Al Jazeera is one of the leading broadcast news outlets in the Arab world. Its Arabic name literally means “the island,” but it refers to the Arabian Peninsula, historically viewed by inhabitants as an island surrounded by the Persian Gulf, Arabian, and Red Seas, and connected to Southwest Asia only by vast deserts. Qatar itself is an extension of the Arabian Peninsula into the Persian Gulf, essentially an island in itself. By taking the name of the larger area, Al Jazeera seeks to represent the larger area containing Saudi Arabia with the two most revered Muslim sites—Mecca and Medina—as well as Yemen, Oman, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, and Kuwait. After detailing the development of Al Jazeera, this entry will discuss the network’s approach to ...