Profile
QATAR, ITS EMIR AND AL JAZEERA
"You are listening to Al Jazerra, broadcasting from Qatar”. This sentence, repeated every hour on an old TV Set, has spread to the whole Arab world from Tangier to Baghdad. But street humour has quickly changed it to “Here Qatar, broadcasted by Al Jazerra!” This inversion illustrates the enigmatic relation that unites the Arabic equivalent of CNN, with the country hosting it. By diffusing live the first aerial strikes on Kabul, Al Jazeera did not know its renown would spread beyond the frontiers it then had. And when Osama Ben Laden, the most wanted man on earth, chose Al Jazeera to respond to G.W. Bush, the channel ignored it would become a target of the American retaliation...
On November 1st 1996, close to the official Qatari radio and television networks, in cramped premises, a new television channel takes birth. Its name: Al Jazeera, or “the island”. With the strength of a network comprising of correspondents in thirty towns, it suddenly assumes a front stage function when it comes to announcing internationally important news. The freedom of its tone stands out in an Arab world, where the Medias are tightly controlled. In little time, it manages to impose itself on a boring and archaic audiovisual landscape. Its audience grows incessantly. It owes its success to two leading programmes “Opposite Direction” and “More then just an Opinion”, but also to its star presenters, plucked from the Arabic BBC at an enormous price. This latter institution has to shut down due to a disagreement with its Saudi partner. Breaking all taboos, Al Jazeera forges itself an independent reputation by inviting to its political debates Arab dissidents, censured in their own countries.
It is true that on Al Jazeera, one does not get bored. Its set is the scene of real shows where all themes are covered: corruption, democracy, human rights, Arabic unity, Islamism, freedom of expression, etc...As to the information given, it is never censured; both reporters and presenters can say what they want. Ever since its launching, the channel is the scene of many controversies. An Arab channel will never have caused such admiration and yet such rejection simultaneously, even amongst the elite. Cheik Hamad Ben Jassim Al Thani, the Qatari Minister of Foreign Affairs recently admitted that much of his diplomatic work consisted in repairing the “damage” caused by Al Jazeera. Be it just because Al Jazeera’s audacious style frightens Arab powers with a contagious effect that would reduce the room for manoeuvre within their current regimes.
Al Jazeera has without doubt lived its finest moments with Iraq and Afghanistan. Already during the “Desert Fox” operation in December 1998, Saddam Hussein decided to ignore CNN and his own television networks, instead choosing Al Jazeera to address himself to the Arab World. A year later the channel decides to diffuse exclusive talks with Osama Ben Laden. It even airs an official statement written by Ben Laden where he calls on to Pakistanis, to defend Afghanistan against American retaliations. But Al Jazeera has also proved its qualities, when covering the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the ongoing skirmish amongst Iraq and the US, as well as the different crisis in ex Yugoslavia.
What got into Qatar’s Emir, to tread such an ambitious and perilous path? How could he inject 120 Million dollars in a project that might never be profitable? Cheik Hamad Ben Khalifa Al Thani’s Qatar is quite perplexing. How can a country with 600’000 inhabitants, out of which only 120’000 are Qatari, dare lack in respect to such powerful neighbours! The only other Wahhabi country other then Saudi Arabia, after the 1995 Coup d’Etat Qatar wanted to distance itself from the previous Emir’s policies, as well as distinguish itself from Riyadh. The new teams’ first strategy was to lead an offensive diplomacy by multiplying treaties and alliances with Foreign Powers, notably the Unites States. The second strategy was to equip Qatar with a media network capable of giving the country the status it never had. That channel is called Al Jazeera. While being conscious of its own limitations in front of its powerful Saudi neighbour, Qatar has adapted very well to this unfavourable geopolitical situation. It is true that this is not the first time the Emir shines.
Already in 1997 at a time when the peace process in the Middle East was offering serious perspectives, Qatar had organised the 4th Economic Conference for the Middle East and Northern Africa. This conference was boycotted by thirteen of the twenty two Arab League Member States. These countries wanted to signal without doubt their dissension with the direction taken by the new master of Qatar and in passing, protest against the policies of the Israeli government. Beyond the failure of this Conference, the Emir surprised everyone by keeping the Conference on time and inviting the Israeli delegation, risking the wrath of his Arab brothers. But the Arab brothers no longer possess the means to thwart Doha. Indeed, since June 1992, Qatar and the US are united together by a secret defensive agreement. The only thing we know for sure is that Qatar hosts an American military base on its soil that is considered the greatest deposit of military arsenal outside the US. Enough to divert Riyadh form its hegemonic temptations.
Finally, Qatar has just written its name down in the history of trade negotiations. After the failure of the WTO Conference in Seattle, a new cycle of trade negotiations was launched in Doha on November 13th 2001. From an economic point of view, the Emir can flatter himself of having taken a brilliant course. When in 1996 he became indebted by investing 25 billion dollars in the exploitation of gas layers, many observers were sceptic as to the feasibility of the project. Today, the first results announce a great future for this country and its GDP is constantly growing.
But the Emir doesn’t want to leave things there. He wants to associate his people to power, to implicate them in the decision making process. In March 1999 he convokes his fellow-citizens to the first free municipal elections where women participate for the first time. Later in May of the same year, the members of the Chamber of Commerce are elected, a rare feat for a country of the Gulf. A “democracie hors sol” takes birth in Qatar. Another victory: the settlement of the ongoing territorial disagreement opposing Qatar with its neighbour, Bahrain, and which had nearly broken into an armed conflict in 1986. This sixty year old conflict was settled with a ruling by The Hague International Court of Justice, well accepted by both countries and unanimously praised in the region. When the verdict was announced, Bahrain’s Emir Hamad Ben Issa Al Khalifa spoke of “historical victory” and of “glorious day”. He also added “Bahrain’s firmness as well as its attachment to its rights have led to this fair result”. Less triumphant, his Qatari counterpart congratulated himself on the end of the conflict while admitting that the refusal of his country’s claims on the Hawar islands was “not easy” to accept. He assured that despite the sorrow his fellow-citizens felt, the decision of the Court was in the nature of “reinforcing security and stability in the countries of the Gulf as well as consolidating the Gulf Cooperation Council”. The Emir has just launched the English version of Al Jazeera and covered the closure of the Asian Games with brilliance. His diplomacy has distinguished itself in the conflict opposing Yemen with the followers of Iman al Houthi, and in the Bulgarian nurse crisis.
The Emir is determined to bring his country out of anonymity and he has risen to the task perfectly well. But today another challenge awaits : how to maintain himself in the Arena of the Great?
Published in Politique Internationale, updated by Hasni Abidi ,Director of Cermam
translated by Ines Ward, research assistant trainee at CERMAM
Permanent link to this entry (permalink)
- Origin CERMAM
- http://www.cermam.org/en/logs/portrait/qatar_its_emir_and_al_jazeera/
- Publié le 10 September 2007