Category Archives: Bahrain

Arab Counterrevoltion, Arab Revolutions, Bahrain, OPEC, Saudi Arabia

Illusion of Gulf Arab Reform, the Lethal Price of Petroleum, Qaddafi the Good Repentant Leader …….

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      BFF

“When U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton made a statement about the need to speed up political reform in the Arab countries, especially Saudi Arabia and Bahrain, did she really think that is possible under these two regimes? There is no way the answer to that can be in the affirmative, unless “reform” means some cosmetic marginal plans and some practices like symbolic elections and “consultative councils” that the state media use……… These day of domination of oil money, such terms are meaningless, especially when large Western public relations firms are available to polish the images of despotic regimes that have unlimited financial liquidity. When the price of crude petroleum exceeds $110 per barrel, the weapon of money in the hands of these repressive regimes becomes an even more effective weapon than torture and other means of repression. I recall meetings between op Western officials, among them Tony Blair, and the now-murdered Colonel Qaddafi when he was an absolute dictator. Yet the same media quickly changed the image of that “repentant leader” back to the “dictator that must be overthrown”………..”

This is my translation of a brief excerpt of a column by exiled Bahraini academic and activist, Dr. Saied al-Shihabi who lives in London. Arab columns are often long, some are way too long, most should not even be written. This was a good one, I enjoyed reading it.
Cheers
mhg


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Apartheid, Arab Counterrevoltion, Arab Revolutions, Bahrain, GCC, Human Right, Media

Shaikh bin Goebbels of Bahrain Continues Fibbing on Alarabiya………….

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      BFF

“If you have no shame, then do (and say) whatever you wish….” A good Arab saying

The divisive sectarian approach of Saudi semi-official Alarabiya network is breath-taking, especially on its Arabic website. It never misses a chance to highlight Shi’a-Sunni differences and divisions and to stoke their sectarian fires, especially in the Gulf region. Here it is writing about Bahrain, in the language of the official media of that country:

“Shaikh Fawaz Bin Mohammed Al-Khalifa, Chief of the Information (Propaganda) Authority of Bahrain, asserted that none of the opposition were ever prevented from appearing on the Bahrain television. He revealed that more than 300 Shi’a personality from among the opposition and government employees and civil society activists were invited but they all declined, either by refusing directly or pretending to be sick…….. About why the Bahrain government did not present any evidence of Iranian involvement in the Bahrain ‘events’ he said that has to do with future security reasons. He added that there is much evidence of Iranian involvement………….”

I am thinking of changing the middle name of the ruling family from Bin Technocrat al-Khalifa to Bin Goebbels al-Khalifa.

Cheers
mhg


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Arab Counterrevoltion, Arab Media, Bahrain, GCC, Hezbollah, Iran, Kuwait, Media, Saudi Arabia, Terrorism

GCC Breaking News: Plots in Bahrain, Plots in Kuwait, Hezbollah under Every Bed, Shi’as Occupying Mecca……….

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      BFF

Breaking News: the government of Bahrain has not announced the discovery of any new Iranian or Hezbollah terrorist plots today. They have not identified any installations or individuals who may have been targets of today’s uncovered plot. This is an unusual development for Bahrain.The regime and its imported mercenarise are slowing down
On the other hand, the Kuwaiti-Saudi daily rag alseyassah is taking up the slack. (I find alseyassah entertaining, although not as humorous as, say, The Onion). It reports that Hezbollah has put its sources on alert around the region, and that there was in fact a terror plot in Bahrain and added an extra-credit bonus: that the latest Bahrain plotters got financing from some Kuwaitis, meaning Shi’as in Kuwait (apparently the Iranians and Hezbollah ran out of money!).
Alseyassah, like a couple of other rags in my hometown, fits well into its Saudi patrons’ propaganda drive to divide the Gulf region along sectarian lines.
It also dropped a bombshell that only our overfed “faithful” would believe: it reported that Iranian and Syrian agents were plotting to assassinate three Gulf GCC foreign ministers, no less! Alseyassah has not yet report that Hezbollah and Iran are planning an invasion of Mecca to take over the Kaaba, after blowing up the Vatican. Not yet, but stay tuned.
Saudi media are not as dumb as their Gulf surrogates. They have become smarter, more subtle, with the exception of Alarabiya which is openly sectarian on its Arabic website.
Cheers
mhg


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Arab Counterrevoltion, Arab Revolutions, Bahrain, Corruption, GCC, Human Right, Torture

Bahrain Sports: Mixing Soccer, Football, and Torture…………..

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      BFF

“A few days ago, ESPN looked at calls for political change in Bahrain through the lens of sport, and it’s not a pretty picture (I’ve embedded the video below). The story of Alaa and Mohammed Hubail, former stars of Bahrain’s national football team now living in exile, reminded me of Saddam Hussein’s Iraq, where athletes lived in constant fear of Saddam and his sons. Iraq, like Bahrain, has a Shiite majority. And, like Bahrain, Saddam’s Iraq was ruled by a Sunni leader who blithely ignored the wishes of the majority of his population. Such situations corrupt everything. In Iraq, national players were tortured and jailed for poor performances. Many promising Shiite players never got a chance at the national team because of their fate. Now, in a smaller way, Bahrain is emulating Saddam Hussein’s Iraq. Alaa and Mohammed Hubail, brothers and national-team stars, are now living in the shadows, kicked off the national team and humiliated. After being arrested and, according to them, beaten in a Bahraini government detention center, they were also fired from the professional clubs. Why? They joined a democracy protest last February. Like most Bahrainis, they are Shiites, and were angry at the monarchy. Alaa is probably the country’s greatest-ever player, with 21 goals for his country. Of his detention, he told ESPN: “We were living in a nightmare of fear and horror.“………”

No comment this time, but I reserve the right for a rain check. Meanwhile, here is the ESPN video link.
Cheers
mhg


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Bahrain, Espionage, Iran, Kuwait

Iranian General Killed in Explosion, Unlikely Spies in Abadan, Bahrain……………

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“A commander of the Revolutionary Guard killed in an explosion at an ammunition depot west of Tehran was a key figure in Iran’s missile programme, the elite military force said. General Hasan Moghaddam was killed alongside 16 guard members on Saturday at a military site 25 miles south-west of Tehran. The Revolutionary Guard said the accident occurred while military personnel were transporting munitions……..”

Time Magazine reports, quoting intelligence reports, that the Israelis were behind the explosion.
Meanwhile, the tit-for-tit of espionage and arrests continue. Bahrain has announced yet another of their weekly Iranian plots. I think soon they will start discovering Iranian plots on a daily basis (maybe even more often if Hezbollah is thrown in as well).
WTF of the week: Iranian authorities have arrested an Iranian who reports for the BBC. They must consider correspondents for foreign media as spies now. The shocker is that the Iranians also claim they have arrested two Kuwaitis (reportedly journalists for a Kuwait TV network) who they claim were spying in the oil center city of Abadan on Shatt al-Arab. It is hard to believe: Kuwaiti spies? Highly unlikely. The charge is almost as ridiculous as the weekly (soon to be daily) Bahrain regime claims.
Cheers
mhg


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Arab Counterrevoltion, Arab Revolutions, Arabian Peninsula, Bahrain, Hezbollah, Iran, Qatar, Salafi, WTF

Bahrain (& maybe Qatar) Uncover another Stupid Terror Plot, about that Embassy Bombing……….

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      BFF

“JEDDAH: A terror cell planning attacks against the Saudi Embassy, the King Fahd Causeway and other vital installations in Bahrain has been broken up, a Bahraini Interior Ministry spokesman said Saturday. Four members of the cell were detained in Qatar and turned over to Manama, while a fifth Bahraini was arrested inside the country, said Gen. Tareq Al-Hasan. The alleged targets also included the Bahraini Interior Ministry and other individuals. Al-Hasan said the four arrested in Qatar had been traveling by car from Saudi Arabia. Security officers at a checkpoint seized “documents and a computer containing information of a security nature (and) details on certain vital sites.” They were also carrying US dollars and Iranian rials………..”

If I were an Iranian official plotting terrorism in Bahrain or in Saudi Arabia, I would never hand the terrorists Iranian money, for two reasons: (1) American dollars, or Euro, or Gulf currencies are easier to use, and (2) Iranian money would look suspicious if these men get caught. A smart Iranian “control” would have them carry wads of Israeli NIS.
If I wanted to make sure everyone “knew” the Iranians were behind a plot, I’d give the terrorists some Iranian currency, a lot of it. So, somebody is very stupid: it can be the Iranians, or the Bahrainis, or the Saudis. Who do you think is that stupid? Could it be all of the above? I suspect any of the above have operatives who are stupid enough. The good news (or is it the bad news) is that we have not read anything (yet) linking this “plot” to an Iranian used car dealer in Texas named Arbabsiar. But it is early.

The Bahrain and Saudi media are running away with it. Saudi semi-official network Alarabiya headlines that members of the appointed Bahrain sectarian “parliament” have claimed Iran and Hezbollah were involved (they forgot to add North Korea). Qatari media have not reported on this, yet. Which is also odd, but maybe they are as suspicious of the timing of this as I am.
I think somebody somewhere ought to quit while they are ahead: the question is where is that somebody? Tehran or Manama or Riyadh?
Cheers
mhg


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Arab Counterrevoltion, Arab Revolutions, Bahrain, GCC, Qatar, Saudi Arabia

Arab Potentates Gaming the Electoral Systems: Qatar, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia…….

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      BFF

“Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani said there would be a vote for an advisory council in 2013, in line with a constitution introduced eight years ago. The decision is another victory, though a small one given the delayed and partial nature of the change, for the Arab Spring which Qatar did so much to foment. The royal family’s failure to introduce any semblance of the democracy it was helping elsewhere to promote, through the Al-Jazeera television channel which it owns, and finance with its large-scale backing for the revolution in Libya, has drawn increasing political attention to itself. “We have always preferred that regimes start changes on their own and lead the movement of transformation, instead of seeing people rise up,” the Emir said in a nod to the contradiction………...”

No doubt the Qatari potentate had to do something. His Aljazeera network could not continue publicizing Arab uprisings against despots in Syria and Libya and other places while his own people had no representation. A two-third elected parliament is better than no parliament, depending on what other actions the government takes to influence the elections. The “devil is in the detail” and all that. It will be better than Bahrain which has nominally a half-elected legislature but it is effectively no more elected than 30% or so. It is even better than the case of Saudi Arabia where no one votes for a legislature or a dog-catcher and the ‘Shoura” council is fully appointed by the royal family. The Saudi “elections” they are talking about are for toothless municipal councils, which will also act as “advisory”, pending the accession to the throne of Prince Nayef (Naif) who will then get rid of them.
Arab potentates on the Gulf are learning how to “game the system”. Just as Mubarak and Saleh did, they can have all the pretensions of popular elections, without the headache and inconvenience of actual accountability. It would also make the Western allies happier, once they learn to turn a blind eye.

Cheers
mhg


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Arab Counterrevoltion, Arab Revolutions, Bahrain, GCC, Healthcare, Iraq, Persian-American Gulf

Gulf Soccer Tournament Moved from Iraq to Repressive Bahrain…….

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     BFF

Sports potentates of the Persian-American Gulf, including the GCC states and Yemen (which is not a Gulf state) and Iraq but minus Iran, met Monday and made a sudden decision to move the upcoming Gulf Cup games from Iraq to Bahrain. They cited instability in Iraq as a reason for the move, adding that it was not a political move and that the next round, the 2013 tournament, will be in Iraq. The move was from the frying pan of Iraq to the fires of rebellious occupied Bahrain.

Of course the move was all political. Moving the games from terrorist-threatened Iraq to a Bahrain where the people are in revolt against the regime. It was also a way for the GCC potentates to needle Iraq, insult it by forcing it to attend in occupied Bahrain or, possibly better yet, forcing it to withdraw from the event. No doubt the Saudis and their al-Khalifa toadies were behind the move, hoping the Iraqis will decide to quit. Of course the al-Saud may have to send in more tanks and soldiers into Bahrain for the games, and they may have to ban a majority of Bahrain’s people from attending the games. I suspect most of the people may boycott the games anyway.
 
One thing is almost certain: whoever wins the Gulf trophy can attribute the victory, as usual, to the ruling potentates; whoever loses will blame the mullahs in Iran.
Cheers
mhg


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Arab Counterrevoltion, Arab Revolutions, Bahrain, GCC, Human Right, Salafi, Torture, US Foreign Policy

In the Shadow of the Fifth Fleet: “five months in custody, enduring beatings, torture, sexual assault and threats of rape……..”

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     BFF

“When a Bahraini hospital started to take in casualties from the violent crackdown on protesters earlier this year, Rula al-Saffar was one of the first to volunteer. As a medical professor and president of the Bahraini Nursing Society, she was not on the staff of the overwhelmed Salmaniya hospital, but doctors needed all the help they could get. Saffar could not have known at the time that in stepping in to help save lives she was endangering her own. Within weeks she would be arrested, charged, convicted in a trial lasting minutes and sentenced to 15 years in prison, along with 19 other hospital medics………. Saffar was arrested on 4 April after receiving a late-night phone call ordering her to present herself to Bahrain’s Central Investigation Department for interrogation. “The minute I entered they just closed the gate, and suddenly I was blindfolded, handcuffed and started being pushed and cussed at the whole time. “I never knew why was I there. And then this woman started shouting at me, that you hate the system, that you were a protester against the system, against the king. “I kept saying: ‘No, this is not what happened,’ and of course the minute you say no they beat you up and they electrocute you … And I thought: ‘How dare you do this?’ Interrogation … as you see in a democratic country, I thought my country had the same thing, where you have a right for your lawyer, they read your warrant. But this is not what happened to us.” Saffar spent five months in custody, enduring beatings, torture, sexual assault and threats of rape… ……”

Yes sir, those mercenary interrogators from Pakistan and Jordan are sure earning their pay. As do the local thugs of the regime. That must be what the billion-dollar a year GCC aid was intended for. I wonder if they had some of those Salafi shaikhs they have in their pockets sanction such behavior as kosher, in a Salafi Islamic sense. For a price, of course. As for our Wahhabi faux-liberals on our Gulf, many of them think it is alright, as long as the Salafi shaikhs say so. In the shadow of the U.S. Fifth Fleet.

Cheers
mhg


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Bahrain, GCC, Kuwait, Persian-American Gulf, Salafi, Saudi Arabia, WTF

Kuwait Protests? about Saudi Protests, Bahrain Protests, Salafi Uprising………….

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“Meshal al-Zaidi says he was drawn into Kuwait’s protest movement by political ideals, not the economic grievances that helped spur revolts in poorer Arab countries. “My friend drives a Porsche Cayenne, another a Porsche Panamera, you’ll see the best cars at Kuwaiti protests,” said al-Zaidi, a 25-year-old who runs a public relations firm and attends rallies seeking the ouster of Prime Minister Sheikh Nasser al-Mohammed al-Sabah. “It’s not about money, it’s not about oil, it’s about real democracy.”………” Bloomberg News

No, it is not all about real democracy. It is hardly about democracy. God knows there is plenty of corruption and mismanagement in Kuwait, although not nearly as much as in Saudi Arabia or Bahrain. Hell, they even hired Tony Blair as a consultant: now that can’t reflect any true commitment to honesty and clean management, can it? But then all that is really lowering the bar.
Although some, a few, of the protesters want more freedom and accountability, there are many more among them who have no desire for democracy. Just ask almost anyone who shows up at these small events about Saudi Arabia, and they’ll either praise that country’s regime or get evasive. Unfortunately most of the so-called protesters are either of the local Wahhabi faux-liberals or the Islamists (die-hard Salafis) with a few bored-to-death others thrown in. Some may be part (pawns) of an intense power struggle within the ruling elite.
 
The Wahhabi faux-liberals are already tweeting and ‘column-izing’ against the currents protests in Saudi Arabia, labeling them an “Iranian” plot, just as they do in Bahrain. I don’t think they are stupid, nobody can be that stupid (or can they?). The Salafi Islamists among them have no desire to have any form of enhanced democracy, but they are great opportunists. Some of these Islamists seem to be the loudest, more media-grabbing among the “protesters”. They failed to get rid of the current prime minister through a parliamentary vote since most members voted against them (either out of conviction or for self-interest). That is when they tried the street. Many of these same Salafis have pushed for more restrictions on the freedom of expression in the legislature. They mostly look toward Salafi Wahhabi corrupt Saudi Arabia as the “model”, to the extent of pushing for some form of political ‘consolidation’ presumably under some form of Saudi rule (perhaps a satrapy like Bahrain?).
This local columnist here gives a glimpse into some of the “Saudi” loyalties at work. He is too shy to mention the country’s name directly. He points out that the government is guilty and responsible for past policies that created the current atmosphere of corruption and unrest.
Cheers
mhg


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