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

Waiting for the Revolution

How is it that “the world turned upside-down” always manages to Right itself? Why does reaction always follow revolution, like seasons in Hell?

Uprising, or the Latin form insurrection, are words used by historians to label failed revolutions — movements which do not match the expected curve, the consensus-approved trajectory: revolution, reaction, betrayal, the founding of a stronger and even more oppressive State — the turning of the wheel, the return of history again and again to its highest form: jackboot on the face of humanity forever.

By failing to follow this curve, the up-rising suggests the possibility of a movement outside and beyond the Hegelian spiral of that “progress” which is secretly nothing more than a vicious circle. Surgo — rise up, surge. Insurgo — rise up, raise oneself up. A bootstrap operation. A goodbye to that wretched parody of the karmic round, historical revolutionary futility. The slogan “Revolution!” has mutated from tocsin to toxin, a malign pseudo-Gnostic fate-trap, a nightmare where no matter how we struggle we never escape that evil Aeon, that incubus the State, one State after another, every “heaven” ruled by yet one more evil angel.

If History IS “Time,” as it claims to be, then the uprising is a moment that springs up and out of Time, violates the “law” of History. If the State IS History, as it claims to be, then the insurrection is the forbidden moment, an unforgivable denial of the dialectic — shimmying up the pole and out of the smokehole, a shaman’s maneuver carried out at an “impossible angle” to the universe. History says the Revolution attains “permanence,” or at least duration, while the uprising is “temporary.” In this sense an uprising is like a “peak experience” as opposed to the standard of “ordinary” consciousness and experience. Like festivals, uprisings cannot happen every day — otherwise they would not be “nonordinary.” But such moments of intensity give shape and meaning to the entirety of a life. The shaman returns — you can’t stay up on the roof forever — but things have changed, shifts and integrations have occurred — a difference is made.

You will argue that this is a counsel of despair. What of the anarchist dream, the Stateless state, the Commune, the autonomous zone with duration, a free society, a free culture? Are we to abandon that hope in return for some existentialist acte gratuit? The point is not to change consciousness but to change the world.

I accept this as a fair criticism. I’d make two rejoinders nevertheless; first, revolution has never yet resulted in achieving this dream. The vision comes to life in the moment of uprising — but as soon as “the Revolution” triumphs and the State returns, the dream and the ideal are already betrayed. I have not given up hope or even expectation of change — but I distrust the word Revolution. Second, even if we replace the revolutionary approach with a concept of insurrection blossoming spontaneously into anarchist culture, our own particular historical situation is not propitious for such a vast undertaking. Absolutely nothing but a futile martyrdom could possibly result now from a head-on collision with the terminal State, the megacorporate information State, the empire of Spectacle and Simulation. Its guns are all pointed at us, while our meager weaponry finds nothing to aim at but a hysteresis, a rigid vacuity, a Spook capable of smothering every spark in an ectoplasm of information, a society of capitulation ruled by the image of the Cop and the absorbant eye of the TV screen.

In short, we’re not touting the TAZ as an exclusive end in itself, replacing all other forms of organization, tactics, and goals. We recommend it because it can provide the quality of enhancement associated with the uprising without necessarily leading to violence and martyrdom. The TAZ is like an uprising which does not engage directly with the State, a guerilla operation which liberates an area (of land, of time, of imagination) and then dissolves itself to re-form elsewhere/elsewhen, before the State can crush it. Because the State is concerned primarily with Simulation rather than substance, the TAZ can “occupy” these areas clandestinely and carry on its festal purposes for quite a while in relative peace. Perhaps certain small TAZs have lasted whole lifetimes because they went unnoticed, like hillbilly enclaves — because they never intersected with the Spectacle, never appeared outside that real life which is invisible to the agents of Simulation.

Babylon takes its abstractions for realities; precisely within this margin of error the TAZ can come into existence. Getting the TAZ started may involve tactics of violence and defense, but its greatest strength lies in its invisibility — the State cannot recognize it because History has no definition of it. As soon as the TAZ is named (represented, mediated), it must vanish, it will vanish, leaving behind it an empty husk, only to spring up again somewhere else, once again invisible because undefinable in terms of the Spectacle. The TAZ is thus a perfect tactic for an era in which the State is omnipresent and all-powerful and yet simultaneously riddled with cracks and vacancies. And because the TAZ is a microcosm of that “anarchist dream” of a free culture, I can think of no better tactic by which to work toward that goal while at the same time experiencing some of its benefits here and now.

In sum, realism demands not only that we give up waiting for “the Revolution” but also that we give up wanting it. “Uprising,” yes — as often as possible and even at the risk of violence. The spasming of the Simulated State will be “spectacular,” but in most cases the best and most radical tactic will be to refuse to engage in spectacular violence, to withdraw from the area of simulation, to disappear.

The TAZ is an encampment of guerilla ontologists: strike and run away. Keep moving the entire tribe, even if it’s only data in the Web. The TAZ must be capable of defense; but both the “strike” and the “defense” should, if possible, evade the violence of the State, which is no longer a meaningful violence. The strike is made at structures of control, essentially at ideas; the defense is “invisibility,” a martial art, and “invulnerability” — an “occult” art within the martial arts. The “nomadic war machine” conquers without being noticed and moves on before the map can be adjusted. As to the future — Only the autonomous can plan autonomy, organize for it, create it. It’s a bootstrap operation. The first step is somewhat akin to satori — the realization that the TAZ begins with a simple act of realization.

…source

On the Day I Became a Terrorist
by benjamin haas

On the day I became a terrorist there wasn’t a nuclear meltdown or pipe bomb
explosion.

There was a radioactive and over-fished ocean, but that had nothing to do with
me.

I am not sure what I was wearing, probably something denim.

I didn’t buy white powder, fertilizer, meat, birds, or bacteria.

I didn’t sneeze, scream, get sick, slink down an alley, or see the dentist.

There were cops, but there are always cops, and no shots fired.

On the day I became a terrorist the sun came up on Bagdad, Jerusalem, New
York, Coney Island, L.A., the Mississippi River, El Paso, San Diego, Bogotá,
Tokyo, Baton Rouge, Tripoli, Kingstown, and almost everywhere else too.

I probably checked my email, drank a cup of coffee, and read the news.

Someone made a paper airplane, and pretended it was a crop duster.

There wasn’t a hurricane, tornado, swarm of locust, lightning storm,earthquake,
blizzard, typhoon, wildfire, brown out, mudslide, or flood covered by the media.

I drove my car and regretted not being on my bike.

For me the clouds were still in the shapes of animals and cartoon faces.

There was distant smoke, but if you ignored it, you could convince yourself it
wasn’t there.

On the day I became a terrorist I wasn’t subject to denial of service online or at a
restaurant.

Someone drank a car bomb, smoked marijuana, and snorted cocaine in a
bathroom.

I wasn’t stockpiling a weapons cache or plotting with my radical friends.

I didn’t own a single vest.

And I have no idea what was going on in the PLO, Tamil Tigers, CIA, Hezbollah,
IRA, Department of Homeland Security, FARC, Tea Party, Al Qaeda, KKK, or
anybody else.

I talked with small number of people on the phone.

I doubt I said the word “jihad,” unless I was talking about music.

I ate a salad with home-grown tomatoes, and had a glass of port.

There were children dying from the self-interested decisions of old men, and I did
nothing about it.

I didn’t cover my face, throw a brink at a window, do any looting, or judge anyone
who did.

On the day I became a terrorist bridges spanned, buses and subways ran, and
still some people cried.

Someone lost their grandfather’s pocketknife in airport security.

There was drilling into the crust of the earth, and gas leaks in several apartments.

I thought that power lines must have seemed like the industrial revolution’s cat’s
cradle.

And I counted the tiles on the bathroom floor, while someone else was held
hostage.

A suicide bomber changed her mind, and nobody ever knew.

Something was so much fun, somebody said it was a riot.

There were lots of flags flying.

On the day I became a terrorist there was just the sound of rustling and pens
dragging across paper, signing bills into law

and silence. boom.

…source

What lies behind Britain’s ‘special relationship’ with Bahrain?
By Andrew Smith – New Internationalist – 14 March, 2014

On 14 March 2011 Saudi Arabia sent hundreds of troops into Bahrain to help crush a growing protest movement. More than 30 people died, hundreds were injured and thousands arrested.

The response of the British government was to support and condone the action. We know that Saudi forces used armoured vehicles supplied by Britain as they entered the country, and we know that the Foreign Secretary, William Hague, was told about the plan in advance.

Britain’s military support for the Saudis has continued apace, with arms sales reaching US$5.8 billion. Some may recall the humiliating sight of Prince Charles doing a sword dance for the Saudi royal family in order to lubricate a deal on behalf of BAE Systems.

Arms sales to Bahrain have also increased, with the most recently published figures showing that Britain has licensed almost US$66 million worth of military and dual-use exports to the regime since 2012. These have included assault rifles, explosives, pistols, naval guns and sniper rifles.

As important, has been the increase in political support. The House of Commons’ Foreign Affairs Committee recently concluded: ‘Both the government and the opposition in Bahrain view UK defence sales as a signal of British support for the government’.

Britain’s relationship with the regime was embodied in GREAT British Week celebrations put on in January by the British embassy in Bahrain to mark what organizers called 200 years of ‘friendship and strong bilateral relations’. The event saw a 250-strong delegation including such luminaries as Prince Andrew, Philip Hammond, the Secretary of State for Defence, a host of weapons companies, such as Rolls Royce and BAE Systems, and even a big red London bus.

The festivities were a far cry from the experience of Bahraini citizens on the receiving end of government-sanctioned abuse. King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifah of Bahrain has subsequently introduced a law that imposes jail sentences of up to seven years and a fine of up to 10,000 dinars (US $26,500) on any citizen who publicly insults him.

Unfortunately this was not an isolated event. GREAT British Week was only the latest in a long line of events promoted by the British government to strengthen its relationship with the dictatorship. Since then, Prince Charles has made a visit to the regime with Britain’s ambassador emphasizing that the UK-Bahrain relationship ‘is a warm, close and long-standing one’. Similarly, British Prime Minister David Cameron has met with the regime a number of times, last year receiving the King in Downing Street. After the meeting, Cameron used the opportunity to talk up a possible deal over Eurofighter jet sales, but said nothing of Bahrain’s human rights situation.

In its most recent ‘Human Rights and Democracy’ report, the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) listed 27 countries of concern. Bahrain was not included. The report concluded that, despite all of the evidence on the contrary, human rights were improving in the Gulf country. The report concluded that: ‘The UK remains committed to providing the government of Bahrain with the support and assistance it requires’. The decision was widely criticized by human rights organizations, with Human Rights Watch saying ‘we believe that the FCO continues to overstate the extent of reform in Bahrain and downplay serious and continuing rights abuses there’.

Of course Britain is not alone in aligning itself with tyrants and ignoring human rights concerns. The most recent European arms exports report, which covers licences for 2012 shows that during the 2011 Saudi invasion into Bahrain EU member states licensed US $43.5 million worth of weapons to the regime. In 2012, despite the deteriorating human rights situation, this figure increased by over 150 per cent, resulting in almost US $111 million in licences. The profitable nature of these relationships has muted criticism, which has been instrumental in ensuring that pro-democracy activists in Bahrain are campaigning in an environment characterized by violence, intimidation and repression.

Earlier this year the Stop The Shipment campaign succeeded in halting a huge cargo of South Korean teargas canisters to Bahrain. Following international attention, South Korea’s arms export licensing agency Defense Acquisition Programme Administration (DAPA), announced that due to political instability and pressure from international rights groups it would cease all teargas exports to the regime.

This has set a precedent that needs to be built on with a European-wide embargo on all future arms sales to both Bahrain and Saudi Arabia. Only by putting a stop to the political and military support that is strengthening them can we ensure that when the next anniversary of the invasion comes the human rights situation and the prospects of their citizens will look stronger than today. …source

Bahrain: Victim Of Police Shooting Suffers Critical Brain Injury, Remains In Coma
13 March, 2014 – ABNA

The Bahrain Center for Human Rights expresses concern over the ongoing use of excessive force against peaceful protesters, which is resulting in serious and critical injuries such as the case of AbdulAziz AlAbbar, who has suffered a critical brain injury and has been in a coma for the past two weeks.

(Ahlul Bayt News Agency) – The Bahrain Center for Human Rights expresses concern over the ongoing use of excessive force against peaceful protesters, which is resulting in serious and critical injuries such as the case of AbdulAziz AlAbbar, who has suffered a critical brain injury and has been in a coma for the past two weeks.

On 23 February 2014, riot police attacked the peaceful funeral procession of Ali AlMosawi with tear gas and pellets. AbdulAziz Mosa AlAbbar (27 years-old) was hit in the head with a tear gas canister and shotgun pellets during the attack, which occurred in the village of Saar. After his injury, AlAbbar was first taken to receive medical care in a house for fear of arrest if moved to a hospital. However, due to the extremely serious nature of his injury, he was moved immediately to a hospital. AlAbbar arrived at the hospital unconscious and vomiting. He was admitted to the ICU where he has remained in a coma since.

According to available information, AlAbbar was seriously injured with two pellets in the head, one that penetrated his eye, and another that penetrated his skull and entered his brain, which caused serious damage as it damaged the blood vessels and caused internal bleeding in the brain.

Initial reports indicate that the shooting of AlAbbar was by police officers standing at close range, using both tear gas canisters, and shotgun pellets. A large amount of video evidence has shown police officers firing teargas directly at protesters heads and upper body, in direct violation of international guidelines for the use of crowd control weapons.

The authorities are restricting access to information regarding AlAbbar’s medical condition, including his family, although they have been allowed to visit him with prior permission from the police station, and while under heavy security presence. It is not clear if AlAbbar is under arrest, or if he is facing any charges. The following images were obtained by the BCHR, although the authorities continue to withhold the complete medical records. …more

US Black Ops Torture and Rendition Center Around the World

U.S., Rebuffing U.N., Maintains Stance That Rights Treaty Does Not Apply Abroad
By CHARLIE SAVAGE – 13 MARCH, 2014 – NYT

WASHINGTON — The Obama administration declared Thursday that a global Bill of Rights-style treaty imposes no human rights obligations on American military and intelligence forces when they operate abroad, rejecting an interpretation by the United Nations and the top State Department lawyer during President Obama’s first term.

The administration affirmed that stance in a meeting in Geneva of the United Nations Human Rights Committee on Thursday. The United States first expressed the stance in 1995 after the Clinton administration was criticized for its policy of intercepting Haitian refugees at sea, and the Bush administration later amplified it to defend its treatment of terrorism suspects in overseas prisons.

Human rights advocates had urged the Obama administration to acknowledge that the country has obligations under the treaty, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, when it imprisons people overseas. But the administration decided not to change the position.

“The United States continues to believe that its interpretation — that the covenant applies only to individuals both within its territory and within its jurisdiction — is the most consistent with the covenant’s language and negotiating history,” said Mary McLeod, the State Department’s acting legal adviser.

The American presentation before the United Nations panel, which monitors compliance with the treaty, was streamed online.

The treaty, which the Senate ratified in 1992, bans arbitrary killings, torture, unfair trials and imprisonments without judicial review. It is a subject of debate over whether it imposes legal obligations only in connection with people inside a country’s territory, or also people elsewhere who are subject to its control.

The United Nations panel says the treaty applies abroad, and there was a push inside the Obama administration to abandon the Clinton-Bush position. In 2011, the administration signaled that the question was under review, saying in a report that it was mindful that many disagreed with the position the United States had taken in the past.

That ambiguous comment grew out of a push during Mr. Obama’s first term by Harold H. Koh, the State Department legal adviser last confirmed by the Senate, and Michael H. Posner, the top State Department human rights official. Mr. Koh wrote a 56-page memo in 2010 concluding that the American interpretation was not legally tenable; The New York Times published the memo last week.

But military and intelligence agencies have resisted changing the treaty’s interpretation out of fear that it could complicate their operations abroad, although some also argue that the law of armed conflict trumps the accord in wartime situations.

Mr. Koh and Mr. Posner stepped down last year and have not been succeeded by Senate-confirmed political appointees, creating a bureaucratic vacuum, and there had been indications that the administration was not planning to embrace the view that the United States had human rights treaty obligations abroad.

Still, it was not clear whether the administration would fully return to the Clinton-Bush position, or instead leave the matter ambiguous by saying it had nothing to add to the 2011 report. On Thursday, it wholeheartedly embraced the Clinton-Bush view.

The reiteration of that claim provoked sharp questions from Walter Kälin, a representative of the United Nations committee from Switzerland. Citing Mr. Koh’s memo, among other things, he pressed Ms. McLeod to say whether the text and its drafting history were inconclusive, and whether there were reasonable arguments on both sides. He also suggested that the American position, if adopted universally, would foster “impunity and lack of accountability” for human rights violators. …more

As the United Nation’s Human Rights Council discusses state practiced torture and impunity in its 25th session, Mr. Kevin Laue, the Legal Advisor of the Redress Trust has called on the participants to read the report released by his organisation about torture in Bahrain.

Torture expert criticises ongoing use of torture in Bahrain
13 March, 2014 – ABNA

(Ahlul Bayt News Agency) – As the United Nation’s Human Rights Council discusses state practiced torture and impunity in its 25th session, Mr. Kevin Laue, the Legal Advisor of the Redress Trust has called on the participants to read the report released by his organisation about torture in Bahrain.

Bahrain has been criticized by a number of European States in the Human Rights Council for having refused twice the visit of the Special Rapporteur on Torture, who has reiterated his request for the third time.

A number of Bahraini activists and opposition members are attending the Human Rights Council’s 25th session.

Mr. Kevin Laue said in a side event at the HRC 25th session that Bahrain uses torture to extract false confessions and show protesters as terrorists, as well as to repress the people from speaking out.
He added that torture is not restricted to the past 3 years but has always been used by rulers to stop calls for reform.

The Redress report was issued in April 2013 under the title “Bahrain: Fundamental reform or torture without end?” It overviews torture and political life in Bahrain, before and after the 2011 prodemocracy uprising. It made a number of recommendations to the Government of Bahrain to address torture and impunity as well as recommendations to international actors to reach effective implementation of the prohibition of torture and ill-treatment according to international law. …more

Terrorists’ identities and source of funding exposed
13 March 13, 2014 – Gulf Daily

MANAMA: The identities of terrorists in Bahrain and their sources of funding have been exposed, said Minister of State for Information Affairs and the government’s official spokesperson Sameera Rajab.

The terror blast that took place in East Eker was similar to previous attacks, she said in a statement to London-based Asharq Al Awsat newspaper.

On the timing of the East Eker explosion and its similarity to the Daih blast, the minister stressed that the time of terrorist incidents carried out by outlaws cannot be selected.

“Terrorism has no time, religion, sect or land,” she said.

Terrorism is alien to the region, she said, adding that it is “imported” from outside and noted that it is not normal that many acts of violence and terrorism occur in a short period of time.

Terrorism in the region is caused by three factors – projects targeting the region, the international system which hasn’t taken its final shape yet and attempts by some regional sides to expand and gain influence using terrorism. …more

Enemies of the Internet 2014: entities at the heart of censorship and surveillance
12 March, 2014 – Reporters without Borders

Natalia Radzina of Charter97, a Belarusian news website whose criticism of the government is often censored, was attending an OSCE-organized conference in Vienna on the Internet and media freedom in February 2013 when she ran into someone she would rather not have seen: a member of the Operations and Analysis Centre, a Belarusian government unit that coordinates Internet surveillance and censorship. It is entities like this, little known but often at the heart of surveillance and censorship systems in many countries, that Reporters Without Borders is spotlighting in this year’s Enemies of the Internet report, which it is releasing, as usual, on World Day Against Cyber-Censorship (12 March).

Identifying government units or agencies rather than entire governments as Enemies of the Internet allows us to draw attention to the schizophrenic attitude towards online freedoms that prevails in in some countries. Three of the government bodies designated by Reporters Without Borders as Enemies of the Internet are located in democracies that have traditionally claimed to respect fundamental freedoms: the Centre for Development of Telematics in India, the Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ) in the United Kingdom, and the National Security Agency (NSA) in the United States.

The NSA and GCHQ have spied on the communications of millions of citizens including many journalists. They have knowingly introduced security flaws into devices and software used to transmit requests on the Internet. And they have hacked into the very heart of the Internet using programmes such as the NSA’s Quantam Insert and GCHQ’s Tempora. The Internet was a collective resource that the NSA and GCHQ turned into a weapon in the service of special interests, in the process flouting freedom of information, freedom of expression and the right to privacy.

The mass surveillance methods employed in these three countries, many of them exposed by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden, are all the more intolerable because they will be used and indeed are already being used by authoritarians countries such as Iran, China, Turkmenistan, Saudi Arabia and Bahrain to justify their own violations of freedom of information. How will so-called democratic countries will able to press for the protection of journalists if they adopt the very practices they are criticizing authoritarian regimes for? …more

Bahrain detains 25 for involvement in bomb blast
4 MArch, 2014 – PressTV

In Bahrain, 25 people have been arrested on suspicion of being involved in a deadly bomb attack targeting police forces near the country’s capital, Manama, earlier this week.

The country’s interior minister Sheik Rashid bin Abdullah Al Khalifa made the announcement during a televised address on Tuesday, March 4.

The Bahraini minister said the attack on Monday, March 3, left at least three police officers who were trying to break up crowds of anti-government protesters in Daih, dead.

He also mentioned an attack that killed a policeman last month.

Bahrain’s main opposition groups have also condemned the deadly attacks.

Manama also listed the February 14 coalition, and the al-Ashtar Brigades and the Resistance Brigades opposition groups as terrorist organizations, without further explanation.

Since mid-February 2011, thousands of pro-democracy protesters have held numerous demonstrations in the streets of Bahrain, calling for the Al Khalifa royal family to step down from power.

One month later, troops from Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates invaded Bahrain to assist the Bahraini government in its crackdown on peaceful protesters.

Reports suggest scores of people have been killed and hundreds of others arrested over the past three years.

According to the Physicians for Human Rights, Bahraini doctors and nurses have been detained, tortured, or disappeared because they have “evidence of atrocities committed by the authorities, security forces, and riot police” in the crackdown on anti-government protesters. …more

4 Bahrainis could face death penalty: Prosecutors
9 March, 2014 –

Four Bahrainis could face the death penalty over an alleged attack that killed three policemen earlier this month, prosecutors say.

On Sunday, the Bahraini prosecutors issued a statement saying the four men have “confessed” to involvement in the blast that killed the security personnel, AFP reported.

On March 3, the three policemen were killed in the bomb attack in Daih village, west of the capital Manama, Bahrain’s Interior Ministry said.

An officer from the United Arab Emirates, deployed in the Persian Gulf state, was among the dead officers.

The explosion happened as Bahraini troops attacked and fired teargas to disperse thousands of people who had gathered to mourn the death of an anti-regime activist in the village.

Since mid-February 2011, thousands of pro-democracy protesters have held numerous demonstrations in the streets of Bahrain, calling for the Al Khalifa royal family to relinquish power.

On March 14, 2011, troops from Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates invaded the country to assist the Bahraini government in its crackdown on peaceful protesters.

According to local sources, scores of people have been killed and hundreds arrested.

Physicians for Human Rights says doctors and nurses have been detained, tortured, or disappeared because they have “evidence of atrocities committed by the authorities, security forces, and riot police” in the crackdown on anti-government protesters.

On March 3, 2014, three policemen were killed in the bomb attack in Daih village, west of the capital Manama, Bahrain’s Interior Ministry said. An officer from the United Arab Emirates, deployed in the Persian Gulf state, was among the dead. The explosion happened as Bahraini troops attacked and fired teargas to disperse thousands of people who had gathered to mourn the death of an anti-regime activist in the village.

Since mid-February 2011, thousands of pro-democracy protesters have held numerous demonstrations in the streets of Bahrain, calling for the Al Khalifa royal family to relinquish power. On March 14, 2011, troops from Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates invaded the country to assist the Bahraini government in its crackdown on peaceful protesters. According to local sources, scores of people have been killed and hundreds arrested. Physicians for Human Rights says doctors and nurses have been detained, tortured, or disappeared because they have “evidence of atrocities committed by the authorities, security forces, and riot police” in the crackdown on anti-government protesters.” target=”_blank”>…more

Bomb wounds two policemen in Bahraini Shi’ite village
By Farishta Saeed – Reuters – 11 March, 2014

DUBAI (Reuters) – A homemade bomb exploded in a Shi’ite Muslim village in Bahrain on Tuesday, wounding two policemen, the interior ministry said, nine days after another blast in the Gulf Arab kingdom killed three police officers.

Bahrain has been grappling with unrest by majority Shi’ites over the past three years demanding political reform and an end to perceived discrimination in the Sunni Muslim-ruled country. Bahrain denies any discrimination against Shi’ites.

Bomb attacks have increased since last year, raising concern about further instability in the Western-allied kingdom where the U.S. Fifth Fleet is based as a bulwark against Shi’ite giant Iran across the Gulf.

The interior ministry said the two policemen sustained moderate injuries from the bomb as they were working with a third officer to secure a neighbourhood in the village of al-Eker in the late afternoon.

An investigation was under way to identify and arrest those involved in the incident, a statement by the ministry said.

On March 3, three policemen, including one from the United Arab Emirates, died when what the authorities say was a remote-controlled bomb exploded during a mourning procession for a 23-year-old Shi’ite who died in custody on February 26.

The Interior Ministry has said the blast occurred as police were trying to disperse protesters who were blocking roads in the village of Daih, west of the capital Manama. Four people have been arrested in connection to the Daih bombing.

Mainstream opposition groups, including the main Shi’ite al-Wefaq movement, have condemned the bombing and called on their followers to ensure that protest activities remain peaceful.

The village of al-Eker was the scene of a bomb blast and riots that killed a policeman in 2012, the first to die after the lifting of martial law in the country in June 2011.

Bahrain has accused Iran of fomenting bloodshed in the kingdom. Iran denies having links to Bahrain’s opposition or any hand in violence, but champions the cause of Shi’ites there. …more

Emirati police officer among three dead in Bahrain blast
5 March, 2014 – Kannadiga World

First Lieutenant Tariq Al Shehi died along with two members of the Bahraini police force “while performing his national duty of maintaining order.

An Emirati police officer from a joint Gulf force in Bahrain was among three personnel killed on Monday in a bomb blast at a village near Manama, the UAE Ministry of Interior announced on Monday.

First Lieutenant Tariq Al Shehi died along with two members of the Bahraini police force “while performing his national duty of maintaining order,” the ministry said in a statement.

The UAE officer was working in Bahrain within the Gulf Waves Force under the joint GCC security cooperation agreement.

Tariq Al Shehi“The Ministry of Interior, while mourning martyr First Lieutenant Tareq Mohammed Al Shehi and his fellow personnel, pray Allah to accept them among the group of honourable martyrs and martyrs of duty who sacrificed their souls in defence of the right and protection of innocent people,” the ministry said. It prayed Allah to grant his family the patience and solace to bear his loss.

The late Al Shehi was known among his colleagues and family of good conduct, commitment, dedication, bravery and courage.

The blast in Daih occurred when Bahrain’s security forces were dealing with riots after the funeral ritual of a Bahraini youth who died in detention of sickle cell Anemia complications.

The radical Muqawama ‘Resistance’ Group that is active in social media announced that its members were behind the blast.

The death of the three personnel comes less than a month of the death of a policemen in a similar blast in Dair, which is a village in Muharraq.

The Bahrain Interior Ministry said on its Twitter account that a group of protesters had broken away from a mourning procession in the village of Daih and started blocking roads. The explosion took place as police were trying to disperse the rioters, it added.

There was no immediate word on what had caused the blast.

The explosion occurred as hundreds of Bahrainis marched in a procession to mark the final day of mourning for the 23-year-old who died in custody last week. The Bahrain Interior Ministry had said the man, who was detained in December and had been accused of smuggling weapons, had died of an illness. …more

On 10 March 2014, 27 experts sent a letter to United States President Barack Obama urging him to address the growing crisis in Bahrain with counterparts in Saudi Arabia during his upcoming visit to the country. Please continue reading for the full letter or click here for a PDF.

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Dear President Obama,

We are writing to encourage you to discuss the crisis in Bahrain with your counterparts in Saudi Arabia during your upcoming visit to the Kingdom. Saudi Arabia has significant influence in Bahrain through its strong political, economic, and social ties with the Bahrainis. Real and lasting stability in Bahrain can only be achieved through genuine reform, and we call on you to urge the Saudi leadership to play a more constructive role in this regard.

As Deputy Secretary of State William Burns recently noted, when the United States and the Gulf “work in concert, we can help shape outcomes that not only advance reform, but also advance stability.” You have a key opportunity to achieve this goal in Bahrain.

As the situation in Bahrain continues to deteriorate, addressing this issue must be an urgent priority. The State Department recently assessed the Bahraini government’s progress in implementing the recommendations of the 2011 Bahrain Independent Commission of Inquiry (BICI), and found that only five of its 26 recommendations were fully implemented. The assessment also recognized the Government’s failure to investigate claims of torture and cases that resulted in death, to ensure that individuals are no longer charged or detained for exercising their right to free speech, or to foster an environment that promotes dialogue.

Efforts last year to negotiate a political solution collapsed after the process failed to deliver any real progress, key opposition figures were arrested, and human rights violations continued. As you said in 2011, “The only way forward is for the government and opposition to engage in a dialogue, and you can’t have a real dialogue when parts of the peaceful opposition are in jail. The government must create the conditions for dialogue, and the opposition must participate to forge a just future for all Bahrainis.” That was true then, and remains true today. …more

Global Military Spending Is Now an Integral Part of Capitalism
by Richard Seymour – 7 March, 1014 – common dreans

China has embarked on a sequence of double-digit increases in defence spending. (Photograph: Chinafotopress/Getty Images)China’s surge in military spending gains headlines, partly because of the ominous implications regarding its regional contest with Japan, but it’s the deeper structures of military spending in general that are far more compelling.

There are few surprises about the distribution of military spending: for all the current focus on China’s growing military outlays – and it is significant that they have embarked on a sequence of double-digit increases as a percentage of GDP – the United States still accounts for 40% of such expenditures. However, the distribution is not the only thing that matters; it’s the sheer scale of such investment – $1.756tn in 2012. The “peace dividend” from the end of the cold war has long since bitten the dust. Global military spending has returned to pre-1989 levels, undoubtedly a legacy of the war on terror and the returning salience of military competition in its context. In fact, by 2011 global military spending was higher than at any year since the end of the second world war.

So, what is the explanation for such huge investments? Is it simply the case that states are power-maximising entities, and that as soon as they have access to enough taxable income they start dreaming war?

In a very general sense, militarisation could be seen as an integral aspect of capitalism. One of the central ambiguities of capitalism is that it is necessarily a global system, with production and exchange extending beyond national boundaries; yet at the same time, units of capital (corporations etc) tend to be concentrated within national states where they are afforded an infrastructure, a labour force, and a great deal of primary investments. Even the process of globalisation presupposes the investment and guidance of national states. The more deeply companies are intertwined with national states, the more they rely on those states to fight their competitive battles on a global stage. Maintaining a military advantage is arguably an intrinsic part of this.

However, once this rather abstract principle is established, the question still remains unanswered. After all, there is no inherent reason why geo-economic competition should lead to defence spending consuming trillions of dollars of value each year. Part of the answer has to be located in the way that high levels of military spending became such an entrenched part of the global landscape in the aftermath of two world wars.

In the context of the second world war, and then in the subsequent cold war, one thing about military spending that became abundantly clear is that it is never just about conflict. As in the conduct of wars themselves, the institutionalisation of military spending quickly becomes entangled in a series of incentives that are entirely tangential to the ostensive motive. …more

Obama Comes Out Against Self-Determination
by Paul Craig Roberts – Voltaire Network – 8 March 2014

The White House Fool has repeatedly declared erroneously and foolishly that it is “against international law” for Crimea to exercise self-determination. [1] Self-determination, as used by Washington, is a propaganda term that serves Washington’s empire but is not permissible for real people to exercise.

On March 6 Obama telephoned Putin to tell the Russian President again that only Washington has the right to interfere in Ukraine and to insist against all logic that only the “government” in Kiev installed by the Washington-organized coup is “legitimate” and “democratic.”

In other words, the elected government in Crimea pushed by the people in Crimea to give them a vote on their future is “undemocratic” and “illegitimate,” but a non-elected government in Kiev imposed by Washington is the voice of self-determination and legitimacy.

Washington is so arrogant that it never occurs to the hubris-infected fools what the world thinks of Washington’s blatant hypocrisy.

Since the Clinton regime, Washington has done nothing but violate international law–Serbia, Kosovo, Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Syria, Iran, Pakistan, Yemen, Somalia, Honduras, Venezuela, Ecuador, Bolivia.

Does Russia have an Africa Command? No, but Washington does.

Is Russia surrounding the US with military bases? No, but Washington has used the NATO organization, whose purpose disappeared 23 years ago, to organize western, eastern, and southern Europe into an empire army with forward bases on Russia’s borders. Washington is determined to extend the boundaries of a North Atlantic Treaty Organization to Georgia in central Asia and to Ukraine on the Black Sea. Both Georgia and Ukraine are former constituent parts of both Russia and the Soviet Union.

Washington is doing the same thing to China and Iran. Washington is working to establish new air and naval bases in Philippines, South Korea, Vietnam, Thailand, Australia, with which to block the flow of oil and other resources into China. Iran is surrounded by some 40 US military bases and has US fleets standing off its coastline.

In Washington’s propaganda, this rank militarism is presented as “defending democracy.”

The Russian government continues to act as though Washington’s thrusts at Russia’s independence and strategic interests can be defused with good sense and good will. But Washington has neither.

Since the Clinton regime, Washington has been in the hands of a collection of ideologues who are convinced that the US is “the exceptional indispensable country” with the right to world hegemony. Everything that Washington has done in the 21st century is in pursuit of this goal. ..more

Ukraine is About Oil. So Was World War I
by Robert Freeman – 8 March, 2014 – common dreams

Pro-Russian supporters wave Russian flags to welcome the Russian Black Sea Fleet flagship, the missile cruiser Moskva, entering Sevastopol bay in September 10, 2008. (Photo: AFP)Ukraine is a lot more portentous than it appears. It is fundamentally about the play for Persian Gulf oil. So was World War I. The danger lies in the chance of runaway escalation, just like World War I.

Let’s put Ukraine into a global strategic context.

The oil is running out. God isn’t making any more dinosaurs and melting them into the earth’s crust. Instead, as developing world countries aspire to first-world living standards, the draw-down on the world’s finite supply of oil is accelerating. The rate at which known reserves are being depleted is four times that at which new oil is being discovered. That’s why oil cost $26 a barrel in 2001, but $105 today. It’s supply and demand.

Oil recalls that old expression: “In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.” In industrial civilization, the nation that controls the oil is king. And 60% of the known oil reserves are in the Persian Gulf. That’s why the U.S. invaded Iraq in 2003: to seize control of the oil. Alan Greenspan told at least one truth in his life: “I hate to have to admit what everybody knows. Iraq is about oil.”

But the U.S. lost the war in Iraq. Remember? The U.S. was going to install a democracy and 14 permanent bases there. They’re not there. The U.S. was run out after proving unable to pacify the Islamic jihad it had unleashed under the pretext of searching for non-existent weapons of mass destruction. Instead, Iraq allied itself with Iran, its Shi’ite comrade-in-arms in the Muslim Wars of Religion.

So today, the battle for the Persian Gulf is being carried out through its two regional powers, Saudi Arabia, the champion of Sunni Islam, and Iran, the torch carrier for Shi’ite Islam. Think of the Wars between the Protestants and Catholics in the 1500s. The U.S. backs Saudi Arabia, as it has done since 1945, when Roosevelt cut a deal with Ibn Saud to protect his illegitimate throne in exchange for the House of Saud only selling oil in dollars.

Iran, of course, is implacably hostile to the U.S. after the U.S. overthrew Iran’s democratically elected president, Mosaddegh, in 1953 and installed its own fascist puppet, the Shah of Iran. The Iranians overthrew the Shah in 1979 and installed a fundamentalist theocracy that continues to this day.

Iran’s main ally in the region is Syria, which the U.S. has been trying to overthrow for three years by helping the al-Qaeda-linked rebels that are attacking Syria. Syria’s chief military patron is Russia, which conveniently bailed Obama out of his childish “red line” declaration last year, a declaration he had neither the military nor political nor diplomatic capacity to carry out. …more

Brainwashed – The Indoctrinated West
by ANDRE VLTCHEK – 7 March, 2014 – counter punch

Is it really possible that the European public has no clue what was done to Ukraine? Are the men and women of the continent that lives in hallucination, that it is well educated and well informed, really unaware how its own governments have created and supported that ‘opposition movement’ in Kiev; a movement full of fascists and bigots?

Unfortunately, it is possible, and it is to be expected!

After working in some one hundred and fifty countries, in all the continents, I have finally come to the absolutely clear conclusion: there is no part of the world as brainwashed, so programmed, so indoctrinated, as are both Europe and North America.

There are no people so out of sync with the global reality; people so naively and willing to follow the religious doctrine of market fundamentalism and the self-righteous belief that they, and only they, are the sole guardians of democracy, freedom and virtue, on this planet.

The world is once again in flames, and both Europe and North America (let us please not pretend for one second longer, that the Empire is actually somehow divided between that bad United States and that ‘moderate’ Europe) are bulldozing, demolishing, moving out of their way everything that is still standing straight and proud; everything that is defending those who used to be defenseless, everything and everyone who is dreaming about, and actually building egalitarian and decent societies.

And the great majority of Europeans are clapping. They read their propaganda sheets and they are clapping. And they are engaged in pathetic pseudo-intellectual discussions, (while sipping, Oh! – In such a sophisticated manner, their refined wine and beer), while millions are being murdered by implementing their bigoted ‘interests’.

Entire nations are, again, bleeding, in order to make sure that millions of French or Italian farmers can drive their luxury BMW’s (oh, sorry, in Europe they are not marketed as luxury, but as ‘reliable cars’), consuming enormous subsidies, for producing and often for not producing anything at all.

The subsidies are paid with the blood of African and Asian people.

How many people in poor countries have to die, so some grandma in Germany or the Czech Republic can go to a doctor, for free, again and again, simply because she is lonely or bored staying at home?

Should there be free medical treatment for all? Yes! Yes. It should be free, and for all. But not just for Europeans, while the rest of the world has to pay the going rate!

How many countries in Africa, Asia, the Middle East and Latin America have to be destabilized, so that the Empire can enjoy its privileges? So that the rich there can be even more obnoxiously rich, and even the poorest citizens can afford to live way above those who belong to the middle classes in the countries that are still being plundered by the West?

***

Now, please, I am not trying to be funny and I am not trying to play with words: I am honestly wondering… I am humbly asking: “Are people in the West, particularly in Europe… are they pretending that they don’t know what is happening in Syria, Venezuela, Thailand and now, particularly, in Ukraine? Or have they simply turned into a cynical assembly of brainwashed degenerates?

Where is that fabled diversity? Where is intellectual courage?

Where are huge demonstrations shaking Paris, Rome, Berlin; demonstrations trying to bring down governments that have been destabilizing a huge European nation – Ukraine, while provoking Russia, the nation that saved the world from Nazism and later helped to liberate many African and Asian nations from the claws of colonialism? …more

Kissinger thinks Ukraine should be more like Finland
Voltaire Network – 9 March 2014

In an opinion article published by the Washington Post, Dr. Henry Kissinger takes a position on the Ukrainian crisis.

After stating that Ukraine, as a state, can not survive either as an ally of Russia, or as an ally of the West, but only as a bridge between the two, he continues – at the risk of contradicting himself – with an illustration of the historical roots linking the two countries.

According to him, Yulia Tymoshenko is pro-European and whereas Viktor Yanukovych is pro-Russian, and he argues that the current crisis has its origin in the obstinacy of these two major Ukrainian leaders to impose their will on the whole country, in defiance of the other half.

Kissinger deplores the current military turn of the crisis and cautions against the unpredictable consequences that each of the two parties might have to face.

Finally, he puts forward four proposals to serve as a basis for discussion and not as recipes for U.S. policy :
– 1 . Ukraine must be entitled to choose its economic system and even in association with the European Union.
– 2 . Ukraine should not join NATO.
– 3 . Ukraine should model itself on Finland (that is to say, become neutral).
– 4 . Crimea should not secede, but Kiev should bolster its autonomy and ensure the maintenance of the Russian fleet at Sevastopol.

This shaded text must be seen as an attempt to find a way out of the current standoff.

The description of the two Ukrainian leaders, respectively as pro-European and pro-Russian, does not correspond to reality: Tymoshenko negotiated and signed the gas deal with Russia, which led to her prosecution and sentencing, while Yanukovich negotiated and signed the agreement with Shell to exploit the country’s shale gas potential, which could also lead to his conviction. On such crucial occasions, the two leaders served their own personal interests and not those of an ideological camp. …more

“…if in Washington people throwing Molotov cocktails are marching on Congress—and these people are headed for the Ukrainian Congress—if these people have barricaded the entrance to the White House and are throwing rocks at the White House security guard, would President Obama withdraw his security forces?”
— New York University Professor Emeritus Stephen Cohen

US, Russia war looms large over Ukraine
7 March, 2014 – PressTV

The prospect of armed conflict between the United States and Russia has once again become a worrisome possibility, reminiscent of the tense times during the Cold War. But instead of Soviet missiles in Cuba provoking the impassioned rhetoric from the US president, this time it is Moscow’s alleged meddling in the internal affairs of Ukraine that has brought Washington’s assurances of political support from the international community and offers of IMF loans to stabilize Ukraine’s economy.

“There is the ability for Ukraine to be a friend of the West’s and a friend of Russia’s as long as none of us are inside of Ukraine trying to meddle and intervene, certainly not militarily, with decisions that properly belong to the Ukrainian people,” declared US President Obama on March 4, 2014.

Incredibly, at the very moment Obama made this declaration, his secretary of state John Kerry was in fact meddling inside Ukraine in Kyiv talking to the leaders of the “new” Ukrainian government. While conceding that Russia had “legitimate interests” in what happens in Ukraine and neighboring Crimea, Obama nevertheless insisted “that does not give it the right to use force as a means of exerting influence inside of that state.”

Strange how similar concerns voiced by autocratic ally Saudi Arabia seem to have been accepted by Washington as justification to invade neighboring Bahrain, where the US just happens to maintain headquarters for its 5th naval fleet. The Russians, with their Black Sea Fleet stationed in Sevastopol, have had national interests in Crimea dating back to 1783, not long after the US war of independence from Britain, so it should be no surprise that Moscow would respond to any potential threat to its naval installation there.

“As to the Russian military who are in the Russian Black Sea Fleet in Sevastopol,” Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov explained, “They always strictly follow the agreements on the basis of which the Russian fleet is present on this territory and the positions and requests made by the legitimate administration of Ukraine, and in this case also the legitimate administration of the Republic of Crimea.” …more

According to a report in Kommersant-Ukraine, the finance ministry of Washington’s stooges in Kiev who are pretending to be a government has prepared an economic austerity plan that will cut Ukrainian pensions from $160 to $80 so that Western bankers who lent money to Ukraine can be repaid at the expense of Ukraine’s poor. It is Greece all over again.

The Looting of Ukraine Has Begun
by Paul Craig Roberts – 7 March, 2014 – voltaire.net

Before anything approaching stability and legitimacy has been obtained for the puppet government put in power by the Washington orchestrated coup against the legitimate, elected Ukraine government, the Western looters are already at work. Naive protesters who believed the propaganda that EU membership offered a better life are due to lose half of their pension by April. But this is only the beginning.

The corrupt Western media describes loans as “aid.” However, the 11 billion euros that the EU is offering Kiev is not aid. It is a loan. Moreover, it comes with many strings, including Kiev’s acceptance of an IMF austerity plan.

Remember now, gullible Ukrainians participated in the protests that were used to overthrow their elected government, because they believed the lies told to them by Washington-financed NGOs that once they joined the EU they would have streets paved with gold. Instead they are getting cuts in their pensions and an IMF austerity plan.

The austerity plan will cut social services, funds for education, layoff government workers, devalue the currency, thus raising the prices of imports which include Russian gas, thus electricity, and open Ukrainian assets to takeover by Western corporations.

Ukraine’s agriculture lands will pass into the hands of American agribusiness.

One part of the Washington/EU plan for Ukraine, or that part of Ukraine that doesn’t defect to Russia, has succeeded. What remains of the country will be thoroughly looted by the West.

The other part hasn’t worked as well. Washington’s Ukrainian stooges lost control of the protests to organized and armed ultra-nationalists. These groups, whose roots go back to those who fought for Hitler during World War 2, engaged in words and deeds that sent southern and eastern Ukraine clamoring to be returned to Russia where they resided prior to the 1950s when the Soviet communist party stuck them into Ukraine. …more

Political analysts, like Nil Nikandrov, are paying attention to the timing of America’s efforts to replace the government in Venezuela and Ukraine. Washington wants to prove that a superpower is still capable of directing the course of events in different parts of the world to suit its agenda. In this article, the author focuses on the crisis situation unfolding in Venezuela and sets the record straight on what may be the most lied about country in the Western media.

US against Venezuela: Cold War Goes Hot
by Nil Nikandrov – Voltaire.net – 8 March, 2014

During the recent carnival in Venezuela, the isolated pockets of student protests taking place in large cities died out as if by magic. Or, to be more precise, they died out in the privileged areas of the cities. The organisers of the anti-government protests had assured the world that the carnival would not take place, and that the tradition of travelling to Caribbean beaches would be cancelled, since “the dissatisfaction of the people” had reached a climax. Just a little bit more and the regime would come crashing down, President Nicolás Maduro and his comrades would run off to Cuba, and the country would return to “a true democracy”. The protests were widely covered by leading television channels in the West, and now – complete silence. Venezuelans are celebrating and relaxing.

A major role in the information and psychological war against Venezuela belongs to US intelligence agencies. The whole of Hugo Chavez’s presidency was spent amid severe information warfare which the US placed great emphasis on in order to compromise the very idea of building a 21st century socialism in Venezuela. Chavez never promised a speedy success on this journey, but his well thought out social policy achieved many things. According to opinion polls, Venezuelans are among some of the happiest people in the Western Hemisphere.

The achievements of the Bolivarian Revolution with regard to healthcare, education and the construction of affordable housing guaranteed Chavez popular support. A solid home front made it possible for Chavez to successfully counteract America’s subversive operations not just in Venezuela, but in the international arena as well. One of the focal points of this information warfare was the creation of the TeleSur TV channel with the support of allied Latin American countries, and then the subsequent creation of the RadioSur radio station. Local television and radio networks were organised throughout Venezuela, and a national film studio was opened, which produces feature films on patriotic themes. A new Venezuelan film appears on the country’s screens almost every week, attracting just as many viewers as Hollywood action movies. Documentary films are also released that expose America’s policy in Latin America, including the seizure of oilfields and the removal of politicians that Washington finds disagreeable. …more