Qatar’s Hypocrisy Strikes Again: Al Jazeera Incites U.S. Chaos, But Tells Qataris To Behave

-Analysis-

BEIRUT — Al Jazeera and its social media accounts continue to be flooded with reports that fully endorse Hamas in Gaza. Its role has been closer to that of a propaganda machine, offering intense coverage of student protests in American universities and taking its usual resistance-style editorial tone. That’s why the recent news felt like a bucket of cold water.

The Qatari-owned media reported that the country’s embassy in Washington had issued instructions to Qatari citizens traveling to or residing in the U.S., warning them against engaging in any political or protest activities and calling on them to exercise full caution.

The embassy called on Qatari citizens not to participate in public gatherings or protests and to avoid reposting or commenting on political topics on social media — especially those related to the war in Gaza. It also recommended that Qatari citizens fully cooperate with U.S. authorities, even to the extent of handing over passwords to their electronic devices upon request.

What is happening here? Why is Qatar’s prominent media instigating and encouraging Arabs in the U.S. to protest against Israel and American bias toward it, while the country’s embassy warns its citizens against doing so and even prohibits them from interacting on social media?

Qatar’s contradictions

This contradiction reveals a consistent pattern in Qatari policy based on exploiting just causes — like the Palestinian cause — through the media and international propaganda, while ensuring that no political or security cost is incurred internally or among its own citizens.

Al Jazeera has been and continues to be the spearhead in marketing “people’s revolutions” — as long as the revolutionary is not Qatari and none of these causes reflect on Qatar’s domestic policy.

Behind this duplicity, the Al Udeid Air Base stands as a symbol of the strategic alliance between Doha and Washington

Behind this duplicity, the Al Udeid Air Base — the largest American military base in the Middle East — stands as a symbol of the strategic alliance between Doha and Washington. Qatar not only hosted this base, from which the United States conducts its operations in the Middle East, but went so far as to give U.S. President Donald Trump a private plane. The move sparked controversy and objections even among Trump’s closest associates, and raised questions over the implications of accepting a $400 million gift from Qatar.

So how does Qatar market itself as a patron of Palestine while being a military and security partner of Washington? How does it claim to side with Gaza while not daring to allow a protest on its soil against Israel or in support of the Palestinian people — and even prevents its citizens from participating in protests abroad?

Have you ever heard of a pro-Palestine protest in front of the U.S. embassy in Qatar? Such a thing could never happen of course. Qatar uses Al Jazeera to bidding against Egypt for not opening the front, and opens its airwaves to those bidding against Lebanon because its government woke up and wants to spare the country from being dragged into a war that makes Al Jazeera’s heart flutter and amuses Doha in its regional game.

Sowing turmoil

As an extension of this approach, Qatar is considered the largest regional supporter of the Muslim Brotherhood — whether through sympathetic media coverage or political and financial support. Through Al Jazeera, the Brotherhood has long been presented as a “moderate reform movement,” ignoring its ties to violent offshoots or its involvement in internal conflicts in several Arab countries.

This approach is even more clear in Al Jazeera’s coverage of Ahmad al-Sharaa in Syria — one of the faces of the Islamic current that has recently been rehabilitated. The media has presented Al-Sharaa in a tolerant tone, with no criticism of his past positions or links to extremist organizations, or of his and his armed groups’ current practices in repressing people, enforcing Sharia, and committing massacres against minorities.

Qatar’s contradictions are dizzying.

Meanwhile, ousted Syrian President Bashar al-Assad rightly received what he deserved on Al Jazeera, which turns a blind eye to the resemblance between al-Sharaa and his executioner and their role-swapping.

This schizophrenia has been repeating for years: from supporting Islamic movements in Syria and Egypt, to providing military facilities for the United States, to playing mediator with the Taliban, to financial and political support for Hamas on one hand and normalization with Israel on the other; Qatar’s contradictions are dizzying.

There is no doubt that Qatar excels in the art of diplomacy and practices it shrewdly, using it to ward off any threat or even discussion about its domestic affairs. It diplomatically deflects any issues that could drag it into turmoil far from home, yet promotes such issues elsewhere. In this, Qatar embodies what Winston Churchill once said: “Diplomacy is the art of telling people to go to hell in such a way that they ask for directions.”