This book examines the deeper meaning of the advent of the Al Jazeera Media Network with regard to ongoing debates on global communication ethics, not only in the global public sphere but also in terms of its influence on new non-Western approaches to media ethics. Rather than simply calling for international perspectives on media ethic is a unique and significant addition to the literature on the topic. The book investigates whether Al Jazeera’s vision, mission, and operations are actually inspired by the New World Information Order debates over contra-flow and hegemony. Further, the book identifies ways of developing new non-Western approaches to global communication ethics, as it suggests injecting more cosmopolitanism in global news reporting and commentary.

Few phenomena in the Arab world are more controversial than Al Jazeera - the satellite television news channel that, despite its brief history, has made its impact known throughout the world and changed the face of a formerly parochial Arab media.This timely collection of articles, many by Arabic-speaking scholars, gives us more information and analysis of the network - and how it has affected the public and even the foreign policies of Western governments - than any other of the very few books published in English up to now.The book provides rare insights into Al Jazeera's politics, its agenda, its programs, its coverage of regional crises, and its treatment of the West. The authors attempt to gauge the station's impact on ordinary Arab viewers, understand its effect on an increasingly visible Arab public sphere, and map out the role it plays in regional Arab politics. The image of Al Jazeera that emerges from this book is much more complex than its depiction in American media. It reveals the powerful role that the network plays in shaping ideas and reconstructing Arab identities during a crucial juncture in Middle Eastern history and politics.

Al-Jazeera, the independent, all-Arab television news network based in Qatar, emerged as ambassador to the Arab world in the events following September 11, 2001. Arabic for "the peninsula," Al-Jazeera has "scooped" the western media conglomerates many times. With its exclusive access to Osama Bin Laden and members of the Taliban, its reputation has been burnishing quickly through its exposure on CNN, even as it strives to maintain its independence as an international free press news network. Al-Jazeera sheds light on the background of the network: how it operates, the programs it broadcasts, its effects on Arab viewers, the reactions of the West and Arab states, the implications for the future of news broadcasting in the Middle East, and its struggle for a free press and public opinion in the Arab world.

Instant Nationalism: McArabism, al-Jazeera, and Transnational Media in the Arab World discusses the role of Arab transnational media, in particular the Qatar-based al-Jazeera, in the emergence of a new pan-Arabism. The book argues that through context and technology a new pan-Arab identity known as McArabism is being formed. McArabism, the author suggests, represents the convergence of local tribal identities with globalization and the forming, or reforming, of a new regional Arab identity. This book also explores the impact of this new identity on Arab society, the Arab-Israeli conflict, and new representations of the West and the Islamic and Arab World.

With more than fifty million viewers, Al Jazeera is one of the most widely watched news channels in the world. It's also one of the most controversial. Set up by the eccentric Emir of Qatar, who turned a failed BBC Arabic television project into an Arab news channel, Al Jazeera quickly became a household name after September 11th by delivering some of the biggest scoops in television history, including airing a taped speech from Osama bin Laden. Lambasted as a mouthpiece for Al Qaeda, little is actually known about Al Jazeera and its operations. Financed by one of the weathiest countries in the world, Al Jazeera quickly established itself as the premiere news channel in the Islamic world by covering events Arabs cared about in a way they had never seen before. However, accusations of ties to Al Qaeda continue to plague it. Their journalists have been accused of spying for everyone from Mossad to Saddam Hussein, sometimes simultaneously. This the story behind the Arab news channel that makes the news.

Al Jazeera is one of the most widely watched news channels in the world--and one of the most controversial. A noted journalist speculates on the potentially dramatic effects of the network's new station on the Western world while uncovering the true story behind one of the most influential media outlets.

"Ever since its launch over a decade ago, Al-Jazeera has influenced broadcast journalism globally and transformed the Arab television news sphere. Its coverage of wars and conflicts in the region has earned the pan-Arabic news network many admirers and a few powerful adversaries, as Tal Samuel-Azran's book ably demonstrates. This is an empirically strong contribution to the literature on the politics of global news."---Daya Thussu, Professor of International Communication, University of Westminster, London --Book Jacket.