Its annual budget was estimated at $25 million at the time.Įxpansion Al Jazeera English
Employment had more than tripled in one year to 500 employees, and the agency had bureaux at a dozen sites as far as EU and Russia. 1 January 1999 was Al Jazeera's first day of 24-hour broadcasting.
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It was broadcast to the immediate neighborhood as a terrestrial signal, and on cable, as well as through satellites (which was also free to users in the Arab world). It offered 6-hours of programming per day this would increase to 12 hours by the end of 1997. 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.Īl Jazeera's first day on the air was 1 November 1996. The BBC channel had closed after a year and a half when the Saudi government attempted to thwart a documentary pertaining to executions under sharia law. This was following the closure of the first BBC Arabic language television station, then a joint venture with Orbit Communications Company, owned by Saudi King Fahd's cousin, Khalid bin Faisal Al Saud. The original Al Jazeera Satellite Channel (then called JSC or Jazeera Satellite Channel) was launched on 1 November 1996.
In June 2017, the Saudi, Emirati, Bahraini, and Egyptian governments, supported by 12 other OIC member governments (with initial rumours claiming the support of additional governments later reduced to 9 member governments by the latest of August 2019), pressed for the closure of the entire conglomerate as one of thirteen demands made to the government of Qatar during the Qatar diplomatic crisis. The network's news operation currently has 70 bureaus around the world that are shared between the network's channels and operations, the second-largest amount of bureaux of any media company in the world after the BBC.
Al Jazeera has aired videos and audio recordings of Osama bin Laden. Under this organisational structure, it receives funding from the State of Qatar and according to media scholar Tine Ustad Figenschou, while both Al Jazeera and Qatari officials stress that the network is politically and editorially independent, this independence is "relative and conditional." The network is sometimes perceived to have mainly Islamist perspectives, promoting the Muslim Brotherhood, and having a pro- Sunni and an anti- Shia bias in its reporting of regional issues. The organisation is a " private foundation for public benefit" under Qatari law. The acting director general is Mostefa Souag. The chairman is Sheikh Hamad bin Thamer Al Thani.
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Initially launched as an Arabic news and current affairs satellite TV channel, it has since expanded into a network with several outlets, including the internet and specialty television channels in multiple languages and beyond. It is the parent company of International Arabic news channel Al Jazeera and other similarly branded factual media operations. 'The Peninsula', referring to the Qatar Peninsula) is a Qatari international public media conglomerate headquartered at Qatar Radio and Television Corporation Complex in Wadi Al Sail, Doha.
Al Jazeera Media Network ( AJMN) (Arabic: الجزيرة, romanized: al-jazīrah, IPA: lit.