Al Arabiya TV is NOT representative of Middle East

The first televised interview as President by Barack Obama was given to Al-Arabiya TV, an Arab news channel in the Middle East and is known as "friendly" to US image. The interview definitely showed a new brand of politics in the White House and was generally well received in the Middle East and by American Dems. However, to be clear, unlike what many websites are saying right now, Al Arabiya is not the mainstream news channel of the Muslim world. It's Al-Jazeera. In fact, Al Jazeera has around as much TV viewership as BBC world. BBC and Al-Jazeera have this agreement now on being able to share each others footage among other things. But Al-Jazeera is largely regarded as "confrontational" by the US which was probably why Obama dodged granting them an interview instead. That is understandable especially if you're trying to bolster US image. But just know that Al-Arabiya is not mainstream and it is the 'FOX' of the Middle East to some. But I'm not complaining. You can't be that fussy about these things. Small baby steps must be taken first before we actually speak to Al-Jazeera.