Bahrain

NOVANEWS British personnel regularly run courses for the Saudi Arabian national guard in "weapons, fieldcraft and general military skills training, as well as incident handling, bomb disposal, search, public order and sniper training Bahrain's army officers have continued receiving training in the UK even months after the ruling regime began a brutal crackdown against peaceful anti-government protesters. A Freedom of Information (FoI) request has led to the disclosure that the British military continued training five Bahraini officers at Sandhurst, the elite military academy in Surrey, as recently as last month, daily The Independent reported. The British Ministry of Defense (MoD) has also been criticized for dispatching its army personnel to Saudi Arabia to train the Ki...

NOVANEWS   Bahrain's anti-government demonstrators are set to begin a new wave of protests against the ruling regime of King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa. Bahrain Center for Human Rights stated on Tuesday that anti-government protests will enter a new stage on June 1. The rights center also said that King Hamad has announced June 1 as the day when the 'state of national safety' will be lifted. On March 15, the Bahraini King declared a state of national safety to tighten security in the Middle Eastern country. Since the beginning of anti-government protests across Bahrain in mid-February, regime forces, backed by Saudi army troops, have abducted many people, including opposition activists, journalists, teachers, students, doctors, and nurses, and have also destroyed dozens of mosques. S...

NOVANEWS Bahraini comrades sent me this:  "As you may know the oppressors in Bahrain are targeting professional women arresting from their places of work or study. Many have disappeared into military style prisons and have not had access to lawyers or their families. The few who have been released report sexual attacks, verbal and physical insults and threats and other forms of torture. I attach for your attention a spreadsheet with the names of only 55 of these detainess. You will note that one of those arrested is a pregnant woman who happens to be the wife of an activist.  Many others are young women in their early 20's. One of these young ladies is a poet and a student teacher who was arrested after 4 of her brothers were threatened at gunpoint to turn their sister in. No other Arabi...

ذوالفقار ضاهر إن المتتبع لاحوال الثورات العريية التي اندلعت خلال العام الجاري قد تستفزه "السلمية" التي يواجه بها ثوار البحرين جلادهم والتي ميّزت هذه الثورة عن غيرها من شقيقاتها من الثورات العربية، رغم ان هذا النظام لم يختلف ابدا عن بقية الانظمة في استخدام العنف والقسوة لقمع من يثور ضدها. فلم يختلف الحال في البحرين في التعامل مع الثورة حيث اتبع ذلك النظام مع انطلاق شرارة الثورة أساليب عديدة للمناورة بهدف إجهاض تحركات المواطنين المحقة وبدأ يطرح مبادرات اشبه بمسرحيات للحوار، وأعلن رغبته ببدء مفاوضات ونقاش بين الحاكم ورعيته بينما الاعتقال والقتل وأحكام الإعدام هي السائدة. النظام البحريني يتواصل مع مواطنيه بالنار والرصاص سرعان ما بدأ النظام الحاكم وقواته الامنية من المرتزقة والمجنسين وتلك المستدعاة من "الجيران" باستخدام لغة النار والسلاح كوسيلة للتواصل مع المواطنين لتزداد مع مرور...

NOVANEWS   A pile of wreckage remains of what was once the Imam Ali masjid in Zayed Town, Bahrain. This masjid along with several others in different cities, generally servicing congregations of Shi‘is, were deliberately razed to the ground by Bahraini “security” forces, assisted by Saudi and Emirati troops and American-supplied munitions and personnel carriers.     By Zafar Bangash Bahraini security forces backed by Saudi troops and their masters in Washington have and continue to perpetrate indescribable crimes against innocent civilians in Bahrain. Those targeted include not only peaceful protesters, but also doctors and nurses treating the injured in hospitals. Poets, teachers and university professors and their family members have also been targeted...

NOVANEWS Bahrain updates: or what does not bother Obama "Today was the appeal for the 4 protestors who got death sentences for supposedly killing the policemen. Two got their sentences changed to life, two others are getting the death penalty. I can't believe they are actually going threw with this. The four men are so young.   In another trial today, Shaikh Al Muqtad, one of Bahrain's most important religious figures that was imprisoned, told the judge that drilled a hole into his leg and showed the judge the hole. He then said he has even more torture marks but he's not allowed to show them.  Oh they also arrested a high school girl from the Al Khawaja family (they really can't stand that family). She called her family and told them to bring her clothes. She says they to...

NOVANEWS   "Bahrain has set up new units within its Information Affairs Authority to monitor the output of foreign news services and social media, it was announced on Wednesday.   Nawaf Mohammed Al Mawadh, the IAA's director of publication and publishing and acting director of foreign media, said the move was part of a new strategic plan for 2011-15.   Al Mawadh said that the IAA had restructured its directorates and created new ones to "further help project the kingdom’s achievements and respond to false information that some channels broadcast".  He said in comments published by state news agency BPA that new directorates included one for media monitoring, another for media relations and one for social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter." Bahrain sets up new units to mo...

NOVANEWS   "In Bahrain doctors and nurses who treated protesters injured by security forces have vanished. Also in Bahrain, Abdulhadi al-Khawaja, the former head of the Centre for Human Rights and a fierce critic of the regime, was seized by armed men in the middle of the night. A month later he reappeared, tortured and is now facing trial." Human-rights abuses Nothing new under the sun Some dictators may have fallen, but human-rights abuses continue The economist Tunisian plainclothes back in action THE world really can become a better place—that seemed to be the belief of the protesters who have thronged streets in the Middle East. Sadly, those who spoke this week at the Oslo Freedom Forum, a glittering gathering of veterans of human-rights struggles, instead attested to the wi...

NOVANEWS While Bahrain demolishes mosques, U.S. stays silent Braigh mosque in Bahrain before destruction | YouTube  View larger image  By Roy Gutman | McClatchy Newspapers MANAMA, Bahrain — In the ancient Bahraini village of Aali, where some graves date to 2000 B.C., the Amir Mohammed Braighi mosque had stood for more than 400 years — one of the handsomest Shiite Muslim mosques in this small island nation in the Persian Gulf. Today, only bulldozer tracks remain. In Nwaidrat, where anti-government protests began Feb. 14, the Mo'men mosque had long been a center for the town's Shiite population — photos show it as a handsome, square building neatly painted in ochre, with white and green trim, and a short portico in dark gray forming the main entrance. Today, only the portico ...

NOVANEWS By Prof Lawrence Davidson Part I – Welcome to Bahrain   If you want to see how an ostensive religious regime can be corrupted into something close to fascism, just take a look at contemporary Bahrain. In February 2011 there were a series of non-violent demonstrations staged mostly by the small kingdom’s Shia majority (approximately 70% of the country’s Muslim citizens.) These were held to protest the discriminatory practices of the country’s Sunni monarchy. The protests were soon violently suppressed by the Bahraini army and police, with the help of troops from Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. However, it was what followed the crushing of the demonstrations that smacks of fascism. Here is how a report, dated 6 May 2011, by Roy Gutman of the McClatchy Newspa...