Movement Strategy Brunches: “Campaign Season” Never Ends for the Professional Left “One Big Progressive Cluster-F–k”
by The INSIDER – November 14, 2012 – counter punch

President Barack Obama was elected merely a week ago in a presidential campaign that ran a bill of $6 billion.
“Campaign Season,” as its called by the electioneering professionals and most journalists, has officially come to an end in the eyes of most citizens and the press, both mainstream and “independent media” alike. For the “Professional Left” though, “campaign season” never actually ends, which explains why they refer to their form of activism as “campaigns.” It’s truth in advertising, at last!

The newest “campaign” in town is being run by….wait for it….a MoveOn.org offshoot in the form of “Movement Strategy Brunches” being held nationwide on Nov. 17-18.

“Drink Mimosas”

On Nov. 8, writing to a confidential email list, Liz Butler, a “Senior Fellow and Network Organizing Project Director” of the Movement Strategy Center, declared,

“We are asking you to set up a Movement Strategy Brunch – an informal, low-key way to bring together you and other local grassroots people at the local level to reflect, drink mimosas (or healthy green smoothies) and talk about the future. Sound fun? It’s supposed to be! After so much hard work, it’s nice to be able to kick back, drink some orange juice, and munch on a flaky croissant.”

The Movement Strategy Center is the Fiscal Sponsor for Van Jones’ Rebuild the Dream, according to Rebuild the Dream‘s website. Jones’ front group for the Democratic Party set up shop in June 2011 when MoveOn.org gave $348K to Rebuild the Dream in start-up capital, according to its most recent Internal Revenue Service (IRS) 990 form.

Rebuild, as regular CounterPunch readers will likely recall, was responsible for the attempt to co-opt the Occupy movement not once, but twice – once in the fall of 2011 and once again in the spring of 2012.

Butler oversaw the “99 Spring,” the front operation for both MoveOn.org and the Democratic Party. Prior to her current stint at the Movement Strategy Center in April 2012, Butler worked for 3.5 years as the Campaign Director for 1Sky, which in April 2011 merged with 350.org, currently in the throes of its “Do the Math” campaign.

The email was co-signed by Billy Wimsatt, a Fellow at the Movement Strategy Center, as well as an employee of Rebuild the Dream, two outfits that are interchangeable and one-in-the-same. A WhoIs.net search shows Wimsatt registered the website for the “Movement Strategy Brunches” on Oct. 16, a few weeks ahead of the Nov. 6 election.
“Consensual Domination”

Like its cousin the 99 Spring, the ”Movement Strategy Brunches” give well-meaning grassroots activists the illusion of having full control of things at the local level. “YOU organize it,” shouts its website.

Yet again, it’s the same players managing a brand new version of what University of California-Santa Barbara Sociology Professor William I. Robison refers to as “consensual domination” in his classic book, “Promoting Polyarchy: Globalization, US Intervention, and Hegemony.”

“The Gramscian concept of hegemony as ‘consensual domination’ exercised in civil and political society at the level of the individual nation (or national society) may be extended/applied to the emergent global civil and political society,” he wrote in the book’s introduction. “The emergence of ‘democracy promotion’ as a new instrument and the orientation in US foreign policy in the 1980s represented the beginnings of a shift – still underway – in the method through which the core regions of the capitalist world system exercise their domination over peripheral and semi-peripheral regions…”

The tools of imperialism have come home to the core of the empire, as they always do. This time, like the many times before, it’s in the form of “consensual domination” on the part of citizens who partake in “activism” that’s nothing more than freshly installed astroturf for the Democratic Party disguised as “democracy promotion.”
“These pseudo-revolutionaires no doubt believe their own propaganda, or their ‘memes,’ as they prefer to call them. But these liberal cultists are nothing more than convenient lap dogs for the ‘progressive’ millionaires who fund them and the Democrats,” said John Stauber, author of the book Toxic Sludge is Good for You and Founder of the Center for Media and Democracy. ”They are well fed, they groom each other, they regurgitate the same talking points, and they consistently accomplish nothing in the real world except to push a false hope that they are leading a real Movement. In other words, it’s a classic form of cooptation, which is both made possible by the severe limitations of the political process and of course serves to limit it further. It is essential to maintaining a status quo that benefits the 1%. Follow the money, this is one big progressive cluster-fuck.”

The Insider is the pseudonym of an activist who works inside the Liberal Foundation-Funded Democratic Party-Allied Belly of the Beast.

Two homemade bombs defused in Bahrain
11 November, 2012 – Muslim World News – By IANS/WAM,

Manama: The Bahraini security forces have defused two homemade bombs, just like those used in the recent string of terror attacks.
s
The bombs were found Thursday during a search of a minibus parked near a shop. The visiting special security squad later defused them.

Meanwhile, in a clampdown on terror acts, the security forces raided a warehouse in Bani Jamra area and seized 178 Molotov cocktails, 11 fire extinguishers, 200 iron rods and two petrol tanks. …source

Security of Bahrain Arrests 4 Bombers
11 November, 2012 – newzglobe.com

Bahrain authorities announced that it had arrested four suspects in the bombings that killed two people in the capital Manama and accused the Lebanese group Hezbollah of being behind this attack. The Public Security Chief Major-General Tareq Al Hassan said the suspects were arrested after prosecutors issued arrest warrants and police were hunting for other killers.

Bahrain government has been struggling since early last year to suppress pro-democracy unrest. Minister Samira Ebrahim Bin Rajab said that the bombings were staged by terrorist groups trained outside Bahrain and that were based in countries including Lebanon. She added that the groups were operating under principles set by Iranian Supreme and that 19 pro-Iran satellite media channels were inciting their supporters in Bahrain to subvert the government.

Bahrain government has repeatedly blamed Iran of fomenting the chaos and Hezbollah denies his involvement in the Bahrain protests, but has criticized the government’s handling of them.

The UN Secretary urges all Bahrainis to come together in a spirit of national unity and to resolve differences peacefully through dialogue and reconciliation. …source

Rashed Al Rashed, the member of “Islamic act” movement underscored the malignant attempts of Bahraini government for quashing demonstration and terminating the process of revolution in this country and also frightening people who are abide by resistance.

Recent explosions, a cover used by Bahraini Government: Rashed Al Rashed
11 November, 2012 – ABNA

(Ahlul Bayt News Agency) – Pointing to the recent explosion in Bahrain, the political activist, Rashed Al Rashed, in an interview underlined that no body and no group took the responsibility of the recent explosions and it seems that the government try to cover its own violent measures by exploiting such event in this country.

A rough transcription of the interview follows.

Qs: As one of the members of “Islamic act” movement, what is your idea about the recent explosions happened in Bahrain?

Up to now, no groups took the responsibility of such explosions. But the government, obviously enough, try to exploit such actions and events to cover its own violent measures against the revolution and Bahraini nation.

As we observed in the event of surrounding Al ‘Akr area, the government claimed to occurring some events (such as killing one of the security forces during the peaceful demonstration), but none of those claims were true and corroborated by no opposition groups.

It would, on the face it, seem that the government hide behind some few people and through such show, surrounded the whole area and terrified the area residents.

At this time it is announced that five explosions happened in the country but no one, except the ministry of the country, knows about the hows of its happening and those who were behind that.

After announcing such news, the government quickly set up checkpoints in different parts of Bahrain to scare Bahraini people.

Undoubtedly all these attempts are for terminating the revolution and frightening people, opposition groups and protesters. But resistance is the want of all Bahraini people and this nation is abided by it, inasmuch as not only their country has been occupied, but also Bahraini government has no legal legitimacy to run the country.

The country of Bahrain is occupied by Saudi forces, US-back forces named “Separe Jazireh”, alongside; the UK also sent their spy forces to this country. Such measures alongside increasing massacre, arresting and committing sacrilegious acts made people more resolute in what they want.

Qs: Would you please explain more about the condition of captive people and children?

By perpetrating such measure, the government proved that it does not think about Bahraini people and let the foreign forces commit such crimes to quash demonstration and protest in this land.

Nowadays, Bahraini protesters do not belong to just a specific party; on the contrary, all these nations are against the violence, massacre, arresting children, political activists, religious scholars and women in this country.

Such violent policy and movement illustrate this fact that the government cannot tolerate hearing any idea running counter to its policy.

Such arresting also carries a message for the international communities and European countries. It actually reveals that Bahraini government reached to this level that even does not let the nation cast their vote or arrest people for expressing their ideas in twitter.

Qs: What role international organizations, especially UNICEF, played for supporting children and those who were arrested in Bahrain?

The most paramount movement made by international organizations was Geneva Meeting in which 58 countries condemned the crimes of Al Khalife. But such meeting did not come up with some decision for castigating the regime of Al Khalife, for breaking the human right rules in this country. For instance, we did not witness sending any letter from the conference to the Security Council.

Movement done by the international organizations just limited to some statements issued by human right organizations and unfortunately the foresaid organizations and foundations did not took future step in this arena and no practical movement made against the massacre and killings in this country.

Qs: What is your view point about the termination of Bahrain revolution?

Nations, definitely, are resolute in what they want and are after. Nations stay and these are the governments which come and go. It seems that despite of all killings, cracking down, sacrilegious acts and arresting children and women, the process of transformation has been initiated in this country and the U.S and U.K forces cannot support such abhorred government any more.

Nations are always the winners and by God’s help the government of Bahrain will be collapsed and people get what they are after. …source

Al-Khalifa Regime’s Forces Storm 50 Houses in Southeastern Manama
FARS – 11 November, 2012

TEHRAN (FNA)- Security forces stormed 50 houses in Sitrah island town Southeast of the capital Manama as part of their widespread brutal crackdown on peaceful protests against the Bahraini regime.

“The security forces of the Bahraini regime have stormed over 50 houses during last 4 days and most of the attacks came at dawns,” Bahrain’s al-Wefaq National Islamic society said in a statement.

The statement called the regime’s move “illegal” which has taken place with no “permission”.

“Bahraini citizens faced sudden attack by masked forces at their houses while they were asleep,” the statement said.

Forces loyal to the Al-Khalifa regime have intensified their clampdown on people in the recent months.

On Friday, the security forces killed a 16-year-old boy who reportedly tried to get to a mosque and was then chased onto a highway where he was struck by a car and killed.

Al-Khalifa forces had kept many people from attending the Friday prayers of Sheik Isa Qassim, who has already denounced Bahrain’s move to revoke the citizenship of 31 activists and lawyers.

Anti-government protesters have been holding peaceful demonstrations across Bahrain since mid-February 2011, calling for an end to the Al Khalifa dynasty’s over-40-year rule.

Violence against the defenseless people escalated after a Saudi-led conglomerate of police, security and military forces from the Persian Gulf Cooperation Council (PGCC) member states – Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates, Oman and Qatar – were dispatched to the tiny Persian Gulf kingdom on March 13, 2011, to help Manama crack down on peaceful protestors.

So far, more than 69 people have been killed, hundreds have gone missing and thousands of others have been injured.

Police clampdown on protesters continues daily. Authorities have tried to stop organized protests by opposition parties over the past month by refusing to license them and using tear gas on those who turn up.

The opposition coalition wants full powers for the elected parliament and a cabinet fully answerable to parliament. …source

Bahraini Dissidents Face Deeper, Systematic Crackdown
Daniel R. DePetris – November 12, 2012 – Atlantic Sentinel

Bahrain may appear a relatively stable Western ally in a critically important region of the world there is a dark cloud hanging over the small island kingdom.

The peaceful protests in Bahrain that were once prevalent during the beginning of the country’s version of the “Arab spring” have succumbed to a dangerous mix of arrests, flimsy prosecutions, indefinite detention, torture and violence. A significant part of this is fueled by the Bahraini monarchy’s refusal to enact political reforms, much to the chagrin of international human rights activists. Recommendations to enhance the power of the legislature and prosecute senior security officials who are suspected of abuse have been largely ignored.

Instead of more freedom to speak and a political order that is more accountable to Bahrain’s people, what the country’s residents have faced is a deeper and more systemic crackdown on their activities.

In October, all protest gatherings were decreed to be illegal. The government has since ramped up arrests and thrown ordinary citizens in prison for “hurting Bahraini unity and solidarity.” Some of the very civil rights activists that were released from prison have been arrested and convicted again.

The United States Government, Bahrain’s biggest patron outside the Middle East, has been mostly quiet despite these abuses. Policy makers have spoken out publicly against the situation in the kingdom on occasion but only when high profile figures were convicted on questionable grounds in Bahraini courts. The Obama Administration also condemned Bahrain when it banned all protests. “The decision to curb these rights is contrary to Bahrain’s professed commitment to reform and it will not help advance the national reconciliation nor build trust among all parties,” said a spokesman for the State Department.

Public remarks cannot be Washington’s only pressure valve. Criminalizing public demonstrations has the effect of silencing all peaceful avenues of dissent. With no way to voice their anger in a legitimate way, Bahrainis may take it upon themselves to exercise more confrontation toward their authorities. Police officers have already been killed from firebombs and homemade explosives. The casualties could get a lot worse if the order to block peaceful assembly remains in place over an indefinite period of time. ….more

The Senior Officer gets in the last hit.

Cyber-cops in United Arab Emirates given more leeway for crackdowns on Web activism
By Associated Press – 13 November, 2012

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — The United Arab Emirates set stricter Internet monitoring and enforcement codes Tuesday that include giving authorities wider leeway to crack down on Web activists for offenses such as mocking the country’s rulers or calling for demonstrations.

The measures are another sign of tougher cyber-policing efforts by Western-backed leaders across the Gulf amid growing concerns over perceived political or security threats since the Arab Spring uprisings.

The Web clampdowns, however, have brought outcry from rights groups and media freedom advocates that claim Gulf authorities are increasingly muzzling free expression in the name of preserving the powers of the ruling clans from Kuwait to Oman.

The new UAE codes — posted on the official news agency WAM — also raise questions about potential new red lines for the country’s huge expatriate work force in which parodies and pointed criticism of the UAE are common fodder on websites. It’s unclear, too, whether the codes could put a chill on media coverage of sensitive issues such as the rising profile of Islamist factions.

The UAE has not faced any street protests during the Arab Spring upheavals, but authorities have stepped up arrests and pressure on groups including an Islamist organization, Al Islah, that official claim seeks to undermine the country’s ruling system. In September, Dubai’s police chief, Lt. Gen. Dahi Khalfan Tamim, warned of an “international plot” to overthrow the Gulf governments by Islamists inspired by the rise to power of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt.

Many of the codes in UAE’s updated Internet law focus on issues such as online fraud, privacy protection and efforts to combat prostitution.

But a major section spells out sweeping limits and possible prison terms for any posts “to deride or to damage the reputation or the stature of the state or any of its institutions,” including the rulers and high officials across the UAE — a federation of seven semiautonomous emirates.

It also outlaws “information, news, caricatures or any other kind of pictures” that authorities believe could threaten security or “public order.” These include Web posts calling for public protests or “disobeying the laws and regulations of the state.”

The decree, issued by the UAE President Sheik Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan, came just hours after the UAE was elected to a three-year seat on the U.N. Human Rights Council.

In an apparent response to the worldwide chaos touched off in September over a video clip denigrating the Prophet Muhammad, the new codes said jail terms are possible for any Internet posts that “display contempt” for Islam or any other faith.

Across the Gulf, other authorities have stepped up prosecutions against online activists and others. Earlier this month, a Bahraini man was sentenced to six months in prison on charges of insulting the Gulf nation’s king in Twitter posts. In September, a journalist-blogger in Oman received a one-year prison term for alleged anti-government writings.

…source

Bahrain endorses Gulf Cooperation Council security treaty draft
Global Arab Network – – Shahid Abbas – 13 November, 2012

A security treaty draft that allows the tracking down of lawbreakers and wanted people across the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries regardless of their nationalities has been endorsed by Bahrain, Global Arab Network reports according to local media.

“The Cabinet reviewed a memorandum from the Interior Ministry on the GCC security draft and approved it,” Yasser Al Nasser, the Cabinet secretary general, said following the session on Sunday.

The draft aims at reinforcing security cooperation and coordination between the six member countries of the GCC, Al Nasser said.

Under the treaty, each GCC country is bound to take legal action — based on its own legislation — against citizens or residents who interfere in the domestic affairs of another member. The member countries will also exchange information and expertise to combat all forms of crime, the draft stated.

The security treaty could be taken up by the GCC leaders when they convene for their annual summit in December in Bahrain. In May, the leaders endorsed an agreement to promote collective security.

The initial security agreement was announced in Manama in December 1994, but only Bahrain, Saudi Arabia and Oman endorsed it at the time. Qatar entered the pact in 2009. The GCC leaders, at their 2010 summit in Kuwait, called for building on the understanding by putting it to a committee of experts and specialists from the GCC countries.

On Saturday, Gazi Al Omar, Kuwait’s interior ministry assistant undersecretary, announced that the final draft was ready and would be reviewed by the interior ministers. “The interior ministry undersecretaries have discussed the final draft and it was forwarded to the interior ministers who will review it when they convene,” he said.

The GCC is going through critical times that require a unification of the policies, plans and implementation strategies of security agencies of member states, the official was quoted as saying by Kuwait News Agency (Kuna). …source

U.S. Wars: Are They Lawful?
By David Swanson – Global Research, 12 November, 2012

Remarks at the biennial general meeting of the War and Law League in San Francisco on Armistice Day 2012.

I’ll try briefly to make five points.

First, there are clear laws on the books that make U.S. wars unlawful, along with U.S. threats of war and U.S. propaganda for war. The laws are either forgotten, ignored, evaded, or cleverly reinterpreted to reverse their meaning. But they could be enforced someday.

Second, U.S. wars are evolving in ways that make them violate additional laws without bringing them into compliance with any of the laws already violated.

Third, participants in U.S. wars face occasional prosecution at home or abroad for their specific actions, although those actions do not stray from the basic purpose of the wars.

Fourth, other nations are prosecuted for or would be prosecuted if they attempted the same behavior engaged in by the United States.

And Fifth, U.S. wars are launched and conducted by officials elected in an illegitimate system dominated by open bribery.

On the original Armistice Day in 1918, much of the world ended a four-year war that served no useful purpose whatsoever while costing the lives of some 10 million soldiers, 6 million civilians, 21 million soldiers wounded, an outbreak of Spanish influenza that took another 100 million lives, environmental destruction that is ongoing today, the development of new weapons — including chemical weapons — still used today, huge leaps forward in the art of propaganda still plagiarized today, huge setbacks in the struggle for economic justice, and a culture more militarized, more focused on stupid ideas like banning alcohol, and more ready to restrict civil liberties in the name of nationalism, and all for the bargain price, as one author calculated it, of enough money to have given a $2,500 home with $1,000 worth of furniture and five acres of land to every family in Russia, most of the European nations, Canada, the United States, and Australia, plus enough to give every city of over 20,000 a $2 million library, a $3 million hospital, a $20 million college, and still enough left over to buy every piece of property in Germany and Belgium. And it was all legal. Incredibly stupid, but totally legal. Particular atrocities violated laws, but war was not criminal.

The Outlawry Movement of the 1920s — the movement to outlaw war — sought to replace war with arbitration, by first banning war and then developing a code of international law and a court with the authority to settle disputes. The first step was taken in 1928 with the Kellogg-Briand Pact, which banned all war. Today 81 nations are party to that treaty, including ours, and many of them comply with it. I’d like to see additional nations, poorer nations that were left out of the treaty, join it (which they can do simply by stating that intention) and then urge the greatest purveyor of violence in the world to comply.

It’s easier to comply with the U.N. Charter because of the two big loopholes it opened up, allowing wars that are either defensive or simply U.N. approved. As you know, the United States fights wars against unarmed impoverished nations halfway around the planet and calls them defensive. The U.S. fights wars never approved of by the U.N. and claims that they were. When the United States chose never to end World War II, never to demilitarize, de-tax, or de-mobilize, when the U.N. Charter, NATO, the Geneva Conventions, and the CIA made war normal and supposedly civilized it, we lost the ability to think of abolition, or even to award Nobel prizes to those who worked for it. However, the U.N. Charter made threatening war illegal, and while the Kellogg-Briand Pact is forgotten, the U.N. Charter must be intentionally ignored, as the United States is constantly threatening wars.

There has been an International Criminal Court for 10 years now, but it only prosecutes particular atrocities, and only those committed by Africans. The idea seems to be that African war makers should get civilized and learn to melt the skin off children and radiate neighborhoods and burn down houses the way the enlightened war makers do. The ICC is years away from possibly prosecuting the crime of making war, and then only for nations that have chosen to subject themselves to its authority, only in cases approved of by the permanent members of the U.N. Security Council, and only in cases of aggressive war (as if there were some other kind).

Since 1976, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights has made war propaganda illegal. The argument that our First-Amendment right to freedom of the press and of speech overrides this is severely weakened, I think, by the fact that our major media outlets routinely shut out the viewpoints of the vast majority of us, to the point where people holding majority opinions on most political questions can be expected to believe they are part of a small minority. If we had freedom of the press we would have the ability to effectively counter war propaganda. As it is, we largely lack that freedom, and war propaganda is so pervasive we barely recognize it. …more

Kuwait opposition rallies outside Parliament
12 November, 2012 – Al Akhbar

A leading Kuwaiti opposition figure on Monday asked a court to allow him to travel for medical treatment ahead of his trial this week for “insulting” the emir, as tens of thousands continue to demonstrate against changes to the country’s voting law.

The request came during the first hearing in former Islamist MP Musallam al-Barrak’s trial where he faces charges of making public remarks deemed offensive to the Gulf state’s ruler, who under Kuwaiti law cannot be criticized.

If convicted, he faces a jail sentence of up to five years.

A mix of Islamist supporters, lawmakers, tribal groups and youth activists packed a square across from Kuwait’s parliament on Sunday in a peaceful rally against a new amendment to the elections law which favors pro-government candidates.

The demonstration also coincided with the 50th anniversary of Kuwait’s constitution.

It was the first in a series of recent protests against the voting amendment to take place without incident.

Last week, police locked down Kuwait City to prevent a massive rally from taking place, but demonstrators reassembled on the outskirts of the city where riot police attacked them with tear gas and sound grenades.

Dozens have been injured in other anti-government demonstrations, since the emir of Kuwait, Sabah al-Ahmad al-Sabah, dissolved parliament on October 1 and proposed changing the voting rules.

Previously, registered Kuwaiti voters could select up to four MPs for each voting district, but the decree changed the elections process into a one non-transferable vote per voter.

The opposition, a loose coalition of Islamists, tribal factions, and various youth groups, have vowed to boycott the December 1 Parliamentary elections unless the government reverses its changes to the law.

Aside from Barrak, five other opposition MPs have been arrested on similar charges.

Falah al-Sawwagh, Khaled al-Tahus and Bader al-Dahum are to appear in court on Tuesday for allegedly insulting the emir. A fifth former lawmaker is to appear in court on November 26 while a sixth ex-MP is facing similar charges but no date has been set for his trial.

The al-Sabah family has ruled Kuwait for over 250 years. The emir, crown prince, prime minister and key cabinet ministers all hail from the ruling family. …source

Bahrain crackdown: West talks, Paramilitary forces walk
12 November, 2012 – Bahrain Freedom Movement

The head of Bahrain’s main opposition group says envoys from Western states are in discussions with the Gulf island’s rulers to end the conflict there. Meanwhile, paramilitary forces have been deployed to quash 21 months of local political unrest.

Sheik Ali Salman told the Associated Press the talks are unlikely to bear fruit, as increasingly radicalized protesters are acting independently of the organized opposition, including his Al Wefaq group.

Following a string of firebomb attacks and clashes, Bahrain’s paramilitary National Guard – which acts independent of the country’s regular military forces – was deployed to “strategic locations” on Saturday.

Guard troops were reportedly setting up in Sitra – dubbed the “Capital of the Revolution” by the opposition – Hadi al-Musawi, a spokesman for Al Wefaq said. The guard forces had previously only been used in specific locations, like the capital, Manama.

Intense fighting between protesters and security forces broke out on Saturday as mourners headed to the funeral of a teenager who was killed the day before.

The opposition says the boy was hit by a car after being chased onto a highway by police, though the authorities deny having any part in his death.

Violence erupted on Saturday after the government set up checkpoints and military roadblocks to prevent mourners from reaching the funeral for Ali Radhi. Similar security measures prevented people from attending Friday prayer, leading to the chaos that allegedly resulted in Rahdi’s death.

Over 55 people have died and hundreds have been arrested amidst 21 months of unrest in the strategically vital country, which is home to the US Navy’s 5th fleet.

Increasingly draconian measures have been implemented as the Sunni-ruled kingdom has attempted to quash dissent amongst its Shiite majority, which has been demanding sweeping political reforms.

On Wednesday the government revoked the citizenship of 31 activists, claiming they presented threats to state security, the interior ministry said. The announcement coincided with the arrests of four prominent opposition activists implicated in aseries of bomb blasts that ripped through the capital on Monday, killing two.

In late October, Bahraini authorities indefinitely banned all protest gatherings and rallies. …source

The Western-backed Bahraini monarchy has been facing continuous street protests… since February 2011 calling for an elected government to replace decades of misrule and corruption under one family. While the self-styled royal rulers and their hangers-on live in absolute luxury -– never having worked a day in their pampered lives -– the majority of Bahrainis live in poverty and under constant harassment from regime goons and death squads hired from neighbouring Sunni countries, such as Yemen and Pakistan.”

Bahrain uprising threatens US hegemony
12 November, 2012 – By Finian Cunningham – PressTV

Connecting the dots of recent dramatic events in Bahrain spells one unmistakable message — the US-backed Al Khalifa regime is on the political ropes. It is desperately trying to defeat a determined pro-democracy movement that just won’t lie down or go away.

The regime is fighting for its very survival under unrelenting pressure from the mainly Shia population, who won’t back down in their demand for human dignity and freedom, no matter how much they are brutalized and terrorized.

But it’s not just the survival of the Khalifa regime that is at stake. It’s the entire US-backed order of Arab monarchies which has been in place for over six decades, and which is now showing cracks in the dam. This order has historically guaranteed the West a reliable source of oil; and more recently it is crucial to shoring up the bankrupt petrodollar system that Anglo-American global capitalism depends on.

Moreover, the Persian Gulf Arab dictatorships are a lucrative destination for the American and British weapons industries. The latter vital interest was underscored last week by the visit of British prime minister to the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia — whose sole mission was to sell $9 billion-worth of fighter jets to these regimes. The Pentagon is also planning to sell Saudi Arabia $6.7 billion-worth of military transport planes, on top of the $60 billion deal signed off last year. In an age of debt-ridden American and British capitalism, the Arab dictators are vital sources of cash.

This crucial geo-strategic backdrop to Bahrain explains the escalating repression in the tiny island kingdom against civilian protesters, with a blanket ban invoked by the regime on all public demonstrations. Bloggers and organisers caught or suspected of agitating on social media have been dealt with instant imprisonment.

Then last week saw the rulers making the extraordinary Orwellian move of deleting the nationality status of 31 Bahraini pro-democracy leaders — a move that has shocked human rights observers and which contravenes the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Imagine a government making its own citizens “non-nationals.” How sinister is that?

Those draconian moves followed on the heels of suspicious explosions in the capital, Manama, and earlier last month in the village of Eker, which claimed the lives of two Indian workers and a policeman, respectively.

This theatre of dirty tricks and playing to the gallery with lurid accusations of foreign subversion is, to be sure, aimed at justifying the unjustifiable — the use of state terrorism and repression against civilians who are simply demanding basic democratic rights. However, what the latest draconian moves by the Khalifa dictatorship tells us is that the regime and its powerful backers are coming under acute pressure for political survival.

The Western-backed Bahraini monarchy has been facing continuous street protests over the past 21 months — since February 2011 — calling for an elected government to replace decades of misrule and corruption under one family. While the self-styled royal rulers and their hangers-on live in absolute luxury — never having worked a day in their pampered lives — the majority of Bahrainis live in poverty and under constant harassment from regime goons and death squads hired from neighbouring Sunni countries, such as Yemen and Pakistan.

Bahrain’s mainly Shia population wants the Al Khalifa regime, headed by King Hamad, to be abolished — and quite rightly so. The regime is seen as an imposter, originally from the Arabian Peninsula, which was installed by the British Empire to rule over Bahrainis in order to make the territory and Persian Gulf waterway safe for Britain’s geopolitical interests. This function of the Khalifa as a foreign proxy still persists for American and British interests.

Over the past two years, largely peaceful demonstrations have been held nearly on a daily basis across the oil-rich Persian Gulf island, despite a brutal crackdown by regime forces that has caused some 100 deaths since the uprising.

Two factors underpin the Al Khalifa’s shaky hold on power. First, massive support from neighbouring Persian Gulf monarchies led primarily by Saudi Arabia. These unelected Sunni kings and emirs have bankrolled their smaller neighbour since protests have taken a heavy toll on the economy and investor confidence. Saudi Arabia — the world’s biggest oil exporter — has also sent troops into Bahrain, which have greatly intensified the repression against the Bahraini population and shored up the Khalifa regime with a reign of terror.

Secondly, Bahrain’s monarchy has been able to rely on unwavering diplomatic and military support from the United States and British governments. Apart from the occasional muted words of concern about human rights, Washington and London’s repeated salutations of “key ally” and flow of weapon sales have, in effect, told the Bahraini and Saudi regimes that they have a green light to crush the popular revolt by whatever means necessary. The unquestioned stationing of the US Navy’s Fifth Fleet in Bahrain is perhaps the clearest signal from Washington that its patronage to the Khalifa regime is rock solid.

Also the dearth of reportage in the Western media on state violence in Bahrain not only reflects the commitment of Washington and London to the Bahraini regime, but the lack of media coverage has served to stymie Western public disquiet over what are ongoing crimes against humanity by Western-backed regimes.
[Read more →]

Bahrain opposition leader: Hopes fading for talks
12 November, 2102 – Bahrina Freedom Freedom

MANAMA, Bahrain (AP) — Envoys from the U.S. and other countries are acting as intermediaries with the Gulf nation’s rulers in attempts to ease 21 months of unrest, the head of Bahrain’s main opposition group said Sunday.

Even so, he said protest groups see little hope for breakthrough dialogue as crackdowns widen.

The remarks by Sheik Ali Salman, head of the top Shiite political bloc Al Wefaq, underscore the sense of a deepening crisis in strategic Bahrain after a week that included deadly bomb blasts and an expanded deployment by the paramilitary National Guard.

On Sunday, clashes erupted after the funeral of a teenage boy killed on Friday. Opposition groups claim he was hit by a car while fleeing a security clampdown, but Bahraini officials say the death resulted from a traffic accident.

More than 55 people have been killed in Bahrain’s unrest since February 2011 after an Arab Spring-inspired uprising by the country’s majority Shiites to weaken the influence of the Sunni monarchy and seek a greater say in the nation’s affairs. The showdown also has placed Washington in an increasingly difficult policy bind.

The U.S. does not want to jeopardize its relations with the leadership in Bahrain, which hosts the U.S. Navy’s 5th Fleet as the Pentagon’s main counterbalance to Iran’s military expansion in the Gulf. But Washington is growing uneasy with the harsh measures against Bahrain’s opposition, including a ban on protest rallies imposed late last month.

Salman told The Associated Press that American envoys and others are serving as “indirect mediators through meetings with the opposition and the (government) authorities … These communications are efforts to end the crisis.”

But Salman said there are fading hopes for dialogue to resolve the crisis because of the escalating crackdowns and convictions of opposition figures, including some sentenced to life in prison.

“Things are getting worse … After 21 months, we did not see any preparations or serious initiatives to enter into dialogue with the opposition,” Salman said in an interview.

Bahrain’s leaders say they are ready to talk and have already adopted some reform steps, such as giving more oversight powers to the elected parliament. Opposition leaders, including Salman, insist the concessions are not enough, demanding that the ruling dynasty give up its control of key government posts and policies.

The rising violence also has overshadowed efforts for talks.

Government authorities claim escalating attacks — including arson, firebombs and homemade explosives — forced the decision to outlaw protest gatherings and to expand patrols by the National Guard. Last Monday, two South Asian workers, an Indian and Bangladeshi, were killed in a series of blasts the government described as “domestic terrorism.”

The main Shiite opposition groups issued a joint statement renouncing violence after the blasts. But Salman acknowledged that they cannot control breakaway protest factions that have confronted riot police with firebombs. Government officials also blame protesters for homemade bombs that have killed civilians and police.

“We don’t agree with them, but can’t stop them because they’re not listening,” said Salman. “This is happening because of a lack of freedom.”

Salman urged for greater international efforts to “stop the bleeding in Bahrain.”

“We welcome and will cooperate with any mediator: American, European, regional. It doesn’t matter,” he said. “We need to solve the issue in Bahrain.” …source

Clinton and the shameful behavior of the opposition
by Pierre Khalaf – 9 November, 2012 – By Ghaleb Kandil

No room for a third option in Syria

The consecutive American recognitions of the increasing size of the Takfiri movements and Al-Qaeda-affiliated groups within the so-called armed opposition in Syria, settled the controversy launched at the beginning of the events in favor of the Syrian national state, and exposed the Western hypocrisy which was based on the exploitation of the terrorist and Takfiri organizations and the facilitation of the entry of Al-Qaeda’s armed men and the so-called factions of international Jihad, in order to get rid of Syria’s regional strength and the repercussions of its role which is opposed to American hegemony and Israel.

Firstly, the Americans and French are presenting their project to reshape the Syrian opposition under the headline of creating a force capable of containing extremism in Syria. They are also talking about the restructuring of the so-called Free Syrian Army to achieve that same goal, thus emulating the failed Western experience in Afghanistan where the Americans and French adopted a plan to arm and support Afghan groups opposed to the Takfiri organizations such as the Taliban, and what was dubbed at the time the Arab mujahedeen who constituted the nucleus of Al-Qaeda, after they had benefited from financial and military support provided by the United States, the NATO member states, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and many other Arab countries headed by Egypt and Jordan, in partnership with the international organization of the Muslim Brotherhood.

Secondly, the key and qualitative difference between Afghanistan and Syria is that the Syrian national state is unified and strong, along with its national army, at a time when the Afghan state was destroyed, drowned in chaos and saw its military institution disbanded and scattered. This was originally the plan drawn up for Syria, but it failed despite the massive capabilities allocated to implement it in the region and around the world, by all means necessary. In the face of the global war, Syrian popular polarization is tilting in favor of the national state and its armed forces, while the national leadership represented by President Bashar al-Assad is earning wider support in the ranks of the Syrians with all their social and religious factions.

Thirdly, it is clear through the West’s attempts to gather, break down and reassemble the Syrian opposition movements at the level of their political fronts and tools on the field, that the search for a secularist fighting nerve within these oppositions’ ranks in order to deter the Takfiri movements on the ground is useless, as well as a desperate attempt whose outcome will be the slaughtering of agents working for the American intelligence apparatuses at the hands of the Takfiris and the West’s riddance of some of those whom it used to mobilize the extremists through their liquidation, as it usually happens to the American agents once their roles and tasks expire. But in any case, this enterprise is doomed to fail, because all the components of the political front which were mobilized by the West and its agents, constitute a mixture featuring the Muslim Brotherhood organization which is behind Takfir, Al-Arour’s Takfiri wing and the Bandar-affiliated Al-Qaeda wing which is funded and armed by Al-Hariri’s envoy Okab Sakr. As for the rest, they are mercenaries who do not represent any real power, while the Free Army is a mere hybrid mixture of thieves and criminals, along with fleeing officers who have turned into terrorist Takfiris and into sheikhs ordering killings and slaughters. …more

Bahraini Police Kill Teen Headed to Friday Prayers
10 November, 2012 – FARS

TEHRAN (FNA)- Authorities in Bahrain are being blamed for the death of a 16-year-old boy, as opposition supporters and human rights activists said police prevented people from attending Friday prayers by setting up checkpoints and firing tear gas at the crowds.

Ali Radhi reportedly tried to get to a mosque, and was then chased onto a highway where he was struck by a car and killed. According to activists, the boy’s family blamed the officers and the police barricades for their son’s death, RT reported.

The security measures kept many people from attending the Friday prayers of Sheik Isa Qassim, who denounced Bahrain’s move earlier this week to revoke the citizenship of 31 activists and lawyers.

“The revoking of citizenship from honorable people is aimed at punishing those who have opposition views,” he told worshippers who managed to reach his mosque in the Diraz village. The town is a district outside the capital of Manama.

According to Bahraini human rights activist Zainab al-Khawaja, worshippers prayed on the streets after they realized they won’t be able to enter the mosque. Several people attempted to scale the walls in order to avoid the security blockade.

Al-Khawaja also tweeted a photo of the young boy who was killed on the highway, as well as his family preparing for his funeral. She also wrote that police were preventing outraged Bahrainis from attending the burial.

Al-Wefaq, the largest political party in Bahrain, posted pictures of people taking to the streets to protest the death of the 16-year-old on its Twitter account.

The party also posted graphic images of a different boy, suffering from a wounded leg after being hit by a tear gas canister. An elderly man can also be seen suffering after allegedly being suffocated by tear gas.

The violence continues to mount. A Youtube video posted yesterday shows several Bahraini officers kicking, hitting, and dragging a civilian from a cemetery before forcing him into a police car.

Patrick Henningsen, a geopolitical analyst for current affairs website UK Column, said that the Bahraini leadership is now effectively tightening the screws on those who dare to speak against it.

“This is an unprecedented move by the government – the violations have been chalking up left right and center for the last year … Only last week there was a double bombing in the neighborhood, and that was blamed on pro-reformers or terrorists, according to the government, but little evidence has been presented to show it was done by these people. And what it has done, is it’s given the government carte blanche to really crack down on the pro-reform movements …”

Anti-government protesters have been holding peaceful demonstrations across Bahrain since mid-February 2011, calling for an end to the Al Khalifa dynasty’s over-40-year rule, end of discrimination, establishment of justice and a democratically-elected government as well as freedom of detained protesters.

Violence against the defenseless people escalated after a Saudi-led conglomerate of police, security and military forces from the Persian Gulf Cooperation Council (PGCC) member states – Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates, Oman and Qatar – were dispatched to the tiny Persian Gulf kingdom on March 13, 2011, to help Manama crack down on peaceful protestors.

So far, tens of people have been killed, hundreds have gone missing and thousands of others have been injured. …source