I’m very surprised and pleased by your thread because he was my undergraduate dissertation advisor. I’d also obviously recommend reading his work (especially The Crusades), but also another book he put me on to: Saladin: The Triumph of the Sunni Revival by Azzam. Potentially the best Saladin biography I’ve read

Okay, but you think that the Guardian is against the BBCs choice to present Qatar critically even though it’s clearly the opposite? So where does that leave your assessment of their use of language?

Perhaps, but you must agree they are on average far less brash with their language choice than those papers

That’s why I distinguished it into the same group as other non-tabloid papers…

Dude, you are really misreading the tone here. Every quote you list is supportive of the BBC actions.

The Guardian disapproves of Qatar getting to project soft power through this event.

The Guardian doesn’t like the idea that ‘politics should be kept out of football’.

The Guardian does not have any interest in presenting this event with niceties either.

This is all relatively in-line with the Guardian’s own mission.

Maybe in a tabloid paper like the Sun they’d be using super positive approving language, but in a paper like the Guardian, Independent or Times they try to keep a more detached tone, even if their own politics are being highlighted.

IT WOZ THE SUN WOT SPORTS-WASHED IT!