With a couple of exceptions -- particularly in Kuwait -- there are few journalistic voices in the Arab world defending the war to depose Saddam Hussein, and the barrage of anti-war sentiment and anti-Americanism has rubbed off on traditionally stale state media outlets.

It is the first war in the Arab world to be covered by 24-hour news channels in Arabic. The oldest of them is seven-year-old Al-Jazeera, based in Qatar, which first earned Western attention by broadcasting statements from Osama bin Laden following the September 11, 2001 attacks.

Al-Jazeera now has two main competitors: Abu Dhabi television, based in the United Arab Emirates, and Al-Arabiya, a Dubai-based channel with Saudi, Kuwaiti and Lebanese financing.

Besides abundant footage of casualties inside Iraq, the three channels feature hours of political and military analysis. The roundtable format resembles that of their all-news counterparts in the West, except on the Arabic channels most of the commentators support Baghdad.

Arab media coverage of the war was chided Thursday by the US State Department, which complained some of it was "very inflammatory" and "very biased."

Competing for the first time with independent channels, Arab state television networks -- previously mostly known for showing endless pictures of heads of state shaking hands -- have been forced to offer coverage of the war.

While Saudi television has not changed its normal programming, it has been addressing the war.

Although slow to cover the humanitarian side of the conflict, it has repeatedly taken pains to repeat the official line that the kingdom will not participate in the US-led operation.

"The Saudi media can't just close their eyes to Saudi public opinion, which is greatly hostile to America," explained one Saudi journalist.

Last week Information Minister Fuad al-Faresi urged Saudis to shun "biased" foreign media and urged them to follow news from the kingdom's television, radio and newspapers, which generally reflect the official line.

As in the broadcast media, the anti-war tone dominates the Arab print media.

However, on Saturday the al-Sharq al-Awsat, a respected Arabic daily printed in London, put on its front page a picture of a US doctor treating an Iraqi soldier on the battlefield -- a far different note from newspapers in the Gulf, which mostly feature pictures that would seem to incriminate the coalition.

The main exception to the anti-war bent of the coverage comes from Kuwait, whose 1990-91 occupation by Iraq was ended in the US-led Gulf war.

In sharp contrast to media in neighboring countries, Kuwaiti television describes US and British soldiers as "liberators," the war as "an act of heroism" and Iraqi forces as "criminals."

Many viewers in other Arab countries have little patience for the Kuwaiti coverage.

"When I watch Kuwaiti television I want to throw up," said Saudi viewer Abdul Wahab, adding that he also opposed Saddam.

Kuwaiti television has also become a frequent target on Islamist websites.

One message posted on the qal3ah.org site described Kuwait's ruling Al-Sabah family as "worse than the Zionists."

WAR.WIRE