Murdoch's Ben Ali moment? by *Brian Whitaker

For the last couple of weeks my attention has been divided between the uprisings in the Middle East and an affair much closer to home: the unfolding storm around Rupert Murdoch and News International (part of News Corp).

Murdoch is the most powerful media figure in the English-speaking world, with interests in Britain, the US and Australia plus others elsewhere. Though once regarded as unassailable, he now reminds me more and more of ex-presidents Ben Ali and Mubarak as the growing scandal moves steadily closer to the top.

There are some striking parallels. Murdoch runs his media empire in much the same way that Arab rulers run their countries: autocratically. News Corp is a public company but, since his family owns a crucial block of voting shares, there isn't much need to worry about what other shareholders think.

Like many an Arab ruler, Murdoch has held power for far too long. He's now 80 years old but, in the hallowed tradition of Arab leaders, has a son – James – waiting in the wings to inherit his throne. 

The Murdoch name inspires both awe and fear. Politicians have often been reluctant to stand in his way and many of his employees live in constant fear for their jobs.

This culture of fear, which kept Murdoch on top for many a year, now looks like becoming his nemesis. Journalists at the News of the World – his British Sunday tabloid – were under such pressure to deliver spectacular stories that some of them, aided by a private detective, began hacking the voicemails of celebrities, as well as paying the police for information.

An affair began in a small way several years ago with the jailing of what was wrongly claimed to be a single rogue reporter has now burst open with a series of arrests and resignations – including two of Britain's most senior police officers – and raising uncomfortable questions about the British prime minister's links with the Murdoch empire. This has since spread across the Atlantic to the US, where investigations are also getting under way.

Rupert Murdoch's behaviour in all this has been more than a little reminiscent of Ben Ali in Tunisia – failing to appreciate either the scale of the problem or the groundswell of public opinion against him. In a recent interview with his own Wall Street Journal, he even congratulated himself on his handling of it.

Could a "Ben Ali moment" now be in store for Murdoch? Two weeks ago it seemed unlikely but, judging by some recent American commentary on the way he runs his businesses, his position is looking more precarious. Perhaps the most significant pointer, as in the Arab uprisings, is the breaking of the fear barrier. In the words of one London broker quoted by the Bloomberg news service:

"We'll see more pressure on Murdoch now. One of the things that’s kept people away is that he has a powerful media presence, and people are fearful of crossing swords with him. Much of that fear is gone now."

Murdoch, it need scarcely be said, has had a powerful and often harmful influence on American discourse about the Middle East – through ill-informed commentary on Fox News, some bizarre opinion articles in the Wall Street Journal by Bernard Lewis and others (despite its generally thorough news reporting), and the neoconservatives' house journal, the Weekly Standard.

It's not surprising, therefore, that Melanie Phillips, one of Britain's most outspoken pro-Israel columnists, should be concerned about Murdoch's fate:

"In a western world whose intelligentsia is consumed by irrational and malevolent hatred of America and Israel and is hell-bent on undermining the west and assisting its mortal enemies, Murdoch has provided the one media voice putting forward a pro-America, pro-Israel, pro-defence of the west position – including support for the Iraq war."

Interestingly, though, Ms Phillips didn't mention that News Corp'slargest shareholder outside the Murdoch family is the Saudi billionaire, Prince Alwaleed bin Talal. Murdoch, in turn, also holds a stake in the prince's Rotana media empire.

Brian Whitaker, is a journalist for the British newspaper The Guardian since 1987 and its Middle East editor from 2000-2007. He has a degree in Arabic from the University of Westminster. He also runs a personal website Al-Bab.com about politics in the Arab world.