From Unexpected Source, New Voice Emerges in Arab TV
Al-Alam, News Report, Compiled by Jalal Ghazi for Link TV, Posted: Oct 16, 2003
Al Jazeera has a new competitor. The competition comes not from another Arab country like the United Arab Emirates, which sponsors Abu Dhabi Television, or Saudi Arabia, which runs Al Arabia Television.
This time, it was Iran that launched a 24 hours news channel in Arabic called Al Alam – “the world”.
The channel, in terms of style, has similarities to Al Jazeera. But in terms of content, it offers surprisingly moderate analysis of the U.S. nation-building efforts in Iraq and positive coverage of the new governing council, which is backed by the United States.
Al-Alam broadcasts in Arabic, although the language of Iran is Farsi. Al-Alam says that it launched a 24-hour Arabic-language news channel to provide an alternative to western media regarding the Middle East, including countries such as Iraq and other Arab-speaking countries.
The two stations broadcast news on the hour, accompanied with dramatic music and live coverage. Another similarity is the focus on the human impacts of the Iraq war and the U.S. occupation of Iraq, including personal stories from Iraqi children and women, subjects usually ignored in U.S. media.
The new Al-Alam TV channel only started regular broadcasting in March, as the Iraq war began, and it already has established itself as popular Arab television for viewers in Iraq and abroad.
Al-Aalam was critical of the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq. However, if one watches the channel regularly, it is easy to notice that it is relatively moderate in the way it covers U.S. presence in Iraq.
It is interesting to note in this context, that the Iranian government has expressed support for the U.S. backed Iraqi governing council.
Al-Alam does criticize U.S. policy in Iraq, but it does not criticize the U.S. presence in Iraq, which reflects the Iranian position towards the war.
After the war in Iraq, both Iran and the Hezbollah organization in southern Lebanon that it backs both found themselves having to decide how to position themselves with regards to the U.S. presence in Iraq.
Now they have good reasons to work with U.S. officials to legitimize the Iraqi governing council, because it has majority of Shiite representatives: 13 out of the 25 council members.
Iran is an overwhelmingly Shiite Muslim country. Iraq is also majority Shiite, although it has a substantial Sunni minority, to which many key elite members of the Saddam Hussein regime belonged. Iran was one of the first countries to send delegates to the Iraqi governing council.
Unlike Al Jazeera, Al-Alam does not criticize members of the Iraqi governing council. Al Jazeera's outspoken criticism of the council members as puppets for the U.S. occupying authority led to the channel being banned from covering official events related to members of the governing council. Some members accused Al Jazeera of “encouraging terrorism”.
This has put Al-Alam at a better position to cover official events, at least temporary.
An example of Al-Alam’s carefully calibrated criticism of U.S. forces in Iraq can be illustrated in a recent report in which the channel disapproved of the way the U.S. forces failed to curb the behaviors of Turkish drivers, who cause major accidents in Iraq while they driving huge oil trucks to sell fuel in Iraq.
Al –Alam reporter says, “As the winter season approaches, and the citizens’ need for oil increases, more and more oil has to be imported, which explains the sudden increase in the number of oil container trucks coming from Turkey to Iraq. These oil containers cause … car accidents every day. Strangely, the Iraqi police can’t take the Turkish drivers to traffic courts, because the U.S. forces usually interfere by releasing the Turkish drivers who cause the accidents.”
Al -Alam also has aired several reports criticizing the Turkish parliament decision to send 10,000 Turkish troops to Iraq. These reports may also illustrate Iranian reservations toward a strong Turkish influence in Iraq.
Al-Alam also seems to be reaching out to the United States to convince the U.S. administration to change its policy toward the Middle East. For example, in one news report, the Al Alam reporter pleads with the United States to be more balanced in the way it treats Iran and Israel: “(the) U.S. position toward the huge Israeli nuclear arsenal is a double standard policy.
The U.S. always supports Israel’s refusal to open its nuclear facilities to international inspections, but it is uses very heavy handed policy with others countries if it suspects they have nuclear programs, even if these programs are developed for civilian purposes.”
Al -Aalam is less moderate in its coverage of the Palestinian and Israeli conflict. They refer to suicide bombers as "martyrdom operations."
Also, during the coverage the 80th birthday of Shimon Peres, the leader of the Israeli Labor party, Al-Alam reporter said, “Peres, who is a quarter-century older than Israel, said that the Hebrew state faces demographic threats: Today, the total population of Palestine is 10.5 million. The number of Jewish settlers, according to Zionist figures, is 5.5 million.”
The reporter concluded that within twenty years, the Israeli Jews would become a minority, albeit a large one, in Palestine.
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