was warned not to publish pictures of a
seven-year-old girl in plastic hand restraints.

Her sacking evoked the ire of not only Muslim groups but also left-wing
British politicians and activists.

In other words, Al Jazeera can only please some of the people some of the
time. Hate it or love it, advocates of democracy and freedom should ensure
its continued existence. Whether one agrees with it or not, its right to
broadcast should be defended. Else what is the message here?

Whatever his ultimate decision, Shaikh Hamad should be proud of his
creation. Al Jazeera is on everyone's lips from Los Angeles to Lahore and
its 50 million viewers put it streets ahead of its competitors.

Qatar has already bent over backwards to be amenable to America and its war
on terror. How ironic would it be if Qatar fell victim to US intimidation,
another terror of sorts?

Ahmad Shaikh, Al Jazeera's news editor, said: "We understand that Americans
are not happy with our editorial policies, but if anyone wants us to become
their mouthpiece, we will not do that. We are independent and impartial, and
we have never come under any pressure from the Qatari government to change
our editorial approach."

Could the New York Times or the Washington Post, which both said their mea
culpas vis-à-vis their pathetic coverage of the invasion of Iraq and their
burial of anti-war points of view, say as much?