Of course, Al Jazeera has some overt prejudices. In covering the Israeli-Palestinian dispute, for example, it is clearly on the Palestinian side. Tear-jerking features about the sufferings of the Palestinians are not matched with equal coverage of the Israeli human terrain. What you get from Al Jazeera is the developing-world point of view, or, more specifically, that of the emerging developing-world bourgeoisie; and that outlook is inherently pro-Palestinian, as well as deeply hostile to American military power. (full article…)

Yet the American media is not biased because it overwhelmingly sides with a brutal occupying power. Apparently that’s not bias; that’s what this author would condescendingly call the “developed-world” media.

The English-language cousin of the Qatar based news channel Al Jazeera launched yesterday in the Washington D.C. area after signing its first major U.S. cable deal with non-commercial MHz Networks last week.

The MHz deal means 2.3 million subscribers will now have access to the channel, adding to the 140 million households currently receiving Al Jazeera English worldwide. (more…)

Since Al-Jazeera English went on the air in November 2006, it has struggled to gain a spot on traditional American airwaves. The station says only three small cable operators offer the network in Ohio, Vermont and Washington, D.C.

None of the biggest U.S. cable systems carries Al-Jazeera English, claiming viewer interest is not sufficient. (more…)

The Israeli army prevented paramedics from entering the area where the family was sheltering for several days, according to the Samouni family.

Send us your views and eyewitness videos When they finally escaped, Israeli soldiers shot at them, Nawal’s other children told Al Jazeera, saying that the soldiers had looked on them and laughed. (more…)

“It’s not an executive order closing Guantanamo Bay, but a halt to the trials for 120 days.” (more…)

Who Will Save the Palestinians?

Waterboarding is used in interrogation to make a detainee feel as if he is drowning.

Asked whether he thought it was appropriate, Cheney replied: “I do.”

Asked if he thought, in hindsight, any of the tactics went too far, Cheney said, “I don’t.” (more…)

It was a noisy night in Washington, DC. Cars were parading the streets and honking their horns all night long. People around were very excited and people walked the streets and yelled and shouted in joy.

AlJazeera offices: now that was a different story. The chaos there could not hide the festive atmosphere. People took bets and they had a sheet with staff names. I asked who was betting on McCain: no one, they said but they were betting on when the results would come in with news of Obama victory. People were excited and emotional.

As I sat with the three anchors listening to Obama’s victory speech, I would make critical comments. I could tell that people did not enjoy that and there was a white technician who was very emotional got really mad at me because I was being critical of Obama.

I ran into Lawrence Korb (former assistant secretary of defence under Ronald Regan) and I asked him if he had endorsed Obama. He said that he did not do that publicly but that he was advising him on defense and national security policies. He said that there is a move to appoint Richard Halbrooke as Secretary of State. I said: but the man (in addition to annoying the hell out of me) is the biggest self-promoter in the world. (more…)

Control Room, directed by Egyptian-American filmmaker Jehane Noujaim, provides unique insights into the media dynamics on the eve of the 2003 US invasion of Iraq. It primarily portrays the interactions between Al Jazeera journalists on the one hand and US military spokespersons and Western journalists on the other hand. Al Jazeera is a TV station largely funded by the Arab Emirate of Qatar, which has the politically most open system in the Emirates. It was initially hailed by Western commentators and the US government as exceptionally critical of Arab governments and the region’s most prominent outlet for free speech. When it reported on atrocities by the Algerian military, for example, the Algerian government decided to disconnect the electricity in the capital city of Algier to avert that ordinary Algerians would observe the grim accounts. Al Jazeera fell into disfavor with many rulers, as a consequence of which its licenses to broadcast and report have been canceled or otherwise thwarted in dozen countries. Contrary to popular perception, Al Jazeera was not chiefly at odds with Western government before the Iraq invasion. (more…)

I came across two interesting cases in a matter or hours yesterday as I checked my RSS feed from Ha’aretz. Both cases deal with censorship in some way, first of media and then of expressing Pro-Palestinian sentiments.

Apparently, Israel plans to impose an official embargo on the Qatar-based news network Al-Jazeera in retaliation for perceived “unfair” portrayal of the IDF.

“The Foreign Ministry has held discussions on the matter, and decided to embargo the station,” Deputy Foreign Minister Majali Wahabe told Army Radio, adding: “These reports are untrustworthy and they hurt us, and they arouse people to terrorist activities.”

Israel would do well to consider that killing over 125 people over a matter of days in Gaza (half of whom were children) is difficult to spin in a “fair” way—when fair means favorable to Israel. Perhaps they should even (gasp) consider that their brutal actions in the occupied territories fuel so-called “terrorist activities”. (more…)