As we've all been told by the right-wing noise-machine,
Al Jazeera is nothing more than a propapaganda tool for Bin Laden, al Zarqawi, and the rest of their mean and nasty terrorists.
BULLSHIT!
And most of you probably know as much. Founded in 1996, al Jazeera is an independent news service - the only one of its kind in the Arab world. So while perusing my favorite progressive websites this evening, I came across a few good articles I thought deserved a bit of attention.
Here are a few tidbits from a Guardian article by Wadah Khanfar, the director general of al-Jazeera:
It (al-Jazeera) was rumored to have been set up by Isreal's Mossad intelligence agency with the purpose of improving Isreal's standing in the Arab world. It has also been accused of being a CIA mouthpiece designed to disseminate western culture among the Arabs.
...it has been condemned by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi and bitterly criticized by Donald Rumsfeld.
It was seen as the single most important force for reform and democracy across the Arab region.
It has been accused by the US of inciting violence through the broadcast of al-Qaida tapes and of playing footage of beheadings. Our viewers know that no beheadings whatsoever were shown on our screens.
So the next time some Hannity worshipper proclaims that al-Jazeera shows beheadings, call him(neuter) on his bullshit.
The Nation has this fine piece by Jeremy Scahill.
On April 9 Washington demanded that Al Jazeera leave the city (Falluja) as a condition for a cease-fire. The network refused. Mansour wrote that the next day "American fighter jets fired around our new location, and they bombed the house where we had spent the night before, causing the death of the house owner Mr. Hussein Samir.
With the Pentagon paying to plant propaganda news stories, and the limited access of our corperate in-bed embedded reporters, it's nice to have a news service that reports the genuine situation on the ground in occupied Iraq.