Has Al-Jazeera become the "loyal opposition?"

I used to be Al-Jazeera's number one fan.  I felt like it stood for the colonized instead of the colonizers, that it was representing the majority of the people in Africa, Asia, Latin America, and especially the Middle East that were staring down the barrel of Western imperialism.  There were times when I was glued to it during Israel's raids on Gaza, when it showed footage you would never see on any of the other corporate networks, shots of Palestinian flesh being melted to bone from the white phosphorus dropped by the Israeli military. 

In Powers and El-Nawawy's article "Al-Jazeera English and Global News Networks: Clash of Civilizations or Cross-Cultural dialogue?' the authors show the results of a study in which many of the viewers polled also felt the same way about the network.  Had I read this in 2009 when the study was released I would have probably shared their same sentiments. 

But, over the last year I've noticed a shift in Al-Jazeera's coverage that has left a bad taste in my mouth, to the point where I've pretty much stopped viewing it all together.

The network has thrown any kind of objectivity it once had out the window when it comes to the so-called "Arab Spring."  It has become a cheerleader for the so-called "revolutionaries" in Egypt, Libya, and Syria  when the goals of these protesters happen to dovetail nicely with American plans for regime change in the region.  But when movements begin to threaten friends of Qatar-such as we've seen in Bahrain, Yemen, and Saudi Arabia-the network coughs, shuffles its feet, and mumbles a few words. 

The "Arab Spring" is not a spontaneous, grassroots uprising of frustrated youth looking for greater freedom and democracy.  It's the continuation of the neo-liberal agenda to reshape the Middle East that was laid out years ahead of time.  It's the use of Facebook warriors to implement regime change.  And when that doesn't work, as in the case of Libya, it's a good excuse to sell weapons and military contracts in the name of "protecting civilians," even while NATO is slaughtering them at the same time.

Al-Jazeera has gone completely over to the dark side.  As soon as Hilary Clinton declared it to be "real news" back in March I knew they had made some kind of deal that compromised their former integrity.  The goal of journalism should be to hold people in power, and any news organization that is getting praise heaped on it by the State Department, which formerly regarded Al-Jazeera as an enemy, should be suspect. 

Al-Jazeera has become the "loyal opposition."  These days, while pretending to represent a challenge to imperialism, it ends up supporting it.  This became even more clear to me last summer when it created a Wikileaks-style whisteblower site.  
(http://news.softpedia.com/news/WSJ-and-Al-Jazeera-Reserve-the-Right-to-Sell-Out-Whistleblowers-204935.shtml) Only, on their version you aren't allowed to leak material unless you've obtained it legally, and they don't guarantee the whistleblower the right to confidentiality and anonymity.  This is exactly the kind of thing the loyal opposition would do-pretending to reach out to those wanting to expose corruption while, at the same time, reserving the right to hand them over to the authorities like Bradly Manning.  You can't have it both ways, Al-Jazeera.

Nowhere, however, has their reporting fallen more flat than when it comes to the U.S. orchestrated invasion of Libya and the overthrow of the Gadhafi government.  Since Al-Jazeera is owned by the Emir of Qatar, and Qatar has provided troops for the Libyan invasion (as well as funding for anti-Gadhafi media) it is impossible to take their claim of unbiased coverage seriously.  They have cheered on the CIA-backed rebels from the very start.  Any rumor that the insurgents wanted to spread, whether it was Gadhafi's Viagra-fueled troops, his planned masscres of civilians, or his use of African mercenaries, was quickly picked up and spread by Al-Jazeera, even though there is no evidence to back any of these rumors.  News anchors would take cell phone calls from anonymous "protesters" and play their unverified claims live over the air.

At the same time, it showed a complete lack of interest in covering any of the many civilian casualties caused by NATO.  NATO bombed many civilian targets, such as the Al-Fatah University, and the Great Man-Made river irrigation project.  There have been many reports that coalition forces are using depleted uranium munitions which will leave radiation in the soil for thousands of years. 

At least one former Al-Jazeera journalist, Ghassan bin Jeddo, agrees with me.  He resigned from the network last summer, saying publicly that "Al-Jazeera has abandoned professionalism and objectivity, turning from a media source into an operation room that incites and mobilizes."  Now that we have the head of Al-Jazeera, Wadah Khanfa, resigning in September and being replaced by a member of the Qatari royal family, we can only expect their future coverage to fit even more smoothly into the plans laid out by the U.S., Qatar, and it's gang of dictator friends in the gulf.