Bahrain and the violence
Bahrain, Special Report, 9/22/1997

Bahrain is the only Gulf country with a significant indigenous proletariat that has some experience of collective action, and has had few difficult moments to live through.

Until 1970, the Shah of Iran considered Bahrain 9 British protectorate or not 9 as part of his natural empire, based on the Shiite majority and a few incursions over the centuries. He managed to persuade Iran to renounce its claim formally on the eve of independence, but an empty desk marked "province of Bahrain" was kept.

Standing in the Majlis in Tehran, after the Iranian revolution, the old pretensions were not formally renewed, but then such a step would in fact have been superfluous in the eyes of the Islamic Republic. Bahrain seemed to be the perfect proving ground for exporting the Islamic revolution.

Since 1980 Bahrain has survived at least three coup attempts more or less inspired by Tehran, but Tehran had never shown any particular political ambition. At the end of the Gulf war, it had accomplished this, and remarkably well, by the technique of keeping its head down for as long as possible.

On the other hand, Bahrain, more than any of the other Gulf states, has the attention of human rights associations. Their protests have expressed concern about the number of political prisoners, which are presumed to be two kinds.

The first category includes those implicated in alleged attempts to overthrow the government . One alleged plot was scheduled to take placeon December 16, 1981, but the culprits were unmasked a few days before. Several dozen people then were joined by several dozen more two years later when arms were discovered in the Islamic Center on the Buddaiya Road. Authorities presumed coup attempts were snuffed out in December 1987, when a small group of plotters, who were said to have been trained and supported by Tehran, were arrested before they could do any harm.

The second category consists of what might be called prisoners of conscience, arrested for their open sympathy with outlawed left-wing political movements, like The Popular Front for the Liberation of Oman and the Arab Gulf, The Bahrain Popular Liberation Front and the left-wing parties or trade unions which had begun to flourish before the dissolution of parliament.

Moreover, most of the opposition groups have representatives abroad and they are irate even about talking, they know that they are unlikely to be assassinated for it, secondly, and at least as important, Bahrain. The world standard for freedom has been applied to it so often, sometimes in unduly divergent contexts, that the disappointment is all the greater in discovering that pleasant, open and relaxed Bahrain, does not function exactly like a Western parliamentary democracy.

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