Dont mean to sound like a stuck record but I guess Al Jaz is everywhere! Last week I chanced upon a documentary called "Control Room", by Jehane Noujaim. It was made about 3 years ago, during the Iraq war. Jehane basically struck on a simple albeit brilliant idea.
She decided to cover those who covered the war. She covered the behind the scenes of "Cent Comm" or Central Command which is the US's middle east head-quarters and also the media headquarters for the US military. As is evident, it was a media circus where the jokers, acrobats and Lion -tamers were all in the act.

Jehane followed Al Jazeera's correspondents in Baghdad as well as their Doha operations. The documentary was drawing comparisons between the war's coverage by the American and British media and the Arab media's new face, Al Jazeera.
The documentary showcased quite brilliantly how no modern day war can be fought sans media propaganda. It went to to raise various questions for journalism as a profession, like news management, spinning of stories, major cover-ups by the powers that be and most importantly, how truth is the first casualty of war.
It also made me realise that the school of thought that affirmed objectivity as a basic tenet of journalism, is quite endangered in this era of the profession. And more so in the context of war reporting. Just like everything else, there are 2 sides in a war. If a media organisation happens to originate from one side, their target audience automatically plays a decisive role in its editorial policies and content. Playing to public sentiment of the target audience during time of war ensures higher TRPs than confirming to the "so-called" foundation of journalism- pure dissemination of information or objective reporting.

Journalism, unfortunately is a part of a larger scheme of things and cannot survive without the shenanigans of the media industry. It ultimately boils down to the economics of entertainment. While FOX, SKY, CNN played to American patriotism, Al Jazeera catered to the Pro- Arab pro-muslim sentiments, of which Anti- Americanism is an integral part.