Anthony Shadid, as is his way, has written the best piece I've yet seen on al-Arabiya. He very nicely captures both the stylistic innovations on al-Arabiya in recent month (including its focus on business news and cultural fluff) and its editorial approach (including both its attempt to brand itself as the "moderate" alternative to al-Jazeera and its deference to Saudi political interests). Shadid does a nice job showing the tensions between theory and practice at the station:
Rashed is blunt. He accuses Arab journalists of "conspiring not to tell the truth" in their coverage of Iraq, particularly by inflating civilian casualties in U.S. bombings. He points with pride to al-Arabiya's decision to no longer air the anonymous tapes of Iraqi insurgents, believing they gave groups of questionable credibility an unwarranted platform.
But some staff members will say there is sometimes an al-Arabiya in theory, Rashed and Khatib's vision of a new style of Arab news, and an al-Arabiya in practice, where those ideals get muddied. In moments, editorial decisions can become political crises, from Morocco to Iran, and editors at times have decided not to air promotions for news shows to avoid a feared backlash from Arab leaders. Reporters say stories have been killed or pulled after generating too much criticism. In the newsroom, workers whisper about strained relations between King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia and the parent company, MBC, which is owned by Walid al-Ibrahim, a brother-in-law of King Fahd, Abdullah's predecessor.
I would add this to the "theory and practice" bit, taken from today's al-Quds al-Arabi:
Al-Arabiya flacks love to attack al-Jazeera for airing bin Laden videos, and to define themselves as the "responsible" ones who don't do that sort of thing... but I guess when it's a Zawahiri video found on the internet it's totally different.
Shadid has good stuff on the "cultivating of the Saudi market" thing:
On the television behind him, the al-Arabiya news bulletin led with a speech by the Saudi monarch promising gradual political reform by the world's largest oil exporter without violating Islamic principles. Despite breaking news from Iraq and the Gaza Strip, it stayed the top story through the day.
"It is important," he said, "but suppose we have another story? It will still remain our first headline."
Abdel-Raouf, a veteran of the state-controlled Egyptian Gazette, ticks off other subjects: minimal coverage by al-Arabiya of the demonstrations over the cartoons of the prophet Muhammad in a Danish newspaper; less attention to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, which he says editors think has begun to bore viewers; 72 hours straight on King Fahd's death last summer, coverage so intense that some on the al-Arabiya staff said they started watching al-Jazeera. Even on breaking stories, the broadcast will routinely cut to business news, "telling viewers this is more important than the news story."
"It is a political point of view, not a news point of view," Abdel-Raouf said. "You don't have to ask about the guidelines because you know what they are. When you hear it once, twice, three times, you don't need anyone to remind you."
Shadid gets particularly high marks for getting station director Abd al-Rahman al-Rashed to go on record on some things (like al-Arabiya's backing off the Khaddam coverage) which had previously just been rumours:
Rashed acknowledged that he faced Saudi pressure, "to an annoying degree," although he says it comes from other governments as well, along with an Arab intelligentsia he finds reactionary. In past months, the station has quit covering a former Syrian vice president who defected in Europe. In a huge scoop, it had aired an interview with him in December, where he blamed Syria for the assassination of a former Lebanese prime minister. Veiled threats followed from Syria, and the station brought its Beirut correspondent to Dubai for more than a month, fearing for his safety. Rashed said the threats were part of the decision to stop covering the exiled official.
"I am calculating my risk," he said. But he acknowledged, too, that Saudi officials had ordered him to back off.
Great piece, highly recommended for those interested in the ever-evolving Arab media market.
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