“Al Jazeera in the past positioned itself as the ‘resistance’ channel in the region. In 2011, it became the ‘Arab spring’ channel. Today, unfortunately, Al Jazeera Arabic is the ‘state channel’ of the Muslim Brotherhood across the Arab region.”
That said, the Saudi-funded Al Arabiya television channel, Al Jazeera’s closest competitor — like most news media covering Egypt today — has been faring just as badly when it comes to selective reporting of recent events. The difference is that Al Jazeera’s dramatic fall comes from what many saw as a higher journalistic pedestal.
As it prepares for the launch of its U.S. channel later this year, Al Jazeera remains a network staffed largely by good journalists, but run by a shortsighted and biased administration. One of the first steps Qatar’s young new emir took upon succeeding his father was to replace Al Jazeera’s director-general, who was a member of the ruling family. Perhaps the new replacement will be able to save the channel at this critical time.
via Al Jazeera’s Awful Week – by Sultan Al Qassemi
ah….. ye olde times!
The day this channel stoped being managed by a proffesional and started being managed by a royal, I knew this was going to happen… and now that the new king enters inscene with the aura of pro-brotherhood around his oqal… it may get worst.
It’s been ages since I watched them. Even RT seems more interesting. And yes…. their agenda is more evident than AJ’s!!
Al-Must'arib (the vocational Mossarab) 
I wonder why people around the world admit that Al-Jazeera played a dirty role in Egypt and they refuse to admit they played a dirtier role in Syria…
Why any voice that was raised from a syrian citizen like me that Al Jazeera had goals other than spreading the truth I was accused of being “pro regime” or “Shabeeha” ..
From the article 😉 :
“Al Jazeera has altered its coverage to suit its owners’ interests before. Prior to the Qatari-Saudi rapprochement over the past few years, Al Jazeera hosted critics of Saudi Arabia and even produced a documentary on the Al Yamama weapons deal between the Saudi and British governments that was mired in corruption allegations. Now that relations have improved between the two countries, Al Jazeera has changed its tune and was rewarded with the reopening of its bureau in Riyadh in January 2011.
A similar reversal took place with Hezbollah, the Lebanese militant group allied with the Syrian regime of Bashar al-Assad. Qatar emerged as a major supporter of Hezbollah following the latter’s 2006 war with Israel. When Qatar’s former emir, Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani, visited southern Lebanon after the war, Al Jazeera heaped praise on the group in one report, saying the “guest [the emir] is kind and those receiving him [Hezbollah] are kind as well.”
In August 2008, Al Jazeera’s Beirut bureau hosted a birthday party live on air for a Lebanese fighter who was released as part of a prisoner exchange deal with Israel. The festivities featured a large cake decorated with a photo of a smiling Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of Hezbollah. But following Hezbollah’s intervention in Syria, Al Jazeera’s change of heart was evident in its daily coverage and talk shows, on one of which a presenter recently alleged that “hundreds of women were raped by Hezbollah in [the Syrian town of] Qusayr; it’s all documented.”
Last month, Al Jazeera Arabic posted a controversial poll asking who was responsible for the descent of the Syrian war into a sectarian conflict: Sunnis or Shiites (read: Hezbollah). Qatar also recently expelled 18 Lebanese Shiites after the Gulf states collectively agreed to take measures against the group’s members. Salem, the Arab media researcher, said that “Al Jazeera in the past positioned itself as the ‘resistance’ channel in the region. In 2011, it became the ‘Arab spring’ channel. Today, unfortunately, Al Jazeera Arabic is the ‘state channel’ of the Muslim Brotherhood across the Arab region.”
….so…. they already stated their positioning in Syria as well as in Egypt. Aljazeera used to be a very respectable news channel. but those were the times when royal qatari family was not dircetly involved and pushed for women to wear veil, and other stuff following the progressive islamization of its style… latter times in Egypt just placed them as one sided as Fox news can be in USA.
And a News channel that has a side just calls attention to that side … and only that. Not my side, btw.
Thanks for commenting 7lwah! 😉