Al Jazeera was a great way for little totalitarian Qatar to project its power regionally and even globally, though mainly by aiding the Muslim Brotherhood and other terror groups.
Al Jazeera America seemed like a no brainer. Pay Al Gore $500 mil for his crony capitalist lefty cable channel. Rebrand. Deal Qatar in as a major domestic player in American politics.
Unfortunately for Qatar...
1. Americans didn't want to watch Al Jazeera America. The channel had no viewers
2. It got involved in a lawsuit with Al Gore over money
3. Its executives hired women and Jews and then began making sexism and anti-Semitic comments. Also they had no actual experience. So more lawsuits, personnel changes, etc...
4. There were still no viewers
5. The HGH story and likely lawsuits resulting from it
6. The price of oil hurt Qatar's bottom line
So you won't have Al Jazeera America to kick around anymore. The channel which no one watches, will shut down. Though the many lawsuits spawned by its rotten corrupt existence are likely to continue.
But the real question is how much money did Qatar blow through on this mess? A New York Post story this summer estimated $2 billion. But that isn't counting the cost of fighting the various lawsuits. and those wouldn't have been cheap.