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A Kenny G Holiday

I read last week that Saudi royal celebrity Prince Al-Waleed Bin Talal is delaying the start of his new Arabic television news network (Al-Arab). It was supposed to start broadcasting this year, but has been postponed at least until sometime in 2014. Like that other Saudi semi-official network, Alarabiya, it will be stationed outside the kingdom. Only state television and radio can operate inside Saudi Arabia. Al-Waleed has picked Bahrain to house his new network: news and tear gas go together these days. But don’t expect his network to cover the nearly three years old Bahrain popular uprising that continues just outside its future studios. Al-Waleed also famously owns part of News Corp, which makes him part owner of Fox News and Sarah Palin and the Cheneys. Fox is also the most Islamophobic U.S. network; perhaps Islamo-phobic but apparently not so Wahhabi-phobic.
Saudi princes and their kin and retainers control all the “Saudi” media inside and outside the kingdom. They have also bought and control much of the media in the eastern part of the Arab world, including Lebanon and the Gulf, as well as almost all Arab media that operate from Europe. The controlled media is now like petro-money, their main tool of regional and even international policy.
Saudi daily newspaper Asharq Alawsat, different editions of which are published in Riyadh and London, is often described by Western media and pundits as “pan-Arab” or ‘independent” or “independent pan-Arab”. It is none of the above: it is owned by Saudi Crown Prince Salman Bin Abdulaziz al-Saud, hardly independent or pan-Arab. Saudi daily Al-Hayat, different editions of which are published in Riyadh and London, is also often described in the West as “independent” or “pan-Arab” or both. It also is none of the above: it is owned by former deputy defense minister Prince Khaled Bin Sultan al-Saud, hardly independent or pan-Arab. Alarabiya network is owned and operated (from Dubai) by an in-law of the Saudi royal family.
Ever wonder why you never read about a Saudi journalist being arrested in the kingdom? Unlike most Middle East countries, unlike Egypt and Iran and Iraq and Tunisia where journalists often spend time in prison? That is because of the system of pre-emptive censorship (they call it self-censorship): all media publications are approved before publication. Anything that is not considered kosher or halal by the regime is never printed: that way nobody goes to prison. Not that it is likely that anything controversial will ever be published anyway by the cowed writers and journalists. All local media are owned by the princes, their in-laws, or their retainers and partners among the business elites. They are all basically state-owned and state-controlled media.
That explains why Saudi Arabia often gets better ratings from NGOs like Reporters Without Borders, RSF, than other Middle East countries. You see: nobody is “allowed” to go to prison for what they publish because nobody is allowed to publish anything that might land them in prison. Who said conformity is not always good?

Cheers
mhg