Middle East Focus: On My Gulf: Arrests, the Closure of Websites and Newspapers…….

Arabia Deserta

On My Gulf: Arrests, the Closure of Websites and Newspapers…….

Walking on water

“Saudi Arabia has the largest number of Shias at 2m-odd, but they are thinly diluted in a population ten times bigger and are subject to more systematic discrimination. No Shia has become a cabinet minister or general—or even a headmistress in a state school, reflecting the Saudis’ severe Wahhabism, in effect the kingdom’s official doctrine. Still, in recent years the Saudi government has loosened some strictures on Shia worship and forced extremist Sunni clerics to lessen their anti-Shia vitriol. Those gains look fragile amid a mood of rising sectarian tension across the region. In Bahrain, months of agitation by Shias campaigning for greater rights have led to growing government fears of worse to come in the event of trouble with Iran. Pressure from Saudi-aligned Sunni radicals has led to a full-scale crackdown on Shia politicking. Widespread arrests, the closure of mainstream Shia websites and newspapers, and the banning of some Shia preachers from mosque pulpits have combined to tilt much of Shia opinion into sullen hostility to the state…….” Economist
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