Al Arab (Arabic: العرب, romanized: The Arabs) was the first Arabic daily following the independence of Qatar. It was printed between 1972 and 1995 and was relaunched on 18 November 2007 as an e-newspaper which is based in Doha, Qatar.[1]
Al Arab was established in 1972.[2] The paper was first published on 6 March 1972 as a weekly tabloid and became Qatar's first post-independence Arabic publication.[3][4] The paper is also the first political paper of the country.[5]
The founder and the first editor-in-chief of the daily was Qatari intellectual Abdullah Hussein Nemma,[6] known as "Dean" of the Qatari press.[3] The publisher was Dar Al Orouba.[6]Al Arab was converted into a broadsheet daily on 22 February 1974.[3] It was closed down in 1995.[7] The license of the paper was sold by Nemma's family to the Minister of Foreign Affairs Hamad bin Jassim Al Thani in the 1990s.[7]
It was relaunched on 18 November 2007 as online newspaper.[8]Abdulaziz Al-Mahmoud who also contributed to the foundation of the daily was named as editor-in-chief and served in the post until November 2009.[9] As of 2013 Ahmed Al Romaihi was the editor-in-chief of the paper[10][11] and his deputy is Mohammed Haji.[12]
In July 2020 the newspaper canceled its paper edition and continued to be published on the website.[13] Its owner is Dar Al Arab.[14]
Al Arab in its first period has an independent political stance.[3] In 2013, BBC describes it as a pro-government paper.[15]
In 2009, Al Arab contributor Samar Al Mogren, a Saudi Arabian novelist and feminist, received death threats due to her article in which she criticized Saudi cleric Mohammed Al Arifi for vilifying Shiites and calling IraqiAyatollah Sistani "an Infidel".[16] In August 2013, Faisal Al Marzoqi published an article in the daily, accusing the officials of the Qatar Museums Authority of power misuse.[10] The criticism also indirectly targeted Al Mayassa Al Thani, chairperson of the authority and caused reaction by the Qatari officials.[10]
^ abcdMohamed M. Arafa (1994). "Qatar". In Yahya R. Kamalipour; Hamid Mowlana (eds.). Mass Media in the Middle East: A Comprehensive Handbook. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press. ISBN978-0313361623.
