Protests follow killing of 14-year-old in Bahrain

Thousands of people marched through a village six miles from the center of Manama, Bahrain’s capital, on Sept. 1 for the funeral of a 14-year-old boy killed during a protest against the government the day before.

Activists said many Bahrainis were outraged by the death of the boy, identified as Ali Jawad Ahmad. People filled the streets of Sitra in protest and in mourning. They held photocopied images of the boy and chanted, “Down, down, Hamad!” a reference to the country’s ruler, King Hamad bin Isa al-Khalifa, according to a witness.

“It’s a huge march in Sitra village; it’s tens of thousands,” said Mohammed al-Maskati, the president of the Bahrain Youth Society for Human Rights, who attended the march. Images posted online showed a large crowd moving through the streets with the boy’s coffin. (New York Times, Sept. 2)

Nabeel Rajab, president of Bahrain’s Center for Human Rights, said that people took to the streets Thursday night and remained there into early Friday.

Riot police tossed tear gas canisters and shot rubber bullets in hopes of breaking up the protest, according to Rajab, who said he witnessed the clashes in one Manama suburb and also spoke to multiple eyewitnesses.

Journalist Mazen Mahdi added that he witnessed a similar crackdown in Sanabis, another suburb of the capital, and saw security forces sealing off the area.

In response, protesters set up makeshift barricades and threw stones at riot police in an attempt to stop them from going further into residential parts of the suburbs.

“Security forces raided homes and fired shots into Shiite suburbs as a form of collective punishment,” said Rajab. “It is a common tactic they use to stop youth from demonstrating against the regime.” (CNN, Sept. 2)

In addition to the killing of the youth, the clashes resulted in several injuries and dozens of arrests, according to Rajab.

Although ignored by the U.S. media, the Bahraini masses have conducted an ongoing struggle against the monarchist regime, which used lethal force against peaceful civilians in an attempt to crush an uprising earlier this year. Thousands of Saudi troops armed with tanks who invaded Bahrain in March aided the king.

More recently, another U.S. ally, Pakistan, sent thousands of mercenaries to quell the protests in Bahrain.

The Bahraini government in Manama has been recruiting former soldiers and police from Pakistan at a steady rate to strengthen the government’s forces. In many demonstrations, Bahraini protesters have shouted slogans in Urdu against Pakistani security forces. Pakistani and Saudi forces have played a major role in suppressing anti-government protests in Bahrain since the beginning of unrest in February. (The Nation, Aug, 22)

Bahrain is a close ally of the United States and houses the headquarters of the U.S. Navy’s Fifth Fleet. Even as the U.S. and NATO viciously intervene in Libya and Syria, allegedly in the name of human rights, the U.S. has given Bahrain’s openly undemocratic regime a virtual blank check to carry out repression.

Thousands of protesters have been detained, tortured and killed. Medical personnel who attempted to treat wounded demonstrators earlier this year were arrested and given life sentences. Two protesters have received the death penalty.

The trials and convictions continue and are the work of military tribunals in violation of international law. (Amnesty International, Aug. 31)

On July 24, the United Nations high commissioner on human rights spoke out against the harsh sentences, including life imprisonment, handed down to activists in Bahrain, saying their trials bear the marks of “political persecution.” (U.N. News Service, July 24)

Many of those detained in Bahrain’s Dry Dock Prison have been conducting hunger strikes to protest the arbitrary detention and military crackdown in the country. The Bahraini masses deserve the support of freedom-loving people everywhere.