Al Jazeera speech by the leader of Qatar, Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani. Staff members protested that the speech was not the most important aspect of the debate, and that it was a repetition of previous calls for Arab intervention. "The Guardian" also said in September 2012 that Qatar had taken steps in recent years to consolidate control of Al Jazeera English. A 13 August 2015 article in "The Independent" on poor BBC news reporting also made reference to the political bias in Al Jazeera from the Qatar government. Al Jazeera Al Jazeera (, , literally "The Island", though referring to the
Al Jazeera BBC announced that it had signed an agreement with Al Jazeera for sharing facilities and information, including news footage. Al Jazeera's availability (via satellite) throughout the Middle East changed the television landscape of the region. Prior to the arrival of Al Jazeera, many Middle Eastern citizens were unable to watch TV channels other than state-controlled national TV stations. Al Jazeera introduced a level of freedom of speech on TV that was previously unheard of in many of these countries. Al Jazeera presented controversial views regarding the governments of many Arab states on the Persian Gulf, including Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Bahrain