Why Al Arabiya is so boring!

Whenever I watched the BBC Arabic, they would forever and anon turn to Dr. Edmund Ghareib when discussing political issues in the Middle East. Dr. Edmun Ghareib is an analyst based out of Washington DC, but he is originally Arab.

Yesterday, I was watching Al Arabiya, and who do they suddenly announce but Dr. Edmund Ghareib himself! They do the exact same thing as the BBC Arabic: he shows up via a live video connection, with the Washington Monument in the background over his shoulder.

Turns out he is a very busy man, because I was watching Al Arabiya with someone else, and she said that Dr. Edmund is forever showing up on Al Jazeera, too. So he is apparently not picky, he likes to be on all the news channels, and they all love him.

However, I think they do themselves a disservice. Whenever he comes on the air, I can't help but tune him out. I think he's kind of dull. Then again, I can never really catch what he's saying.

I learned some more things about Al Arabiya: during the coup in Egypt, they took the side of the Egyptian army. A lady who watched the coverage at the time told me that Al Arabiya actually didn't even present the side of the Muslim Brotherhood and Mursi.

Well, they are doing the same thing now with Iraq. Al Arabiya takes the side of the Sunnis in Iraq. All the time I've been watching Al Arabiya these days, I've never seen them interview anyone who represents the side of Al Maliki's Shia government.

For example, yesterday evening's program featured two guests: one was Dr. Edmund, an independent analyst, and the other was an Iranian guy, who lives in Britain and despite the fact that he is Iranian really doesn't like Al Maliki. They ought to have had a third guest, someone who took the opposite view of the Iranian. That is what the BBC Arabic always does: they have an independent person, and then they'll have two or even three other people who represent various opposing points of view. And honestly, that makes it more interesting, because everyone starts fighting! But at least they're just fighting with words.

Al Arabiya really should think about this, because their little conversation yesterday with Dr. Edmund and the Iranian guy was quite simply boring.

As for Al Jazeera, I've not been watching them; but I've just heard that although they sided with the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood and Mursi during the coup, they did at least present the side of the Egyptian army.

Lyse Doucet and Iran

(March 10, 2014)

Lyse Doucet is a BBC reporter. I have liked her since I saw her reports in 2012 from Syria. She's really good! She belongs to the regular English BBC, and all her reports are in English.

Any case, she had a report about the visit of a European official to Iran, and the BBC Arabic dubbed the report into Arabic and broadcast it. So that is how Lyse Doucet ended up on the BBC Arabic:

This is the European official who was visiting. Her name is Catherine Ashton. If you have two daughters, you can name them Lyse and Catherine. That is a nice combination.

And here is Ms. Doucet asking a question at a press conference:

Distinguished Muslim Woman Contest

There was an interview with a young Iranian woman who traveled to Indonesia recently for the 'Distinguished Muslim Woman' contest.

Her name is Masooma.
This pageant was an Islamic-themed rival to the Ms. World beauty contest, which was also held in Indonesia this year. 

 Here's some of the other contestants:

 Here's the audience:

 And this was the Nigerian contestant upon learning she had won, fallen to the ground!

Masooma said she was happy for the Nigerian contestant, who is a beautiful person inside and out, and deserved to win!

She did pretty well herself; she was one of the 100 finalists out of the 550 entrants. She said they were judged based on their accomplishments, opinion of the hijab, and knowledge of the Quran. She said the point was to show that a hijab does not stop a Muslim girl from accomplishing anything and achieving much.

Since the contestants came from all over the world, I think they actually conducted the pageant in English. That's what it seemed like from the clips they showed, and Masooma kept lapsing into English when speaking, as though she was used to rehearsing answers in that language.

The interviewer told her: that's all very nice, but did you know that some people criticized the whole function as unIslamic?

I think the Iranian lady basically rolled her eyes at that point and said: we were all wearing hijabs, the whole thing was Islamic. I don't know why people would call it unIslamic.

Then the interviewer said: I know people watching are thinking, you speak very good Arabic.
Masooma said: oh, I hope so!
The interviewer: Indeed you do. Where did you learn it?
She said: in Iran, we learn Arabic in school, but only in so far as to read the Quran. Then I lived in Dubai for two years, but my social circle consisted of only other Iranians, so I did not improve my Arabic a lot. When I returned to Iran, I started listening to Arabic music and watching Arabic TV, and that was how I learned.

She added one more thought at the end that made the interviewer smile cheesily:

 

"I wanted to say to anyone learning Arabic today that I think Arabic is a very beautiful language. I love Arabic, whatever the accent: the Lebanese accent, the Egyptian accent, the Gulf accent, and foreign accents. And I hope Inshallah one day that all of us will be brothers and sisters to each other!