Political Naturalization & Martyr Fakhrawi's Case

Our regime hungers its people & feeds strangers. 48,000 Bahraini families await houses while mercenaries are given ones upon arrival

 

Bahrain regime complains about the hatred it receives from its people while it enriches mercenaries to get rid of its people

 

Both sects reject political naturalization. Do not gamble with the fate of Bahrain. The countries resources doesn't sustain your madness! 

 

In California a man was sentenced to life imprisonment for beating a dog to death while in Bahrain, those who tortured Martyr Fakhrawi to death were sentenced to 7 years!!

Slaves: created to serve autocratic regimes

Some struggle for freedom from slavery; others demand improvements in slavery conditions. A slave believes in inferiority

Pro-dictatorship journalists & those who defend them enunciate the same ideas & troll up against anyone who believes otherwise

They cannot understand the logic of those who believe in freedom

When an autocratic regime reaches rock bottom, it uses people with minimal education, wealth, & dignity to defend itself

Bahrain regime has used Iran as a scarecrow so as not to allow those who are ignorant to ask for their rights

I feel pity not anger towards people who defend Bahrain regime while it treats them as insects-destroys anyone who infringes on its territory

Even in powerful countries, the ruler has a budgeted income. In this part of the world the ruler treats country’s budget as his

We do not live in countries but in private property owned by ruling families

Any ruling family member can beat, kill, or steal from a person while the person cannot stop the aggressor

No wonder oppositionists are labeled with treason because they opposed the ruler who owns everything. This is the logic of slaves

Status of Bahrain Prisons

AlArabiya tv channel & its rags-to-riches reporter Moh’d AlArab has shown a documentary describing Bahrain prisons better than the “Hilton”

Even lying has limits. 4 have died in Bahrain prisons in 2 months. Young people leave with grey hair & healthy ones become sick

Stories recited by released prisoners are painful. I’ve been told that people from Balushistan have more mercy than Bahrainis & Arabs

1. A 22yo prisoner told me he was detained to falsely testify against another villager. He was beaten & denied any food for 2 days

2. He was beaten & starved by 2 officers of similar age. When they left, a Baluchi gave him a sandwich & asked him to eat it quickly

Who would’ve believed the mercenaries would be more merciful than our fellow Bahrainis who were transformed into beasts by sectarianism 

From my perspective, the worst victims are not the martyrs but those prisoners who live under the mercy of vicious torturers

Bahrain prisons: poor medical care, deteriorating health of activists, bad food, inhumane treatment, & no prisoner rights

What proves their lies about prison status is that sudden visits to prisons take place worldwide but in Bahrain, it needs months to arrange

If we weren’t moved by dignity nor jealousy for our homeland, the daily injustice suffered by prisoners should fuel our revolution

A Session about Bahrain in the House of Lords

The Bahrain session in UK House of Lords: 2 videos were shown, very good participation, & was covered by 6 channels. It's cost was £20

Bahrain regime questions the opposition's finances although it spends millions on trivial events 

£20 was the cost of printing pictures. Thanks to @SaeedShehabi for his good organization

I don't think that Bahrain regime, with its full potential, is capable of organizing such an event   

The event took an ample space in news channels' coverage due to what has been presented

Walls of the House of Lords shook when Ali Mushaima talked about his dad, a cancer patient who is dying slowly in Bahrain prison

With an enthusiasm of a 20yo @SaeedShehabi talked about Bahrain & the pain of its people. He encouraged celebrating Bahrain martyrs' day

@JalalFairooz & Hussain Abdulla talked about #Bahrain regime's decision to strip their nationality & its disrespect to international obligations

I talked about British support & training provided to military forces in Bahrain & asked parliament for government accountability in that matter

Sister of martyr Ahmed Ismail talked via Skype. Compassion to our faithful martyrs & victory for our rebels

This £20 event celebrated Bahrain martyrs' day. How much did the embassy's national day ceremony cost?

@LameesDhaif smiling jubilantly after the event in front of the House of Lords

Lamees Dhaif's speech on Sectarianism in the United Nations, Geneva on September 19, 2012

Good morning ladies and gentlemen.

After nearly 2 years since the beginning of the uprising in Bahrain, I can honestly say that I am fed up of the accusations describing our revolution as sectarian. I do not think anyone asked the opposition in other countries of the Arab Spring about their religion or ethnic background nor doubted them due to racial or sectarian considerations. But in Bahrain, we always had to refute the myth describing our movement as sectarian.

Well, today I will let you know who is really sectarian in Bahrain using statistics rather than allegations.

The council of ministers is made up of 24% Shiite Muslims, 36% Sunni Muslims, and 40% royal family members.

In commissions, institutions, and government agencies the number of Shiites in senior positions does not exceed 7% whereas royal family members and Sunnis account for 29% and 64% respectively.

To understand the magnitude of discrimination that we're talking about, we have to tell you that the ruling family, which seizes the lion's share in all positions do not exceed 11 thousand people. The males account for 4500 individuals and occupy positions that exceed that of the largest sect in the country by number and statuary resemblance.

In the judiciary system, members of the ruling family account for 33%, Sunnis 58%, and Shiites and foreigners account for the small remaining percentage.

In municipalities and provinces royal family members account for 40%, Sunnis 40%, while Shiites account for 20% of the positions.

One family that does not even make up 0.5% the population confiscates more than what the largest category of people owns. During the past year alone, 296 senior government positions were distributed and only 42 posts of them to the Shiite community which account for 14%.

Who enforces sectarianism, ladies and gentlemen?

Is it the person who considers the country feudal and distributes its resources on his own people or is it the person asking for justice and reform? And who is sinful and should be blamed and doubted: a person demanding equality or a person who measures people according to their sects and ethnic background?

The other day, I received a phone call from a girl. Her voice could barely be heard because of her continuous crying. I have spent the last 12 years studying hard to fulfill my dream of becoming a doctor, she said. My father is a taxi driver and we live in difficult circumstances. I struggled in order to achieve a better future for both me and my family. Although I scored 97.8%, I was deprived of the scholarship because it was given to colleagues with a lower score but belonged to the other sect. They gave me 1200 dollars instead, she continued. While crying her eyes out she asked me: Why exactly am I punished? Why? I did not choose my sect, why do they confiscate my dream?

This girl's story is similar to that of thousands of youngsters in Bahrain. They are unjustly discriminated against due to sectarian considerations, and if they demand equality, they are labeled as sectarian!!

Article 4 of the Constitution of Bahrain states: Justice is the basis of government. Cooperation and mutual respect provide a firm bond between citizens. Freedom, equality, security, trust, knowledge, social solidarity and equality of opportunity for citizens are pillars of society guaranteed by the State.

This is what is mentioned in our constitution but the reality is something else.

Believe it or not: Shiites, who represent the majority of Bahraini population, cannot work in the army because of their sectarian affiliation.
Believe it or not: the regime imports ignorant mercenaries from all around the world to cover the shortage caused that rather than giving a chance to those who are unemployed.
Believe it or not: in the country where its young people suffer from poverty and unemployment, naturalization was used extensively to change its demographics. The regime has naturalized around 50 to 60.000 for political reasons.
Believe it or not: in the Supreme Defense Council members of the ruling family occupy 13 seats out of 14. In the Ministry of Interior Shiites make up 10% of the positions whereas the ruling family occupies 35% and Sunnis occupy the remaining posts.

Believe it or not: Shiites are prevented from living or owning a house in the whole area of Riffa (Both East and West). Can you believe that a country in the 22nd century prevents a large segment of its citizens from ownership in a residential area due to sectarian considerations? Yes, it’s Bahrain.

Whereas 47 thousand families await a modest home sometimes for periods over 20 years, mercenaries and their families are given decent housing where native citizens, sometimes up to 5 families, pool up in mud houses.

We are not a poor country. But we live under the mercy of a corrupt system. I do not see the elements of good governance and justice in my country.

These are only pieces of the brutal reality and let me conclude: this small island had more revolutions since 1923 than any other country - not because of its sectarian combination - but because we are facing a regime which strives on repression, discrimination and corruption.

 
Do not let the Bahraini regime justify its crimes using the sectarian strife that it has created. And do not allow the international community to justify its failure due to divisions created by the regime.
Bahrain's problem is not in people demanding equality and justice.
But rather in a system that detests equality and justice.
Thank you

Lamees Dhaif's speech on Torturers' Impunity at the United Nations

In the year 2004 I was volunteering in a human rights committee to monitor violations and help victims of torture, when a young graceful man entered. He was about my age, and would only speak to the committee of veteran human rights activists upon my departure. I left the committee with a heavy sense of humiliation, but after only a few minutes the same man came hastily out after wetting his pants. I looked away to avoid embarrassing him, but our eyes met for a glimpse, I still to this day remember the look in his eyes; a combination of oppression, pain, anger, shame and despair.

Later I recognized that he was one of the detainees from the nineties that were arrested and viciously tortured. He was a teenager at that time, but he was abused repeatedly, hanged from the ceiling, forced to relieve himself in this position, and was beaten on his kidneys and bladder until their functions disrupted… After this bitter ordeal, and at his early age, the young man suffered from insomnia, involuntary bedwetting, isolation and depression. In our conservative societies it very easy to be transformed from a victim into an outcast individual… No one would marry; people would shy away from your friendship after your manhood was desecrated.

A youth like this is not a unique example in a country like Bahrain where torture and all sorts of derogatory practices were routinely practiced in detention centers between the years 1975 and 1999. With the death of the former Amir, and after his young son took throne, everyone welcomed the new ruler and felt optimistic about his initial steps for reform, however the impunity of the torturers and criminals quickly took us back to square one, after several years of relative calmness.

On February 19th, last year, and after the launch of the public demands that were confronted with suppression and bullets, and while I was walking through the wounded masses who fell during the mass demonstrations that had started and did not subside for more than a year, I found myself in front of him again, the same young man that was raped who I had met 7 years ago, he was the most calm of the wounded as if he was celebrating death, he looked at me as if to say: My stolen dignity… will return.

This youngster and thousands others are some of the victims of Decree No. 56 issued in 2002, and whoever has not heard of this decree before, we say that the proof of innocence granted by the King to all those who committed crimes of killing and torture before this date, under this decree, no citizen is entitled to pursue or demand the punishment of his torturers during the dark state-security era; this decree allowed human rights violators to renounce responsibility – definitely not out of protection for them – but out of protection for those who gave them the green light to commit those abhorrent practices, and some of them were – and still are – holding senior positions in the pyramid of power. I can say that those victims were wronged twice: once when they were hideously tortured, and when they were deprived the right of justice a thousand times which intensified their physical and mental sufferings, and this happened to thousands of victims who could not find anyone to avenge for them.

The impunity of those paved way for torture's return after years of absence, which equals – or exceeds – what the people knew in the seventies up to the nineties, some of them were still practicing their military work although their hands are stained with blood. Others were leading extreme civil militias, which the regime turns a blind eye to in an apparent encouragement to them. One of the melodramatic absurdity is that the Bahraini regime is facing all the crimes of murder and torture of innocents "including the ones who died under torture in prison" with one reply: we will "seriously" investigate those accusations… and what is deplorable is that those "serious" investigations did not result in convicting a single military worker, not even a single one, during all those years and regardless of the fall of all those victims!!

Today, in our detention centers, the methods of torture, inhumane and derogatory treatment varies inside the prison cell, and the scope of victims widened to include women, who the regime had avoided causing them harm in the past decades. We have received extremely disturbing information stating that the regime is making use of subhuman monsters such as Saddam's Commandos, and mercenaries from Pakistan and Jordan and other countries to take part in the systematic torture.

I stand before you today to remind you of this young man and of thousands of victims and shattered families, whose regime that is suppressing them is getting support from some of your regimes.

I ask you to send an independent international investigation committee, not funded by the regime and not engrossed by the regime's offerings, to convey to you and to the world the buried truth of what is happening on ground… we are relying on international pressure in order to resolve our case.

I thank you for your patience and interest and leave you with this short reportage that I've prepared, hoping that it will give you a deeper insight into what happened and what is still taking place in Bahrain.

Lamees Dhaif's Speech at the United Nations, BahrainUPR in Geneva 21st May 2012 on testimonies regarding Freedom of Speech

I stand before you today as a living example of the price paid by anyone practicing freedom of speech in Bahrain.

Before 1 year, 2 months and 4 days I left Bahrain. I know it exactly because I count by the day. When I was packing to leave, everyone (including myself) thought it was temporary: weeks or a few months. Only my mother, because of the sense of motherhood, knew that I will be gone for a long time. That’s why she hugged me tightly and said: You are my eyes; from this day onwards, I would be blind.

My mother preferred to live “without her sight” rather than me losing my life or getting arrested and tortured, as what happened with my own sister who was kidnapped at dawn, detained, tortured and forced to confess to fabricated charges. Her only crime was performing her job and treating injured demonstrators.

I am a journalist. I got terminated from four jobs in 2 days. I was black-listed so that I would not be hired anywhere. My house was attacked 3 times with Molotov cocktails. During the first few months after February 14, I used to wake up to letters of threats and sleep on insults because my phone numbers, home address, and ID numbers were published in pro-government websites and a member of the ruling family threatened me on his Twitter account, and I quote, "Cut me in half". I was also threatened, and I quote again “to be taken to the grave” by an X-colonel . They even started rumors targeting my manners and chastity to avenge and harm me.

My only crime was that I did my job and did not accept to become a false witness, and I did not accept being manipulated to say only what the authorities intended me to say, as what happened with my colleagues who gave up their morals for rewards and high-ranking posts while those who adhered to the rights of people deserved abuse and intimidation. Certainly, I am not the only victim. Every Bahraini citizen who stood against the regime paid a price in the form of detention, torture, job termination, denial of services and scholarships, and some people even lost their lives as a price for opposing the regime.

Recently, the government enacted a law to imprison anyone condemning the King up to 5 years with a fine of around 40 thousand dollars. Lately, the government began a campaign to monitor the activists on social media, who sought cyberspace to express themselves freely, and threatened to sue them for that. The regime already dismissed thousands from their study and work, investigated and arrested lots of youth because of something they wrote or recapped on social media and we do not know what step might be taken further to suppress any opinion that expose the regime.

I do not know what to say. My words stumble before the amount of suffering I see in my country. I know one thing for sure: that the world does not care about what is happening to us and that everyone intentionally turns their back on our daily suffering. In conclusion, please let me ask you: don’t we have the right to live like others, like yourselves, or are we a different type of human beings? We do not demand more than our right for justice and democracy, our right for dignity to live as citizens not as slaves, and our right to say what we witness and think without putting our lives or future at stake. Since you call for democracy, why don’t you help us achieve it?

I call upon your support for our cause. I call upon on an international community to visit Bahrain to investigate the humanitarian status. We look up to you, do not let us down.

The worst Nightmare of my life: The Night My Sister Was Arrested

 

After the regime ordered armored vehicles, tanks, and the army to clamp down the pro-democracy movement, the regime began to take revenge from its opponents!!
A list comprising 18 individuals that needed to be executed has been distributed by loyalists. My name was the sixth! I was the only one from the media field. The rest were jurists and politicians. I was not surprised especially that my voice was high, my pen very critical, and I was the fiercest among colleagues in exposing violations. As a result, I have become one of the regime’s most important targets. My house was attacked twice by pro-government thugs. Death threat calls and threats of kidnapping were a daily dose for me. That’s why I expected my arrest at any moment, especially after my arrest was rumored on that day for a reason that I still do not understand.
****

The events that took place burdened me emotionally. I was shocked by the regime, and I did not expect that it was capable of what it did. It suppressed people and killed them in cold blood. The regime demolished mosques and other places used for worship. It has set up armed civil militia to help them.
The regime has lost its senses.

I left my house to relieve some of the concern my family and friends had on my safety. Every night I used to prepare clothes for my arrest. After key political figures and activists were arrested with their pajamas, I decided to sleep with clothes "suitable" for the arrest. Then I decided to prepare clothes that took less than a minute to be worn.
At 3:30 am on March 19th, there was a loud knock on my door. I peeked into the door's magic eye where I saw Mohammad, my sister's husband, and thus realized that the "zero hour" has arrived. I told him quietly: "A minute". In less than a minute I opened the door. I was ready. I was ready to hear from him that the military mobbed his home in order to arrest me. I was ready to face the huge masked men whom we heard about in the last few days, ready to face the investigator's poisoned way of thinking, ready to be suffocated by water, beaten with a plastic hose, and even electrocuted. I was ready for everything and anything except the three words uttered by Mohammed:
 "They took Nada".

*****
Suddenly, my strength turned into weakness and my courage was crushed. "How .. why .. Is there some sort of mistake?" I asked.
I found myself in front of a lot of questions but very few answers.

A group of 5 riot vehicles had surrounded my father's house in the Zinj at 2 am that same night. 16-20 masked men stormed the house. Unfortunately, my elder sister's son had spent the night at our house and thus witnessed the horror that my family had gone through and until the next day he thought they had come to arrest me. The masked men had pointed their machine guns in the face of my mother and father. They threatened to blow up one of my brothers' head in front of my parents. The picture of the blown- up head of martyr Ahmed Farhan was still present in everybody's memory. They threatened to arrest and torture my 60-year-old father. And they would have done more atrocious things had they not known that my brother works in the judiciary system. My brother was forced to go with them to Nada's house so half of the masked men left with him while the rest had kept my family members as hostages until the job was completed.
Who would have imagined!
My family kept as hostages?!  Masked men occupying my house and brandishing machine guns at the foreheads of my brothers!
I would not have seen anything like this even in my worst nightmares!


What did Nada do that deserves an arrest?!! She is not a member of any organization, not involved in politics, and does not even work in the largest government hospital. She has volunteered, as a physician, to treat demonstrators. Did she turn into "Bin Laden" because she treated the victims of the military? What will they do to her? Will she receive a double dose of punishment because she is my sister?

Incomplete thoughts, each thought cuts the idea of the previous one..  Another thought jumps and cancels it before it was completed. I reached Nada's house. Everyone was in shock but at the same time trying to calm the other. My mother called and tried to sound strong, but I can sense her muted anger and I can taste tears in her words. She told me that they showed off their power, but they are not as powerful as Allah.

I tried to console my brothers who started arriving at my sister's house. I also tried to calm down Mohammad who seemed as if his soul has left his body. Suddenly, an indescribable cold feeling ran through my body  although the weather was warm. I rushed to Nada's closet to take one of her coats or perhaps run away from everybody's eyes. I went to her room, and I can smell her perfumes. I opened the closet and pulled a fur coat. In a glimpse, I recalled her smile and I felt a sickening pain in my stomach.
Nada is in prison now!! The dirty hands of the military personnel extend to pull her. Can she bear such humiliation?! Another thought stormed my head.. What I will say to Lulwa and Alia when they wake up later and not find their mum?

I wish they had arrested me, hanged me, torn me to pieces, but not taken my sister!
Will they approve taking me as a substitute instead or her?
Everything paused in my head. I engaged in bitter weeping in the middle of her closet trying to hide my tears with my hand and hide my cries that wanted to penetrate the ceiling and shake the walls. I can hear the Dawn prayer now.

Allah is the Greatest.. Allah is the Greatest.

I lifted my head and could hear myself say "Allah is greater than all of those who try to dominate by force"!

Bahrain Revolution

This article is an example a of column that I am publishing right now. In two adjacent columns, I converse with a writer from Tunisia in which we write about things that take place in our countries that are related to the revolutions of the Arab Spring. They are thus written in a letter format.

Dear Ahmed,

Let me first tell you a little about my country. I come from the smallest country in the Arab world, the Kingdom of Bahrain. It lies in the middle of the Arabian Gulf where the number of its indigenous population is 570,000. The number of foreigners and expatriates exceed the number of locals, but I tell you - with pride - that despite the geographic and demographic facts, we are giants in our courage and determination to achieve our legitimate rights.

My country, my dear, is governed by the same ruling family since 230 years ago. In my country the indigenous people are treated as second-class citizens and others are imported from abroad to replace them and assist in their suppression and persecution. When this Bedouin family entered our country in the year 1782, the indigenous citizens "who are generally farmers and fishermen" welcomed them ignorantly not knowing that they are jeopardizing their future and the future of their grandchildren.

Historically, the vast majority of the people of Bahrain are Shiite Muslims while the ruling family is Sunni. This did not cause friction among citizens until they found that the royal family imported Sunnis from various countries and nationalities to change the demographic composition of the country.

Throughout our history, our country has had several uprisings and revolutions in which the regime suppressed all of them using all types of means. During the fifties, sixties, seventies and the eighties of the past century, thousands of people lost their jobs and entire families were deported by putting them in boats and sending them to the unknown. Lots of oppositionists were also arrested and tortured to death both from the Shiites and Sunnis. People opposing the regime were targeted and attacked because they opposed the power or stood with the oppressed people.

In 1999, the formal Amir, Shaikh Isa Bin Salman Al-Khalifa passed away.  And I call him formal because the real ruler of Bahrain for more than 50 years, is his brother, Sheikh Khalifa bin Salman, who is characterized as savvy and malice. The young Crown Prince - Hamad bin Isa – became the ruler of the country.  When he took the throne, he ordered for the detainees to be released, the exiled to return to the country, and allowed for the establishment of a parliament. He promised reforms to the extent that people wanted to carry him on their necks. But the hands of his uncle, the Prime Minister and some members of the royal family were determined to enslave the indigenous people, especially citizens, which led to the erosion of reforms from the inside and the return of torture and systematic discrimination.  The regime naturalized foreigners in an attempt to erase the identity of the country. Corruption and stealing public money was also underway. It became vital for people to revolt, my friend. The identity of their country was buried in front of their eyes. People were ethnically and religiously persecuted while they stand still to see how the looting of the country’s resources took place for the benefit of the ruling family and their allies.

 

The factors of the revolution were thus complete and we were encouraged by the Arab Spring in which you in Tunisia became the first precursors. We went out on the streets requesting our rights, justice, and freedom, but we were attacked with tanks, machine guns, and tear gas. They beat us without mercy. They arrested our key oppositionist figures, our women, and our children. They brutally tortured people and cut off their salaries. The regime also tried to intimidate and crush our revolution using help from the armies of neighboring countries in addition to its own. But our unarmed people stood proud and steadfast and are still standing to defy the might of tyrants with their faith and determination.

This is briefly, my friend, the story of the great people of my country. I will tell you next time about my story and that of my mother and my sister, the dentist who was sentenced for 15 years for treating injured protesters. I will tell you about my story in exile. I will tell you the stories of Fadheela, Bahia, Ibrahim Sharif and Khawaja. They are our heroes so that you will get to know the courageousness and bravery of my people.

 

The High Commision of Human Rights Delegation's visit to Bahrain

I address the OHCHR delegation that is visiting Bahrain, not as an activist but as a person who knew the regime more than I wanted

In the jungle, creatures survive by feeding on weaker prey. They do not stand against anything more powerful just like Bahrain's regime

They are masters of deceit. When you talk to them, they would empathize with you and tell you exactly what you want to hear UN Bahrain 

Envision the gap bet their words/actions, their promises/what's applied, & their claims/reality to see how they run Bahrain like a PR firm

Dictators have the courage to defend their actions! Bahrain regime denies. It's too weak to face or admit its faults

Loyalists' desire to "cancel" the other sect is more than that of the regime. They are driven by self-interest

I want stability for Bahrain & dignity for its people. I dream of returning home to sleep without fearing my family would be intimidated

People of Bahrain demand basic human rights: not to be attacked/raped/tortured by police just because they had enough from the corrupt regime

The agreements you sign with Bahrain regime will use the name of OHCHR to beautify itself, but you will remember their deceit

OHCHR delegation: please visit Bahrain's native people, families of martyrs & detainees to see the truth, patience & courage. We trust you.