Satelliet-tv en de Arabische hervormingen

Hans Schippers deals with the rise of satellite television stations in the Middle East. In 1985, the first Arab satellite, Arabsat, was launched, followed by stations in many Middle Eastern countries, such as Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, Syria and Tunisia. In November 1996, the launch of Al Jazeera marked a true revolution in the Arabic media world. Al Jazeera started to broadcast news and discussion programmes, thereby enjoying a remarkable level of editorial freedom. The author analyses Al Jazeera's news reporting during the last decade on many important topics in the Middle East and the conflicts this entailed with the authorities of nearly all Arab countries, in order to assess how independent this Arab language television station really is