Al-Resalah ( ar, قناة الرسالة; ''The Message'') is an Arabic language

satellite television Satellite television is a service that delivers television programming to viewers by relaying it from a communications satellite orbiting the Earth directly to the viewer's location. The signals are received via an outdoor parabolic antenna comm ...

channel "to present true

Islam Islam (; ar, ۘالِإسلَام, , ) is an Abrahamic religions, Abrahamic Monotheism#Islam, monotheistic religion centred primarily around the Quran, a religious text considered by Muslims to be the direct word of God in Islam, God (or ...

". It is funded by Prince

Al-Waleed bin Talal Al Waleed bin Talal Al Saud ( ar, الوليد بن طلال آل سعود; born 7 March 1955) is a Saudi Arabian billionaire businessman, investor, philanthropist and royal. He was listed on ''Time'' magazine's Time 100, an annual list of the hu ...

Saudi Arabia Saudi Arabia, officially the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA), is a country in Western Asia. It covers the bulk of the Arabian Peninsula, and has a land area of about , making it the fifth-largest country in Asia, the second-largest in the A ...

, recorded in all over the

United Arab Emirates The United Arab Emirates (UAE; ar, اَلْإِمَارَات الْعَرَبِيَة الْمُتَحِدَة ), or simply the Emirates ( ar, الِْإمَارَات ), is a country in Western Asia (The Middle East). It is located at th ...

Morocco Morocco (),, ) officially the Kingdom of Morocco, is the westernmost country in the Maghreb region of North Africa. It overlooks the Mediterranean Sea to the north and the Atlantic Ocean to the west, and has land borders with Algeria to ...

and

Kuwait Kuwait (; ar, الكويت ', or ), officially the State of Kuwait ( ar, دولة الكويت '), is a country in Western Asia. It is situated in the northern edge of Eastern Arabia at the tip of the Persian Gulf, bordering Iraq to the nort ...

, and broadcast from

Cairo Cairo ( ; ar, القاهرة, al-Qāhirah, ) is the capital of Egypt and its largest city, home to 10 million people. It is also part of the largest urban agglomeration in Africa, the Arab world and the Middle East: The Greater Cairo metro ...

. Al-Resalah has slots on the

Arabsat The Arab Satellite Communications Organization (often abbreviated as Arabsat) is a communications satellite operator in the Arab World, headquartered in the city of Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Arabsat was created to deliver satellite-based, public and ...

and

Nilesat Nilesat (; , ''or'' ) is an Egyptian company and the name of a series of Egyptian communications satellites. It was established in 1996 with the purpose of operating Egyptian satellites and their associated mission control center and ground st ...

satellites, serving primarily the

Middle East The Middle East ( ar, الشرق الأوسط, ISO 233: ) is a geopolitical region commonly encompassing Arabian Peninsula, Arabia (including the Arabian Peninsula and Bahrain), Anatolia, Asia Minor (Asian part of Turkey except Hatay Pro ...

, but

North Africa North Africa, or Northern Africa is a region encompassing the northern portion of the African continent. There is no singularly accepted scope for the region, and it is sometimes defined as stretching from the Atlantic shores of Mauritania in ...

and Europe as well. The General Manager of Al Resalah was

Tareq Al-Suwaidan Tareq Mohammed Al-Suwaidan ( ar, طارق محمد السويدان) (September 15th,1953) is a Kuwaiti Islamic author and speaker, and businessman. He has been among the 500 Most Influential Muslims in 2022. Al-Suwaidan is considered to adopt a ...

, a former host at the

Middle East Broadcasting Center MBC Group ( ar, مجموعة إم بي سي), is a Saudi media conglomerate based in the Middle East and North Africa region. Launched in London in 1991, the company moved to its headquarters to Dubai in 2002 then moved to Riyadh in 2022. MBC ...

(MBC) and a leading member of the Kuwaiti Muslim Brotherhood. Tareq Al-Suwaidan was fired from his job in August 2013 by the channel's owner, Prince Alwaleed bin Talal, because of Al-Suwaidan's support for the Moslem Brotherhood. The head of Al Resalah’s programming in Egypt is

Ahmed Abu Haiba Ahmad ( ar, أحمد, ʾAḥmad) is an Arabic male given name common in most parts of the Muslim world. Other spellings of the name include Ahmed and Ahmet. Etymology The word derives from the root (ḥ-m-d), from the Arabic (), from the ve ...

, the original producer of

Amr Khaled Amr Mohamed Helmi Khaled ( ar, عمرو محمد حلمي خالد; born: 5 September 1967) is an Egyptian Muslim activist and television preacher. ''The New York Times Magazine'', in reference to Khaled's popularity in English-speaking coun ...

’s first television program.Fatwas and Feminism: Women, Religious Authority, and Islamic TV
By Sharon Otterman, TBS 16, 2006 The channel's advisory committee includes Sheikh Abdullah Bin Sulaiman Al-Manai (Senior

Ulema In Islam, the ''ulama'' (; ar, علماء ', singular ', "scholar", literally "the learned ones", also spelled ''ulema''; feminine: ''alimah'' ingularand ''aalimath'' lural are the guardians, transmitters, and interpreters of religious ...

Commission,

); Dr. Abdallah Omar Naseef (president of the Muslim World Congress); Dr. Hamed Ahmad Al-Refaie (secretary-general of the MWC and president of the International Islamic Forum for Dialogue); Dr. Abdullah Al-Muslih (

Commission on Scientific Signs in the Quran and Sunnah The Commission on Scientific Signs in the Quran and Sunnah is an organization established to publicize what it calls "Scientific Signs found in the Quran and Sunna", i.e. references to what it believes are numerous discoveries of science (everyt ...

); Sheikh Ali Al-Nashwan (executive manager of the prince's

Kingdom Holding Company The Kingdom Holding Company (KHC) ( ar, شركة المملكة القابضة) is a Saudi conglomerate holding company, based in Riyadh. The KHC is a publicly listed company on the Tadawul (Saudi stock exchange). The KHC consists of a select ...

's Humanitarian Division, and religious advisor to the prince); Dr. Abdulaziz Al-Askar (former head of the media department at

Imam Muhammad ibn Saud Islamic University Imam Mohammad Ibn Saud Islamic University (IMSIU) (), commonly known as Al-Imam University, is a public university in Baladiyah al-Shemal in northern Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. It was founded in 1953. represented by the College of Sharia Sciences (n ...

); and Dr. Walid Arab Hashem (

Shura Council In Arab culture, a Majlis-ash-Shura ( ar, مجلس الشورى; Shura Council in English) is an advisory council or consultative council. In Islamic context, the Majlis-ash-Shura is one of two ways that a Caliph, khalifa (Islamic leader) may be s ...

member). Al Resalah’s website features a list of fatwas by Egypt’s preacher

Yusuf Al Qaradawi Yusuf al-Qaradawi ( ar, يوسف القرضاوي, translit=Yūsuf al-Qaraḍāwī; or ''Yusuf al-Qardawi''; 9 September 1926 – 26 September 2022) was an Egyptian Islamic scholar based in Doha, Qatar, and chairman of the International Union of ...

approving music videos,

SMS Short Message/Messaging Service, commonly abbreviated as SMS, is a text messaging service component of most telephone, Internet and mobile device systems. It uses standardized communication protocols that let mobile devices exchange short text ...

chatting and hosting non-veiled women on its shows.Religious broadcasters avoid confrontation
by Ayat Basma, MEB Journal, Jan Feb 2008

IslamOnline IslamOnline is a global Islamic website on the Internet providing services to Muslims and non-Muslims in several languages. Its motto is "credibility and distinction".It was founded by Yusuf al-Qaradawi. Contents The website consists of forum ...

noted that

Iqraa TV Iqraa TV also spelt IQRA TV ( ar, اقرأ ' "read") is a satellite and internet television channel owned by Saleh Abdullah Kamel's Arab Media Corporation. It was founded in 1998. The channel promotes itself as a "Muslim family's safe hav ...

was the first

Islamic Islam (; ar, ۘالِإسلَام, , ) is an Abrahamic monotheistic religion centred primarily around the Quran, a religious text considered by Muslims to be the direct word of God (or '' Allah'') as it was revealed to Muhammad, the mai ...

channel created, followed by others such as

Al-Fajr TV Al-Fajr (الفجر) may refer to: *Al-Fajr (sura), the 89th sura of the Qur'an * Fajr, the first of the five salat prayers Media *''Al Fajr'', a UAE newspaper based in Abu Dhabi *'' El Fagr'' (Egyptian Arabic pronunciation of ''Al-Fajr''), an Egy ...

and

Al-Manar Al-Manar ( ar, المنار, ''al-Manār'', lit='' The Lighthouse'') is a Lebanese satellite television station owned and operated by the political party Hezbollah,

, but that Al-Resalah had "taken things a step further, pushing forth into the wider realm of entertainment media". Al-Suwaidan too speaks of a nascent revival that has started not only in Muslim countries, but also within Muslim minorities, and that Al-Resalah hopes to contribute to. In February 2008 al-Suwaidan explained that Al-Resalah began with a wide range of programmes, but in the end concentrated on religious features, aiming to be within the top ten by

Ramadan , type = islam , longtype = Religious , image = Ramadan montage.jpg , caption=From top, left to right: A crescent moon over Sarıçam, Turkey, marking the beginning of the Islamic month of Ramadan. Ramadan Quran reading in Bandar Torkaman, Iran. ...

2008. He claimed that after only one and a half years, Al-Resalah ranks at 18 out of 400 Arab satellite channels and at number one of religious channels outside of Saudi Arabia. The

target audience A target audience is the intended audience or readership of a publication, advertisement, or other message catered specifically to said intended audience. In marketing and advertising, it is a particular group of consumer within the predetermined ...

is Arab, young and female: according to al-Suwaidan, 70% of the viewers are women (60% according to Abu Haiba). Some members of the

Egypt Egypt ( ar, مصر , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a transcontinental country spanning the northeast corner of Africa and southwest corner of Asia via a land bridge formed by the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Mediter ...

ian

Muslim Brotherhood The Society of the Muslim Brothers ( ar, جماعة الإخوان المسلمين'' ''), better known as the Muslim Brotherhood ( ', is a transnational Sunni Islamist organization founded in Egypt by Islamic scholar and schoolteacher Hassan ...

have expressed enthusiasm for the station.The new Muslim TV: media-savvy, modern, and moderate
Ursula Lindsey, The Christian Science Monitor, May 2, 2006

MEMRI The Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI; officially the "Middle East Media and Research Institute") is a nonprofit press monitoring and analysis organization co-founded by former Israeli military intelligence officer Yigal Carmon and ...

, a nonprofit press monitoring and analysis organization with headquarters in Washington, DC, has accused al-Reslah of airing anti-Western,

anti-Semitic Antisemitism (also spelled anti-semitism or anti-Semitism) is hostility to, prejudice towards, or discrimination against Jews. A person who holds such positions is called an antisemite. Antisemitism is considered to be a form of racism. Antis ...

, and pro-Al Qaida content.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Al-Resalah Satellite Tv Arab mass media International broadcasters Arabic-language television stations Television channels and stations established in 2006 Islamic television networks