BBC Arabic Television is a news and information television channel broadcast to the Middle East by the BBC. It was launched at 0956GMT on 11 March 2008. The service was announced in October 2005 and was to start broadcasting in Autumn 2007, but was delayed. Presenters include Hassan Muawad, Tony Khouri, Lena Do, Rania Al-Attar and Dalia Mohammed.
BBC Arabic Television is run by the BBC World Service; as such, it is funded from a grant-in-aid from the British Foreign Office and not the television licence that is used to fund the BBC's domestic broadcasting. The service is based in the Egton Wing of Broadcasting House in London, but some technical aspects are managed at the BBC World Service's Bush House. Initially the service is broadcasting for 12 hours per day; 24-hour programming will begin later in the year.
BBC Arabic can also be seen via www.bbcarabic.com. The website includes a 16:9 live stream of the channel.
BBC Newshour, an hour-long news bulletin is broadcast twice a day. In this programme, the top stories of the day are analysed and covered by BBC correspondents around the world. Other bulletins are half-an-hour long. The top stories are broadcast on the channel every 15 minutes.
This is not the first time that the BBC has attempted to set up an Arabic television service. The previous attempt closed on 21 April 1996, after 2 years on air, when the BBC's partners, Orbit Communications Corporation (owned by King Fahd's cousin, Prince Khaled) pulled the plug after the BBC broadcast an episode of Panorama that was critical of the Saudi Arabian government. Many of the staff who worked for the original BBC Arabic Television service went on to work for Al Jazeera television [1]. Al Jazeera is one of BBC Arabic Television's main competitors.
Competitors
References
External links
- BBC Arabic.com (Arabic)
- Live video stream
- BBC Press Release
- [1]
- The Failed Dream That Lead To Al Jazeera
- Faisal Abbas: "BBC Arabic TV 'should try to be different, " BBC News Online on March 12, 2008
- Adam Sherwin: "BBC Arabic TV service tunes in to crowded news market," The Times (UK) on March 6, 2008
- Eric Pfanner: "BBC Set to Open Its New Arab World TV Channel in New York Times on March 4, 2008
- David Chambers: "BBC Arabic TV will Rock the Arab World," Middle East Times on March 10, 2008 (also Yemen Observer, Radio Netherlands Worldwide (RNW), Arab News/Italy)
- Chris Forrester: "‘Switch off Al Hurra’ call," Rapid TV News on March 10, 2008
- "BBC launches Arabic TV channel," BBC on March 11, 2008
- Oleg Gordievsky: "World Service kowtows, March 22, 2008 (with Vladimir Bukovsky, Martin Dewhirst, Sergei Cristo, and Leonid Finkelstein)
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