from exercising their supervisory role” (1) , as noted by Mohamed Elamin Musa, Associate Professor of Online Journalism at Qatar University, an issue that frustrates the new media culture brought by Al Jazeera. Al Jazeera’s media culture and professional standards stirred up diplomatic crises between Qatar and certain Arab countries that with- drew their ambassadors from Doha (i.e. Tunisia, Morocco, Jordan, etc.); in fact, for the first time, a talk show, or even a news item or statement in a news bulletin, could lead to a diplomatic crisis. Some countries even demanded that Qatar shut down Al Jazeera, as was the case during the Gulf crisis that led to the blockade of Qatar on 5 June 2017. Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Egypt submitted a list of demands consisting of 13 conditions for the restoration of diplomatic and economic relations with Doha. Chief among those demands was “the closure of the Al Jazeera network and its affiliated stations”, as the sixth item on the said list provided (2) . Al Jazeera’s bureaus in conflict zones, such as Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Yemen and Libya, have been targeted in various ways. This led to the deaths of correspondents Tariq Ayoub, Rashid Wali, Ali Hassan Al-Jaber, Muhammad Al-Masalma, Muhammad Al-Qasim, Mahran Al-Diri, Muhammad Al-Asfar and Za- karia Ibrahim; and the arrests of Sami Alhaj, Tayseer Allouni, Abdullah Elshamy, Baher Mohamed, Mohamed Fahmy, and Mahmoud Hussein, to name a few. 2. The Areas and Levels of the Cognitive-Media Split from Arab and International Media By analysing Al Jazeera’s news model with its three dimensions (a new perspective of news standards, a new media culture, and the news approach to the coverage), we discover the lines of demarcation between Al Jazeera and the rest of the official Arab media, as well as certain international media organisations. Throughout the years, an (1) Mohamed Elamin Musa, Professor of Mass Communication at Qatar University, Phone Interview, 5 September 2020. (2) Ahmed Al-Shamrani, “Closing Al Jazeera”, Okaz , 29 June 2017, https://bit.ly/2VSJJAk (accessed 9 December 2020).
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