The Alhurra Project: Radio Marti of the Middle East

On June 8, Larry Register announced his resignation from the troubled American Arabic-language satellite television station Alhurra. His departure came in the wake of a relentless campaign by conservative journalists and members of Congress, fueled by disgruntled stalwarts of Alhurra’s previous, failed incarnation. Register’s forced departure marks a low point for American efforts at broadcasting to the Middle East, an entirely predictable debacle which likely puts paid to even the slender hopes that the station might turn itself around. The latest Alhurra fiasco began with a crusade launched by Joel Mowbray in a series of Wall Street Journal op-eds and postings to the conservative Powerline blog. In reality, however, it dates back to the shift in the station's leadership. Last year, the founding director Mouafic Harb left under a cloud of criticism, after a scathing GAO report criticized the station’s management and performance, while noting serious deficiencies in mandated evaluations of audiences and content. Most independent observers had come to agree that Alhurra had grown into a white elephant, an expensive irrelevance. Very few American officials even bothered to appear on it, preferring to spend their valuable time on Arabic TV stations with an actual audience. By the time Harb departed, Alhurra was widely recognized as a failure, with little market share and even less political impact.