Al Jazeera: NOT pro-Arab, just anti-US.

Al Jazeera is reporting 1.5 million pro-Syrian protesters in Lebanon today. The rest of the world is saying between 50,000 toseveral hundred thousand.

Interesting, especially when you consider there are only 3.7 million Lebenese total. Figure about 2.5 million adults, and Al Jazeera is claiming that 60% of the entire adult population was in the street today. A Tuesday. I know the unemployment rate is high in Lebanon, but 60%?

So the question is: why would Al Jazeera buy such an absurd claim? The Lebanese claim Arab ancestry (by and large), so it isn't yet another case of mindless belief of all Arabs, as is AJ's general M.O.

This seems to me to be the truth behind Al Jazeera's mission: whatever the U.S. is for, we are against. This is the appeal and marketing posture of AJ to the Arab world. The Arab world can always count on AJ to take the other point of view, no matter how silly that POV is.

Bush is for it so AJ is against it. They sacrifice the interest of some Arabs, so long as thier own Sunni pan-Arabist (Baathists) are shown in heroic light.