Al-Monitor, a website founded in January 2012, is publishing pro-Hezbollah and pro-Assad journalists, Tablet reports.
The main site offers analysis as well as reporting by seasoned journalists. Washington reporters Barbara Slavin and Laura Rozen hold down the domestic front, while Al-Monitor’s Middle East correspondents include experienced journalists like longtime Haaretz columnist Akiva Eldar, who signed on last year as a full-time contributor to the "Israel Pulse" section. Other contributors include former D.C. policymakers like Aaron David Miller, The Washington Post’s former Middle East bureau chief Thomas Lippman, and 30-year CIA veteran Bruce Riedel, alongside newer faces like Iranian-American journalist Roxana Saberiand influential Emirati analyst Sultan Sooud Al Qassemi. Each "pulse" includes original work commissioned for Al-Monitor, as well as articles translated from dozens of publications it has partnered with throughout the Arab world, Turkey, Iran, and even Israel. […]
Observers assert that the arguments and positions of the Assad government receive heavy coverage in the site’s "Lebanon Pulse" section, with an emphasis on translated material from pro-Hezbollah, pro-Assad media outlets as well as original content produced for Al-Monitor by writers who also work for pro-Hezbollah, pro-Assad media.
Critics are worried Al-Monitor is providing an outlet that will allow pro-Assad and pro-Hezbollah messages to feature more prominently than they otherwise would.