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Middle East Eye

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Middle East Eye (MEE) is a United Kingdom–based media website and channel that primarily focuses on news related to the Middle East, North Africa, and the broader Muslim world. It is reportedly funded by the government of Qatar, though the organization itself denies this.[3]

Middle East Eye (MEE)
TypeOnline
Owner(s)Undisclosed
Editor-in-chiefDavid Hearst[1]
FoundedApril 2014; 10 years ago (April 2014)
Headquarters1 Sussex Place, London, England, United Kingdom[2]
Websitemiddleeasteye.net

Organization

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MEE was launched in London, England, in April 2014. It is not transparent about its ownership. It is formally owned by a company called M.E.E. Limited with a single director named Jamal Bessasso, who is not specified as the owner.[4] Its editor-in-chief is David Hearst, a former foreign lead writer for The Guardian.[1] It employs about 20 full-time staff in London as of 2017.[5]

According to its critics, MEE began forming in London in 2013, as the Islamist influence of the Qatari state-funded Al Jazeera Media Network began to wane; several Al Jazeera journalists subsequently joined the project.[6][7][8][9] Jonathan Powell, a senior executive at Al Jazeera, was a consultant ahead of its launch and registered the website's domain names. Bassasso, a Kuwait-born Palestinian living in London, who lists his nationality as Dutch at Companies House, was the sole director of MEE's parent company M.E.E. Limited, as well as company secretary for a few weeks in 2018. Bassasso was also a former director for the Hamas-controlled Al-Quds TV, which halted its operations in the Gaza Strip and Lebanon due to financial difficulties in 2019.[10] Bessasso is listed as owning more than 75% of the shares and voting rights and has the right to appoint or remove directors.[11] Hearst has denied that Bessasso is the owner of the news site, but refrained from divulging the real owner's identity.[12][13]

According to American lawyer and policy analyst Ilan Berman and Emirati columnist Sultan Sooud Al-Qassemi, MEE is backed by Qatar.[14][15][16] The governments of Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Egypt, and Bahrain have accused MEE of pro–Muslim Brotherhood bias and of receiving Qatari funding. During the Qatar diplomatic crisis with the Arab League, among the demands made to Qatar were that it halts its funding of Al Jazeera and of MEE and that both organizations be shut down.[5][17] MEE later released a statement denying the accusations and saying that it is an independent organization that does not receive funding from any country or movement.[18]

Coverage

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Middle East Eye covers a range of topics across the Middle East. According to its website, it reports on events in 22 different countries. Content is separated into different categories on its website including news, opinion and essays.[19]

Since the foundation of the media outlet, it has provided exclusives on a number of major events in the Middle East, which have often been picked up by other media outlets globally. In early June 2017, an anonymous hacker group began distributing emails to multiple news outlets that they had hacked from the inbox of Yousef Otaiba, the Emirati ambassador in Washington D.C.[20] This included providing details from leaked emails of Saudi crown prince Mohammed bin Salman and American officials.[21] This revelation on 14 August 2017, led to other media outlets printing other material from the leaked emails.[22][23] According to The New York Times, the hacked emails appeared to benefit Qatar and be the work of hackers working for Qatar, a common subject of the distributed emails.[24]

On 29 July 2016, MEE published a story alleging that the government of the United Arab Emirates, aided by Palestinian exile Mohammed Dahlan, had funnelled significant sums of money to conspirators of the 2016 Turkish coup d'état attempt two weeks earlier.[25] In 2017, Dahlan brought a lawsuit of libel against the MEE in a London court seeking damages of up to £250,000. However, Dahlan abandoned the suit shortly before the case was to begin. In a statement, Dahlan maintained that the story was "fully fabricated" but claimed that he has "achieved his goals in the English courts," and was now planning to sue Facebook in Dublin where the article was "widely published". However, according to MEE and their lawyers, by dropping the claim, Dahlan would be forced to pay all the legal costs, of both parties, estimated to be in excess of £500,000.[26][27]

In November 2019, the Turkish government officially accused Dahlan of involvement in the 2016 Turkish coup d'état attempt and is offering $700,000 for information leading to his capture.[28]

Controversies

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Blocking in Middle Eastern countries

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In 2016, the United Arab Emirates blocked the MEE countrywide. MEE says it contacted the UAE embassy in London for an explanation, but received no response.[29]

Saudi Arabia also blocked the website across the country in May 2017.[citation needed]

Following protests against the President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi in September and October 2019, Egypt also blocked the website.[30]

2017–2018 Qatar diplomatic crisis

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Saudi Arabia accused MEE of being a news outlet funded by Qatar (both directly and indirectly).[31] On 22 June 2017, during the Qatar diplomatic crisis, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Egypt, and Bahrain, as part of a list of 13 demands, demanded that Qatar close Middle East Eye, which they saw as sympathetic to the Muslim Brotherhood and a Qatari-funded and aligned outlet.[31][32][33]

Accusations of Qatari backing

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MEE denies receiving funds from them stating that the demand was an attempt to "extinguish any free voice which dares to question what they are doing."[34] In a statement responding to the demand, the publication's editor-in-chief said "MEE covers the area without fear or favour, and we have carried reports critical of the Qatari authorities, for instance how workers from the subcontinent are treated on building projects for the 2022 World Cup."[35][36]

Commentator Ibrahim Alkhamis, writing for the Saudi Arabian newspaper Arab News, accused the MEE of propagating rumours and fabrications regarding Qatar's state enemies such as Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and Egypt, while simultaneously remaining silent on the misdeeds of Qatar's own members of its royal family, and said that MEE functions as an "extension to Al Jazeera" without being accused of being a state-owned news outlet yet hosting a rotation of columnists and Al Jazeera employees.[9]

2020 cyberattack

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In April 2020, MEE was one of 20 websites targeted by hackers that cybersecurity experts, ESET, have linked to an Israeli surveillance company called Candiru. The website was impacted using a Watering hole attack which serves malicious code to certain visitors allowing the attackers to compromise their PCs.[37]

2022 suspension of Palestinian journalist for pro-Nazi posts

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On 20 October 2022, MEE cut ties with Palestinian journalist Shatha Hammad after it was discovered that she made a Facebook post in 2014 which praised Adolf Hitler for the Holocaust and for "sharing the same ideology". The Thomson Reuters Foundation had withdrawn a 2022 Kurt Schork Award in International Journalism from her, after the discovery on 18 October.[38][39][40][41]

In 2017, the American Enterprise Institute stated that Middle East Eye was the "other covert media arm" of Qatar (after Al Jazeera), and accused it of being pro-Muslim Brotherhood and pro-Hamas.[42]

Notable contributors

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Jamal Khashoggi

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Jamal Khashoggi wrote for MEE prior to joining The Washington Post.[58][59]

According to a post on the MEE website, Khashoggi wrote for them over a period of two years. According to MEE, his op-eds were not credited to him at the time due to concerns for his safety because many of his articles for MEE are critical of Saudi Arabia and its policies, and Saudi Arabia's rift with Qatar.[58] Khashoggi, a Washington Post columnist, was assassinated when he entered the Saudi consulate in Turkey on 2 October 2018. After initial denials, Saudi Arabia stated that he was killed by rogue assassins inside the consulate building with "premeditated intention".[60]

References

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  1. ^ a b "David Hearst". Middle East Eye. Archived from the original on 11 April 2019.
  2. ^ "About – Coverage". Middle Easy Eye. Archived from the original on 11 June 2019.
  3. ^ "Qatar row: Al Jazeera hits back over closure demands". BBC News. 23 June 2017. Retrieved 12 April 2024.
  4. ^ Rubin, Michael (25 July 2017). "Qatar's Other Covert Media Arm". American Enterprise Institute - AEI.
  5. ^ a b Mayhew, Freddy (29 June 2017). "UK-based Middle East news outlet also targeted for closure in Saudi-led demands against Qatar". Press Gazette.
  6. ^ Gregg Carlstrom (24 June 2017), "What's the Problem With Al Jazeera?", The Atlantic
  7. ^ Samuel Tadros (20 August 2015), The Brotherhood Divided, Hudson Institute
  8. ^ James Langton (26 June 2014), "New London connection to Islamists", The National
  9. ^ a b Alkhamis, Ibrahim (2 July 2019). "How Middle East Eye is fake-news central". Arab News.
  10. ^ Langton, James (26 June 2014). "New London connection to Islamists". The National. Archived from the original on 7 July 2014.
  11. ^ "M.E.E LIMITED persons with significant control - Find and update company information - GOV.UK".
  12. ^ Langton, James (26 June 2014). "New London connection to Islamists". The National.
  13. ^ Rubin, Michael (25 July 2017). "Qatar's Other Covert Media Arm". American Enterprise Institute - AEI.
  14. ^ Al Qassemi, Sultan (7 June 2017). "Gulf states have had enough of Qatar's broken promises".
  15. ^ Berman, Ilan (2018). Digital Dictators: Media, Authoritarianism, and America's New Challenge. American Foreign Policy Council. Rowman & Littlefield Publishers. p. 90. ISBN 978-1-5381-1991-4. Archived from the original on 2 April 2022.
  16. ^ James M. Dorsey [in German] (2017). "The Gulf Crisis: Small States Battle it Out". SSRN 3003598.
  17. ^ "Neighbors Hand Qatar Their List of Demands". VOA News. 23 June 2017.
  18. ^ "'An attack on free thought': Middle East Eye responds to Saudi demands". Middle East Eye. 23 June 2017. Archived from the original on 26 May 2022.
  19. ^ "News page". Middle East Eye. Archived from the original on 20 March 2019.
  20. ^ "Someone Is Using These Leaked Emails To Embarrass Washington's Most Powerful Ambassador". HuffPost. 3 June 2017. Archived from the original on 10 February 2019.
  21. ^ "Saudi crown prince wants out of Yemen war, email leak reveals". Middle East Eye. Archived from the original on 21 June 2019.
  22. ^ "UAE ambassador says 'whole of Saudi Arabia is cuckoo' in leaked email". The Independent. Archived from the original on 14 May 2022.
  23. ^ "Yousef al-Otaiba berates Saudi in leaked emails". Al Jazeera. 19 August 2017. Archived from the original on 21 June 2019.
  24. ^ Kirkpatrick, David D. (1 July 2017). "Journalist Joins His Jailer's Side in a Bizarre Persian Gulf Feud (Published 2017)". The New York Times. Archived from the original on 9 November 2020.
  25. ^ "EXCLUSIVE: UAE 'funnelled money to Turkish coup plotters'". Middle East Eye. Archived from the original on 8 November 2021.
  26. ^ Tobitt, Charlotte (12 September 2019). "Middle East Eye journalism 'vindicated' after Palestinian politician drops libel case". Press Gazette. Archived from the original on 9 December 2019.
  27. ^ "Dahlan drops libel case against MEE over article on Turkey coup". Al Jazeera English. 12 September 2019. Archived from the original on 9 December 2019.
  28. ^ "Turkey to offer $700,000 bounty for exiled Palestinian strongman Dahlan". The Times of Israel. 22 November 2019. Archived from the original on 9 December 2019.
  29. ^ "UAE government blocks access to Middle East Eye". Middle East Eye. Archived from the original on 20 June 2019.
  30. ^ "BBC Arabic website blocked in Egypt". BBC Monitoring. Archived from the original on 30 October 2019.
  31. ^ a b Wintour, Patrick (14 November 2017). "Qatar given 10 days to meet 13 sweeping demands by Saudi Arabia". The Guardian. Archived from the original on 11 June 2019.
  32. ^ Carlstorm, Gregg (24 June 2017). "What's the Problem With Al Jazeera?". The Atlantic. Archived from the original on 29 April 2019.
  33. ^ Mandhai, Shafik (18 July 2017). "Al Jazeera: 'Business as normal' despite Gulf Crisis". Al-Jazeera. Al Jazeera Media Network. Archived from the original on 31 May 2019.
  34. ^ Carlstrom, Gregg (24 June 2017). "What's the Problem With Al Jazeera?". The Atlantic. Archived from the original on 29 April 2019.
  35. ^ "Unacceptable call for Al Jazeera's closure in Gulf crisis". Reporters Without Borders. 28 June 2017. Archived from the original on 23 April 2019.
  36. ^ "'An attack on free thought': Middle East Eye responds to Saudi demands". Middle East Eye. Archived from the original on 26 May 2022.
  37. ^ Brewster, Thomas. "Blacklisted Israeli Surveillance Company Linked To Middle Eastern Hacks, Denies Knowing Whom Customers Spy On". Forbes. Archived from the original on 28 November 2021.
  38. ^ "Reuters retracts award for Palestinian over pro-Hitler, pro-terror comments". The Jerusalem Post. 18 October 2022.
  39. ^ "Palestinian journalist stripped of award over antisemitic comments". Arab News. 21 October 2022.
  40. ^ "2022 Kurt Schork Awards in International Journalism update". Thomson Reuters Foundation. 18 October 2022. Archived from the original on 21 October 2022.
  41. ^ "Middle East Eye cuts ties with Palestinian journalist Shatha Hammad". Middle East Eye. Archived from the original on 19 October 2022.
  42. ^ Michael Rubin (25 July 2017). "Qatar's Other Covert Media Arm". American Enterprise Institute. Retrieved 12 April 2024.
  43. ^ "Britain is right to welcome Saudi crown prince and support his reforms". Middle East Eye. 6 March 2018.
  44. ^ "Ian Cobain bio". Middle East Eye.
  45. ^ Jonathan Cook, bio, Middle East Eye
  46. ^ "From Obama to Trump: The lessons, the challenges". Middle East Eye. 2 February 2017.
  47. ^ "Richard Falk bio". Middle East Eye.
  48. ^ "Turkey: Why the West should show more support". Middle East Eye. 26 January 2017.
  49. ^ "Faisal Kutty bio". Middle East Eye.
  50. ^ "Ali Lmrabet bio". Middle East Eye.
  51. ^ "Daniel Levy". Middle East Eye. Retrieved 7 October 2024.
  52. ^ "Gideon Levy bio". Middle East Eye.
  53. ^ "Political Islam will go the same way as nationalism and communism". Middle East Eye. 15 June 2016.
  54. ^ Joseph Massad bio, Middle East Eye
  55. ^ "Peter Oborne bio". Middle East Eye.
  56. ^ Madawi al-Rasheed bio, Middle East Eye
  57. ^ "Sarah Leah Whitson bio". Middle East Eye.
  58. ^ a b "Jamal Khashoggi articles". Middle East Eye. Archived from the original on 9 June 2019.
  59. ^ Mayhew, Freddy (29 June 2017). "UK-based Middle East news outlet also targeted for closure in Saudi-led demands against Qatar". Press Gazette. Archived from the original on 11 May 2018.
  60. ^ Smith, Saphora (24 October 2018). "Saudi Arabia now admits Khashoggi killing was premeditated". NBC News. Archived from the original on 25 October 2018.
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