“Bahrain’s crown prince met the Shi’ite Muslim opposition leader on Wednesday in search of a way out of a three-year political deadlock, a week after reconciliation talks were suspended in a setback for efforts to stabilize the U.S.-allied Gulf state. The breakdown in the reconciliation process raised jitters in the tiny Gulf Arab island monarchy in the middle of a regional tussle for influence between Shi’ite Iran and Sunni Muslim powerhouse Saudi Arabia. The meeting between Crown Prince Salman al-Khalifa and opposition chief Sheikh Ali Salman was the first since shortly after major unrest among majority Shi’ites demanding democratic reforms and a bigger say in government broke out in early 2011….…………”
The Bahrain uprising will be three years old on St. Valentine’s day in about two weeks. From the outset in February of 2011 there have been various reports and occasional speculation in Western media about Bahrain and its ruling family. One argument has been that the ruling Al Khalifa family are divided among ‘hawks’ and ‘doves’. The ‘hawks’ want to keep chipping away at what little freedoms (very little) remain from Bahrain’s original post-independence constitution. Their goal, presumably, is a Saudi-style form of democracy where the ruling family senior shaikhs are the only voters (they are almost there). The ‘doves’ presumably want to limit that ‘chipping away’. The two sides of the ruling family have at least one thing in common: they both have no respect for their original post-independence covenant with the people.
The Crown Prince Salman is reportedly listed as one of the ‘doves’. So, they report a meeting with some of the opposition as the Bahrain uprising enters its fourth year next month. Too close to the anniversary and to another round of the Formula One Grand Prix event next spring.
This is all useless, all this talk about a dialog between the ruling family and the opposition who, as a group, represent the majority of the people of Bahrain. The crackdown on opposition protests at Lulu (Pearl) Square started with the Saudi invasion of 2011 under the guise of the GCC Peninsula Shield. The Peninsula Shield was supposed to help member countries against foreign aggression, not help the regimes against their peoples. The only opportunity it had to do so was when Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait: but at that time the Saudi princes were quaking in their boots (I wouldn’t be so rude as to say they were soiling their underpants) until U.S. forces arrived.
Anyway, the Saudi entry in Bahrain started the ratcheting up of the repression that continues to this day. That is because the Saudi princes have a certain view of what should be ‘allowed’ in Bahrain, and they will veto everything else. Anything too divergent from the Saudi-style absolute tribal family rule will not be acceptable to the foreign Wahhabi overlords of Bahrain. They “own” the regime of Bahrain now, and no solution is possible as long as Saudi forces and security agents occupy the country.
Since it is unlikely that the Saudis will withdraw willingly, well, then you can draw your own conclusion as to how this will go in the coming months. Maybe more Saudi forces and agents to bolster the thousands of foreign mercenaries the regime keeps importing from places like Pakistan and Yemen and Jordan and Syria. Which will make it even harder to reach a compromise.
And the beat goes on……….
Cheers
mhg
