Is that Alan or Albert Qaeda?

Rico says he's grown tired of the mainstream media's inability to write (or spell, or parse a sentence), especially their total cluelessness about the transcription of foreign languages.
The constant references in news articles to the terrorist organization properly known as al-Qaeda vary from just Qaeda (wrong) to the ludicrious Al Qaeda.
The 'al' in this usage is the Arabic for 'the'. It is an honorific like the Japanese 'san', and the exact equivalent of the Hebrew 'el'. They wouldn't refer to the Israeli airline as 'Al', would they? Thought not...
(And it's not 'Qaida', either, dammit.)