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Al Jazeera was established in the Arab state of Qatar and the first
transmission was in November 1996. Since its inception it has stuck
to its motto, "Al Ra'e wa al ra'e el akhar", which literally means
"the opinion and the other opinion". Many news services claim that
they offer a balanced view, but arguably the majority offers news
through a certain prism, which eventually precludes other points of
views. John Pilger once said " It is not enough for journalists to
see themselves as mere messengers without understanding the hidden
agendas of the message and the myths that surround it". Al Jazeera
has taken it upon itself to always present all points of views and
dig deeper into the issues.
Never in the History of Arab media did a foreign official figure
appear on TV and spoke to the public in Arabic and expressed his
opinion freely in front of an audience of well over 40 million
Arabs. Never in the history of Arab media did an Israeli minister
appear live on the screen to answer questions and give opinions.
Those are only tiny examples. More has been done, and more to come.
Interestingly, when the Japanese pay TV operator Sky perfect that
boasts close to three million subscribers, asked to have Al Jazeera
on its bouquet of channels their reasoning was that " we wanted a
non-CNN view of the world". |
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