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Shamefully, Al-Jazeera failed as an independent news outlet and became a mouthpiece of its masters in the Qatari sheikdom. Many years I found it refreshing to watch AJ as it became the Arab version of CNN and was able to report news items where western journalists couldn’t or wouldn’t go: Gaza, West-Bank, Egypt, Lybia, Iraq and Pakistan. For some time now, the news broadcasts have become biased in pro-Sunni Arab regimes, especially the Gulf States. A new mouthpiece for the Assad regime and Iran won’t help …
‘Anti-Al Jazeera’ channel Al Mayadeen goes on air
(France24) – The new, Beirut-based pan-Arab TV station Al Mayadeen attempts to redress the perceived biases of the Sunni Gulf Arab-financed channels such as Al Jazeera. But will Al Mayadeen be truly objective and independent?
A new pan-Arab news channel that many regard as the anti-Al Jazeera, hit the airwaves with coverage aimed as a counterweight to the Qatari-financed channel’s perceived bias against the Syrian and Iranian regimes. With its slogan, “Reality like it is,” the new channel, Al Mayadeen – which translates as “the public squares” – promises to objectively cover a region that has been home to strong opinions and even stronger emotions.
But Al Mayadeen has its own critics who say the channel is backed by the regimes in Syria and Iran, making for its own set of biases. Not so, says Ghassan bin Jiddo, a well-known Tunisian journalist who heads Al Mayadeen. “We do not speak in the name of Iran or the Syrian regime, we are a completely independent channel which reflects reality as it is.”
Bahrain, an ignored uprising
As the winds of revolution sweep through the Arab world, the spotlight has been turned on the Arab media’s coverage of events. Ali Hashem, another journalist who quit Al Jazeera to join Al Mayadeen, made headlines in Lebanon in March when he vented his anger over the one-sided coverage of Syria on Al Jazeera in several emails, which were leaked by Syrian hackers.
In his emails, Hashem criticized the Qatar-based channel for refusing to cover the anti-regime uprising in Bahrain, a Shiite majority Arab country ruled by a Sunni monarch.
“I felt in one way or another, I am losing my integrity as a journalist, being pushed to lie. It’s the owners of Al Jazeera, those who own Al Jazeera, the Qataris. They are pushing this channel toward journalistic suicide,” said Hashim in an interview.
More below the fold …
The mystery financer
Omar Ibhais, a freelance Lebanese TV producer, claims that he has learned, from inside sources whom he refuses to name, about the new channel’s funding source.
“Al Mayadeen channel is a joint venture between the Iranians and Rami Makhlouf, who is the cousin of President Bashar al-Assad,” says Ibhais, referring to the wealthy Syrian businessman who is believed to control as much as 60% of the Syrian economy through his web of business interests that include telecommunications, oil and gas, construction, banking, airlines and retail, according to the Financial Times.
Syrian uprising ‘saturates Lebanese politics’
According to Ibhais, Iran launched a media campaign about a year ago to support the revolution in Bahrain and the minority Shiite regime in Damascus.
Franklin Lamb, a US journalist who works for the English service of the Iran-based al Itijah radio and TV station, says the Syrian uprising is a particularly sensitive topic in neighbouring Lebanon, a country that has the same confessional divides as Syria and was under a 30-year Syrian occupation until Syrian troops pulled out of Lebanon following the February 2005 assassination of Lebanese Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri.
Syria’s Electronic Warriors Hit Al Jazeera
DAMASCUS, Syria (al-Akhbar) – The entire staff of the Al Jazeera network allegedly received an email instructing them to change their computer and email passwords. Earlier in the week, the network’s server had been hacked by the self-styled Syrian Electronic Army, and some of its secrets were released to the media.
The major find to be made public was an email exchange between anchorwoman Rula Ibrahim and Beirut-based reporter Ali Hashem. The emails seemed to indicate widespread disaffection within the channel, especially over its coverage of the crisis in Syria.
Ibrahim wrote to her colleague saying that she had “turned against the revolution” in Syria after realizing that the protests would “destroy the country and lead to a civil war.” She went on to deride the opposition Free Syrian Army, which she described as “a branch of al-Qaeda.”
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."
