Brace yourself: Fox News comes to the Middle East 7, July 2010
Posted by thegulfblog.com in Al-Jazeera, American ME Relations, Media in the ME.Tags: Fox News, Fox News Middle East, New arab TV news channel, New Middle East TV channel, New Murdoch TV channel
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Rupert Murdoch, the owner of the ‘fair and balanced’ [sic] news channel Fox News is to open a Middle East station in conjunction with Saudi’s Prince Alwaleed bin Talal.
Fox News, famous for its uncomplicated, gun-ho and pro-Israel stance whilst maintaining a mocking notion of neutrality, does not seem like a likely partner. Their coverage of Middle Eastern issues is far from renowned or competent. Expect flashy, glitzy sets; female Lebanese anchors [probably the ones that left Al Jazeera last month] wearing an inch of makeup and simple coverage of complicated issues.
Their main competition is Al Jazeera and Al Arabiyya.
The former was started in the mid-1990s by Qatar to – essentially – promote themselves. It was a revelation in the region: it discussed sensitive issues in an open and candid manner never seen before in the Arab world. This garnered Al Jazeera and Qatar enemies throughout the region who believed that Al Jazeera was acting as a provocative mouth-piece of Qatar’s Foreign Ministry. Saudi and Bahrain in particular felt that Al Jazeera ‘picked on’ them significantly in the early years. The Saudi Ambassador returned to Doha in 2008 after a 4 year Al Jazeera inspired absence and since then Al Jazeera’s coverage has calmed. Only last month Bahrain banned Al Jazeera from Manama after, it is believed, unfavourable coverage of poverty in the country. Egypt is also perpetually angered by Al Jazeera.
The latter was begun by Saudi Arabia as an alternative to Al Jazeera. Despite looking similar in a modern, Western, professional, CNN style, its coverage is far less controversial and really quite tame.
The Gulf blog 
“Fox News, famous for its uncomplicated, gun-ho and pro-Israel stance whilst maintaining a mocking notion of neutrality, does not seem like a likely partner.”
replace pro-israel with anti-israel and you can say the same things if not worse about Al Jazeera and many others.
I didn’t see you complaining about them.
Interesting parallel but it doesn’t fit. Al Jazeera was the first Arab TV channel, for example, to have Israeli spokespeople on it.
Describing a news outfit as like Fox News is a serious charge, which Al Jazeera, for all its faults, does not merit.
And what do you EXPECT but distortion of the truth from some scumbag who would stand up for False Noize Nutwurkz, david?
What are the going to do?
Attempt to convince all those Muslims that they are the root of all evil in the world and responsible for all of Israels atrocities on the Palestinian people while Christianity is their savior an No One Can come before The Father(Allah)without First going through HIS Son Jesus(Mohammed) like they have convinced the ignorant that watch them in America?
[…] neutrality, does not seem like a likely partner” for the Middle Eastern news network, writes David Roberts at the Gulf Blog. “Their coverage of Middle Eastern issues is far from renowned or […]