It is undeniable that Al-Jazeera has a strong pro-Palestinian tilt. But tilt is relative. An Arab network that didn't advocate for the Palestinians would be taken about as seriously as -- well, as Al Hurra, the region's widely ridiculed American propaganda channel.

Hugh Miles, a British journalist and fluent Arabic speaker, has followed the network closely for several years; he recently published a pro-Jazeera book, "Al Jazeera: The Inside Story of the Arab News Channel That Is Challenging the West." Lately, Miles has noticed that the network is increasingly using the terminology, like "suicide bomber," favored by its American and British counterparts. This has led some Arabs to label Al-Jazeera a tool of the CIA, which the U.S. intelligence community surely gets a kick out of. The station's Western critics also contend that it fosters conspiracy theories. Miles says Al-Jazeera has aired the popular theory that Israel staged 9/11 -- but emphasizes that the theory hasn't been promoted by its journalists. Rather, Miles says, the debates on popular programs like "The Opposite Direction" (modeled on "Crossfire") serve to debunk such rumors.

What really pisses people off, say Al-Jazeera's boosters, is that it covers news that governments would rather cover up: bomb-mangled bodies in Iraq and Afghanistan, Palestinian homes being bulldozed, Arab government corruption, and so on. And Al-Jazeera, like other Arab news media, pursued allegations of torture by U.S. forces more aggressively than American outlets, which didn't give such stories much play until "60 Minutes II" and the New Yorker ran the infamous pictures from Abu Ghraib.

By some measures, its supporters say, Al-Jazeera offers coverage that's more balanced than U.S. networks. A recent American University survey of correspondents in Iraq found that they felt news was often scrubbed of the horrors they witnessed on the ground. Reporters complained of pressure to self-censor, and of unrealistic demands to produce "good news." A typical anonymous comment: "I think we sanitized the images too much so that people do not see the reality of war."

Incidentally, Al-Jazeera has been banned from Baghdad by the U.S.-appointed governing council. During the invasion, its bureau there was hit by the U.S. military; the resulting death of Baghdad correspondent Tareq Ayoob, chronicled in the documentary "Control Room," has never been explained to the satisfaction of Al-Jazeera staffers, who feel the attack was deliberate. U.S. military spokespeople have no patience for such theories; they maintain that the attack was an unfortunate accident. But it's understandable why Al-Jazeera employees might feel as though they're running around with targets on their backs. The Baghdad bureau had supplied the U.S. military with its coordinates before it was hit with a missile. (During the first stage of the Afghan war, the Kabul bureau also took fire.) Miles says that when Al-Jazeera reporters embedded with American forces in Iraq, they "were told by the Marines that they were the enemy."

Al-Jazeera is at least on better terms with the U.S. than Al Manar, the television organ of Hezbollah. Not that they're comparable, exactly; where Al-Jazeera has adopted Western models of balance (what it calls "the opinion and the other opinion"), Al Manar exists specifically to promote Hezbollah's goals. In September 2001, Al Manar was the source of a story that 4,000 Jews didn't show up for work on 9/11, and, in November 2004, it notoriously broadcast the theory of an "expert" who held that Zionists were spreading AIDS among Arabs. Last year the U.S. State Department added Al Manar to one of its "terrorist" lists, prompting its American distributor to toss the channel faster than a ticking parcel. (Responding to the State Department slap, the moderator of Al Manar's "What Is Next" talk show didn't address any complaints about his employer. Instead, he opened his program with a litany of American atrocities beginning with the annihilation of "the Red Indians" and running through slavery, the bombing of Cambodia, imperialism in Africa, and depleted uranium munitions.)

In contrast, executives of Al-Jazeera's English service had private sessions last month with members of Congress and federal officials -- including State Department spokesman Richard Boucher, who, not long ago, was complaining about the network's pattern of "false and inflammatory reporting." Miles thinks State and the CIA are slowly softening their position on the channel. But, he says, the neocons still believe the network is the voice of terror. "They're misguided, and struggling to understand why America is so unpopular in the region. Rather than examine their policies, they prefer to blame Al-Jazeera," Miles said.

One can only pass the buck so long, though, until the buck gets tossed back in one's lap. An English-language Al-Jazeera, based in and advocating for the Third World, could threaten the Bush administration's siege strategy in its war with the press. (American newspapers may be getting feistier, but the administration can still count on almost uniformly tame television coverage.) At the very least, it may soon be one more voice on the dial, which Americans can trust, boycott or ignore at their pleasure, and which Dick Cheney may have to flip past while he's tuning in to "Special Report With Brit Hume."

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