…from beneath the crooked bough, witness 230 years of brutal tyranny by the al Khalifas come to an end

Bahrain accused of systemic repression
21 June, 2013 – UPI

PARIS, June 21 (UPI) — Human rights activists imprisoned in Bahrain should be released immediately and unconditionally because their detention is arbitrary, a rights federation said.

The Bahrain Center for Human Rights and the Observatory for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders, organizations party to French advocacy consortium International Federation for Human Rights, said Friday they were frustrated with the harassment and ill-treatment of rights defenders in Bahrain.

The rights group said at least four human rights defenders are imprisoned or were held briefly on charges of participating in “illegal gatherings” or for establishing a group “in order to disable the provisions of the constitution.”

Dozens of protesters died during violence associated with anti-government demonstrations in 2011. The Sunni-led monarchy was criticized for its harsh crackdown on dissenters, though the government said it is committed to reforms outlined by a commission probing the incidents.

The rights organizations criticized Bahrain for its “acts of repression, including judicial harassment, against human rights defenders” in the country. The charges filed against rights defenders are not justified, they said.

Human Rights Watch published an 87-page report Thursday highlighting what it said were repressive policies in Bahrain.

Bahrain said a national effort to promote reconciliation would put its work on hold during the holy month of Ramadan, which starts next week.
…source

Bahrain activist Zainab al-Khawaja ‘given new jail term’
25 June, 2013 – BBC

A court in Bahrain has sentenced pro-democracy activist Zainab al-Khawaja to two months in jail for insulting police, opposition sources say.

The decision would mean she stays in jail until February 2014, as she is already serving previous sentences.

Her father Abdulhadi al-Khawaja is also in jail.

Ms Khawaja has been a leading activist in the Gulf kingdom, which has been in political turmoil since pro-democracy protests erupted in February 2011.

In March Ms Khawaja was sentenced to three months in prison for “insulting and humiliating a public employee”.

Since then she has been sentenced to several additional short terms on other charges which she is serving concurrently.

Her father is among eight activists and opposition figures sentenced to life imprisonment for allegedly plotting to overthrow the state.

The evidence that Mr Khawaja was convicted on is widely accepted as having been secured under torture.

Bahrain is ruled by a Sunni Muslim royal family but the majority population is Shia who have long complained of discrimination.

On 14 February 2011, peaceful protesters – many of them Shia – calling for reform and democracy took over Pearl Roundabout.

Three days later security forces cleared the site using tear gas, batons and birdshot.

As violence escalated 35 people, including five police officers, were killed, hundreds more were hurt and thousands jailed in February and March 2011.

Since then, opposition and human rights activists say more than 50 people have died, a figure which the government disputes.
…source

Detained Bahraini activist Nabeel Rajab writes to IFEX from prison
17 Jun, 2013 – Bahrain center for Human Rights

In a letter read out during the IFEX general meeting, detained Bahraini activist Nabeel Rajab thanked IFEX members for their support and encouraged them to continue fighting for free expression:

Colleagues, heads and members of regional and international organisations that defend freedom of opinion and expression and human rights, my friends from the members of the IFEX network, activists and advocates, and leaders of civil society groups,

Dear friends, the unknown soldiers, the managers, administrators and workers at the IFEX office in Canada,

Warm greetings.

It’s saddening to be away from your important meeting for the second time and, as you know, this absence is out of my control.

I was banned from travelling during the previous IFEX general meeting in 2011 without any given reason. My absence this time is because I have been behind bars for more than a year as I am serving an unfair and arbitrary sentence as revenge for my struggle and activities which aim to defend freedom of opinion and freedom of expression in my country Bahrain and in the whole of the Gulf region.

I would like to inform you, my dear friends, that despite the bad and difficult circumstances I have been suffering from since my arrest, my beliefs have not changed at all and my spirit is still very strong. These circumstances have not weakened me or caused any despair or lack of hope. This injustice has motivated me to continue fighting for freedom of opinion and expression and for human rights, and to stand by all oppressed peoples whose rights have been violated, and to enable them to look forward to a better future.

Dear colleagues, the dissemination and promotion and protection of human rights principles and moral values and virtues in our communities which live under oppression and injustice is not an easy job, but we must, as activists and human rights defenders in this region of the world, be prepared to pay the price of this struggle, and this price is often painful and it is the punishment I serve out today, which has kept me away from you and from this valuable meeting.

What makes me strong, brave and respectful is the stance and support given by you and the free people of the world to me and to all people who are detained because of their opinions and human rights work in the Gulf region. It is because of the good feelings you have given us, which made clear that we as Bahraini and Gulf activists are not alone in the battle for gaining freedom. You are standing by us.

The continuous urgent actions and the incredible work you have done through IFEX in recent months was brilliant and clear to all in our country and the whole region and also to regional and international human rights institutions. The fast professional development of the network (IFEX) would not have happened without these unknown soldiers who work tirelessly at IFEX’s offices day and night. These people became like members of my family who communicate on a daily basis and the youngest of my children now knows the names of the staff and managers of IFEX as a result of this constant communication and the care that is shown.

Certainly our network has a global position today, developing in a few years as one of the leaders of the major struggles in defending human rights and freedom of opinion and expression in the world. And so we feel proud when we tell people that we are members of IFEX which takes up the fight and has contributed to spreading human rights education and the awareness of freedom of opinion and expression in our Gulf region and also publicising and uncovering the ongoing violations against freedom of expression worldwide in different languages. Also, the network has offered professional, technical, moral and organisational support available to us at the Bahrain Centre for Human Rights and the Gulf Centre for Human Rights and also for many regional and international organisations which work on similar issues.

I call on you to carry on with your work for a better future for our rights of freedom of opinion and expression and all human rights worldwide and especially in our region, towards which most countries turn a blind eye in order to protect their interests in the oil-rich region.

Finally, I must lift my hat and bow my head in respect and appreciation for your struggle for rights and send a kiss and hug for each one of you.

God bless you,

Nabeel Rajab
Jaw prison, Manama, Bahrain
June 2013
…source

Iran Court Summons Ahmadinejad , after he steps down as President
19 June, 2013 – Jafria News

Iran’s President Ahmedinejad faces Criminal CourtJNN 19 June 2013 Tehran : Iran’s outgoing president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, has been summoned to a criminal court in Tehran to answer unspecified charges in regard to a complaint lodged by Majlis Speaker Ali Larijani and others following the victory of the moderate cleric Hassan Rouhani in Friday’s presidential election.

On Monday, Branch 76 of the Criminal Court of Tehran Province issued the summons, stating that Ahmadinejad would face the unnamed charges in November.

Ahmadinejad is scheduled to hand over the presidency to Hassan Rohani in early August, when the latter is sworn in.

Local news agencies on Monday published a copy of the summons issued by judicial authorities demanding that Ahmadinejad appear before the court in November, a few months after he has handed over the Iranian presidency to Rouhani. It revealed little except that a lawsuit had been lodged by the parliamentary speaker, Ali Larijani.

Nearly 50.5 million Iranians, including more than 1.6 million first-time voters, were eligible to participate in the presidential election. The Interior Ministry put voter turnout at 72.7 percent.

Rohani won 18,613,329 votes or 50.7 percent to secure an outright victory. In the Iranian system, if no presidential candidate receives 50 percent of the vote, the two top candidates must face off in a run-off election.

Rohani currently represents Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei in the Supreme National Security Council and is a member of the Expediency Council and the Assembly of Experts. He is also director of the Expediency Council’s Center for Strategic Research.

MP Mohammad Ali Pour-Mokhtar, the chairman of the Majlis Article 90 Committee, and Yaghoub Khalilnejad have joined Larijani in the legal action against the outgoing Iranian president.

Iran’s official news agency IRNA says there have been several other subpoenas issued previously to Ahmadinejad.

In February, Ahmadinejad and Larijani engaged in a public spat at the highest levels of the Islamic republic when the president played a secretly filmed tape in a public session that implied the speaker’s brother was financially corrupt.

Ahmadinejad engaged in a dispute with Larijani during the impeachment session for Cooperatives, Labor, and Social Welfare Minister Abdolreza Sheikholeslami in early February.

In his speech in defense of Sheikholeslami, the Iranian president leveled certain allegations against Larijani’s brother Fazel, who is the president of the Science and Research Branch of Islamic Azad University in the northern city of Amol.

In a dramatic sequence of events that marked the climax of the power struggle between Ahmadinejad and his conservative rivals in parliament, Ahmadinejad’s tape showed Larijani’s brother, Fazel, allegedly trading on his sibling’s influence for financial gain in a conversation with Saeed Mortazavi, the caretaker of Iran’s social welfare organisation.

“These are audio and video, and the tape is clear,” said Ahmadinejad at the time. “If the honourable parliament speaker sees fit, we can turn over the 24 to 25 hours of recordings to you.” A few minutes of a barely audible tape were played as millions of Iranians listened to the extraordinary parliamentary session live on national radio.

“It was a good thing that you showed this to let people learn about your character,” Ali Larijani retorted at the time.

Larijani’s brother, Fazel, denied the accusations and threatened to sue him but the incident was enough to tarnish the speaker’s image. When Ali Larijani delivered a speech in the holy city of Qom shortly after the incident, he was met with angry crowds who threw shoes at him and shouted slogans.

The Majlis speaker strongly criticized Ahmadinejad for raising an issue irrelevant to the impeachment.

Last month, Ahmadinejad accompanied his close confidant and former chief of staff, Esfandiar Rahim Mashaei, to the interior ministry as the latter registered his name as a candidate in the election. However, Iran’s constitutional body, the Guardian Council, disqualified him without giving a reason. Conservatives close to the supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, have accused Mashaei of undermining clerical power by advocating nationalism and putting Iran ahead of Islam. Ahmadinejad, however, has stood by him. …source

Saudi Women Defy Government, Protest Imprisonments

by 2Paragraphs – 18 June, 2013

Small groups of Saudi women held simultaneous “Sit-ins for Freedom” across Saudi cities on June 10, 2013, which were called for by anonymous advocacy group @almonaseron [The Supporters] to call for release of their imprisoned relatives. As a result, over 140 protesters, men and women, were arrested by Saudi forces during the previous two days.

Independent human rights sources say there are over 30,000 arbitrarily imprisoned people [ar], many of whom were arrested in the massive, post-9/11 “war on terrorism”. The detainees were arrested without a warrant and have not had access to lawyers and a trial. Protests in Saudi Arabia are strictly prohibited and participants risk spending many months in prison if they get caught. This, however, did not stop prisoners’ relatives from challenging the ban many times in small numbers over the past two years. …more

Saudi Arabia provides heavy weaponry to militants in Syria
20 June, 2013 – PressTV

Russian President Vladimir Putin has warned other states against providing weapons to the militants in Syria, saying that the arms could end up in Europe one day.”
Saudi Arabia has provided the Takfiri militants operating inside Syria with Russian-made Konkurs anti-tank missiles.

According to the Daily Telegraph, militant sources said they had received the first batch of the heavy weaponry from Saudi Arabia in Aleppo.

The sources said that more arms, including higher-end missiles, would be sent to the militants later.

On June 14, US President Barack Obama ordered his administration to provide the militants with weapons, claiming that the Syrian government had used “chemical weapons” against the militants and thus crossed Washington’s “red line.” Damascus has rejected the allegation as “lies.”

Israeli President Shimon Peres voiced support for Washington’s arming of the Takfiri militants in Syria. Takfiris accuse most Islamic sects of being infidels.

However, Russian President Vladimir Putin has warned other states against providing weapons to the militants in Syria, saying that the arms could end up in Europe one day.

The crisis in Syria began in March 2011. Many people, including large numbers of Syrian soldiers and security forces, have been killed in the foreign-sponsored militancy.

Last month, the Syrian president said that militants from as many as 29 different countries were fighting against Syria.

The Syrian government says the West and its regional allies – especially Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and Turkey – are supporting the militants. …more

Saudi Arabia, France sending Syria rebels anti-aircraft guns
17 June, 2013 – Al Akhbar

Saudi Arabia, with some French funds, began supplying anti-aircraft missiles to Syrian rebels “on a small scale” about two months ago, a Gulf source familiar with the matter said on Monday.

The shoulder-fired weapons were obtained mostly from suppliers in France and Belgium, the source told Reuters. France had paid for the transport of the weapons to the region.

The supplies were going to General Salim Idriss, leader of the Supreme Military Council of the Free Syrian Army (FSA), who was still the kingdom’s main “point man” in the opposition, the source said.

Speaking to Reuters on Friday, Idriss urged Western allies to supply anti-aircraft and anti-tank missiles and to create a no-fly zone, saying if properly armed he could defeat the Syrian army within six months.

The Gulf source said without elaborating that Saudi Arabia had begun taking a more active role in the Syrian conflict.

The remarks come one day after German news weekly Der Spiegel reported that that Saudi Arabia was looking at sending European-made Mistral-class MANPADS, or man-portable air-defense systems.

The article, citing a classified report received by the German foreign intelligence service and the German government last week, said the shoulder-launched surface-to-air missiles can target low-flying aircraft including helicopters and had given mujahideen fighters in Afghanistan a decisive edge against Soviet troops in the 1980s.

It wasn’t immediately clear if these were the same anti-aircraft guns that the kingdom has already allegedly sent.

The United States vowed last week to send military aid to rebel forces after accusing the government of using “small amounts” of chemical weapons. Washington has also sent F-16 jets and anti-aircraft guns to Jordan with talk of possibly enforcing a no-fly zone on Syria.

Russia has repeatedly said that a unilateral US-imposed no-fly zone on Syria would violate international law, and on Monday said it would “not allow” such a scenario. …more

‘Confession’ video stirs Bahrain, rights group decries police abuse
14 June, 2013 – Trielo

Footage of what appears to be a forced confession torn by security forces from a protester to implicate his fellows has sparked controversy in Bahrain. This comes as US lawmakers urge the government to allow a visit by the UN torture envoy.

A video uploaded on YouTube shows a shirtless young man, who identifies himself as Hussain Jameel Jafer Ali Marhoon from Hamad Town, giving what appears to have been a forced confession to an unseen security officer.

In the video, Marhoon is forced to answer approximately 60 rapid-fire questions in just under three minutes. At one point in the video, when the youth is asked why he was out on the street “facing the forces,” he becomes noticeably nervous. For several seconds he shifts his gaze to the right of the room, where a sound is heard, without speaking. …more

Hezbollah defends the people of the Mashreq
By Ghaleb Kandil – 17 June, 2013 – Voltaire.net

In his speech on the occasion of the day of injury resistant, the secretary general of Hezbollah, Hassan Nasrallah, has defined the strategic framework of the ongoing confrontation in the Arab Mashreq, including Iraq, Syria and Lebanon against the alliance led by the United States and composed of Israel, the Takfirist movements, the European Union, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Jordan.

The main tool in this aggression are the Takfirist gangs working for the destruction of the national unity in Iraq, Syria and Lebanon. It is clear that with their ideological baggage, these multinational groups plan to exterminate the Christians and expel them from the region, according to U.S. and Western project. The former French President Nicolas Sarkozy had mentioned during his meeting with the Maronite Patriarch Beshara Rai the existence of such a plan.

Western statements on the existence on the ground in Syria of non Takfirist groups are a lie. The so-called Free Syrian Army (FSA) is a front for a hundred groups that have in their ranks deserting officers, become extremists and fanatical terrorists. The Battle of Qoussair and other clashes have shown that the behavior of these groups did not differ from that of al-Nosra Front, which has received over the past two years, a large part of the weapons and money provided for the rebels, as well as groups linked to the Muslim Brotherhood.

Recruitment for the extremists is made in the ranks of Takfirist worldwide and through company of mercenaries like the infamous Blackwater. Professional snipers and experts in the mass killings, which have raged in Iraq and elsewhere, were sent to Syria. Not to mention the common criminals, released from Gulf prisons, to go for “jihad” in Syria.

The Takfirist and Salafi extremists associations, funded by Qatar and Saudi Arabia, are well established in the community of Arab and Asian immigration in many European countries. Their head quarters are well known to Western intelligence services that let them do. They recruited thousands of jihadists, hundreds were killed in Syria and discreetly buried in Western Europe.

The Takfirist groups in Mashreq target, primarily, the Sunni majority in Syria: they commit massacres, killing religious figures (like the great ulema Mohammad al-Bouti), political, cultural and scientific personalities, to cause religious discord.

The people, the state and the army in Syria supported alone the burden of the fight against this scourge. Hassan Nasrallah revealed details of this evil plan that aims also the Resistance and the Lebanese society and the social ties in Iraq and Jordan. The strategic goal is to destroy the idea of Arabism among the peoples of the region, only able to reflect the diversity of Mashreq. Israel is the main beneficiary.

In deciding to fight in Syria against this project, Hezbollah protects the people of the region, their religions, their diversity, the unity of the social tissue and the will to resist the hegemonic project of Israel, that is at the heart of the party combat.

Hezbollah remains faithful to its tradition as the vanguard fighting against the Israeli-American project, which uses today as the enforcement tool Takfirist groups.
The early failure of the new US plan

Paris recently hosted consultations between France, the United States, Britain and Saudi Arabia, devoted to the evaluation of the situation in Syria after the Battle of Qoussair. The information from the French capital indicate that the American team, devoted to study political and military options, came to a conclusion based on two implacable realities: first, impotence, bankruptcy and fragmentation rebels; the fact that the Syrian people hate the rebels in areas under their control. This means that the extremists and mercenaries recruited and sent to Syria no longer have a significant popular support. This fact largely explains why the balance of power has changed in favor of the state and the army. It is clear that a majority of the population in rural areas now rejects these international extremist groups who commit the worst atrocities and abuses. The decision of the West to send weapons to the armed groups hated by the Syrian people will not contribute in any way to create a popular support, without which the chances of winning any meaningful victory are inexistent. …more

While the Heads of State and Government of the G8 noted their disagreement on Syria, the NATO powers and the GCC are conducting “Eager Lion” war games in Jordan. Their aim is to set up an attack to be launched from the Jordan desert against the Syrian air force to prevent it from flying over a zone that has become a safe haven for the international jihadists. However, contrary to NATO declarations, this cannot be done without the approval of the Security Council.

A “Lion eager” to tear Syria to pieces
by Manlio Dinucci – Voltaire Network – 19 June, 2013

When Italian President Giorgio Napolitano met HM King Abdullah II last year in Jordan he expressed “the high regard with which Italy observes how the Hashemite dynasty has always pursued its desire for peace and its moderate line.”

It is surely in this spirit that Italy is participating in the “Eager Lion” exercise in progress June 9-20 in Jordan under U.S. command. Nineteen countries are taking part, united by a “common purpose to strengthen regional security and stability.”

A stability threatened, no doubt, by the Syria of Assad that is allegedly using chemical weapons to crush the rebellion. The “evidence” was provided by the CIA, the same CIA that ten years ago provided the photographic documentation, shown by Colin Powell to the Security Council, of Iraq possessing 500 tons of chemical and biological weapons and mobile laboratories for biological warfare. Afterwards it was discovered, as Powell himself acknowledged, that such weapons did not exist and that the mobile labs were actually gas generators for weather balloons. The die, however, had already been cast: the “evidence” the CIA provided had been used to justify the war against Iraq.

It matters then little, once the war against Syria is won, whether it will be found that it was the “rebels” who used chemical weapons, as Carla Del Ponte of the United Nations Commission on War Crimes stated. In the unquestionable judgment of Washington, Syria has crossed the “red line” and President Obama has reluctantly decided to provide arms to the “rebels.” This hides the fact, as an investigation by The New York Times (March 26) showed, that since January 2012 the CIA has been providing arms to the “rebels,” delivering them with an airlift to Turkey and Jordan and training in those countries the forces infiltrated into Syria.

Against this background “Eager Lion,” a real war exercise with air force, airlifts and naval, amphibious and land forces is taking place, involving more than 8,000 combat troops. Among these is the Italian military, including probably the 185th Regiment of the Reconnaissance Target Acquisition Thunderbolt Brigade. They are side-by-side with troops of exemplary democratic faith, such as the Saudis, Yemenis, Qataris and others.

All follow the orders of the Central Command of the United States, whose “area of responsibility” covers the Middle East and Central Asia (including Syria, Iraq, Iran and Afghanistan), plus Egypt. What the real purpose of “Eager Lion” exercise is can be demonstrated by the fact that, once it is over, the Pentagon will leave the F-16 fighters and the Patriot surface-to-air missiles in Jordan. These will add to the U.S., German and Dutch Patriot missiles already deployed in Turkey on the border with Syria.

Everything is ready to set up a “limited no-fly zone,” extending 25 miles inside Syria, which — according to U.S. officials interviewed by The Wall Street Journal — will serve to “protect the rebel training camps and the arms supply.” The no-fly zone will be imposed by U.S. jet fighters that, taking off from Jordan and from aircraft carriers, will be able with their missiles to destroy the planes and anti-aircraft defenses of Syria without overflying its territory. The no-fly zone, therefore, “will not require a resolution of the UN Security Council.”

The estimated cost is “just” $50 million per day, which Washington assures us, will also be paid by the Allies. We do not know yet what the Italian share will be, but the government will find the money, squeezing the public coffers and again cutting social spending.
Manlio Dinucci

Translation by John Catalinotto

…source

Bahraini teen activist faces up to 80 years in prison
19 June, 2013 – Al Akhbar

A Bahraini court sentenced an 18-year-old opposition member, Akbar Ali al-Kishi, to 10 years in prison Wednesday over charges of blowing up gas cylinders, family and activists said, adding that the young activist faces several more decades of imprisonment.

Five others were accused of the same crime and were all handed down a ten-year sentence, Kishi’s father told Al-Akhbar, while one of them was tried in absentia.

“They didn’t allow [his mother and I] to be at the court hearing when they gave him the sentence,” he added.

The young activist has already been sentenced to two charges adding up to 16 years prior to Wednesday’s hearing, his father said, and will now have to serve a total of 26 years in prison.

He is currently imprisoned and is facing several other charges in court.

“If he is convicted of all the charges accused of him, he will be facing up to 80 years in prison,” Kishi said over a phone interview.

Bahraini authorities repeatedly tortured, beat and insulted Kishi on different occasions and one of the officers threatened to rape him, the Bahraini Center for Human Rights (BCHR) previously reported.

“A month and a half ago, they arrested him, tortured him and then forced him to sign a confession to the cylinder crime,” Kishi’s father said.

“We can only visit him in prison for half an hour, sometimes 10 minutes, and only after a strip search. We cannot bring him anything with us,” he added.

Kishi had been arrested in 2010, 2012, and 2013 and was avoiding arrest during 2011, Mortada al-Moqdad, an activist close to the case, told Al-Akhbar.

“This is only an act of revenge against people in the opposition group who did not back down,” Moqdad said.

Kishi was wounded in April 2009 by birdshot pellets and was taken into the hospital in “serious condition,” after Bahraini forces attacked a protest in the village of Sanabis, the BCHR said.

Cases of beatings and torture in Bahraini jails in order to pressure inmates to sign confessions are regularly documented by human rights groups. In 2011, Bahrain security forces led a heavy-handed crackdown against an uprising critical of the ruling Khalifa dynasty.

However, the Gulf kingdom has seen intermittent protests since then.

In April, Bahrain cancelled the visit of the UN envoy on torture, Juan Mendez, for the second time, arousing suspicion.

“It is effectively a cancellation as no alternative dates were proposed nor is there a future road map to discuss,” Mendez said. “This postponement could be perceived as if there is something to hide.” …more

Bahrain: Concern over Human Rights Defenders Prosecuted and Sentenced to Prison
21 June, 2013 – fidh

Geneva-Manama-Paris, 21 June 2013. In Bahrain, human rights defenders are being harassed, arbitrarily detained for months and ill-treated or tortured for their human rights work. The Bahrain Center for Human Rights and the Observatory for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders, a joint programme of the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) and the World Organisation Against Torture (OMCT), express their deep concern over the sentencing of three human rights defenders to prison on 22 May 2013 as well as about the judicial harassment against Mr. Mohammed Al-Maskati.

On May 22, 2013, Mr. Naji Fateel, a board member of the Bahrain Youth Society for Human Rights (BYHRS), was sentenced by the Manama Criminal Court to six months’ imprisonment for “illegal gatherings” in relation to a gathering on 24 January 2012 organised in BaniJamrah in which he did not participate. Mr. Fateel was arrested without a warrant after his house was raided by members of the security forces, dressed in civilian clothing, at dawn on 2 May 2013. He was allegedly subjected to severe torture at the Criminal Investigation Directorate. Reports allege that he was subjected to electrical shocks to his genitals, left foot and back in addition to simulated drowning, severe beatings, threats to publish his wife’s photographs (taken from a camera confiscated by the security forces when his house was raided), insults, hanging by his hands from the ceiling, sexual harassment and threats of rape, standing for hours, and sleep deprivation. He was taken to the Ministry of Interior hospital twice for treatment due to the torture. In another case, he is also facing charges of “establishment of a group in order to disable the provisions of the Constitution” [1]. He remains currently in Dry Dock Detention Centre. He was granted access to his lawyer, however he complained about not being provided adequate medical care.

On the same day, blogger Ms. Zainab Al Khawaja and Ms. Masooma Al Sayed, both known for their participation in peaceful gathering calling for reforms and the respect of human rights in Bahrain, were sentenced by the Manama lower criminal court to three months and six months’ imprisonment, respectively, for “illegal gathering”, “assaulting a female officer” and “inciting hatred against the regime” in reference to events that go back to December 2011. Our organisations recall that on 16 December 2011, Ms. Al Khawaja staged a sit-in to call for reforms and more rights at Abu Saiba roundabout and was joined by several women. The riot police fired teargas canisters to disperse them. Ms. Al Khawaja continued her sit-in peacefully and refused to move and she was shot at directly with a teargas canister [2]. She was then handcuffed, dragged across the pavement by her handcuffs, had her Muslim head scarf removed and was slapped by a female police officer. She was further cursed and beaten in the police station. Ms. Masooma Al Sayed continued her peaceful sit-in with Ms. Al Khawaja and refused to move. She was handcuffed and arrested. Ms. Al Sayed was also subjected to ill-treatment: she was kicked on her right leg which caused her to walk with a limp for a time and red marks around her wrists were apparent from the handcuffs. Both women were detained for around a week at that time then were released pending trial. Moreover, since 27 February 2013, Ms. Al Khawaja is serving in Isa Town Women a six months and 22 days sentence in two other cases on charges of “insulting a public official, entering a restricted zone “the pearl roundabout” and illegal gathering”. With these sentences, Ms. Al Khawaja will remain in prison until the end of 2013. In total she stood for more than 13 cases against her and she was sentenced in most of them to either prison or fines at least one more case is still in hearing process and verdict is expected on 25 June 2013 [3]. Since 4 March 2013, Ms. Al Khawaja was not allowed to receive visitation from her family, including her 3 years old daughter, due to her refusal to wear the prison uniform as prisoner of conscience. Furthermore, she is not allowed to go out to the prison yard, or to receive personal items including hygiene items from her family. As for Ms. Masooma Al Sayed, she remains free as of now.

On 19 June 2013, Mr. Mohammed Al-Maskati, President of BYSHR, appeared before the Lower Criminal Court on charges of “participation in illegal protests” in relation to a peaceful gathering held in Manama on 12 October 2012 to call for human rights and democracy in the country. As Mr. Al-Maskati’s lawyers asked for the case file, the judge decided to postpone the case to July 9, 2013. Mr. Al-Maskati could face three to six months’ imprisonment. On October 17, 2012, Mr. Al-Maskati had appeared before Bahrain’s public prosecution under these same charges. He had been summoned the day before to Al Hoora police station, where he had been kept overnight before being referred to the prosecutor’s office. On October 17, he was released on bail, but charges against him had remained pending since then. …more

Human rights record in Bahrain still abysmal – Europe must act
by Mariwan Hama – 21 June, 2013 – Pubic Service Eurpoe

The country’s systemic repression should be on agenda of the EU-Gulf Cooperation Council summit in Manama at the end of this month – says campaigner

Hama When European Union ministers meet their counterparts from the Gulf Cooperation Council states for a summit in Bahrain on June 30, the dismal state of that island kingdom’s human rights record needs to have a prominent place on the agenda. Despite King Hamad’s claims of reform, Bahrain is clearly heading down the road of greater repression and the EU ministers should make a point of clearly and publicly saying so.

For starters, Europe should call for the release of political prisoners – among them three with EU citizenship – who languish in jail, some serving life terms, for crimes such as ‘possessing political leaflets’, ‘participating in illegal demonstrations’ and calling for a constitutional monarchy. Bahrain’s claim that it has released all those jailed solely for speech offenses is a blatant lie.

Freedom of association does not fare any better than freedom of speech: the government recently sent to parliament – where most members are the king’s men – a draft law that allows authorities to take over and dissolve, more or less at will, organisations whose leaders criticise government officials and policies; and severely limits the ability of groups to raise money.

Unregistered organisations are ‘illegal’ and joining one is a criminal offense under the penal code. In May, parliament amended the Public Gathering Law to ban demonstrations near ‘lively places, and places that have a security nature’ and to require organisers to provide up to 20,000 Bahraini Dinars – $53,000 – as a security deposit to hold a demonstration. Authorities can refuse permission if they decide it ‘harms the economic interests of the country’.

Just this week the parliament amended the penal code to prescribe five years in prison and a $26,500 fine for ‘insulting the king’. When Sheikh Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa came to power in 1999, he promised a new era of reform by releasing hundreds of political prisoners, allowing hundreds of exiles to return home and abolishing the notorious State Security Courts. But then the king unilaterally decreed a constitution that was all about preserving the control of the ruling Al Khalifa family.

Now authorities have decisively reversed the pretense of reform by prosecuting and jailing civil and political society leaders and drafting legislation to suppress independent civic engagement and political activism. Public frustrations culminated in massive demonstrations in February 2011 when tens of thousands took to the streets demanding greater political rights, an end to corruption and an elected government.

The Al Khalifas responded with a brutal retribution campaign against protesters. Special military courts sentenced opposition and civil society leaders and hundreds of others to lengthy prison terms after patently unfair trials. Under international pressure, the king appointed the Bahrain Independent Commission of Inquiry to investigate the repression.

The commission’s hard-hitting report of November 2011 documented torture, unlawful killings, arbitrary arrests and other systematic human rights violations. The commission recommended, among other things, freeing all those detained for exercising the right to free speech and peaceful assembly and amending laws to comply with international human rights standards. King Hamad publicly accepted the recommendations but the activists remain jailed and the new legislation is in many ways more restrictive and punitive than what has been on the books.

…more

Bahraini Salafists in Spotlight
Husain Marhoon – Al-Monitor – 18 June, 2013

At the beginning of 2013, 19-year-old Abdurrahman al-Hamd left Bahrain for Syria, driven by a desire to fight in the jihad and to heed the many calls issued by Islamic centers for people to fight against the Syrian regime. On May 28, Abdurrahman returned home in a coffin.

Immediately afterward, his relatives rushed to publish photos of him in battle, one of which showed him — Kalashnikov rifle in hand — atop a military vehicle flying the Jabhat al-Nusra flag.

His father, Sheikh Adel al-Hamd, a Salafist preacher and the imam of a mosque in the al-Rifa’ region south of the capital Manama, said in an audio recording, “He fulfilled his wish.”

Just a few days passed before further news emerged about the deaths of four more young men, which pushed the death toll to five Bahrainis killed in the span of just one week. Websites subsequently published photos of one of them, Abdul-Aziz al-Uthman, wearing the military uniform of the Bahraini Defense Forces in one of the areas controlled by the Syrian mujahideen.

Salafism modified

Until recently, it was believed that the prominent Salafist movement in Bahrain was a traditional one that swore absolute obedience to its leader and forbade all forms of political activities. Even with slight modifications to this line of thought — which lifted the prohibition on political action under the religious premise of allowing “an evil to occur in order to prevent a greater evil from occurring” — absolute obedience to the ruler remained a central tenet of Bahraini Salafism.

The Al-Asalah Islamic Society, which was established in 2002, is considered the most prominent faction espousing this line of thought, and is the main Bahraini Salafist movement.

Al-Asalah, which has close ties with Saudi Arabia, is represented by four MPs in the Bahraini parliament and controls one cabinet portfolio in the current government. Throughout its 10 years of overt political work, Al-Asalah exhibited great synergy with the Bahraini regime. It also expressed its unequivocal rejection of al-Qaeda’s leader, Osama bin Laden, and his jihadist Salafist philosophy.

As a result, Bahrainis never before participated in any operations carried out against the outside world.

But between 2003 and 2012, the Bahraini Interior Ministry announced the uncovering of numerous Salafist cells that it accused of “raising money” for al-Qaeda and “training with the aim of striking against Western interests” as well as “taking photographs of vital installations.” Reports confirmed the incarceration of six Bahraini Salafists in the prison at the US Guantanamo Bay naval base on the island of Cuba, two in Saudi Arabia and one in Kuwait for similar infractions. Despite that fact, it remains difficult to prove whether any of those people actually participated in operations carried out by al-Qaeda.

All of those men were subsequently released, including the ones that were taken at different intervals to Guantanamo after having been sold out by clans inhabiting the Pakistani border region.

Another face of Salafism

The deaths of five Bahraini Salafists in the course of one week in Damascus had a never-before-seen impact in Bahrain, reopening the debate about whether the previously mentioned “spotless” image that the Bahraini Salafist movement enjoyed was true, or whether it only represented the visible part of its hidden, real identity.

In August 2012, a delegation of Bahraini MPs belonging to the Islamist Al-Asalah Society snuck into Syria through Turkey to meet with militants from the Soukour al-Sham (Hawks of Greater Syria) faction, and announced that they “delivered donations sent by the Bahrainis to the Syrian people.”

On May 29, the Salafist preacher Sheikh Adnan al-Aroor, known for his extremist and anti-Shiite views, visited Manama and took part in a campaign held at a mosque in the Al-Buhair region south of the capital, to raise funds from Bahraini Salafists in solidarity with the Syrian people.

Local newspapers later stated that Aroor was able to auction off his religious robes, known in the Gulf as al-Bisht, to a wealthy Bahraini for the sum of 15,000 dinars (approximately $40,000).

These activities did not seem to go beyond humanitarian efforts to include the training of local fighters who were sent to Syria.

On one occasion, a campaign in August 2012 to raise contributions for Syria made a claim that was grossly misinterpreted. In that case, organizers urged donors to contribute money that would be used to “train the hero invaders.” They set the cost of one contribution share to 1,000 dinars ($2,600). The common belief was that the contributions raised would be delivered to Syrian opposition factions. Once again, the view that prevailed was that Bahraini Salafism supported the Bahraini regime. …more

Russia Right to Dismiss Obama Nuke Fakery
Finian CUNNINGHAM – 21 June, 2012

Obama’s Berlin speech this week urging Russia to join the US in making sweeping cuts to their stockpiles of nuclear weapons was fittingly delivered at the German capital’s historic Brandenburg Gate.

For it was another Obama «landmark» delivery of style over substance; histrionics over history; and sentimentalism over seriousness. Unfortunately, 6,000 invited German guests bought the charade with resounding, frequent applauses.

Historians may note that the world-famous Berlin gate was commissioned back in 1788 by the Prussian King Friedrich Wilhelm II as a «triumphal symbol of peace».

But, sadly, the Brandenburg Gate has in actuality come to be associated with wars and conflict. This mismatch in reality and illusion is appropriate for Obama’s «landmark» declamation this week.

A brief history recounts how the gate was adopted as an icon by Nazi Germany to adorn the trappings of its war machine. After the Second World War, the neoclassical arch then stood at the heart of the division of Berlin and Europe by the nuclear-powered Western allies and the Soviet Union. Western historians typically blame Moscow for establishing the Berlin Wall, without the context of Washington and London instigating the Cold War aggression under the threat of nuclear weapons at the close of the Second World War, when the Western allies also covertly rearmed the Nazi war machine against the Soviet Union.

So, just like the Brandenburg Gate itself, Obama’s speech this week belongs more in the realm of fanciful sentiment and deception rather than in credible substance.

The supposed highlight of the American president’s speech was his declared aim to push harder for nuclear arms reduction. Let’s take a closer look at his supposedly earnest words.

Obama declared: «Because of the New START Treaty, we’re on track to cut American and Russian deployed nuclear warheads to their lowest levels since the 1950s.»

That is partially true. The world’s nuclear arsenal – of which the US and Russia account for 90 per cent – has been on a steep decline since the end of the Cold War in 1991. There is currently estimated to be about 17,000 nuclear warheads worldwide – down from the high point of 68,000 in 1985. The US and Russia currently account for about 8,000 total nuclear weapons apiece.

Of these, only about 25 per cent of the stockpiles are believed to be active, giving about 2,000 each. The New START accord of 2010 referred to by Obama in his speech seeks to limit the arsenals to 1,550 each. Obama is now saying that after «a comprehensive review» he wants Russia and the US to push even harder for deeper cuts to about 1,000 warheads – a further one-third reduction than the START deal obliges. …more

Iran’s stunning victory against Western regimes
16 June, 2013 – By Finian Cunningham – PressTV

The Iranian people have won. They have withstood the bullying of Western regimes, including the threats of war, to demonstrate that Iran is a democracy of immense civility. The Iranian people have won the argument and the cause for truth in the eyes of the world. It is now up to the Western regimes to fundamentally change their policy towards Iran and to treat the Iranian people with the democratic respect that they deserve.”
Related Interviews:

‘Iran democracy exemplary in world’
‘Iran voter turnout excels that of US’

Iran’s 11th presidential election since the Islamic Revolution 34 years ago produced a stunning victory. With nearly 73 percent of the electorate turning out last Friday to vote for six presidential candidates perhaps the real winner to emerge was Iran – its people and its democratic system.

Hassan Rohani takes pride of place as the new president of Iran having won over 50 percent of the votes. Mr. Rohani’s election surprised many observers. What his triumph and the turnout in the polls indicate is that Iran has a free and fair democracy, which has a massive mandate from the people.

Six candidates had free and equal access to Iranian media to present their manifestos, and the people then decided; as it turns out they decided for a surprise winner.

Contrast that vibrant and free exercise in people power with the lassitude of many Western states, where voter turnout is often as low as 50 percent; and where the electorate is presented with an empty “choice” between two candidates or parties, all controlled and vetted by the corporate ruling elite. The United States of America is perhaps the most salient exponent of this moribund and oxymoronic state of Western so-called democracy.

In the US, no-one can run for election unless they are bankrolled by billions of dollars. The top one percent of corporate and financial rulers makes the shortlist of presidential candidates from which the electorate is permitted to “choose”. The US system is the antithesis of democracy and that’s why almost half of the electorate – more than 100 million people – don’t even bother going to the polling stations. They know it is a waste of time and vote – because the result is pre-determined by the ruling elite; and that’s why there is never any change in America’s plundering, criminal policies at home and abroad.

The other noteworthy aspect of the Iranian election was the high turnout among young people. Many of these younger voters would not have been born during the Islamic revolution of 1979; many more of the voters would not have had personal experience of the horrible US-backed dictatorship of the Shah (1953-79). That means the active participation of the younger Iranian generation in the latest election is a further sign of genuine popular support for the Islamic revolution, the constitution, the electoral system and the country’s leadership under Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei. …more

Putin stands up to G8 warmongers on Syria, reaffirming support for Assad govt.
19 June, 2013 – By Finian Cunningham – PressTV

The ousting of Assad has been the top foreign political priority of the Western regimes for more than two years. Under the cynical guise of supporting a “pro-democracy uprising”, Washington and the two former colonial powers have plunged Syria into a maelstrom of violence that

has resulted in more than 90,000 deaths.
Related Interviews:

‘Syria militants upset about losses’
‘US posing nuclear threats to China’

Russian President Vladimir Putin can take credit for standing up to the G8 warmongers on Syria. Thanks to the feisty Russian leader’s political courage, an all-out war in Syria may have been averted – at least for now.

Only days ago, Western media were touting that Putin would be given a political drubbing at the G8 summit in Northern Ireland this week by the US, Britain and France – the three main NATO powers pushing for regime change in Syria.

The arrogance and spite awaiting Putin was summed up by Washington’s Canadian puppet prime minister, Stephen Harper, when he accused, through media channels, the Russian president of supporting “thugs in Syria”.

Harper said: “I don’t think we should fool ourselves. This is G7 plus one. We in the West have a very different perspective on this situation. Mr Putin and his government are supporting the thugs of the Assad regime.”

When the conference opened, Putin didn’t waste time on a minion like Harper. He had bigger fish to fry. During the summit, Putin told Obama, Cameron and Hollande face-to-face that Russia was standing firm in its support for the government of President Bashar al Assad in Damascus. He warned that any plans by the Western powers to openly supply weapons to anti-government militants in Syria was against international law and would destabilize the region; and Putin refused to revoke a deal by Russia to deliver anti-aircraft defence missiles to Syria, pointing out that the transaction was a legal bilateral agreement between sovereign countries.

In one fell swoop, Putin used the auspices of the annual G8 forum to debunk Western lies and propaganda on Syria and to reiterate the facts of international relations, namely, that Syria is a sovereign country with a sovereign government.

Earlier, British Prime Minister David Cameron, who hosted the two-day summit in Enniskillen, County Fermanagh, was betting along with US President Barack Obama and French President Francois Hollande that the G8 meeting would cause Putin to wilt under their combined pressure. …more

Cameron insults our intelligence over Syria… and gets a slap from Putin
Finian CUNNINGHAM – 19 June , 2013 – Strategic Culture Foundation

They say a picture paints a thousand words. The photograph of British Prime Minister David Cameron and Russian President Vladimir Putin in London recently certainly does. When the two leaders gave a press conference at the weekend in Downing Street ahead to the G8 summit, Cameron had the excruciating look of a desperate man. Putin, by contrast, appeared in control. The latter spoke in measured tones and with discernible contempt in his voice.

The two leaders had emerged from a «difficult» – diplomatic language for «combative» – private meeting in which Syria was top of the agenda. Apparently, President Putin had kept his British host waiting for one hour before arriving.

Afterwards, at the press conference, Cameron winced and gripped the podium as if it was a precipice from which he was hanging, as Putin delivered his comments. Cameron had good reason to look fearful as he hung on every word emanating from the Russian leader.

Then Putin pushed diplomacy to the limit when he said: «You will not deny that one does not really need to support the people who not only kill their enemies, but open up their bodies, eat their intestines in front of the public and cameras. Are these the people you want to support? Is it them who you want to supply with weapons? Then this probably has little relation to humanitarian values that have been preached in Europe for hundreds of years».

It was the rhetorical equivalent of a public slap in the face for the conceited British prime minister.

Putin was referring explicitly to the countless videos that have emerged over recent months showing a litany of barbarities committed by the Western so-called «rebels» who have been waging a war inside Syria for the past two and half years to topple the government of President Bashar al-Assad. The depravities include eviscerating bodies of slain victims and forcing children to decapitate soldiers and civilians.

In reality these «pro-democracy rebels» whom the Western governments and media have lionized are a rag-tag paramilitary force of extremists and terrorists who have gravitated to Syria from up to 30 countries, including Libya, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Turkey and the Russian Caucasus. These mercenaries share the same abstruse Wahhabi/Salafist theology, which gives them an ideological green light to butcher anyone that stands in their way of setting up a fundamentalist Emirate in Syria. The NATO powers, led by the US, Britain and France, have armed this proxy army to the teeth and equipped it with logistics and training from Special Forces to do the West’s dirty work of regime change. …more

Of especial interest to the USG and allies are the oil and gas resources of the Islamic Republic of Iran
16 June, 2013 – Namavaran Network

Dr. Colin S. Cavell Born and raised in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, Dr. Cavell is an American author who earned his Doctorate of Philosophy degree in Political Science from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. Dr. Cavell is currently Assistant Professor of Political Science at Bluefield State College in Bluefield, West Virginia and Adjunct Professor of Political Science at Holyoke Community College in Holyoke, Massachusetts. Colin S. Cavell is a member of the American Political Science Association (APSA) and the Massachusetts Community College Council (MCCC).

NNC has conducted a Q & A with him that you can read here:

NNC – “U.S. foreign policy”: What is your assessment?
Dr. Colin S. Cavell – The Army, Navy, Air Force, Marine Corps, Defense Intelligence, and Joint Activities are, in descending order of importance, the structures which garner the primary resources of US tax dollars at present. Currently, the FY2013 defense budget is $472 billion, down from $525 billion prior to the Budget Control Act automatic cuts of $1.2 trillion which commenced on January 2, 2013. Also, this is a reduction from the FY2012 defense budget of $530.6 billion. And, just two years prior, the FY2010 defense budget was $664 billion. So we are witnessing a continuing decline in monies going towards US military activities, and this is primarily due to the extravagant waste on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan as well as due to the lingering effects of the economic collapse of 2008. The ongoing war in Afghanistan and continuing activities in Iraq also now fall under the term “overseas contingency operations” and are included in the defense budget instead of being voted on separately as was previous practice. Consequently, we can see that the severe economic crisis is affecting resources the US Government (USG) can put into its military activities to promote its foreign policies abroad.

The aims of US foreign policy remain the same: protect and, where possible, expand the system of private expropriation of labor under the leadership of American-Anglo capitalists and their privately-run corporate institutions. The state apparatus remains the instrument of this capitalist class and works to perpetuate their interests.

The primary threat to the stability of the American-Anglo capitalist class in the present conjuncture comes from the People’s Republic of China (PRC) reflecting its economic prowess and growing domination of world markets. A second threat emanates from a growing belligerence from a more confident Russia which, since the downfall of the Soviet Union in 1991, has gradually established a relatively stable strong state backed by a more nationalistically-oriented capitalist class which sees its interests as diverging from those of the West. In order to corral and contain these powers—both of which have strong Asian interests–US President Obama is diversifying US military focus from a myopic view and fixation on the Middle East towards a greater emphasis on Asia and the Pacific. To effectuate continued US hegemony over much of the world, however, control of the earth’s remaining fossil fuels, notably oil and natural gas, particularly the large quantities under the sands of the Middle East, will continue to be a primary focus of US foreign policy. All present actions towards Syria, Iran, etc., are structured with this goal in mind.

Of especial interest to the USG and allies are the oil and gas resources of the Islamic Republic of Iran, which have been out of American-Anglo capitalist control since the 1979 Iranian Revolution. These resources are the third largest in the world. Sabotage and destabilization efforts by the US and allies, particularly Israel, will continue against the Iranian Republic and its ally Syria, though it is doubtful that the US will commit its own troops on the ground to wage this fight. US reluctance to commit ground troops to this fight at the present time stems largely from: 1) the knowledge (and resulting bad faith) of most members of Congress that the USG is supporting anti-democratic elements to overthrow, at least technically, democratic governments (i.e. Syria and Iran); and 2) the USG is concerned that if the US commits troops to this struggle, then the American people will find out that it is the US who is supporting jihadist fighters associated with Al Qaeda in an effort to prop up anti-democratic monarchical dictatorial oppressive regimes, including Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, etc. Instead, facilitating jihadist fighters from the Persian Gulf kingdoms and elsewhere to fight in Syria is the option being pursued with the aim to: 1) help defuse the growing economic contradictions and political demands of frustrated Arab and other populations in these US-client states; and 2) push back the Arab Spring of democratic protests that is engulfing the region since 2011. Concern by US ally Saudi Arabia and other Persian Gulf monarch client states is that the Arab Spring of democratic revolts will embroil their societies into civil war thus threatening their continued autocratic rule. Hence, there is a perceived existential necessity by these dictators to redirect the Arab Spring away from the Persian Gulf kingdoms and onto the secular democratic regime of Syria so as to expose the Islamic Republic of Iran to the full force of Western-backed imperialist invasion. The underlying belief behind these actions is that overthrowing Iran and bringing it back under imperialist control will obviate the need to make any democratic concessions, as calls for greater freedom will, they believe, dissipate once the Iranian Revolution is nullified. However, the attempt to characterize the Syrian government and the Iranian government as less than democratic has no currency outside of the US. Bashar al-Assad was not only put into office through elections in 2000 and 2007 but, as well, a new constitution approved in February of 2012 has wide popular appeal and will allow him to run again in 2014. Likewise, next week, in mid-June, Iran will be undergoing its eleventh presidential election since the founding of the republic. And, while the US may quibble over the structure of these elections and the candidates running or how they are qualified, political observers in the Middle East are well aware that even in the US—in the world’s self-proclaimed “greatest democracy”—only 538 people select the president and vice president, and yet the American people accept the USG as democratic in form. Thus relative to Saudi Arabia and the other Persian Gulf monarchies, Iran and Syria are considered very free countries, and this is particularly the view of most women in the Middle East. And supporting the rights of women are a key component of which governments will accrue support and/or condemnation in the Middle East. In this regard, Syria and Iran are miles ahead of Saudi Arabia and the other Gulf kingdoms.

Thirdly, American-Anglo capitalists are concerned that captive populations in their spheres of control are too democratically oriented as well as distrustful of the continuation of the capitalist state given the continued high levels of unemployment and economic stress these populations are presently experiencing. Indeed, a recent Rasmussen survey reported only a slight majority of Americans still consider capitalism as superior to socialism, and this is a cause of concern for the powers that be. The usual diversionary tactics of appeals to prurient interests and/or mindless absurdities and/or fantastical spectacles (e.g. alleged sightings of mermaids, etc.) have thus been heightened. But such diversionary tactics or prestidigitatious practices cannot substitute for the lack of jobs and financial security for any length of time. Likewise, Americans are sick and tired of endless wars and are no longer as gullible nor susceptible to jingoistic appeals.

NNC – In your opinion, are concepts like “fighting terrorism” and “promoting democracy” merely a cover for the pursuit of US interests or an aspect of reality in America?

Dr. Colin S. Cavell – “Fighting terrorism” and “promoting democracy” are phrases utilized by the USG and opportunistic politicians in order to rally popular opinion to support their actions both domestically and abroad. “Fighting terrorism” plays upon people’s genuine fear of bombings, assassinations, etc. akin to the September 11, 2001, suicide attacks on the World Trade Center in New York City and the Pentagon in Washington, DC. Appeals to self-preservation and ‘fear of the other’ are ingrained in popular culture so as to reinforce belief in the dominant Anglo-American capitalist culture in the US while denigrating the alleged amoral and insidious nature of foreigners, especially those of suspect cultures, e.g. currently those of Middle Eastern descent and Muslim religious confession. “Promoting democracy” is a phrase utilized by US Presidents and other officials, especially those connected with the US State Department, to castigate any regime the US determines to be in the enemy camp. If the USG is waging war against such regimes or countering their moves in the international arena, such actions are said to be carried out in the interest of “promoting democracy”, even if this means supporting autocratic monarchs in the Persian Gulf or dictatorial regimes elsewhere. …more

“… the Persian Gulf, the critical oil and natural gas-producing region that we fought so many wars to try and protect our economy from the adverse impact of losing that supply or having it available only at very high prices.” -John Bolton, George W. Bush’s ambassador to the United Nations

The US Wants Syrian Oil, Not Democracy
By Carl Gibson – Reader Supported News – 18 June, 13

ll the hubbub over Syria is all about oil. And if you don’t believe me, believe John Bolton.

When there’s something being talked about in the news on a regular basis, and if one angle of the story is being consistently reported by various reputable news organizations, you can be sure there’s something else to the story that isn’t being told. Matt Taibbi called this “chumpbait” when referring to the media’s unified dismissal concerning Bradley Manning’s court-martial. The same applies to the latest corporate media stories speculating on US military involvement in Syria.

If the US were really concerned about spreading Democracy in the Middle East, we’d be helping the Occupy Gezi movement oust Turkish Prime Minister Ergodan and condemning his violent suppression of human rights, rather than assisting the Free Syrian Army. And the only reason the powers controlling the US would be interested in intervening in Turkey would be if Turkish protesters or government forces shut down the highly-productive Kirkuk-Ceyhan oil pipeline, which goes from Iraq through Southern Turkey.

All of the media has been atwitter about whether or not the US should get involved in the civil war unfolding in Syria by supporting anti-government forces. The atrocities recently committed by the Free Syrian Army are reminiscent of the kind committed against the Soviets in the 1980s by the Afghan mujahideen, whom we actively funded and supplied with arms. (Remember the movie Charlie Wilson’s War?) It should be worth noting that the same mujahideen fighters we funded to fight our enemies for us in the 1980s became our enemies even before the 9/11 attacks.

In a roundabout way, the US media is making the argument that because the Assad regime is using chemical weapons on the Syrian people, the US military should intervene by arming and training the Free Syrian Army in the hopes of overthrowing President Assad. On the surface, most Americans would agree that Assad is a brutal dictator and should be removed from office. But if you asked most Americans whether or not the US military should intervene in Syria to make sure the profit margins of oil companies remain strong, it’s likely most rational folks would say no. Digging just beneath the surface, it’s easy to see that US interest in Syria isn’t to provide Democracy to Syria, but to ensure the Kirkuk-Banias oil pipeline will be restored to profitable status. Even President Obama’s press secretary said that foreign policy isn’t driven by what the people want, but by what is best for “American interests.”

The Kirkuk-Banias pipeline runs from Kirkuk in Northern Iraq, to the Syrian town of Banias, on the Mediterranean Sea between Turkey and Lebanon. Ever since US forces inadvertently destroyed it in 2003, most of the pipeline has been shut down. While there have been plans in the works to make the Iraqi portion of the pipeline functional again, those plans have yet to come to fruition. And Syria has at least 2.5 billion barrels of oil in its fields, making it the next largest Middle Eastern oil producer after Iraq. After ten unproductive years, the oil companies dependent on the Kirkuk-Banias pipeline’s output are eager to get the pipeline operational again. The tension over the Syrian oil situation is certainly being felt by wealthy investors in the markets, who are thus dictating US foreign policy.

It’s easy to see why the oil-dominated US government wants to be involved in Syria’s outcome. The Free Syrian Army has since taken control of oil fields near Deir Ezzor, and Kurdish groups have taken control of other oil fields in the Rumeilan region. Many of the numerous atrocities that Assad’s government committed against unarmed women and children were in Homs, which is near one of the country’s only two oil refineries. Israel, the US’s only ally in the Middle East, is illegally occupying the Golan Heights on the Syrian border and extracting their resources. The US wants to get involved in Syria to monopolize its oil assets, while simultaneously beating our competition – Iran, Russia and China – in the race for Syrian black gold. …more

What the Syrian Constitution says about Assad and the Rebels
21 May, 2013 – what’s left – By Stephen Gowans

The idea that the uprising against the Syrian government is inspired by a grassroots movement thirsting for a pluralist, democratic state is a fiction. The opposition’s chief elements are Islamists who seek to establish a Sunni-dominated Islamic state in place of a Syrian government they revile for being secular and dominated by Alawi “heretics.” “Al Qaeda-linked groups…dominate rebel ranks,” notes The Wall Street Journal. [1] “There is frustration with the West’s inability to help nurture a secular military or political opposition to replace Mr. Assad,” echoes The New York Times. [2] “Islamic forces seem to be ascendant within the opposition,” observes Gerald F. Seib. [3]

Indeed, almost from the opening moments of the latest outbreak of Islamic unrest in Syria, the government has said that while some protesters have legitimate grievances, the uprising is driven by militant Islamists with foreign backing.” [4] It’s no secret that Saudi Arabia and Qatar- monarchies which abominate democracy—are furnishing Islamist militants with arms, while Turkey, Jordan, Israel, France, Britain and the United States are also lending support.

Syria’s post-colonial history is punctuated by Islamist uprisings. The Muslim Brotherhood organized riots against the government in 1964, 1965, 1967 and 1969. It called for a Jihad against then president Hafiz al-Assad, the current president’s father, denigrating him as “the enemy of Allah.” By 1977, the Mujahedeen were engaged in a guerrilla struggle against the Syrian army and its Soviet advisers, culminating in the 1982 occupation of the city of Hama. The Syrian army quelled the occupation, killing 20,000 to 30,000. Islamists have since remained a perennial source of instability in Syria and the government has been on continual guard against “a resurgence of Sunni Islamic fundamentalists.” [5] The resurgence, touched off by uprisings in surrounding countries, prompted Glen E. Robinson to write in Current History that the rebellion was a continuation of “Syria’s Long Civil War.” [6]

But the Western media, echoing former colonialist powers and high officials in Washington, would call it something different: a popular, grassroots uprising against a brutal dictator. Today, however, the flood of YouTube videos by Islamic terrorists, chronicling their killings of POWs, eviscerations of captured soldiers, and barbecuing of heads, has spoiled the narrative. It’s no longer possible to angelize the Syrian rebellion as a popular insurrection against dictatorship. Now even the Wall Street Journal and New York Times share Assad’s view.

Still, the rebels’ spin doctors aren’t yielding entirely. They insist that while the rebellion may be dominated by religious fanatics with a penchant for terrorism, that it wasn’t always so. Instead, they say, it began as a peaceful plea for democracy that was eventually hijacked by jihadists only after the government used brute force to crush a protest movement. At that point, protesters were forced to take up arms in self-defense.

This view is dishonest. To start, it sweeps aside the reality that the rebellion is dominated by Islamists who care not one whit for democracy and indeed are actively hostile to it. What’s more, it conceals the fact that the Assad government made substantial concessions in the direction of creating the kind of pluralist, democratic society the rebels are said to thirst for. The rebels rejected the concessions, and that they did, underscores the fact that the rebellion’s origins are to be found in Islamist, not democratic, ambitions.

In response to protestors’ demands, Damascus made a number of concessions that were neither superficial nor partial.

First, it cancelled the long-standing abridgment of civil liberties that had been authorized by the emergency law. The law, invoked because Syria is technically in a state of war with Israel, gave Damascus powers it needed to safeguard the security of the state in wartime, a measure states at war routinely take. Many Syrians, however, chaffed under the law, and regarded it as unduly restrictive. Bowing to popular pressure, the government lifted the security measures.

Second, the government proposed a new constitution to accommodate protestors’ demands to strip the Ba’ath Party of its special status, which had reserved for it a lead role in Syrian society. Additionally, the presidency would be open to anyone meeting basic residency, age and citizenship requirements. Presidential elections would be held by secret vote every seven years under a system of universal suffrage.

Here was the multi-party democracy the opposition was said to have clamored for. A protest movement thirsting for a democratic, pluralist society could accept the offer, its aspirations fulfilled. The constitution was put to a referendum and approved. New parliamentary multi-party elections were held. Multi-candidate presidential elections were set for 2014. A new democratic dawn had arrived. The rebels could lay down their arms and enjoy the fruits of their victory. …more

France’s chemical pre-action to propaganda defeat at Qusair
Finian Cunningham – 10 June, 13 – Strategic Culture Fondation

One of Isaac Newton’s laws of physics states that «for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction».

In light of French claims this week that Syrian state forces were guilty of having used chemical weapons, we may apply a variant of Newton’s law to the study of political diplomacy – for every action, expect an equal and opposite pre-action.

On Wednesday morning, 5 June, around 6am local time, dramatic news came out of Syria that the Syrian Arab Army had finally retaken the strategic town of Qusair. The victory followed several weeks of heavy fighting with the Western-backed militants, who had first taken occupation of the town a year ago. Backed by the Lebanese militia of Hezbollah, the Syrian army reportedly killed thousands of the anti-government militants and routed thousands more to regain full control of Qusair.

Located in the central province of Homs near the border with Lebanon, Qusair is a key transport and logistics hub for the rest of Syria, linking north and south, and providing a corridor to the Mediterranean coast. As one Syrian army commander put it before the recapture of the town this week: «Whoever controls Qusair controls the whole of Syria.»

The victory for the government forces of President Bashar al-Assad may well prove to be a turning point in the more than two-year war.

Despite the Western government and media narrative describing the violence in Syria as the result of «a popular pro-democracy uprising» that has turned into a «civil war», the weight of evidence shows a very different scenario. That is, that the conflict in Syria is mainly a result of a covert war for regime change sponsored by the chief NATO powers of Washington, London and Paris, along with their regional allies of Israel, Turkey, Jordan and the Persian Gulf Arab oil kingdoms.

Syria is, from this viewpoint, a crucial staging post for Western imperialist plans to roll over the oil-rich Middle East in order to install regimes that are pliant with Western geopolitical interests. These interests include untrammeled access to the world’s main oil and gas reserves, eventual regime change in the regional powerhouse of Iran, and the denial of vital resources and markets to the West’s global rivals of Russia and China.

The outcome of the battle for Qusair this week is therefore not just setback for anti-Assad «rebels», as the Western media like to call them, but rather it is a defeat for the NATO-led axis and its strategy for regime change in Syria and the wider region. The military and propaganda significance of this defeat cannot be underestimated, and it comes as a crucial moral boost for the Assad government in Damascus ahead of the international peace conference in Geneva that Moscow and Washington are convening, due to take place sometime over the next few weeks.

Washington, London and the former colonial power, Paris, have together invested huge political capital in this covert, criminal proxy war for regime change in Syria. The NATO states have mounted a relentless campaign to discredit the incumbent Assad government as illegitimate. Their respective foreign ministers, John Kerry, William Hague and Laurent Fabius, have repeatedly demanded President Assad to stand down, claiming that he is a despot who is unfit to govern. Those petulant demands now seem increasingly vain and, frankly, comedic.

The routing this week from Qusair of the Western-backed ragtag foreign mercenaries, including brigades from the Al Qaeda-linked Al Nusra Front, is emphatic illustration of NATO’s bankrupt agenda in Syria. This was no «noble resistance» to an encroaching despot, but rather it was the lifting of an occupying siege that had been imposed on a town of 30,000 inhabitants by Western-backed foreign gangs, which have no popular support among ordinary Syrian citizens.

If, for argument’s sake, this had been the advance of a cruel, murderous army of a cruel, murderous despot, why were there not scenes of public pandemonium and hysteria, with thousands of desperate civilians trying to escape before the fall of Qusair? On the contrary, it seems that the arriving Syrian army was welcomed by the town’s residents, relieved that the siege had finally been broken.

Some 10,000 of Qusair’s inhabitants had managed to flee months ago from the occupying militants and their withering application of Islamic fundamentalism over the past year. The mercenaries fighting in Syria come from more than 30 countries, including Libya, Tunisia, Egypt, the Russian Caucasus, Saudi Arabia and Qatar. They all share, apparently, a devotion to the extremist Wahhabi ideology of Islam, which sees all other non-subscribing Muslims (the vast majority) as «infidels» to be persecuted along with Christians and non-religious. Shia Muslims and Alawites in particular are «to be wiped out», according to the recent comments of one so-called Free Syrian Army commander.

This brutish, sectarian mindset, of course, plays very well for the Western agenda of subversion and sabotage in Syria, as it did during the 1980s in Afghanistan against the Soviet Union. Not that you will see this unvarnished truth being reported in the Western media coverage of the conflict in Syria. Oh no, the Western governments are allegedly supporting «democracy-loving rebels» – incongruously with the help of those well-known democracy-loving regimes in Israel, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and in the news elsewhere this week, Turkey. …more

Public Example – Saudi Arabia Beheadings for Crimes Ranging from Apostasy to Sorcery

Government continues to promote arms to Saudi Arabia as human rights deteriorate
21 May, 2013 – Campaign Against Arms Trade

Campaign Against Arms Trade (CAAT) has condemned as shameful the UK government continued eagerness to sell arms to the authoritarian regime of Saudi Arabia, despite their worsening human rights situation and almost complete lack of democratic institutions.

New government data reveals that in 2012 the UK licensed weaponry worth £111.7 million to Saudi Arabia, plus £5.6 million worth of “dual use” goods. Overall, Saudi Arabia is the largest market for UK arms, buying almost £4 billion worth of weapons and military services between 2008 and 2012.

In 2007, Saudi Arabia contracted to buy 72 Eurofighter Typhoon jets, from arms giant BAE Systems, in a deal worth up to £6 billion. Although the first 24 jets were delivered and arrangements put in place for servicing, upgrading and delivering the remaining 48 aircraft, a final price has yet to be agreed. In November 2012 David Cameron visited Saudi Arabia to help seal the deal – however, the negotiations continue.

The continued arms sales drive comes despite Saudi Arabia’s deteriorating human rights record:

– Saudi Arabia’s ranking in the The Economist Intelligence Unit’s Democracy Index 2012 declined further to 163 out of 167 countries, and it was given zero points for “electoral process and pluralism”. The only countries ranked lower were Syria, Chad, Guinea Bissau and North Korea.

– Saudi Arabia’s press was assessed as “not free” by Freedom House’s Freedom of the Press Index 2013 which listed it as joint 182 of 197 countries listed.

– Saudi Arabia was listed as a “country of concern” in the Foreign and Commonwealth Office Annual report on Human Rights and Democracy 2012.

Despite its “country of concern” label, Saudi Arabia was simultaneously listed as a “priority market” by UK Trade & Investment Defence & Security Organisation (UKTI DSO), the government’s arms sales unit, which regularly invites official delegations from Saudi Arabia to arms fairs and related “trade exhibitions” in the UK.

CAAT spokesperson Kaye Stearman said:

When it comes to Saudi Arabia the UK government completely disregards any considerations of human rights in its effects to sell arms, whether they be Eurofighter Typhoons, Tactica armoured vehicles or small arms and ammunition.

The Prime Minister and arms company executives visit Saudi Arabia to beg for orders and routinely roll out the red carpet for Saudi delegations to the UK, as they will be doing in September for the DSEi arms fair. It’s time to end this damaging and dangerous relationship and stop selling arms to this repressive and despotic regime.
Arms export data – UK arms exports to Saudi Arabia

In 2012 the UK licensed weaponry worth £111.7 million to Saudi Arabia . The main items licensed fell in the categories: “aircraft, helicopters, drones” – £81.4 million; “armoured vehicles, tanks” – £8.8 million; “technology” – £3.8 million; “imaging equipment” – £3.5 million; “other electronic equipment” – £3.2 million; “grenades, bombs, countermeasures” – £3.2 million; “ammunition” – £2.1 million; “chemical, biological agents” – £1.5 billion; and “small arms” – £1.2 million.

In addition, there were licences totalling over £3.6 million for dual use items of “telecommunications and information security”, which could be used against dissidents.

In the five years 2008-2012, the UK licensed arms worth over £3.9 billion to Saudi Arabia, with “aircraft, helicopters and drones” (essentially, Eurofighter Typhoon sales and services) taking the lion’s share at £3.4 billion. There were also substantial amounts of other military equipment and services, including £236 million of “grenades, bombs, missiles and countermeasures”, £90 million of small arms and £67 million of armoured vehicles and tanks. (For these and other items see full list.) In addition, the UK also licensed over £147.5 million worth of “dual use” goods. …source

Bahrain court jails nine Shiites over ‘terror’ cell
21 May, 2013 – Punch

A Bahraini court sentenced nine Shiites to jail terms ranging between 10 and 15 years on Monday after convicting them of forming a ‘terrorist’ group, a judicial source said.

Cleric Ahmed al-Majed and a second defendant were jailed for 15 years, while a third defendant was sentenced to 10 years.

The three were the only defendants to appear in court, as the other six remain at large and were sentenced in absentia to 10 years, the source said.

The first two were convicted of “forming an illegal group that aimed to jeopardise the rule of law and obstruct state institutions from performing their duties… through using terrorism,” the source said, quoting the list of charges.

The other seven defendants were accused of joining the group despite knowing of its “terrorist objectives”.

All defendants were convicted for “possessing explosives”, the source added.

Scores of Shiites have faced jail terms over accusations of involvement in violence since protests against the regime of the ruling Al-Khalifa Sunni dynasty erupted in February 2011.

Despite a heavy-handed crackdown by security forces in mid-March 2011, supported by Saudi-led Gulf troops, protesters were shortly back on the streets, mainly in Shiite villages, where they frequently clash with police.

At least 80 people have been killed in Bahrain since February 2011, according to the International Federation for Human Rights.

Strategically located just across the Gulf from Iran, Bahrain is home to the US Navy’s Fifth Fleet and is also a major offshore financial and services centre for its Arab neighbours in the oil-rich Gulf.

Meanwhile, thousands of people rallied in the Shiite village of Nuwaidrat, south of Manama, to welcome an imprisoned opposition leader who was released briefly for his mother’s funeral, witnesses said.

Supporters filled the streets on Monday to welcome Abdulwahab Hussein, the head of the Shiite Wafa Islamic Movement.

Hussein was to return to prison later, Al-Wefaq, the Shiite main opposition group, said on its website.

He is serving a life sentence with six other opposition leaders and activists after being convicted of plotting to overthrow the monarchy.

They are part of group of 21 sentenced to jail terms ranging from five years to life over their roles in the nationwide protests.

Seven were sentenced in absentia. …more