Reuters: "Saudi Shi'ites held more protests in the kingdom's oil-producing east on Thursday in support of Shi'ites in Bahrain and called for the withdrawal of Saudi forces from there, activists said.
They said hundreds attended four protests in and around the eastern region's main Shi'ite center, Qatif, and also called for the release of Shi'ite prisoners in the kingdom, where the austere Wahhabi version of Sunni Islam is applied."
7 comments :
Wow. The UN authorized a no-fly zone. And some of the rebels are still alive. What an inspiration...
WASHINGTON -- The Obama administration’s new-found willingness to back aerial bombing to protect rebels cornered by Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi's forces may signal a critical turning point for the fledgling democracy movement in the Middle East.
Time is running out for the Libyan people,” said Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman John Kerry (D-Mass.) at a hearing on the Middle East uprisings. “The world needs to respond immediately.”
U.S. officials seemed to get the message. After resisting weeks of calls for a no-fly zone, the administration suddenly found itself leading the international community in crafting a more forceful strategy against Gaddafi as he launched his final push to destroy opposition forces.
“I'm happy that the Security Council appears to be poised to pass something but I'm concerned that the time it will take to actually do something -- mobilize military action -- on the ground, will allow the depraved tyrant to kill more people and possibly squash the uprising,” said Samer Shehata, who teaches Arab politics at Georgetown University, prior to the vote.
“The lesson autocrats drew from revolutions in Tunisia and Egypt was that the key to their survival was preemptive reform. Gaddafi, however, provides an alternate strategy: even more brutal repression,” said Michael Rubin, a Middle East expert at the conservative American Enterprise Institute. “Had Libya fallen [to rebels], we'd be witnessing the regimes in Iran and Syria teetering on the edge of oblivion right now. Now that Gaddafi has rebounded, we see even moderate regimes” like Bahrain’s openly embracing the Libya model.
http://tinyurl.com/48bl88g
how about calling for a withdrawl from Iraq. oh forgot. That is not an occupation.
dear Mojo,
Grand A,Ali al-Sistani gave some words of support to protesters .......
in Bahrain !!
He made no mention tho of the murderous clamp-down next door in Iran, or of the "disappeared" Karroubi,Mousavi, and their wives'
Must be a Shia thing.
bushtheliberator
' "After 38 days of having been deprived of meeting my father and my mother, I was able to see them at their apartment," Mohammad Taghi Karroubi wrote on his personal blog, the website Kaleme.com said. '
Still it's a good point. Sistani doesn't criticize Iran much.
"Ali Karroubi, who was arrested about a month ago, paid bail of one billion rials ($90,000, or 63,000 euros), according to Sahamnews."
Damn. That's a lot of money for a guy who lives in an apartment.
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