In the Name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful
BAHRAIN: A Shameful Human Rights Record By Yasin T. al-Jibouri INTRODUCTION I wrote this essay when I was living in Falls Church, Virginia, and circulated it on October 13, 1993 after it had already been published in Islamic Monitor magazine of IRIC, Islamic Research and Information Center, which maintained an office at the prestigious National Press Building near the White House in Washington, D.C. Since its inception and till its closure, I was an active contributor to this fine magazine. This is one of a number of articles which I wrote for it one of which could not be published due to being too lengthy although it may have been the most important of all those articles: It was my rebuttal to Samuel Huntington’s “Clash of Civilization?” article published in the summer of 1993 in Foreign Affairs magazine. Huntington created a huge storm with his article which I and many other Muslims in the U.S. and abroad regarded as one of the most fierce deliberate attacks on Islam and Muslims. LOCATION AND BRIEF HISTORY Situated in a bay area on the southern coast of the Gulf between the northeastern Saudi coast of al-Ahsa (or al-Hasa) to the west and the Qatar peninsula to the east, Bahrain is comprised of a major island, al-Bahrain, and 30 small islands. Its total area is about 256 square miles, and its population is estimated at less than a million. It gained “independence” from the British in 1971 and became a member of the United Nations. The British, however, seem to be the real rulers in Bahrain, maintaining a total control over the country’s security, economy, and foreign policy, and keeping a British army stationed in Bahrain always ready for action. It was the first Arab country where oil was discovered as early as 1932, but oil experts’ reports predict that in the year 2003, Bahrain will run out of oil. The capital city of Bahrain is Manama in the northeast of the main Bahrain island, and its ruler Isa bin Sulman Al Khalifah resides at ar-Rifa al-Gharbi, about six miles south of Manama. He rules the country on hereditary basis assisted by his brother the Prime Minister. It was only in 1973 that Bahrain had a written constitution which it suspended in 1975, including all articles related to the National Council.
Bahrain has been inhabited as far back as three thousand years before Christ (as), and its strategic geographical location made many nations vie for control over it. Those who subjected it to their control vary a great deal: the Portuguese, the Persians, the British, and even the Saudis (during the reign of the Qaramitah), due to its proximity to al-Hasa, who turned it into a sea port. ISLAM IN BAHRAIN Islam was introduced to Bahrain as early as the first Islamic Hijri century when the Prophet of Islam (pbuh) came to know twenty Bahrainis who were studying the Islamic creed in Medina and whom he instructed to go back home, once their studies reached a satisfactory level, to set up study circles like the ones that flourished in Medina during his lifetime and are called hawzas. We honor those twenty Bahraini ‘ulema and particularly mention by name the following: al-Munthir ibn ‘Aith, alJarood al-‘Abdi, al-Hakim ibn Jibla al-‘Abdi, Rashid ibn al-Hujri, Sa‘sa‘ah ibn Sawhan al-‘Abdi (who is one of the most distinguished sahabis who narrated hadith directly from the Messenger of Allah, pbuh), Shaikh Naseer al-Bahraini, Shaikh Muhammad ibn Sahl al-Bahrani, Shaikh ‘Allam al-Bahrani, and Mas‘ood al‘Abdi. It is said that when Bahrain became independent from the control of the Abbasides’ central government, as many as four hundred ‘alims were leading the populace and carrying out the recommendations of a four-member majlis al shura, advistory committee. Most Bahrainis are Arabs belonging to three main tribes which have been there before the advent of Islam in the mid-sixth century, and they all descended from Adnan; they are: Tameem Banu Madar, Abdel-Qays Banu Rabi‘a, and Bakr ibn Wail of Banu Rabi‘a. All these tribes were very well known for their allegiance to Imam Ali ibn Abu Talib (as) since the first Islamic century, hence most Bahrainis (80% according to the best estimates) follow the Shi‘a Ithna-‘Asheri School of Muslim Law, yet they have no say in ruling their country since Al Khalifah are all Sunnis. The second largest denomination goes to the Dawasir tribe, which had migrated to Bahrain in 1845, and which follows the Sunni Maliki Muslim sect. The other is the Al Ni‘aim tribe which came from Qatar to defend the authority of the present ruling dynasty of Al Khalifah. AL KHALIFAH RULERS Who are these Al Khalifah rulers, and how did they get to rule Bahrain? The last invasion to which Bahrain was subjected was carried out by descendants of the ‘Anza tribe of central Najd (southern Saudi Arabia), and they are one of the ‘Itub tribes to which the ruling Al Sabah clan of Kuwait, the Jalhamites, and the Fadilis belong. In 1756, Al Khalifah, Al Sabah, and a number of Jalhamites (al jalahimah) took control of Kuwait after having migrated from Najd. These three clans ruled Kuwait jointly. Some historians say that Al Khalifah have descended from the Bu Flah tribe to which the rulers of Abu Dhabi belong, whereas others, such as Shaikh Hafiz Wahbah who published his research in a book titled The Arabian Peninsula in the Twentieth Century, say that they came from an area near the Shatt al-Arab water estuary in Iraq where they used to make a living as raiders and pirates. Al Khalifah left Kuwait and headed towards Zibara in the Qatari peninsula due to the fact that Al Sabah had arrested one of their prominent dignitaries whose release they were unable to secure. In order to escape the stigma, they accompanied their cousins the Jalhamites and
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migrated to Qatar. There, the ruling Al Mislim noticed their rough nature and passion for chaos and anarchy, so they banished them to a sparsely populated area of Zibara, a small village inhabited by a few fishermen. Muhammad Al Khalifah was able through a shrewd scheme to make a fortune by lending money to those fishermen on the condition that the catch would be sold only to Al Khalifah. He was also able, due to Zibara’s proximity to Bahrain, to familiarize himself with the latter island and with its wealth. In preparation for invading Bahrain, Al Khalifah were able to finance the construction of fortified citadels along Zibara’s coastline in order to repulse their counter-offensives. In July 1783, Shaikh Nasr Al Mathkoor, then ruler of Bahrain, led his naval forces to attack Zibara after coming to know of Al Khalifah’s preparations to seize his island, but he did not succeed in subduing Al Khalifah, so he retreated in defeat. Using their own naval forces and enlisting the alliance of six other tribes, and having received help from Al Sabah and the Jalhamites, Al Khalifah pursued the retreating Bahraini ruler who surrendered to them on July 29, 1783. This is how Al Khalifah came to rule Bahrain. Al Khalifah are divided into two smaller clans: Al Abdullah and Al Sulman. The latter were able after bloody wars with their cousins, the Al Abdullah, during the 1940s, to monopolize authority and control over the government. THE BRITISH IN BAHRAIN How did the British get involved in Bahrain’s politics? Having lost to their cousins the Al Sulmans, the Al Abdullahs made numerous attempts during 1874, 1880, 1892, and 1894 to regain control, but their attempts failed. During the 19th century, the British intervened in the governments of that region in order to suppress war and piracy and to prevent the establishment of any Egyptian, Persian, German, or Russian influence in it, and they were looking for those who could help them realize their colonial objectives. In order to gain leverage over their cousins the Al Abdullah, the Al Sulman found in the British a strong ally, and the first Bahraini-British treaty was signed on January 23, 1820, a treaty which Bahraini nationals regard as a wholesale of Bahrain, one whereby the sellers bartered their country’s sovereignty in exchange for the protection of their authority. In 1861, Al Sulman signed another treaty with the British whereby Bahrain became a British protectorate, and Bahrain’s amir was to refrain from waging war or engaging in piracy. By 1865, the British had firmed their control over several Arab countries in the Gulf area. In 1892, Shaikh Isa bin Ali signed an agreement with the British according to which he would refrain from exchanging diplomatic missions with any country besides the United Kingdom. In 1900, the British set up their first regency in Bahrain, and in 1909, Isa Al Sulman expressed his desire that the British should take charge of dealing with non-Bahrainis living on the island. It was then that Bahrain relinquished its sovereignty and independence to the British who are now the de facto rulers of the small emirate of Bahrain. In 1926, British Charles Belgrave was granted the post of Councillor to wield his iron fist to quell riots that broke out in 1947, 1956, and 1965. In these riots, some Bahrainis had an armed confrontation with Belgrave and his men, and many Bahrainis were either killed or wounded. The British made use of the authority vested upon them by Al Khalifah, making sure to promote whoever they liked to authority and crush everyone else. In early September of 1868, for example, the British unseated Shaikh Muhammad ibn Khalifah and appointed his brother Ali ibn Isa Al Khalifah as amir of Bahrain. In May 1923, they interfered and unseated Ali ibn Isa and appointed his son Hamad as his successor.
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On the economic front, the British have always made sure that only those loyal to the ruling Al Khalifahs should get the best jobs; in 1988, Bahrain’s oil industry, which is totally controlled by the British, rejected the job applications of as many as five hundred Bahrainis acting on the advice of their oil plant security agency that alleged that those applicants were suspected of dissent. George Calder, a close friend of Ian L. Henderson who oversees the operations of Bahrain’s Ministry of Interior, oversees the said plant security agency. Employees suspected of dissent are also subject to dismissal: from November 1988 to the end of June 1989, nineteen Bahraini employees working at the oil refinery in the southern part of Bahrain were fired on “security” grounds. In the late 1980s, Bahrain’s training and development office remained under the direct management of two British men: Bud Miller and John McKay who were working in coordination with U.S. Ambassador to Bahrain from 1986-1989 Sam Zakhem. Zakhem was accused in the U.S. of embezzling money which he received from the Kuwaiti government to promote its cause in the U.S. to win public support for a devestating U.S.-led attack on Iraq after the latter’s invasion of August 2, 1990 and subsequent short-lived annexation of Kuwait in the same year. Assisted by a couple of his friends, Zakhem had established two organizations: COFAR (Coalition for America at Risk), and Freedom Task Force, receiving $7.7 million from Kuwait, of which he spent $2.2 and did not disclose the balance to U.S. federal tax authorities. Another British officer who remained head of Bahrain’s police force from 1965 till 1992 is Jim Bell who was succeeded by the more notorious and ruthless British officer Ian L. Henderson. According to Bahraini opposition groups, Henderson has been in charge of the intelligence service since 1966. Bahrain’s intelligence community was established by the British in 1957. Henderson used to work in his country’s foreign service in Kenya before being sent to Bahrain. The Public Security Directorate includes riot police, special units, coast guards, prisons, traffic police, civil defense, police stations, criminal investigation, and the State Security Investigation which incorporates the Security and Intelligence Service (SIS), the most hated government apparatus in Bahrain and the most ruthless. Voice of Bahrain (London, U.K.) of March 1993 published a list of some Bahrainis who were detained, interrogated and insulted by officers of the SIS. These citizens were given the ultimatum to either work as informers for the SIS or face an unknown future. They were: Abdullah Abdul-Rasool Saif, Habib Hussein, Hadi al-Moosawi, Mansoor Hamadah, Hamza al-Hawwaj, and Baqir al-Mahroos. The SIS, however, subsequently released them. Literature published by Bahraini opposition groups reviewed for this essay lists other British individuals whom the said opposition accuses of participating in intelligent gathering for the West, encouraging sectarian strife and dissension, harassing highly respected Bahraini religious personalities, and even indulging in homosexuality. Among them, according to the Arabic magazine Al-Thawrah alIslamiyyah, are Keith Gardiner and Ken Foxhall. Bahrain’s struggle for democracy and human rights goes back to 1954 when, on October 13, a large public meeting at the Sanabis village in which one hundred Bahrainis publicly elected from both Shi‘a majority and Sunni minority set out to form a 50-member legislative committee. That committee elected 18 from among its members to form an executive subcommittee to work under the supervision of ‘ulema, highly respected dignitaries, and individuals who enjoyed an exceptionally excellent reputation. Other successive meetings followed and a petition was presented to the amir to establish a legislative majlis based on Islam’s shari‘a. Not only was the petition ignored, government forces fired live ammunition at crowds assembling near
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the municipality building on March 9, 1956 in support of the petition, killing a number of them. The people of Bahrain, since then, went underground to organize opposition to the regime and to demand an end to Britain’s domination of their country. At the close of 1981, the ruling Al Khalifah clan conducted an intensive campaign to distort the goals and objectives of opposition groups organized by Bahraini Islamists followed by arresting 3,500 citizens, accusing them of plotting to undermine the regime and the country’s infrastructure. They were detained from a few days to seven or eight years according to a 1974 “state security law” authorizing the arrest and detainment of suspects for a maximum renewable period of three years. After being tried, many of them were given various prison terms. The harshest sentences were passed regarding 73 young Bahrainis who were accused of belonging to the Al-Jabha al-Islamiyya li Tahreer al-Bahrain (the Islamic Front for the Liberation of Bahrain) led by Sayyid Hadi al-Mudarrisi, a prominent Bahraini theological scholar, writer, author, and public speaker, and of planning a plot to overthrow the government. These 73 defendants are reported to have been tortured, and some of them have become terminally ill. Defendant Ja`fer Kazim al-`Alawi, for example, now has a broken leg because of the beating he received, so much so that he is unable to walk or stand. All the teeth of defendant Mansoor Ali al-Ghasrah were knocked down, while Radi Mahdi Zaynud-Deen al-Darazi died on August 30, 1986 as a result of being tortured. In one of the letters which these defendants were somehow able to smuggle outside their prison, they indicated that they were all exposed to horrible torture: all their nails were pulled out, they were forced to stay awake for six days to the extent of hallucinating, and that they were all sick. One defendant wrote saying that one of the torture methods used was to suspend the defendant upside down while police dogs were permitted to attack and maul his face and chest. Another method was ironing with an electric iron. Other reports indicate that due to being beaten severely, defendant Nadir al-Sayf, of Tarut, had to be hospitalized at Dammam’s Central Hospital (Dammam, Saudi Arabia) where an operation had to be performed on his back. The relatives of these defendants were not permitted all these years to see them, nor was permission granted to any medical delegation or independent human rights organization to visit them. There is only one doctor assigned to visit all prisoners twice a month, and all he has to give them are tranquilizers. These 73 Bahrainis are yet to be released. This incident received wide publicity in the U.K. and U.S. where al-Mudarrisi was described as “terrorist” and those 73 youths as “Islamic terrorists,” a term the news media in the West is very much fond of applying to anyone who in any way threatens the overseas interests of the West. The Saudi government took advantage of the “discovery” of that “plot” by instructing its Minister of Interior Prince Nayef ibn Abdel-Aziz Al Saud to point out that that “terrorist network” did not seek to overthrow only the government of Bahrain, but to undermine all Arab governments in the Gulf, and that its members are present throughout the entire Gulf. Nayef ordered the officials of his Ministry to go out on a “witch hunt” to arrest anyone suspected of dissent. The same had been carried out by the Egyptian government in November 1979. After that, Prince Nayef ibn Abdel-Aziz Al Saud called upon the government of Bahrain to sign a security and cooperation treaty which was, indeed, signed in 1987. Under the pretext of looking for affiliates or supporters of that “terrorist network,” security authorities in Bahrain conducted a thorough combing of the small population of the country from December 14, 1981 to March 1, 1982, arresting more than three thousand men and women.
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Reports of human rights violations in Bahrain are numerous and their sources vary from nationalist Bahrainis, Arab human rights organizations, to Western human rights advocates. The reports reviewed for this essay include the following: 1) Amnesty International, 2) The Islamic Front for the Liberation of Bahrain, 3) the U.S. Congress report on Bahrain, 4) the Arab Organization for Human Rights (Al Munazzamah alArabiyyah li Huqooqil Insan), 5) Lawyers and Human Rights in the Middle East, 6) Organization for the Islamic Revolution in the Arabian Peninsula, 7) the Arabic AlJazeera al-Arabia (the Arabian Peninsula) of London, U.K., 8) the Arabic Sawt alBahrain (Bahrain Voice) newsletter of London, U.K., 9) Arabia Monitor of the Washington-based International Committee for Human Rights in the Gulf and Arabian Peninsula (ICHR-GAP), in addition to a number of secondary references. The material collected from these sources would fill a handsome-size book, but since this is not a book, we are restricted to acquaint the reader with the following samples of human rights violations in that important part of our Muslim world: Part One of the U.S. Congress report on Bahrain concedes that there is no official democratic establishment in the country, in addition to the ban on all political and leftist parties. It lists four underground opposition groups trying to change the political system in Bahrain. These, according to the said report, are: 1) the Islamic Front for the Liberation of Bahrain, 2) the Islamic Call Party, 3) the Popular Front for the Liberation of Bahrain, and 4) the National Front for the Liberation of Bahrain. Defense attorneys in Bahrain are not given access to the files relevant to their defendants’ cases except one day before the trial, and they are not given more than a few minutes to speak to their clients. Often, suspects are not tried at regular courts but are, instead, interrogated at military barracks which are off-limit to the media and the attorneys, and in complete secrecy. Relatives of the accused are not permitted to see the defendants except on the day they are expected to be sentenced. Torture is often used during interrogation and questioning. Bahrainis suspected of dissent are often detained at Bahrain’s International Airport then expelled outside the country and are seldom permitted to return home. Reports have reached various human rights organizations detailing the harassment by Bahrain’s security agents (who sometimes are not Bahrainis but are either British or citizens of other countries hired by the British) of Bahrainis visiting country members of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) due to the joint security pact (referred to above) signed by such members whereby dissidents of any GCC country may be detained by the other and later deported to be arrested and jailed. For example, 26year old Bahraini citizen Salah Abdullah Habil al-Khawaja was arrested on January 2, 1988 by security agents in Saudi Arabia which he visited for the rite of ‘umra on his way back home from Poona University, India. He was interrogated and tortured by the Saudis before being handed over to the Bahraini authorities that tortured him on December 26, 1988 till he became sick with epilepsy because of exposure to electric shocks. Reports reaching the Committee for the Defense of Political Prisoners in Bahrain on January 20, 1989 indicated that Salah’s condition was deteriorating and that he could easily die. His 75-year old father Abdullah al-Khawaja was mistreated and insulted by Bahrain’s security officials when he tried three times to request a doctor to be dispatched to examine his son. On March 18, 1989, the same Committee received news that Salah was forced by his interrogators to agree to work as an informer for them despite being thus tortured. Salah is yet to be tried. When the Committee inquired about the reason why he was not allowed to receive a fair trial, one security agent, namely ‘Adil Flaifil, hinted that Salah could very well be detained for three years according to the “state security law.”
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Security agents in Bahrain sometimes resort to kidnapping suspected dissidents. Ya‘oob Yousuf al-Jafiri disappeared in early February 1988, and when his family informed officials of the “special investigation” section at the Ministry of Interior, they were told that they had no knowledge of his whereabouts. The truth is that these same officials had actually kidnapped Ya‘qoob and detained him for interrogation. One year after his disappearance, the health of Ya‘qoob’s parents deteriorated. It was then that al-Manama prison authorities ordered these parents to be present at the said prison which is located at the Qal‘a (citadel) in the center of the capital where they were informed that the Ministry of Interior had agreed they could visit their son. Those deported outside Bahrain are sometimes not the dissidents themselves but members of their families and/or relatives. According to Amnesty International’s 1990 report, Bahraini authorities wanted to implement the 1974 “state security law” referred to above in the case of 60-year old Abdullah Fakhru who was arrested in 1990 without being charged or tried. He was kept in prison for more than four months for being suspected of opposing Bahrain’s participation in the so-called “Gulf War.” In March of the same year, two Shi`a clergymen, Sayyid Alawi al-Baladi and Shaikh Ali `Ashoor, were briefly detained following their participation in a peaceful demonstration in Manama to protest the Iraqi government’s mistreatment of the great scholar and theologian Grand Ayatullah Abul-Qasim al-Khoei, and it is believed that they were not released till the end of the year. `Atiqa Ali Ibrahim, wife of a prisoner of conscience who received a 15-year sentence, was arrested together with two of her children at Bahrain’s International Airport as she returned from a trip to Syria. She was detained for one week before being forced to return to Syria, and it was only in September 1990 that she was permitted to go back home. On December 14, Dr. Abdul-Latif Mahmood al-Mahmood was arrested at the same airport upon returning from Kuwait where he had delivered a lecture sponsored by Kuwait University about the prospects for a unification among Gulf Cooperation Council member states. Dr. al-Mahmood, a highly recognized Sunni jurist (faqih) and an associate professor of Islamic studies at Bahrain University, remained in jail till he was bailed out on December 28. Those receiving the harshest sentences are, of course, suspected members or supporters of banned Bahraini religious groups such as Al-Jabha alIslamiyya li Tahreer al-Bahrain (Islamic Front for the Liberation of Bahrain), Jam`iyyat al-Taw`iya al-Islamiyya (Islamic Awakening Society), and Hizb-Allah, the Party of God (Bahrain branch), scores of whom have already received death sentences after being falsely accused of attempting to overthrow the government in 1981, according to Amnesty International’s reports covering the period from 1989-1991. Fifteen prisoners of conscience who were arrested in June 1990 were reported to have been tortured in order to force them to admit committing “crimes” of which the Bahraini government falsely accused them. With the exception of one, they were all released on bail in October 1990. In its 1990 report, Amnesty International demanded an end to the practice of torture at Bahrain’s prisons, an end to the solitary confinement, and the improvement of prison conditions especially those related to the prisoners' health and to the prisons’ sanitary conditions. In April of the same year, Amnesty International (AI) submitted its report on Bahrain to the United Nations for its review according to U.N. Resolutions 728 and 1503 regarding human rights violations. In May 1990, AI published its report on human rights violations in Bahrain, expressing alarm at its findings. Bahrain’s Minister of the Interior wrote AI in June telling it that its report was full of “deliberate rumors and misinformation,”
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claiming that there were no prisoners of conscience in Bahrain at all. He also invited AI to visit Bahrain, but till this moment, such a visit is yet to be arranged. Some incidents of arbitrary arrests have already been reported. On September 14, 1992, after the celebration at Al-Mumin mosque in Manama of the auspicious anniversary of the birth of Prophet Muhammad (pbuh), security agents arrested Muhsin Abdel-Karim al-Shihabi, Abdel-Qadir Abdel-Karim al-Shihabi, Muhammad Muhsin Abdel-Karim, and Abdel-Ghaffar Muhammad al-Ghirbal who all reside in the Draz village. They were summarily tortured and insulted then released. No charge was filed against them, nor were they given any reason why they were arrested in the first place. On September 3, 1992, Saudi authorities arrested a Bahraini citizen named Muhammad al-‘Ali, 30, and charged him with possessing a book banned in Saudi Arabia. He was released after twelve hours of interrogation. Majeed Meelad of Ras alRumman was arrested after being charged of participating in the funeral ceremony of the late Grand Ayatullah Abul-Qasim al-Khoei who died on August 8, 1992 in Najaf, Iraq, of heart failure. He was released after being tortured. Zaki Abdel-Majid, of alHoora, was arrested on August 22, 1992 and released on September 3, 1993 after being tortured. The second issue (August 1992) of Al-Dameer (the conscience), an Arabic publication of the Arab Organization for Human Rights, indicated that it delivered a memorandum to Bahrain’s Ambassador in London regarding the mistreatment of prisoners and dissidents in Bahrain, citing the example of what happened to Abdullah Ali Jasim Fakhru who was harassed and mistreated by Bahraini authorities for merely writing the amir petitioning him to fulfill his promise regarding introducing democratic reforms in the country, and also the example of Dr. Abdel-Latif alMahmood. It detailed in the said report the numerous human rights violations in Bahrain such as the lack of personal freedom and security, the mistreatment of prisoners of conscience, the absence of fair trials, the restrictions on individuals’ freedom of movement and travel, and discrimination among the citizens in running the general affairs of their country. Issue 117 (of October 1992) of the Arabic newsletter Sawt al-Bahrain (Voice of Bahrain) reported the Bahraini government granting citizenship to Baluchi, Pakistani, and non-Bahraini bedouins serving in its “defense force,” while denying it for many Bahrainis. This, according to the newsletter, proves the Bahraini government’s mistrust and apprehension of its own citizens. On March 3, 1993, the chief American delegate at the United Nations Human Rights Commission (UNHRC) made a motion to lift the international monitoring of human rights situation in Bahrain, and his motion was seconded by the government of Bahrain, thus the Al Khalifah were given a clean bill of health and are more free now than ever before to trample on all human rights. This action comes despite the full knowledge of the U.S. of the fact that Al Khalifah’s record of human rights is quite shameful indeed. This also falls within the “double standard” U.S. policy in as far as human rights are concerned: when human rights are ignored in countries the U.S. does not like, hell breaks loose, but when they are trampled upon in countries where American or British lackeys rule, it is perfectly alright. Hundreds of Bahrainis now live in exile and are banned from seeing their families and relatives; there are many Bahrainis in prison being denied the most basic of human rights; there are large numbers of Bahrainis who and whose ancestors have lived in Bahrain and yet are deprived of the Bahraini citizenship; the families of those who have been fatally tortured at Bahraini prisons have not been compensated and most likely they will never be; the SIS is still interrogating and abusing the citizens and confiscating their
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rights of speech and expression. Democracy seems to be protected not by merit but by favor. Indeed, those who are often heard talking about democracy are guilty of sheer political hypocrisy. Only simple-minded people take their claims to defend democracy seriously. Nobody should. BAHRAIN AT PRESENT:
An eerie silence and a paralyzing sense of fear currently grip Bahrain. Since mid-March, when tens of thousands of protesters last took to the streets demanding political reform, Bahraini security and military forces have engaged in an ongoing, systematic, and brutal campaign to crush the country’s pro-democracy forces. The crackdown has been sweeping and shocking. Dozens of human rights and political reform activists have been killed. Hundreds more have been imprisoned and tortured. Bahrain’s leading independent newspapear, Al- Wasat, was closed down on May 10. Provocative government actions belie claims that all the monarchy seeks is to re-establish law and order. It is apparent, instead, that the government is using martial law to carry out a vendetta against those who challenged the authority of the ruling al-Khalifa. Checkpoints have been set up to harass the country’s Shi’i citizens, who make up the majority of Bahrain’s native population and of its political opposition. Security forces have laid siege to the island’s hospitals and arrested scores of medical personnel, in what appears to be an especially inhumane and spiteful kind of intimidation. For weeks police and pro-regime supporters roamed the streets of Shi’i villages destroying cars and other property. Those who supported the protests now fear leaving their homes, lest they be publicly accosted or, worse, arrested and disappeared. The Al Khalifa regime is also taking dramatic steps to quiet critics. Authorities have targeted newspapers, journalists, and Internet bloggers in order to stymie public criticism, to control reporting about the scale of the crackdown, and to frighten into silence those who might speak out. In the last few weeks Bahraini blogs and twitter feeds that are normally vibrant have gone quiet, stunned into submission by the brutality of what is happening around them. And they have reason to fear. Those who have spoken out or who have attempted to report events going on around them are paying a high price. In early April of this year (2011), government officials took aim at Bahrain’s largest independent newspaper, al-Wasat, and accused it of “deliberate news fabrication and falsification.” Al-Wasat’s editor Mansoor al-Jamri resigned in an effort to deflect criticism from the newspaper. Instead, al-Jamri and two of his staff members will likely face a politically motivated trial. Al-Jamri was replaced with the pro-
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government Obaidly al-Obaidly. On April 5 authorities arrested Karim Fakhrawi, one of the newspaper’s founders and a member of the opposition political society al-Wefaq; on April 12 Fakhrawi died mysteriously while in police custody. On April 22 police extended their assault on al-Wasat by beating and arresting the columnist Haidar Muhammad al-Naimi, whose whereabouts and fate remain unknown. In light of these pressures, members of al-Wasat’s board of directors and the paper’s investors have reportedly decided to cease publication as of May 10. Those associated with opposition political groups have been hit the hardest, but they are not the only ones to have felt the brunt of the regime’s assault on speech. Two of Bahrain’s most prominent bloggers, Mahmood al-Yousef and Muhammad al-Maskati, were arrested in early April for bearing witness to developments in the country. Although both have been critical of the violence deployed by state security, neither belongs to the country’s opposition. For weeks they routinely appealed for calm and encouraged the government and protesters to avoid provocation and escalation. Their detentions sent a clear signal that the regime’s tolerance for being off message was very low. Bahrain government mobilizing State-controlled media In addition to serving as a form of punishment, the regime’s crackdown on public and social media reflects its struggle to control the narrative. Alongside the silencing of critical voices, authorities have also mobilized state-controlled media to assert their dominance and to offer an lternative view of the country’s domestic conflict. Bahrain’s national TV station led the way in detailing the public case again satl-Wasat on April 2 when it broadcast a program outlining charges that the paper had published fake news. The station has launched similar campaigns against prominent activists as well, including the human rights advocate Nabeel Rajab. Bahrain TV’s most important role has been to frame the country’s domestic struggle not as a contest of democracy versus autocracy, but as a sectarian clash. The state media has used the specters of Iranian meddling and the potential empowerment of the country’s Shi’i population to frighten the smaller Sunni community into supporting the political status quo and the current crackdown. Bahraini state media have also, however, served to expose the regime’s extreme tactics. On April 28 authorities revealed that four activists had been sentenced to death and three others to life imprisonment for their alleged roles in the deaths of two Bahraini policemen. The seven men were tried in closed military courts. Sensitive to claims that the government had not given the men a fair trial, Bahraini officials released a video of the men allegedly confessing to the murders. More damning ١٠
than the purported confessions, which were likely extracted under pressure, was the appearance of an eighth man, Ali Isa Saqer, on the video. Saqer died in police custody on April 9. After announcing his death, authorities claimed that he had created “chaos in the detention center.” An unruly prisoner or not, the images of Saqer’s body showed signs of devastating physical abuse. Whether Saqer’s presence on the video was intended or not, the message of his treatment was nmistakable. And it is the same message that the regime has been sending through its abuse of the media. The Al Khalifa regime has few powerful challengers when it comes to the media. The domestic independent media has been cowed. The regional media, most notably the two most widely-watched satellite news stations, Qatar-based al-Jazeera and Dubai-based al-Arabiya, have kept their distance from Bahrain, apparently due to Qatari and Saudi support for the crackdown. Although the Bahraini government has allowed a handful of Western journalists into the country, many others have been forbidden entry. And journalists who maintain contacts with Bahrainis report that they are increasingly unwilling to go public with their stories out of fear of retribution. Despite Bahraini rulers’ claims to be exposing the true nature of the uprising as an Iranian plot to destabilize the kingdom, it is clear that they are solely concerned with protecting themselves and punishing their rivals—and that they will use any means necessary to accomplish both. For the present, Bahraini citizens are left to with little to do other than ponder their fate and do so in silence. The current quiet is misleading, however: the conflict between a monarchy determined to preserve authoritarian rule and a majority population keen to secure a voice for itself is far from over.
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