Al-Jazeera is a legitimate news-broadcasting network that is accepted around the world as the Arab news service. In some ways Al-Jazeera is similar to American news channels and in some ways they are better. Al-Jazeera has been criticized though by some American media for causing unrest in the Arab world by pandering to known terrorist Osama Bin Laden and presenting the news from an Arab viewpoint. The facts are that Al-Jazeera does cater to an Arab audience but that is only because their audience is Arabian and they have broadcast footage of Osama Bin Laden because they have the video to broadcast. Any bias they have toward Arab concerns is no different than the biases American media like CNN or Fox News have toward American interests. Al-Jazeera is almost completely uncensored by government. They are much more free than the American media that has to deal daily with the Federal Communications Commission and sometimes the Pentagon. Al-Jazeera may have laid the framework to becoming the international news source of the future. Although based in Qatar, they belong to no country but to Arab speaking peoples worldwide. This cross border support is the foundation to their no rules, no holds bard style
Another common question deals with why Al-Jazeera repeatedly runs video of graphic controversial stories like the Osama Bin Laden interviews. This is a valid question when you realize that some think these stories are meant to incite hatred and violence. “Al-Jazeera shamelessly plays to the nastiest corner of the Arab street, offering a frighteningly familiar…mix of virulent anti-Americanism and unrelenting anti-Semitism” (Christabella). For instance, in an exclusive interview from December 1998 that has been broadcast time and again Bin Laden calls for Muslims to “target all Americans” (Emery). Another story that has been run frequently depicts a Palestinian boy and his father evading Israeli troops just before gunfire strikes the boy (Emery). A segment showing Taliban leaders claiming hundreds of dead Arabs and showing a line of body bags in a Kandahar hospital is common occurrence (Emery).
Review Online. 26 July 2002
“Al-Jazeera, The Pride of Qatar.” The Times of India 10 October 2001. World Press
Burkman, Oliver. “News channels at war: Al-Jazeera accused of hiding Bin Laden.”
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