West attacks Libya, Saudi Arabia INVADES Behrain, whats the difference?

[elipst]

The West attacks Libya there is condemnation everywhere.. But then Saudi Arabia invades its neighbour to virtually no raised voices in the Islamic World... Are they not both imperialistic powers?? Are they not both acting to serve their own interests?? At least in the west's case we can say they are acting to remove a crazed, psychotic madman and they say they will work for a democracy which is always appreciated. But Saudi Arabia is just acting to shore up an autocratic monarchy that has lost the support of its people.

Our own religious parties that protest every time the west even looks at a Muslim country are all silent. And our own army has sent our own people to protect and defend this same corrupt Behraini regime.

And our own people who form a large part of the Behrain state's security apparatus are being targeted..

 

[elipst]

Bahrain spillover to spread to Pakistan?
By Cyril Almeida | From the Newspaper
(13 hours ago)
Today


THE harrowing attacks on Pakistani nationals in Bahrain, including the murder of at least one policeman, has perhaps for the first time drawn attention to the for-hire security personnel who travel from Pakistan to defend the Bahraini kingdom and its ruling class.

The role Pakistani nationals play in the Bahraini security apparatus was further underlined on Sunday as reports emerged that as many as 1,000 men are being recruited by the army-run Fauji and Bahria foundations for the Bahrain National Guard.

But the attention garnered domestically by the role of Pakistani nationals in Bahrain there are as many as 65,000, with thousands employed in the security services, according to a Foreign Office official has contrasted with the wall of silence that has met the weeks of protests in Bahrain.

At least 10 protesters have been killed since Feb and Saudi Arabian troops have crossed the 16-mile-long King Fahd causeway in an attempt to shore up the ruling class in Bahrain.

Egypt is key. Everything else Yemen, Libya, Bahrain is a footnote, claimed the Amir of the Jamaat-i-Islami, Munawar Hasan. The JI has historical ties with Egypts Muslim Brotherhood, but while it has condemned the western invasion of Libya, it has remained quiet on Bahrain.

Similarly, while Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Hina Khar on Monday issued a veiled criticism of the western action in Libya, there has been no such criticism of the Saudi action in Bahrain.

Indeed, on March 14, the Foreign Office spokesperson, Tehmina Janjua, appeared to offer Pakistans support for Bahrains rulers: We enjoy close fraternal relations with Bahrain and earnestly hope that the leadership and the people of Bahrain will be able to overcome the present difficulties.

Saudi influence

The reason for the selective silence if not tacit public support is easy enough to identify: Saudi Arabia.

All the religious parties have interests, economic and personal, with Saudi Arabia, said Amir Mateen, a veteran journalist who has tracked religious parties in Pakistan, adding, The religious parties, along with everyone else, have yet again been exposed when it comes to principled politics.

Meanwhile, a Ministry of Foreign Affairs official speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal considerations said: We need to be careful that (Pakistanis working in Bahrain) dont get lynched or thrown out of the country. For every one person there, 10 in Pakistan are dependent on that income.

But the official conceded that there were also deeper concerns: There is a possibility of politics, of Iran and Saudi Arabia being involved. We have to be extra-careful.

A former ambassador familiar with Middle Eastern dynamics was more blunt: The Saudis have bought everyone on the religious right. And remember, they have that massive Madressah network in Pakistan. They (the Saudis) can create problems for any government in Pakistan.

However, Bahrain does not just represent a foreign-policy compromise for the Pakistani state and political class. The Shia-Sunni tensions in Bahrain are couched in a wider Saudi Arabia-Iran struggle for influence in the Middle East, a struggle which could turn especially bitter in the battle for Bahrain.

If the tiny island kingdom with a population of just 1.2 million, including 660,000 non-nationals, were to fall to the Shia majority, the next uprising could be in the oil-rich, Shia-dominated Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia. Iran is trying to enter Saudi Arabia, said Syed Saleem Shehzad, Pakistan bureau chief of the Asia Times Online.

The Pakistan angle

With the stakes so high in Bahrain, there are apprehensions Pakistan could be drawn into a renewed conflict between Shia and Sunni and once again become a proxy battleground for Saudi and Iranian interests.

According to Khaled Ahmed, an expert on sectarianism and militancy, The Bahrain situation is likely to settle down because theres too much at stake. But if it doesnt, since Iran is supposed to be secretly supporting (the protesters in) Bahrain, Sunni groups here may hit Shias and Shias may respond.

Mr Ahmed and others noted that while Bahraini Shias have historically distanced themselves from Iran and belong to a different Shia school of thought, Irans regional interests have pushed it to support the Bahraini Shias.

For now, however, at least three factors appear to minimise the possibility of an imminent sectarian backlash inside Pakistan.

One, Shia militant groups are believed to be on the wane. Other than in parts of Karachi and Quetta, Shia militancy is almost dead, according to Rana Jawad, an Islamabad-based journalist who has extensively covered militancy.

Two, the disparate religious elements in Pakistan appear to be edging closer in recent months. According to a senior police officer, Since the Namoos-i-Risalat issue, weve seen even Shia and Sunni groups being very cordial to each other. There is a sectarian rapprochement wave in the country.

Amir Mateen agreed, The Shia element is on the defensive right now. And the religious parties are trying to unite and bring Shias on board because in the domestic political context they know they cant do much if they stand divided.

Third, most observers believe the situation in Bahrain will not spiral out of control as it has in Libya. The (Bahraini) king isnt like Qadhafi. Plus, given whats at stake, nobody will want to see this deteriorate. The (American) 5th Fleet is there, the (Saudi) Eastern Province is nearby, they will figure out a way, said Tanvir Ahmed Khan, a former foreign secretary.

Khaled Ahmed suggested the conflict would not be prolonged and that the standalone, Akbhari Shias of Bahrain would not be able to resist for long.However, in a region where few things have gone according to decades-old assumptions and expectations in recent months, worries remain.

According to the senior police officer, colleagues monitoring the rapprochement between the religious elements in Pakistan were concerned. Its the Bahrain thing mainly. Theres definite concern that events there dont end up spoiling things over here.

http://www.dawn.com/2011/03/24/bahrain-spillover-to-spread-to-pakistan.html

 

[EniGma90]

The West attacks Libya there is condemnation everywhere.. But then Saudi Arabia invades its neighbour to virtually no raised voices in the Islamic World... Are they not both imperialistic powers?? Are they not both acting to serve their own interests?? At least in the west's case we can say they are acting to remove a crazed, psychotic madman and they say they will work for a democracy which is always appreciated. But Saudi Arabia is just acting to shore up an autocratic monarchy that has lost the support of its people.

Our own religious parties that protest every time the west even looks at a Muslim country are all silent. And our own army has sent our own people to protect and defend this same corrupt Behraini regime.

And our own people who form a large part of the Behrain state's security apparatus are being targeted..

Bro, Only reason behind this silence is that Army of khadmen e haremen sahareefen[hilar] is invading shia population who are in minority in muslims and for some so called muslims, they are not even muslims.. Inshallah time is coming closer and closer and every 1 will witness the power pf truth

 

[hans]

Well the difference is big...!!!

When Western Power go for a Kill it’s refereed as a Crusade ( war between Christendom and Islam).

While Saudi and Bahrain conflict is a bhai-bhai phada.

 

[hans]

Bro, Only reason behind this silence is that Army of khadmen e haremen sahareefen[hilar] is invading shia population who are in minority in muslims and for some so called muslims, they are not even muslims.. Inshallah time is coming closer and closer and every 1 will witness the power pf truth

Well Brother in Islam I have read your lines, kindly tell me when will it happen as for the past 1400 years Shia were there and still a very strong minority... kindly see the map of middle east it might open your eyes.

Remember Iraq, before Saddam?
Remember Kuwait ?
Remember Bahrain?

We all though that there was a strong Sunni majority, well there seems to some odds.
Even a few weeks back I personally thought that there were hardly any Shia in Saudi Arabia... now even before the Saudi government has been toppled we know that there is a very strong Shia presence in
KSA.

Then before I forget, we need to include Yemen, a very strong Shia Population. In fact, there seems to be more Shia outside Iran then ever before.


MAP

 

[mimran301]

Saudi Shia population is demanding their own separate country. Everybody would love to laugh on this irony soon. After Syria and Bahrain.....next stop : Saudi Arabia.

It is season of democracy, let nobody stop it. Kings belong to past. Only good thing about kings is good story for kids to read. So let them go now, so our kids would read their stories.

 

[QaiserMirza]

The U.S. double standard​

The world has wisely intervened in Libya to stop a tyrant from killing his own people. But it won’t do the same for pro-democracy forces in Bahrain, Yemen and other places in the region.

Barack Obama helped engineer regime change in Egypt and joined the Anglo-French-led attack on Libya that should lead to regime change there. But these allies, including Canada, won’t help topple other autocrats who are also attacking their citizens.

Worse, Obama and Co. acquiesced to a Saudi-led military intervention in Bahrain to support the king against the will of his people.

This cynical, self-serving response to the Arab Awakening is sowing the seeds of future conflicts between Arabs and the West and, therefore, Muslims and the West, the very divide that Obama has tried hard to bridge.

Welcome to Obama’s realpolitik. He has sacrificed his grand promise of universal human rights and democracy at the altar of American interests.

All states work in their own interests but few claim the moral leadership that America does.

After siding, albeit reluctantly, with the people’s revolutions in Tunisia and Egypt against pro-American regimes, Obama has reverted to Washington’s old double standard of one law for allies, another for adversaries.

Dissidents in Iran and Syria will, therefore, be cheered on and materially backed in their heroic bids to unseat their regimes. Stephen Harper will be among those beating the drums hard.

But he and others won’t be speaking up, except in banalities, in support of dissidents elsewhere, not just those in Bahrain and Yemen but also in Algeria, Jordan, Oman, Morocco and Saudi Arabia. The autocrats there, repressive in varying degrees, will be counselled against using violence but not penalized for resorting to it, some more viciously than others.

The U.S. wants these allies to reform, not fall.

Bahrain’s King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa uses far more foreign mercenaries than Moammar Gadhafi. He and Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh have been no less brutal than Gadhafi. Yet there’s no call to the United Nations for a no-fly zone over either country.

No bombs will be dropped on Bahrain, host to the U.S. Navy’s Fifth Fleet and also home to an American air base. Nor is Obama pressuring Saleh to quit. Saleh is an ally in counterterrorism efforts against Al Qaeda and provides fuelling facilities for American warships.

Let’s not forget what the Arab autocrats, and the other regional actors, have been up to.

King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia did not seek United Nations permission to send troops into neighbouring Bahrain to save King Khalifa.

The latter is a fellow Sunni ruling over a majority Shiite population that’s systematically discriminated against. The Shiites are routinely abused by an army that’s exclusively Sunni, its ranks recruited from Pakistan, Jordan, Syria and Yemen, many of whom are granted citizenship to alter the demographic mix.

The Bahraini Shiites are also demonized as a fifth column for Shiite Iran. This even though there is no evidence of Iranian meddling.

The Bahraini Shiites are making political, not sectarian, demands.

The second reason for propping up Khalifa is to avoid a possible domino effect that the fall of one monarchy may have on all the others in the region — American allies all, sitting on oil.

There are two views on Abdullah’s move. Having failed to convince Obama not to abandon Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak, a longtime American client, he was swift to protect Khalifa, a Saudi client. Or that Abdullah did consult Obama and arrived at a quid pro quo — the Arabs would cut Gadhafi loose and the West would not interfere in Bahrain and Saudi Arabia.

There is no mass protest movement in Saudi Arabia. But the most potent opposition comes from Shiites, a persecuted minority in that country. They live in the oil-rich eastern province, across a 23-kilometre causeway from Bahrain.

The Shiites in Bahrain and Saudi Arabia are thus doubly damned — for making the same political demands that other Arabs are making and for being Shia.

The Arab uprising, as transformative as it already has been, has run not only into stiff domestic resistance but also geopolitical realities, regional and international.

American flirtation with the Arab spring is coming to an end, if it has not already. The new world order is beginning to look like the old world order.

Haroon Siddiqui is the Star's editorial page editor emeritus. His column appears on Thursday and Sunday. [email protected]

 

[EniGma90]

Well Brother in Islam I have read your lines, kindly tell me when will it happen as for the past 1400 years Shia were there and still a very strong minority... kindly see the map of middle east it might open your eyes.

Remember Iraq, before Saddam?
Remember Kuwait ?
Remember Bahrain?

We all though that there was a strong Sunni majority, well there seems to some odds.
Even a few weeks back I personally thought that there were hardly any Shia in Saudi Arabia... now even before the Saudi government has been toppled we know that there is a very strong Shia presence in
KSA.

Then before I forget, we need to include Yemen, a very strong Shia Population. In fact, there seems to be more Shia outside Iran then ever before.


MAP

Wsalam
bro 40% of shia population is in iran, and iran never ever promoted secterianism. when I say power full iran, i mean a strong ummah.

 

[Pakistani1947]

Shia population in the world

Following statistic was all taken from many independent sources for the year 1999. The percentage of Shia this time is relative to the percentage of Muslims. source

 

[elipst]

The shia in Behrain are not making sectarian demands they are making political demands for their rights, representation. It has almost nothing to do with religion or sect. Iran may try to influence and Saudis may fear it but it is an indigenous uprising against oppression. Saudis should do well to keep away from it. Their time will come too.