Al-Jazeera

Launch

Al Jazeera Satellite Channel was launched on 1 November 1996 following the closure of the BBC's Arabic language television station, a joint venture with Orbit Communications Company, owned by Saudi King Fahd's cousin, Khalid bin Faisal Al Saud. It had fallen apart after a year and a half when the Saudi government attempted to kill a documentary on executions under sharia law.

The Emir of Qatar, Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa, provided a loan of QAR 500 million ($137 million) to sustain Al Jazeera through its first five years, as Hugh Miles detailed in his book Al Jazeera The Inside Story of the Arab News Channel That Is Challenging the West. Shares were held by private investors as well as the Qatar government.

Prior to Al Jazeera, even before he deposed his father the previous year, the Emir had been contemplating a satellite channel. A free press complemented his vision of the emirate as a center of commercial development and progress.

Sheikh Hamad bin Thamir Al Thani, previously Qatar's Deputy Minister of Information, was chairman of the enterprise, although Al Jazeera maintained editorial independence. It was hoped the channel would break even in five years through sales of advertising, news feeds and programs, as well as equipment rental. Much of the staff came from the 250 journalists displaced by the closure of BBC Arabic.

Al Jazeera's first day on the air was 1 November 1996. It offered 6-hours of programming per day; this would increase to 12-hours by the end of 1997. It was broadcast to the immediate neighborhood as a terrestrial signal, on cable, as well as through satellites (which was also free to users in the Arab world). Ironically Qatar, like many other Arab countries, barred private individuals from having satellite dishes until 2001.

At the time of Al Jazeera's launch, Arabsat was the only satellite broadcasting to the Middle East, and for the first year could only offer Al Jazeera a weak Ku-band transponder that needed a large satellite dish for reception. A more powerful C-band transponder became available after its user, Canal France International, accidentally beamed 30 minutes of pornography into ultraconservative Saudi Arabia.

Al Jazeera was not the first such broadcaster in the Middle East; a number had appeared since the Arabsat satellite, a Saudi Arabia-based venture of 21 Arab governments, took orbit in 1985. The unfolding of Operation Desert Storm on CNN International underscored the power of live television in current events. While other local broadcasters in the region would assiduously avoid material embarrassing to their home governments (Qatar had its own official TV station as well), Al Jazeera was pitched as an impartial news source and platform for discussing issues relating to the Arab world.

In presenting "The opinion and the other opinion" to which the Arabic script in the network's logo refers, it did not take long for Al Jazeera to shock local viewers by presenting the Israeli speaking Hebrew on Arab TV for the first time. Lively and far-ranging talk shows, particularly a popular, confrontational one called The Opposite Direction, were a constant source of controversy regarding issues of morality and religion. This prompted a torrent of criticism from the conservative voices among the region's press. It also led to official complaints and censures from neighboring governments. Some jammed Al Jazeera's terrestrial broadcast or booted its correspondents. In 1999, the Algerian government reportedly cut power to several major cities to censor one broadcast. There were also commercial repercussions; Saudi Arabia reportedly pressured advertisers to avoid the channel, to great effect. Al Jazeera was also becoming a favorite sounding board for militant groups such as Hamas and Chechen separatists.

Al Jazeera was the only international news network to have correspondents in Iraq during the Operation Desert Fox bombing campaign in 1998. In a precursor of a pattern to follow, its exclusive video clips were highly prized by Western media.