Alwaght-Saudi-funded Al-Arabiya TV channel has fired its director for airing a documentary considered pro-Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah.
According to Kuwaiti Arabic daily newspaper al-Qabas, the Saudi regime’s satellite broadcasting company Middle East Broadcasting Center Group (MBC), which owns al-Arabiya, announced sacking of prominent journalist and media personality Turki bin Abdullah Al-Dakhil.
The harsh decision was taken days after Al-Arabiya TV aired a documentary titled “Hassan’s Tale” that highlighted the life of Hezbollah Secretary General Seyyed Hassan Nasrallah.
This is not the first time that Saudi Arabia cracks down on media and journalists seen to be favoring the axis of resistance.
Last December, following pressure from Saudi rulers, satellite communications operator Arabsat halted broadcasting Hezbollah-run al-Manar television channel. Al-Manar slammed the move terming it an attempt to muzzle the “voice in the face of oppression.”
It also said “al-Manar is the voice of the Bahrainis, Saudis, Iraqis, Syrians, Tunisians, Egyptians and all the Arabs and Muslims,” vowing to continue its coverage of the developments in the region and the entire Muslim world.
In a similar move last November, the Lebanese al-Mayadeen television channel was also stopped being broadcast via Arabsat after a guest criticized Saudi Arabia’s handling of a tragic human crush in Mina, near the Saudi city of Mecca, during Hajj rituals in late September.
Al-Mayadeen’s Director Ghassan bin Jaddou referred to the channel’s coverage of news concerning Palestinian resistance as well as the Saudi war on Yemen as other reasons why pressure was exerted on al-Mayadeen, slamming Arabsat’s move as a violation of freedom of speech and the rights of media.
The Saudi regime has about a 37 percent investment share in Arabsat which is jointly owned by other Arab states.
