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Saudi Arabia - Citizen's Protest (2011)
Topic Started: Mar 10 2011, 04:27 PM (984 Views)
shure
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The involvement of Prince Bandar bin Sultan bin Abdul Aziz Al Saud aka "Bandar Bush" of Saudi Arabia in the 9/11 operation.


Mp3 audio download link-

http://recordings.talkshoe.com/TC-69500/TS-451961.mp3



Red Flag – Saudi Government Suspects Protected at Every Turn
http://visibility911.com/redflags/2011/02/red-flag-saudi-government-suspects-protected-at-every-turn/



Videos concerning Saudi Arabia and Prince Bandar -

Princes Planes and Payoffs -

Part 1 0f 2 -
http://www.livevideo.com/video/Drachnid/13C25C18B49C4968B0C8B8EB958629E3/princes-planes-pay-offs-1.aspx

Part 2 of 2 -
http://www.livevideo.com/video/Drachnid/ADA5498049654A29903829BFD9F77B60/princes-planes-pay-offs-2.aspx


FRONTLINE - Black Money -

http://video.pbs.org/video/1114436938/

FRONTLINE - House of Saud -

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=4383835181717429209#

Inside the Saudi Kingdom -

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=8855672962952239008#



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UPDATE 1-ANALYSIS-Saudi says protests don't fit Islamic state
Wed Mar 9, 2011 7:18pm GMT
http://af.reuters.com/article/egyptNews/idAFLDE7282JY20110309?sp=true

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* Argument remains same - protests are not Islamic

* Planned Friday, March 11 protests seen as first key test

* Reforms not keeping up with Internet-savvy youth

(Updates number of Facebook call supporters, paragraph 4)

By Andrew Hammond

DUBAI, March 9 (Reuters) - Saudi Arabia's ruling family has mobilised the power of its conservative religious establishment to prevent a wave of uprisings against Arab autocrats from roaring into its kingdom, home to more than a fifth of the world's known oil reserves.

Whether these traditional tactics will work with a young population that grew up in the information revolution age, with the ability to use the internet to organise and spread awareness of ideas of universal rights to political participation, is still to be tested.

As revolts that toppled Saudi allies in Egypt and Tunisia encourage democracy activists to challenge rulers around the region, Saudi authorities have tried every means possible to warn people not to dare try the same.

The day all eyes are fixed on is Friday. More than 32,000 people have backed a call on Facebook to hold two demonstrations this month, the first on March 11 and then March 20.

The theme running through comments from princes, clerics and newspaper editorialists is that protests in the key U.S.-allied state are not Islamic, the subject of a fatwa issued by the Council of Senior Clerics this week.

Just two days before Friday, Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal, the king's nephew, warned that protests were not allowed and that change could only happen through "the principle of dialogue".

They used rhetoric that Saudis are long used to, based on the idea that Saudi Arabia is unique as a country that replicates the early Islamic state -- and Islamic Utopia where God's word is law and allegiance to the ruler is non-negotiable.

They cited Koranic verses and their perception of the early Muslim state established by Prophet Mohammad to argue that reform should come via advice and not street protests, and even argue that signing petitions "violates what God ordered".

But Fouad Ibrahim, who has written studies on Saudi Arabia's Wahhabi school of Islam, said the word of the senior scholars had far less authority now that it did in the past.

"'We live in an Islamic state, we are not like Egypt and Tunisia, we implement sharia law, there is not enough reason for people to revolt against the Islamic state' -- these claims used to be marketed but many people don't believe this any more," said Ibrahim, who is based in London.



SAUDIS QUESTION CLERICS

Wahhabism -- the Saudi interpretation of the Hanbali school of Sunni Islamic law -- stands out for its insistence that the ruler should be obeyed at all costs. Its clerics also frown on political parties, which are banned in the country.

But following the 1990-1 Gulf crisis -- when the government clerics shocked many by authorising U.S. troops on Saudi soil -- many Wahhabi scholars broke away.

More politically active, they presented petitions to the royal family that argued the state had veered away from Islamic principles in domestic and foreign policies. They supported the idea of parliamentary elections.

Many of those scholars, who were imprisoned for their insolence, have more credibility than the government-backed clerics among Saudis today.

One of them, Salman al-Odah, who has a programme each week on pan-Arab channel MBC1, put his signature to a reform petition last month and has made pro-reform comments on social media site Twitter this week. "The youth must be given some freedom to criticise," he said on Wednesday.

Saudi clerics have been split over support for uprisings in Tunisia, Egypt and Libya. Their supporters on Islamist websites fear protests will play into Iranian hands by emboldening Shi'ites, who have already started protesting over the past two weeks in the Eastern Province where most Saudi oilfields lie.

The clerics, given wide powers in society through a historic pact with the Saudi family, also fear protests will benefit liberals who want to rein in the religious establishment.

Saudi Arabia is home to Islam's two holiest sites in Mecca and Medina, and officials often argue this gives the kingdom a special status in Islam akin go the Vatican for Catholics.



INTERNET FREEDOMS

Saudis can pick and choose between the opinions of clerics inside and outside the country, or ignore them altogether.

Abdelkarim al-Khidr, an Islamic jurisprudence professor at Qassim University, has published a study circulating among activists that justifies protests from a Wahhabi standpoint.

"Demonstrations are not violating Islam. Honest people should demonstrate because it's time for it and petitions didn't bring us progress," he told Reuters in Riyadh this week.

Blogger Eman Al-Nafjan said although many Saudi youth were conservative in outlook, that did not mean they followed blindly the words of the official religious establishment.

But the clerics' forbidding of signing petitions had made them look out of date, she said. "The fatwa works against the scholars, they lost a lot of people by issuing it. We already know that the religious scholars are easily bought and they say what they are told to say," Nafjan said.

The interconnected nature of the new generation of Saudis was putting Saudi claims of cultural particularism to their biggest test yet, Ibrahim said.

Deposed rulers Hosni Mubarak in Egypt and Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali of Tunisia as well as Libya's Muammar Gaddafi, who is battling rebels for his survival, all tried to argue that some unique facet of their country would prevent change.

"They all say this. Mubarak said that when Ben Ali was removed. Gaddafi has said Libya is different. (Saudi Interior Minister) Prince Nayef told newspaper editors 'we are different because we implement sharia'," Ibrahim said. (Additional reporting by Ulf Laessing; Editing by Samia Nakhoul)







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U.S. says aware of reports of shots in Saudi Arabia
Reuters March 10, 2011 3:52 PM
http://www.canada.com/news/world/says+aware+reports+shots+Saudi+Arabia/4418331/story.html

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WASHINGTON - The White House said on Thursday it was aware of reports that shots had been fired during a protest in Saudi Arabia and that the United States would continue to monitor that situation.

"We're certainly aware of those reports," White House deputy national security adviser Ben Rhodes told reporters on a conference call to discuss the U.S. response to the unrest in Middle East and North Africa.

Witnesses said Saudi police fired shots when dispersing a protest by members of the Shiite minority in the OPEC member's oil-producing Eastern province, with one to four people wounded.

One witness said police fired percussion bombs to disperse the crowd of around 200 people, while a witness and Shiite activist said shots were fired.

Rhodes said U.S. officials have conveyed to Saudi officials in past conversations their support for universal rights and will continue to do so.

"What we have said to the Saudis and to all the people of the region is that we're going to support a set of universal values in any country in the region and that includes the right to peaceful assembly, to peaceful protests, to peaceful speech," he said.

"We'll, of course, continue to closely monitor this particular situation and get as many facts as we can about exactly what transpired since these reports are relatively recent."






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Saudi Arabia Braces For Friday Protests, Particularly In Shi'ite East
March 10, 2011 By Charles Recknagel
http://www.rferl.org/content/saudi_arabia_braces_friday_protests/2334156.html

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Protesters turned out in Qatif, in eastern Saudi Arabia, on March 9 despite the ban.


As opposition organizers in Saudi Arabia surreptitiously used the Internet to call fellow citizens out for a "Day of Rage" on March 11, there was no way of knowing how many would heed the call.

That's because in Saudi Arabia, public protests are illegal. In fact, even thinking of protesting publicly is reprehensible, condemned both by the government and its close ally, the official clerical establishment.

Still, the protesters may come out, as several hundred did on March 4 in the capital, Riyadh, as well as in cities in the oil-rich east of the country. They shouted slogans against the monarchy and demanded the release of political prisoners.

Those protests, of course, were a faint shadow of the kinds of rallies that have brought hundreds of thousands of people to the streets in other Arab countries. But even so, they were enough to make the government bluntly warn afterward that it had authorized security forces to "use all measures" to prevent any future efforts to "disrupt public order."

Now, ahead of the rallies planned for March 11, the Saudi Interior Ministry has dispatched some 10,000 troops to the east of the country, where the grievances against the government run highest. It's in tacit recognition that if the protests occur in the east they will be fueled not just by the general frustration with official corruption that many ordinary Saudis feel, but by something still deeper. That is, a sectarian divide that many people in the eastern region say leaves them feeling like second-class citizens.

The divide is between Saudi Arabia's Sunni majority and its Shi'ite minority, which makes up some 10 to 15 percent of the country's total population and is heavily concentrated in Saudi Arabia's Eastern Province. The Shi'a are part of a centuries-old Arab Shi'ite community indigenous to Saudi Arabia's Gulf coastline and the island of Bahrain. But while they say they are as Arab and Saudi as the rest of their compatriots, the officially Sunni government tightly restricts their freedom of worship and -- the Shi'a charge -- their access to influential jobs and positions.

Jane Kinninmont, a Middle East analyst at Chatham House in London, says the economic inequalities which separate Saudi Arabia's rich elite from ordinary citizens are particularly glaring in the Eastern Province.

"In the Eastern Province the economic inequality is very visible because it is the area where the bulk of the oil resources are located. So around Dahran and Dammam, which are the centers of the oil industry, there is a large amount of wealth and there are a lot of very wealthy expatriates as well as very wealthy Saudis," Kinninmont said. "It is very noticeable if you are in poorer cities and towns in the Eastern Province that the oil wealth is not equally distributed."

Outsiders

Kinninmont says the Saudi establishment, whose official ideology is the purist Wahhabi form of Sunni Islam, regards Shi'a as heretics. Textbooks used in state-schools refer to Shi'ism accordingly and there are so many restrictions on building Shi'ite mosques that most Shi'a have to meet for prayer in public halls or homes instead.

At the same time, the Shi'a are widely suspected by the Saudi establishment of having loyalties to the Shi'ite orders of Iraq and Iran, a charge which the Saudi Shi'a, who have their own local clerics, reject.

Analysts say that while officially no employment discrimination exists against Shi'a, most Shi'a are limited to lower-level jobs, even in their oil-rich home province.

"They are indeed employed by the oil industry in various jobs, but none of them senior as far as we know at this time," Theodore Karasik of the Institute for Near East and Gulf Military Analysis in Dubai, says. "It is not an issue that is publicly discussed very much but they do have chances at blue collar jobs throughout the Eastern Province."

Anger over perceived discrimination has flared into protests in the Eastern Province many times over the past decades but is not usually widely reported. The Saudi Shi'a last rose up in mass civil disobedience in the locally termed "intifada" of 1979, but smaller protests are more common. On March 4, several hundred Shi'a marched peacefully in the three eastern cities to demand the release of a Shi'ite cleric arrested the week before for calling for more freedom of worship and for a constitutional monarch. The cleric, Tawfiq al-Amer, was reportedly released on March 6.

Since the "Days of Rage" began rolling over the Arab world early this year, Saudi King Abdullah has promised to shower new benefits upon ordinary Saudis who complain that the country's oil wealth is monopolized by the House of Saud and its minions. He has promised to spend $35 billion to offset high inflation, help young unemployed people, and support families to get affordable housing. He has also ordered a 15 percent salary increase for civil servants.

New Generation?

But while those new benefits may persuade some Saudis there is no need to protest, they may fall short of easing tensions in the Eastern Province.

"There are going to have to be specified programs for the Shi'ites of the Eastern Province," analyst Karasik says. "This package that has been announced is going to benefit more of the Sunni community as well as those working in Riyadh and other administrative centers in the provinces of Saudi Arabia."

The question now is to what extent the Shi'ite leadership in the Eastern Province has been galvanized by the protests elsewhere in the Arab world to launch a sustained movement of their own. Such a movement could not only test the Saudi monarchy's ability to cope with protests but also roil oil markets, whose greatest fear is that unrest might spread in the Gulf.

Kinninmont says that for now it is difficult to know how organized the Shi'ite opposition is. But there are signs that a new generation of leaders impatient for change may be coming forward.

"There have been a number of protests particularly in the [eastern] town of Qatif in the past few weeks, so it does appear that some kind of new opposition organization is emerging, probably with younger leaders," Kinninmont says. "I think the older leaders tend to be more cautious, they are very worried about coming under any suspicion of disloyalty and they have taken a very cautious and frankly polite approach to dealing with the government but they haven't managed to solve people's problems or address grievances that way. So I think we are seeing a rising generation who are fed up with that approach and want to try something different."

Just what that "something different" is may become clearer on March 11. The Saudi government is betting that flooding the Eastern Province with Interior Ministry troops will intimidate would-be protestors and it is a tactic which has worked before to keep protests scarce and small. But, as Kinninmont notes, whether it will still work in today's Arab world is anybody's guess.

"I think one thing this year has taught us is that there is room for surprises," she observes. "We can't anymore be complacent about people behaving in the same way as they have behaved in the past."









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from Taha - (4:32pm Thursday)

Well i cant say anything , I saw small protest of every Friday across the country , but tomorrow will be a big day for Saudi Government. and why i am saying this because they publish letter and warning their citizen to dont take part in the...se protest so lets see what is going to happen. but I think saudi government will try its best to divide public voice as much possible as they can , because if these protester unite at any one place then it will be a great problem of government as their police force is not capable enough to face such protest like in egypt and libya.
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Protestors Hold Rare Rally in Saudi Arabia
from March 4, 2011


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cr_QFglsir4

Al Alam TV reports on a popular demonstration launched today in the Saudi capital of Riyadh, following noon prayers. Protestors are demanding the Saudi government implement constitutional and legal reforms, release political prisoners, and stop restricting political freedoms and the media. In a similar demonstration in al-Qatif, over 20 demonstrators were injured, as security forces attempted to disperse the crowd by using live bullets and beating women.





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Saudi Arabia quiet on planned 'Day of Rage' as protests spark violence elsewhere
By Michael Birnbaum Washington Post Foreign Service
Friday, March 11, 2011; 3:16 PM
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/03/11/AR2011031102965.html

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QATIF, SAUDI ARABIA - A "Day of Rage" planned by critics of the Saudi Arabian government proved relatively calm Friday, with peaceful demonstrations in and around the eastern city of Qatif, a day after police fired on protesters there, and elsewhere in oil-rich Eastern Province.

Witnesses reported a heavy police presence in Riyadh, the Saudi capital, but no protests.

In other countries in the region, protests led to violence. Demonstrators in Bahrain who have been on the streets for almost a month calling for democratic reforms were attacked by government supporters brandishing sticks and knives, witnesses said. Police fired tear gas on the protesters as they attempted to march to a royal complex on the outskirts of Manama, the capital.

In Yemen, security forces opened fire on protesters near Aden, injuring at least six, the Associated Press reported. Meanwhile, tens of thousands of people gathered in the capital, Sanaa, to demand the immediate ouster of longtime President Ali Abdullah Saleh and to mourn the death of a protester killed by security forces at a rally on Tuesday.

Also Friday, Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates flew to Bahrain to meet with officials there, in a sign of the United States' continued concern about the events unfolding in the region.

In Saudi Arabia, hundreds marched in Al-Ahsa, an oasis town in the country's largely Shiite Eastern Province, and several protesters were arrested, but there was no violence, said Ibrahim al-Mugaiteeb, president of the country's Human Rights First Society. Another witness said that marches were held in three small towns outside Qatif and that late in the evening hundreds of people marched in Qatif itself. All the protests took place without incident.

Protesters have called for increased democracy in the country that has been ruled by the al-Saud family since they united it by conquest almost 80 years ago. The royal family and the majority of the country's population are Sunni Muslims, and Shiite Muslims in Eastern Province - home to the bulk of the nation's oil reserves - have urged an end to what they say are discriminatory government measures that prevent them from holding many public positions and restrict their public services.

Fridays have been the biggest days for demonstrations and confrontations since protests started sweeping North Africa and the Middle East two months ago; the Saudi government had indicated this week that it would do whatever it took to stop demonstrations from taking place this Friday. Protests, even small ones, are highly unusual in the authoritarian country.

In Qatif, police shot and wounded at least two protesters Thursday night, and a police officer was also injured, according to the Interior Ministry. On Friday, a black bus filled with heavily armed members of what appeared to be the Saudi Arabian National Guard sat parked near the town's main square. But the afternoon passed quietly.

In Riyadh, witnesses said, police helicopters hovered above the city and police officers packed streets leading to proposed demonstration sites.

"The entire area, the designated area for protests, was completely barricaded by police cruisers. You see police checkpoints at every place to get in," said Mohammed al-Qahtani, the head of the Association of Civil and Political Rights in Saudi Arabia.

In Bahrain, security forces fired rubber bullets and tear gas at protesters, most of them Shiites, who were trying to march to the royal palace, and a group of government supporters attacked the protesters with sticks and knives, witnesses said, adding that dozens of people were injured. Witnesses said that some protesters retaliated by throwing rocks at the security forces.

The Gulf Cooperation Council states this week pledged $20 billion in aid for Bahrain and Oman, which has also been struck by protests.

The protest in Yemen's capital came a day after the opposition rejected a presidential offer of a new constitution. Surrounded by pictures of the man who was shot dead by security forces this week and was being buried Friday afternoon, the demonstrators chanted: "The people want the fall of the president."

Special correspondent Portia Walker in Sanaa, Yemen, contributed to this report.












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Saudi Arabia - Citizens Protest (2011)





http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wp2uqEjcRtw



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m0CcY-S0nto






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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i7iMokcMEDE


Saudi Arabian troops enter Bahrain
More than 1,000 Saudi troops take up positions around Bahrain, apparently to help the Sunni royal family control protests by the nation's majority Shiite Muslims.
By David S. Cloud and Neela Banerjee, Los Angeles Times March 15, 2011
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-bahrain-troops-20110315,0,6460608.story?track=rss

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Reporting from Manama, Bahrain and Riyadh, Saudi

Hundreds of troops from Saudi Arabia entered Bahrain Monday at the request of the ruling family, a move that further polarized the tiny island nation and raised the chances of a violent confrontation with protestors.

A line of armored vehicles carrying Saudi soldiers was shown Monday evening on Bahrain television crossing the 16-mile causeway that links the two countries. The surprise deployment came after several days of worsening violence that had paralyzed the country and threatened to bring down the monarchy.

But if the intent of Bahrain's ruling al-Khalifa family was to shore up its tottering position, it seemed at least as likely that bringing in Saudi troops would worsen the crisis by uniting the often fractious opposition behind a single idea—a refusal to yield to outside military pressure.

After learning of the arrival of Saudi troops, demonstrators began expanding the barricades and checkpoints set up to keep authorities out of the tent city that has arisen at the Pearl roundabout, the traffic circle they occupied last month to protest what they say is systematic discrimination against majority Shiite Muslims by the country's Sunni rulers.

"If they send them, they will kill us," said Abdullah Ali, a protestor said of Saudi troops. "We are ready to be killed. Everyone's ready here."

Yet Bahrain's royal family may have felt it was running out of options. Since the protests began , it has faced pressure from Saudi Arabia, not to yield to the demands of the protestors, and from the Obama administration, which has called for addressing the demonstrators demands and criticized the regime's use of force against the protestors early in the crisis.

Likewise, Saudi Arabia has long feared that unrest in Bahrain would spur protests among Saudi Shiites, who form a majority in the eastern part of the country, where the largest oil reserves are found.

Since the unrest began last month in Bahrain U.S. officials have made clear their desire to see stability restored in Bahrain, home to the headquarters of the U.S. Navy's 5th Fleet, but not by use of force against the protestors. The arrival of Saudi troops came only two days after U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates arrived in Bahrain and urged the king and the crown prince rapid but meaningful reforms to meet the protesters demands,

But Bahrain's turn to outside help raised concerns in the White House that Bahrain was preparing for a crackdown to quell the unrest. In a statement, the White House urged the Saudi Arabia and any others countries dispatching troops "to show restraint and respect the rights of the people of Bahrain, and to act in a way that supports dialogue instead of undermining it," Tommy Vietor, a spokesman for the National Security Council.

Despite offers by Bahrain crown prince, Sheikh Salman bin Hamad al-Khalifa, to open dialogue with the protestors, the opposition has remained deeply split and so far unwilling to take up the government's offer for talks to resolve their grievances.

The move to bring in foreign troops might be a move by the royal family to force less hard line elements in the opposition to open talks as a way to avoid a violent crackdown, several analysts said.

Toby C. Jones, professor of modern Middle eastern history at Rutgers University, said inviting the Saudi military in was a signal by Bahrain's rulers to protesters "that no one is going to yield easily here," Jones said." The Saudi message, he said in a telephone interview, is "'this is a hopeless struggle and you should take what your wise leaders have offered.'"

But for the protesters, the Saudi presence is likely to be seen as a provocation and an occupation. The risk of violence at another protest demonstration may be greater if foreign soldiers are involved, analysts said.

Simon Henderson, an analyst at Washington Institute for Near East Policy, said the intervention was set off by the two days of violent confrontation in the streets of Bahrain over the weekend and He said the foreign intervention could have the effect of swelling the size of the Shiite bloc that has resisted negotiations with the royal family.

A statement by the official Bahrain news agency described the Saudi troops as the first wave of a larger intervention by Bahrain's Persian Gulf neighbors, whose mission, it implied, would be to restore stability.

The foreign troops "have started arriving to Bahrain in light of the regretful situation the kingdom is currently witnessing," the statement said. "On this occasion, the Bahrain Defense Forces calls upon all citizens and residents to cooperate fully with the GCC forces and welcome them warmly." The GCC stands for the Gulf Cooperation Council, an organization of the six Arab countries of the Persian Gulf.

For the Bahraini royal family, having soldiers in their midst from their larger, more powerful neighbor next door threatens to limit their room to compromise with their own citizens.

"The risk here is you lose, for lack of a better word, any legitimacy because people will see you as being propped up by a foreign power," F. Gregory Gause III, professor of political science at the University of Vermont, said. "And at the same time you risk the loss of room to maneuver."

But Bahrain's turn to outside help appeared to raise concerns in the White House that Bahrain was preparing for a crackdown to quell the unrest. In a statement, the White House urged the Saudi Arabia and any others countries dispatching troops "to show restraint and respect the rights of the people of Bahrain, and to act in a way that supports dialogue instead of undermining it," Tommy Vietor, a spokesman for the National Security Council.

Bahrain is home to the headquarters of the U.S. Navy's 5th Fleet, and since the unrest began last month, U.S. officials have made clear their desire to see stability there, a. That position that has sometimes appeared to put Washington at odds the more extreme militant protesters, who favor removing the royal family from power.

There was no immediate sign that they troops were moving against the protestors. No soldiers or police visible near the square by late Monday. But a statement by the official Bahrain news agency described the Saudi troops as the first wave of a larger intervention by Bahrain's Persian Gulf neighbors, whose mission, it implied, would be to restore stability.

The foreign troops "have started arriving to Bahrain in light of the regretful situation the kingdom is currently witnessing," the statement said. "On this occasion, the Bahrain Defense Forces calls upon all citizens and residents to cooperate fully with the GCC forces and welcome them warmly." The GCC stands for the Gulf Cooperation Council, an organization of the six Arab countries of the Persian Gulf.








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Related videos -

Princes Planes and Payoffs -

Part 1 0f 2 -
http://www.livevideo.com/video/Drachnid/13C25C18B49C4968B0C8B8EB958629E3/princes-planes-pay-offs-1.aspx

Part 2 of 2 -
http://www.livevideo.com/video/Drachnid/ADA5498049654A29903829BFD9F77B60/princes-planes-pay-offs-2.aspx


FRONTLINE Black Money -

http://video.pbs.org/video/1114436938/

FRONTLINE - House of Saud -

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=4383835181717429209#

Inside the Saudi Kingdom -

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=8855672962952239008#











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Saudi Arabia Strikes Back
The House of Saud's intervention in Bahrain is a slap in the face of the United States, and a setback for peace on the island.
BY JEAN-FRANÇOIS SEZNEC |MARCH 14, 2011
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2011/03/14/saudi_arabia_strikes_back?page=0,0

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One thousand "lightly armed" Saudi troops and an unspecified number of troops from the United Arab Emirates entered Bahrain on the morning of March 14, in a bid to end the country's monthlong political crisis. They are reportedly heading for the town of Riffa, the stronghold of the ruling Khalifa family. The troops' task, apparently, is to protect the oil installations and basic infrastructure from the demonstrators.

The Arab intervention marks a dramatic escalation of Bahrain's political crisis, which has pitted the country's disgruntled Shiite majority against the Sunni ruling family -- and has also been exacerbated by quarrels between hard-liners and liberals within the Khalifa clan. The clashes between protesters and government forces worsened over the weekend, when the security services beat back demonstrators trying to block the highway to the capital of Manama's Financial Harbor. The protesters' disruption of the harbor, which was reportedly purchased by the conservative Prime Minister Khalifa bin Salman al-Khalifa for one dinar, was an important symbolic gesture by the opposition.

For the United States, the intervention is a slap in the face. On Saturday, March 12, U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates visited Bahrain, where he called for real reforms to the country's political system and criticized "baby steps," which he said would be insufficient to defuse the crisis. The Saudis were called in within a few hours of Gates's departure, however, showing their disdain for his efforts to reach a negotiated solution. By acting so soon after Gates's visit, Saudi Arabia has made the United States look at best irrelevant to events in Bahrain, and from the Shiite opposition's point of view, even complicit in the Saudi military intervention.

The number of foreign troop is so far very small and should not make one iota of difference in Bahrain's balance of power. The Bahraini military already total 30,000 troops, all of whom are Sunnis. They are under control of Crown Prince Salman bin Hamad al-Khalifa and supposedly fully faithful to King Hamad bin Isa al-Khalifa. Bahrain also has a similar number of police and general security forces, mainly mercenaries from Baluchistan, Yemen, and Syria, reputed to be controlled by the prime minister and his followers in the family.

At this time, therefore, the Saudi intervention is largely a symbolic maneuver. It is so far not an effort to quell the unrest, but intended to scare the more extreme Shiite groups into allowing negotiations to go forward. The crown prince recently laid out six main issues to be discussed in talks, including the establishment of an elected parliament empowered to affect government policy, fairly demarcated electoral constituencies, steps to combat financial and administrative corruption, and moves to limit sectarian polarization. He notably failed to mention one of the opposition's primary demands -- the prime minister's resignation.

The Saudi move, however, risks backfiring. It is extremely unlikely that the Saudi troops' presence will entice moderate Shiite and Sunni opposition figures to come to the table -- the intervention will force them to harden their position for fear of being seen as Saudi stooges. The demands of the more extreme groups, such as the Shiite al-Haq party, are also likely to increase prior to negotiations. These elements, having seen job opportunities go to foreign workers and political power dominated by the ruling family for decades, have grown steadily disenchanted with prospects of talks.

The crown prince is well aware that the Saudi intervention only makes a negotiated solution to this crisis more challenging, so it is difficult to imagine that he invited the Saudis into Bahrain. The more liberal Khalifas, such as the crown prince, know very well that the only way out of the crisis is to obtain the resignation of the prime minister and some of the more extreme Sunni ministers.

However, the prime minister -- with whom Gates did not meet with during his weekend visit -- does not appear to have any intention of resigning and is the most likely figure behind the invitation to the Saudis to intervene. Although details are still sketchy, he is likely joining with the Saudi king to pass the message to the United States that he is in charge and no one can tell him what to do. Furthermore, it signals that the Saudis agree with Bahrain's conservatives that the Shiite must be reined in rather than negotiated with, even at the cost of telling the United States to kiss off.

The Saudi intervention may also have been precipitated by the deepening rift between the extreme Sunni elements and the liberal Khalifas. If the Saudis are indeed heading to Riffa, it is possible they are tasked with defending the Khalifa stronghold not so much against the Shiite rabble but against the Bahraini military, which is under the command of the crown prince. The Saudi intervention would therefore be an effort by the prime minister and the Saudis to pressure the crown prince into not giving in to the protesters' demands and to fall in line with their plans to secure Bahrain as the personal fiefdom of the Khalifas and their tribal allies.

Whatever the case, the future appears bleak. The Saudi intervention will no doubt provoke a reaction from Iran, which will argue that their Shiite brothers are being systematically oppressed. Any troubles caused by Bahraini Shiites will only provoke further Saudi intervention. Ultimately, the island risks falling under de facto, if not de jure, Saudi control.

The Saudi intervention, however small, is therefore a major step backward for the region. It represents a major slap in the face to the United States, a defeat for the liberal Shiite and Sunni elements in Bahrain, and ultimately a catastrophe for the entire Khalifa family, both the liberal and conservative wings, who may have just surrendered their power to the giant next door.

Ultimately, this may also be a defeat for Saudi Arabia as well. The Saudis have long tried to avoid overt interventions in their neighbors' affairs. They intervened once during the 1994 upheavals in Bahrain and in the past two years have been active on the Yemeni border -- but under King Abdullah they have tried to arbitrate, rather than dominate, events on the Arabian Peninsula. Their decision to intervene directly in Bahrain's affairs suggests a weakness in the Saudi leadership and Riyadh's surrender to the more conservative elements in the country.







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