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BOOK
REVIEW
Dauntless
journalism
Al-Jazeera: How
Arab TV News Challenged the
World by
Hugh Miles
Reviewed by
Sreeram Chaulia
Demonized and hailed with
equal passion, al-Jazeera has risen as an
emancipative force in the world of visual media
over the past decade. Award-winning journalist
Hugh Miles' book does justice to  this radical
television channel's motto of presenting both
sides of the coin through a nuanced appraisal.
Controversy shadowed al-Jazeera from its
genesis. Superficially, it resembled any Western
24-hour TV station that beams current affairs
news. However, one visible mark of distinction was
its skimpy 40 minutes of advertising time per day
(compared to CNN's 300 minutes), thanks to the
antagonistic governments of Saudi Arabia and
Kuwait coercing advertising companies to boycott
the channel. In the newsroom of its Doha
headquarters stood a larger-than-life photo of a
correspondent killed by an American missile in
Iraq. When Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak
visited its choc-a-bloc premises he quipped, "All
this trouble from a matchbox like this?" (p 11)
The upheavals that shook the Middle East in recent
years were thus integral to the story of
al-Jazeera.
On accession to the throne,
Qatar's reformist emir, Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa
al-Thani, governed his tiny country more like a
chief executive officer. He spoke directly to the
press, worked in the afternoons, allowed elected
municipal bodies and shared governance with his
American-educated first lady. Of all his
technocratic transformations, the one that shocked
the Arab world's senile despots was his ambitious
media modernization drive. Al-Jazeera's formation
in 1996 was "an act of liberalism in the context
of Qatar's maverick tradition". (p 24) It ensued
after Qatar's diplomatic row with Bahrain over
televised interviews of dissidents.
The
emir bankrolled al-Jazeera for five years, but
clarified that the editorial board would be
independent of his control. It was an uncanny
promise that he never broke. In 1998 he abolished
censorship in Qatar, freeing al-Jazeera from all
staffing and content constraints. BBC-trained
journalists signed up, a quarter of them Qataris
and the rest from other Arab-speaking countries.
For its first year, the channel was largely
unreceivable in the Middle East due to its weak
transponder signal. A lucky mishap with a French
channel in 1997 turned the tide in al-Jazeera's
favor, a tide that progressively swelled to a
whopping audience of 50 million people.
Al-Jazeera's aura rose from its
iconoclastic liberal programming. For the first
time, Hebrew-speaking Israelis appeared on Arab
television. Its talk shows boldly discussed taboo
political, religious, social and economic topics,
allowing opposite viewpoints to clash. One episode
posed the heretical question, "Are Hezbollah
resistance [fighters] or terrorists?" Callers to
the shows openly lambasted Arab rulers as
sycophantic, corrupt and treacherous. Comperes
such as Faisal al-Qasim thrilled viewers with
bluntness and forthrightness.
In 1998,
Jordan's information minister demanded an official
public apology from al-Jazeera for derogatory
references to Amman's ties with Israel. Other
politicians realized the potential of this new
platform for free speech. Sheikh Ahmad Yasin of
Hamas, Aslan Maskhadov of Chechnya and Muammar
Gaddafi of Libya seized chances to mouth their
viewpoints on the channel. Iraqi president Saddam
Hussein made al-Jazeera his network of choice
after its landmark coverage of Operation Desert
Fox (1998). Osama bin Laden made his debut on the
channel in December 1998, raising hackles in
Riyadh and Kuwait. Weathering diplomatic umbrage,
the Qatari emir announced that al-Jazeera was
autonomous. Since jamming satellite signals was
technically difficult, irate Arab rulers cooled
off after short bans on the channel. Allegations
of bias against al-Jazeera were contradictory and
conspiratorial. The channel rarely compromised
newsworthiness, accuracy and objectivity.
Al-Jazeera's reportage of the second
Palestinian Intifada in 2000 revolutionized the
Middle East. It had the gall to investigate the
inefficiency, abuse and corruption of Yasser
Arafat's Palestinian Authority (PA). The PA
temporarily forced shut al-Jazeera's Ramallah
bureau in retaliation. The channel's live footage
from the front lines came at the cost of crew
operating through trusted local sources at killing
distance in the Gaza Strip and West Bank. For the
first time, the bloody tragedy of Palestine was
relayed live into the homes of millions, forging a
new pan-Arab political awareness.
Since
al-Jazeera made it difficult for Egypt to stick to
a moderate line on the intifada, it was
scapegoated for the civil unrest threatening
President Hosni Mubarak's regime. Around this
time, the channel made its first ripples in the
West. Pro-Israeli lobbyists pushed for its website
to be closed by a US Terrorism Task Force.
Five days after September 11, 2001,
al-Jazeera gained instant notoriety by playing a
signed statement by bin Laden. The channel went on
to become the Saudi fugitive's favorite conduit to
the outside world, evoking Western allegations
that it was a "mouthpiece for terrorists". Miles
finds copious counter-evidence to the slur. For
instance, in 2002 the channel authoritatively
disproved rumors of an Israeli massacre of
hundreds in Jenin. The choice to air bin Laden's
statements was motivated by the practical reasons
that al-Jazeera was the most respected Arab TV
network and would not edit his pronouncements.
The US government banned re-transmission
of al-Jazeera's footage by American channels and
pressured Qatar's emir to "moderate and tone down
its "rhetoric". Sheikh Hamad did not intercede. As
the US invaded Afghanistan, al-Jazeera was the
only station with reporters in Taliban-controlled
territory. It transmitted a string of stories that
showed the American assault as inhumane vis-a-vis
mounting civilian casualties. The US Federal
Bureau of Investigation and its British
equivalent, the MI5, quickly placed the channel's
Washington and London offices under surveillance.
Al-Jazeera's Sudanese cameraman was arrested and
held in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, without charges.
Western TV networks launched a massive information
offensive insinuating that al-Jazeera was
protecting bin Laden. In November 2001, the US
military destroyed the channel's Kabul office with
two massive missile strikes. Taking the cue from
their American benefactors, hostile Arab state
media vilified al-Jazeera for "Zionist tendencies"
and posed hurdles to its staff members. Even
al-Qaeda blamed the channel for "betrayal" that
led to the arrest of Hamburg cell fugitive Ramzi
bin al-Shibh in Pakistan.
In the run-up to
the war in Iraq, al-Jazeera had more journalists
with deep local knowledge in that country than any
other network. The channel unmasked blatant
discord among Arab countries and estimated "how
much money Jordan stood to make out of the war".
(p 235) The daredevil station ignored US President
George W Bush's call for all media personnel to
leave Baghdad and stayed put in spite of the clear
dangers. Though it rejected the legitimacy of the
US invasion of Iraq, its programming meticulously
provided the megaphone to varied stands.
Al-Jazeera's Iraq reportage "broke the
hegemony of Western networks and reversed the flow
of information, historically from West to East".
(p 278) Its truthful depictions of the
humanitarian situation and coalition losses
compelled US soldiers to label it an "enemy
station" whose staff posed a "threat". During the
war, its offices were targeted with missiles, its
cameramen detained, its jeeps riddled with bullets
and one correspondent, Tareq Ayyoub, was killed -
all by the US and the UK. Saddam's police and
Information Ministry also threatened al-Jazeera
staff repeatedly. Ironically, Ahmad Chalabi, the
foxy Pentagon eminence grise, alleged the channel
to be "completely infiltrated by Iraqi
intelligence". Taysir Alluni, its famous reporter,
was arrested in Spain on charges of being an
al-Qaeda agent.
As the US hunkered down to
its occupation of Iraq, general harassment of
al-Jazeera was heightened following canards that
it had connections to the resistance movement. Two
cameramen were arrested in November 2003 and
tortured at the infamous Abu Ghraib prison. By
April 2004, US forces had incarcerated 21
al-Jazeera staff members. In May, cameraman Rashid
Wali was killed in Karbala. Despite overwhelming
intimidation, the station's editorial style was
not diluted.
Miles summarizes al-Jazeera's
overall impact in the final two chapters. The
channel, he writes, spearheaded an information
metamorphosis, dishing out more variety, choice
and voice to Arabs. It brought the notion of
ruler's accountability to the forefront. It
educated Arabs about democracy and life in the
West like no other competing network. Free of
biases, it acted as a "mirror on the Arab world
where the people are more militant than the
governments". (p 367) A crucial weathervane of
public opinion, it was, in the words of a
Jordanian family, "like oxygen to a drowning man".
(p 339) Through grit, excellence and some luck, it
counterbalanced the propaganda empire of the
United States. Its latest plans of privatizing
ownership and starting a new English-language
channel aim to "reposition al-Jazeera as a global
source of news" that would continue to empower the
voiceless.
Miles' comprehensive study of
al-Jazeera's media miracle is commendable for its
diligent research. As "democratization" is the
toast of the day in the US's Middle East tympani,
Miles lays bare the undemocratic practices that
uncomfortably rest beneath the superpower's
hyperbole.
Al-Jazeera: How Arab TV News
Challenged the World by Hugh Miles, Abacus
(Time Warner Book Group). London, 2005. ISBN:
0-349-11807-8. Price: US$24, 438 pages.
(Copyright 2005 Asia Times Online Ltd. All
rights reserved. Please contact us for information
on sales, syndication and republishing.) |
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