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The tiny Gulf state is keen to gain influence out of proportion to its size through diplomacy and al-Jazeera
In an air-conditioned room down an alley in the old market of Qatar's capital Doha, enthusiasts of "damah" gather most evenings. The ancient board game, rarely played in recent years, is now being revived by local enthusiasts. It is, afficionados say, a contest of strategy and finesse – and thus an apt metaphor for the high-stakes manoeuvring by the tiny Gulf state and its hereditary leader, 59-year-old Emir Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani, in recent weeks.
For a country the size of Belgium with a population of 1.7 million, Qatar has been playing an extraordinarily high-profile role. This weekend four Qatari fighter jets are set to join the allied forces already off the Libyan coastline. The combat deployment is the first by an Arab or Muslim-majority country and thus of critical diplomatic significance.
Then there is the key role played in the "Arab spring" by al-Jazeera, the satellite TV channel set up by the emir in 1996. Broadcasting from Doha, al-Jazeera is now the dominant Arabic-language news outlet in the region and increasingly recognised around the world. Al-Jazeera English is gaining fans.
"Al-Jazeera were the first on to the events in Tunisia. Its reports from there were watched by the Egyptians. Then its reports from Egypt were watched by everyone else. It has been a very important catalyst," said Hugh Miles, author of Al-Jazeera: How Arab TV News Challenged the World. Others have gone further and described the successive uprisings as "fundamentally driven" by the TV channel.
Al-Jazeera's role and Qatar's decision to send planes are both rooted in Qatar's size, its location on a spur of the Arabian peninsula and the emir's efforts to ensure his country's independence from much bigger neighbouring states such as Iran and Saudi Arabia.
As in a game of damah, the emir, who seized power from his father in 1995, has eschewed confrontation in favour of a more subtle strategy. "Any wise person would do the same", said Faraj Almohammed, a 45-year-old economic advisor and keen damah player, in Doha's old market last night. For despite wealth from its vast oil and gas reserves which means its inhabitants do not pay income tax or utilities bills and enjoy average incomes of £50,000, Qatar is vulnerable.
"The [Sandhurst-trained] emir is a military man and knows that Qatar is basically indefensible," said Blake Hounshell, the Doha-based managing editor of Foreign Policy magazine. "He has thought laterally about ways of making Qatar more secure." The emir's main two strategic assets are al-Jazeera and diplomacy, said Mustafa Alani, analyst at the Gulf Research Centre in Dubai. "The aim is to give Qatar an importance out of proportion to its size. Al-Jazeera gives it a loud voice and the emir has made a huge effort to make Qatar the local mediator of choice too."
Al-Jazeera broke with the stultifying broadcasting style of government-run channels in the region and rapidly became an integral part of the Arab world's cultural landscape and immensely popular. "Al-Jazeera pitches itself at its viewership. It is Arab-owned, Arab-financed, based in an Arab city and ... gives people what they want to hear in a language they understand," said Miles, the author. For protesters across the region, the presence of al-Jazeera cameras means more than news. Exposure brings a measure of security. In Syria this week, demonstrators chanted: "We want al-Jazeera." In Sana'a in Yemen, a handwritten sign read: "Al-Jazeera is part of our revolution."
Such influence has inevitably caused problems for Qatar. Last year al-Jazeera, which means "the peninsula" in Arabic, was banned in Morocco, suspended in Bahrain and caused a diplomatic incident with Jordan. A camera crew was arrested by Nato-led troops in Afghanistan for "making propaganda".
The channel has been restricted or targeted by almost every Arab state and many others, including the US. But it has also given the emir huge credibility and prestige among ordinary people.
Al Anstey, managing director of al-Jazeera's English-language channel, said any challenge to governments was not deliberate but simply came from reporters covering "the facts on the ground".
For analyst Alani, "like Qatar's role as a mediator, al-Jazeera makes enemies but is a net gain in terms of influence."
Qatari diplomacy is wide-ranging. Successfully bidding for the 2022 World Cup attracted global attention, as it was meant to. Qatar has good relations with the US, hosting its vast airbase at al-Udeid, and, relative to the rest of the region, with Israel too. It also maintains contacts with Hamas and Hezbollah, shares an oilfield with Iran and is careful to be friendly to Riyadh. Angering the latter is "not an option", said one western diplomat based in the region, a factor in what some claim is al-Jazeera's "systematic downplaying" of news of its neighbour. Anstey denied any bias. "We are financed by the state of Qatar but editorially entirely independent. We cover every story on its merits," he said.
Qatar is seen as moderate, at least compared to its neighbours. Alcohol is not illegal, though it is an offence to drink or be drunk in public. Homosexuality is illegal, even if the laws are applied pragmatically. Political parties are banned and, according to Amnesty International, the founder of a human rights organisation was detained this month. To the surprise of some, al-Jazeera reported the arrest.
The effects of the channel on the region may be greater than the autocratic, if relatively moderate, emir of Qatar bargained for.
"Over the last decade, al-Jazeera has done more to educate Arabs about human rights, civil rights, democracy and the world than anyone else," said Miles, the author. "Now anywhere in the Arab world you can have an informed discussion about what's happening in the world ... That is a huge change."
The "Arab spring" appears likely to remain foreign news for al-Jazeera, however. "Qatar is unique in that there are really very few local tensions and no major threat to stability," said Dr Jennifer Heeg, a Doha-based human rights specialist. "The biggest split is between locals and the migrant labourers. A day of rage was called recently and absolutely no one turned up."
This means that, unlike other local rulers, the emir does not have to watch the sentiment of a restive "street".
There is certainly little discontent among students in Education City, a vast complex of colleges set up by the emir on the outskirts of Doha. Students gathered for a snack after classes in the open-air cafeteria of the private Carnegie Mellon University said that, though relations between Qatar and Libya had been poor for a long time, it was the killing of an al-Jazeera cameraman near Benghazi two weeks ago, probably by Gaddafi's henchmen, that justified Qatar's military commitment to operation Odyssey Dawn. "I think [Qataris] ... have the right to go and [avenge] their loss. I think all Arab countries should do the same. We are all Arab and we all should help each other," said Muhammad Hadi, a 20-year-old business administration student. "I think Qatar wants to have more influence on the world [and] I am proud to live in this country."
With additional reporting from Omar Chatriwalla and Shabina Khatri in Doha.