At this very moment, Al Arabiya's special in-depth news channel, called Al Hadeth, is broadcasting live a session from the Security Council at the UN.
First, the Secretary-General spoke. That was translated into Arabic directly as he was talking, so that we heard the interpreter speaking and not the Secretary-General.
Then, a representative from Palestine spoke. This is the part where airing things live from the Security Council maybe does not make for good TV, because that Palestinian man spent a long time congratulation the new Security Council president for his recent election before he got to the point.
Then he started talking about all the Palestinians killed in recent Israeli rocket attacks, laying emphasis on the dead women and children. He used words like massacre, and asked how is it that Israel considers its army to be the most well-behaved in the region, and how is it that Israel considers itself to be the sole democracy in the Middle East (or something like that.) The Palestinian man was speaking in English! So even though his best language is probably Arabic, we still didn't listen to him, but rather to the interpreter.
And the Palestinian man also started out by profusely thanking the UN Secretary-General for his various calls, and for his response to the Palestinian appeals for help.
Then I wandered away, and when I came back, guess what Al Arabiya was showing? They were still at the UN, still at the Security Council, and this time they were live broadcasting the speech of the Israeli representative, again with the interpreter. So, contrary to my previous assessments, sometimes Al Arabiya does show all sides. I would have assumed that as soon as the Israeli started speaking, they would have called it a day and returned to their studio in Dubai.
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