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| Europe |
| 4m in Europe sign up for al-Jazeera |
| 2003-03-26 |
| Subscriptions to the Arabic-language television network al-Jazeera have doubled since the If they ever do this in the US, the FCC will mandate that equal time be given to DEBKA. Al-Jazeera had around 35 million Arabic-speaking viewers before the start of the war in Iraq but most were in the Arabic world, where it is shown free Journalists playing both sides? I suppose they're professionals after all! Although western TV crews remain in Baghdad, al-Jazeera has the only camera crew known to be operating in Basra, Iraq's second city. It also has crews in Baghdad and Mosul. "All the war that's fit to report!" An al-Jazeera crew helped ITN to establish the whereabouts of Terry Lloyd, the veteran reporter who died after coming under fire on Saturday. He was taken to a Basra hospital, where al-Jazeera was allowed to film. The broadcaster has been at the centre of the controversy surrounding the transmission of footage showing Iraqi and American casualties, which many western news organisations considered too sensitive to screen. One image shown repeatedly on Sunday showed the head of a child aged about 12 that had been split apart, reportedly in the US-led assault on Basra. Other footage came from northern Iraq, where US missiles had targeted the Kurdish Islamist Ansar al-Islam organisation. |
| Posted by:Steve White |
| #9 I belive as many people are watchin Al-jazeer as WB right now. |
| Posted by: Brew 2003-03-26 22:47:31 |
| #8 al-Jazeera crew helped ITN to establish the whereabouts of Terry Lloyd. hmmmm.... |
| Posted by: becky 2003-03-26 13:09:03 |
| #7 Canalsat, an offspring of the (fashionably liberal) pay-channel Canal+ and one of the two main sattelite broadcasting providers in France, has banned Foxnews some times ago (still showing CNN & BBC world, though) and has announced it will add AJ to its programs. |
| Posted by: Anonymous 2003-03-26 11:08:54 |
| #6 Al-Jazeera showed on Saturday the results of our attack on the al-Ansar group. I mentioned this in a previous comment. My question at that time and my question still is: Why haven't we heard about this attack on ABC, NBC, CBS, etc? (I have satellite dish, but no cable. Go figure) As I said before, I happened to be in a barber shop(Subscriber to AJ)in Chicago when I saw the reportage. So give credit to AJ for covering a story that our big boys haven't, or am I wrong? (I'm a busy guy on weekends) Jeffrey Goldberg of the New Yorker has written extensively on Ansar in Kurdistan and how the only way they could be in the country is with the permission of Saddam, thus the link with Al-Qaeda since most of the Ansar are purported to be Kurdish/Arab mujahideen/Taliban/Al-Qaeda on the run from Afghanistan. No, we get Friedman on Charlie Rose with questions like "So how bloody will the storming of Baghdad be?", or something like that. So if AJ reports on this stuff, I find value in it. I just have to keep getting weekly trims to keep up. If I don't like the coverage, I'll change channels. So it's pick and choose. Just like I find value in the BBC, but I've been watching it for years now and am able hear between the lines of the news reader's often loaded/provacative questions and how his/her questions are designed to put the Coalition spokesperson or someone who favors our action on the spot and make him sweat. They never ask the same questions to Iraqi officials. For example Peter Jennings was talking by phone (I guess Saturday night) to an Iraqi perfesser and MP, a guy Peter has met and spoken to previously. I won't call them interviews. Peter just kept gushing about how happy he was that the MP was alive. All it takes is for a Baathist to be loved by Peter is to give P. some tea, baklawa, and pretty words. I was pissed off and my kids wanted to know why. I told them that the kinds of tough questions the P. or any of the other talking heads would ask an American/Brit official just don't get asked to Baathists of similar rank and responsibility. My kids told me that the Baathist would get into trouble is he had to answer such sensitive questions. Then I said there's no reason to conduct such interviews because I want tough questions to EVERYBODY regardless of where he's from. This is one of my yardsticks on the value of a channel. Are the tough questions only to Ari, Tommy, and Rummy? Why doesn't Helen Thomas get off her fat ass, take a plane and taxi to Baghdad and pop inane questions to Iraq's Min. of Information? Then I'd respect her just a little bit. Another thing about AJ, but non-war wise. AJ is trusted by Arabs because it is not afraid to get in the faces of regimes and govts. in region. It pisses off Mubarak, Ben Ali, the House of Saud, etc. And all of it coming from Qatar with the permission and money from its Emir, our best ally (or Kuwait) in region. Yes, it's going to be a different world once we fix things in Iraq. Maybe even AJ will be a bit more to our liking editorial-wise but I'm not anticipating this change nor will be disappointed if it doesn't occur. I'll just change barbers. |
| Posted by: Michael 2003-03-26 10:22:14 |
| #5 Mike, I think Murat meant CNN has competition now for the "sucking-up to the Arab masses" and "Religion of Peace™" propaganda market.... or was he? |
| Posted by: Frank G 2003-03-26 08:29:48 |
| #4 Murat: CNN already has competition here in the US: FoxNews, MSNBC, CNBC. |
| Posted by: Mike 2003-03-26 08:01:08 |
| #3 CNN gets compition? What's bad about that, no single sided censored news, great. |
| Posted by: Murat 2003-03-26 02:24:10 |
| #2 Kalle: Good English language sources for understanding the Arab mentality are the Yemen "Local Press" summaries, from: http://www.yementimes.com/page.shtml?p=press The Bush administration should be forced to read these comments, before they announce their unity-through-democracy scheme, for the Arab sandbox. http://www.dailystar.com.lb/15_03_03_c.html They also need to know why democracy is merely a means to ulama-dictatorship ends in Islamania. http://english.daralhayat.com/opinion/22-03-2003/Article-20030322-1511cf49-c0a8-01fc-0031-9753f507e183/story.html Folks: This is what Captain David Waldron (US 3rd Infantry Division) says about Bush/Powell's war-making: "We don't want to hurt people if we can avoid it, but now it has got to be that if you have got a weapon, you have become an Iraqi soldier and we can kill you. This rules of engagement crap is making me lose men." (Oliver Poole, London Telegraph) Am I the only one who remembers that, with the Northern Alliance poised to take Kabul, Bush called for a "broad-based" government of Afghanistan, which was to include the "Taliban." US forces need to be able to kill the Fedayen without case-by-case approval by the State Department. |
| Posted by: Anonon 2003-03-26 02:24:04 |
| #1 al-Jazeera is an arm of islamo-fascism, endlessly spreading jihad propaganda. They don't report facts or try to tell the truth -- they create programmes that pander to Arab/Moslem hatred directed at the free world (mainly the USA and Israel). al-Guardian is not far behind. |
| Posted by: Kalle 2003-03-26 01:29:41 |