Letter From Bahrain

George Bush and the Neo-conservatives were right; there are Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMDs) in Iraq. The WMDs are the digital cameras of the American troops assigned to the Abu Ghraib prison near Baghdad. I don’t think the Neo-con spin doctors can ever peddle out of this public relations fiasco.

Starting Wednesday, Americans have been under tighter security measures in Bahrain. Gordon England, the Secretary of the Navy, paid a one-day visit to the base. He is a civilian with an impressive business-world resume. England’s role is to handle budgetary matters before the U.S. Congress. He has no other serious influence. Nonetheless, England was here on the euphemistic “goodwill tour.”

- on Wednesday, Specialist Jeremy Sivits was sentenced to one year in prison and discharged from the army for his role in the abuse of Iraqi detainees. A U.S. special court martial held in Baghdad handed Sivits the maximum possible sentence of one year in prison.

- on Wednesday, King Hamad bin Isa al-Khalifa released 11 Shias from prison – jailed a few weeks ago, accused of petitioning illegally for changes to the Bahrain constitution.

- on Wednesday, 10 died as Israeli tanks fired on a peaceful protest in the Palestinian refugee camp of Rafah in the occupied Gaza Strip. Among the dead were mostly children.

- on Wednesday, an American military helicopter fired on a wedding party in Mukaradeeb, a remote Iraqi village near the Syrian border, killing more than 40 people, including many children.

Thursday was quiet in Bahrain, yet Americans were placed on restrictions for the evening. This meant no bars, no restaurants and no movie theatres.

By that afternoon, there was virtually no political damage from the astonishing fall from grace of Iraqi National Congress president Ahmad Chalabi, following the raid on his Baghdad home by U.S. backed Iraqi Security Forces.

Allegedly, both Sunni and Shia are indifferent and scornful towards Chalabi. Why not? The long-time Iraqi exile Chalabi is apparently a first-rate con artist. That he was sentenced in 1992 by a Jordanian military tribunal to 22 years in prison for fraud - does not speak in his favor.

Largely because of intelligence provided by Chalabi, the White House built its case against Iraq and planned for massive stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction; a war that would pay for itself; a small post-war stabilization force; and a population ready to welcome American troops as liberators. To say this plan was woefully defective is an understatement.

Now it’s alleged that Iran used the U.S.-funded arm of Ahmad Chalabi's Iraqi National Congress to funnel disinformation to provoke the United Sates into getting rid of Saddam Hussein.

The U.S. had already cut off $340,000 a month funding [payoffs] to Chalabi's political party. The chequered past of the Iraqi National Congress president - he was sentenced in 1992 by a Jordanian military tribunal to 22 years in prison for fraud - does not speak in his favor. No one should be surprised if Chalabi has the same fate as Izz al-din Salim, the council president killed in a car bomb attack on Monday.

By Friday, there were more warnings for Americans in Bahrain to avoid the Seef Round-about where planned demonstrations were set for the afternoon. In Bahrain, if planned demonstrations occur, Friday is the day.

Yesterday there were demonstrations to denounce coalition troops for fighting in the Iraqi cities of Najaf and Karbala, sacred to Shias. There were also the fresh memories of the wedding massacre in the remote Iraqi village near the Syrian border, the Israeli atrocities in the Palestinian refugee camp of Rafah. And, like the rest of the Arab world, many local citizens were perhaps upset by the one-year prison sentence for U.S. Army Specialist Jeremy Sivits for his role at Abu Ghraib prison.

Allegedly, 4,000 demonstrators turned out for the rally and burned a security force jeep after police clashed with the protesters. According to Reuters News Service, more than 20 people were hurt, including Javad Firouz, a Shi'ite opposition activist and member of Manama city council.

Following the demonstrations, King Hamad bin Isa al-Khalifa fired long-time Interior Minister Shaikh Muhammad bin Khalifa al-Khalifa and replaced him with Major-General Shaikh Rashid bin Abdulla bin Ahmed al-Khalifa. To an American, since everyone has the same last name, this just seems like the Bahraini version of a shaikh-up.

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Since moving to Bahrain two years ago, I’ve distanced myself from many U.S. media. This is natural, I’m an expatriate now. Every day I check some media in the U.S. the United Kingdom and the Arabian Gulf. For balance, I rely on the London-based The Guardian.

My views about Palestine have changed considerably during this period. Two days ago, I noted a U.S. poll that reported 46% of Americans are concerned about the economy, 24% are concerned about the war in Iraq, and only 1% care about the Israeli-Palestine conflict. Before moving here, I would place myself comfortably in that same 1% category.

Now I can’t think of a more degraded people in modern times than the Palestinians, and there are so many examples: the Armenian Genocide of 1915; the Rape of Nanking in 1937; the European Jewish extermination by Nazi Germany during World War Two; the Khmer Rouge genocide in Cambodia: 1975-1979; the systematic killing of Tutsis by Hutu extremists in Rwanda: 1994; and the ethnic cleansing in the former Yugoslavia in the 1990s.

Yet the attempt by Israelis to remove Palestinians from their homeland has been on going since 1947. The West doesn’t care. Israel is a proxy state of the U.S. What is shocking is the paralysis of the Arab world.

With all the wealth of the Gulf States, nothing is done by the chief power brokers to achieve a favorable resolution for the Palestinians. The regional media reports daily about the plight of the Palestinians – yet I’m unaware of how Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Kuwait, and the UAE are doing anything meaningful to affect change. The consensus is that Arab countries are too weak to resist the U.S. and the powerful Israeli lobby.

On the surface, the Arab world has all the essential elements to create a power bloc as formidable as the European Union: there is common language, religion, customs and a currency that is easy to align. However, the most important element missing is cooperation.

Will the members who showed up today in Tunis for the delayed annual summit achieve anything? Al- Jazeera describes the atmosphere among dignitaries as gloomy and despondent at their inability to help the Palestinians and end the U.S. occupation of Iraq.

Sometimes it seems Arab leaders prefer to maintain Israel as a target of frustration for their people, instead of settling the Palestinian issue and then being forced to solve the internal problems of their respective kingdoms. Right now, the last thing Arab leaders need is a democratic government in their midst. The border Iraq shares with Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Syria is so porous that it is impossible for these neighboring countries to stop disaffected Arab Muslims from crossing into Iraq to help expel an occupation force. And why should they? Democracy frequently pretends to be morally superior, and the American example for the Middle East is already riddled with horrible blemishes. This is too bad, because the ideal is worthy, but not here, not now.

"Look, if Americans can be convinced that the President of the United States is even barely literate, they can be convinced of anything. You know, the fact that every American isn’t embarrassed by the fact that there’s an imbecile in the White House is already a problem."
- Norman Finkelstein


Keeping pace with events in the Middle East feels like watching a never-ending fire hose of chaos and destruction.

There were two more sickening examples Wednesday. Ten died as Israeli tanks fired
on a peaceful protest in the Palestinian refugee camp of Rafah in the occupied Gaza Strip.
Among the dead were mostly children. Allegedly, children were blood soaked and men were left with their intestines hanging out.

The Palestinian refugees were demonstrating to demand an end to Israel's military siege of the area. Israel, on the other hand, claims its operations are aimed at routing militant groups and destroying tunnels used to ferry weapons from Egypt into the Gaza Strip

The atrocities in the Rafah refugee camp bring to over 40 Palestinians killed by Israeli troops in a two-day period. With the United States abstaining, a U.N. Security Council resolution condemning Israel on Wednesday easily passed 14-to-0.

The next day Israeli helicopter gunships fired missiles as troops moved into two areas on the south side of the town of Rafah. Eight more Palestinians were reported killed in Rafah refugee camp, as the victims of Wednesday's violence were buried.

On Wednesday, an American military helicopter fired on a wedding party in Mukaradeeb,
a remote Iraqi village near the Syrian border, killing more than 40 people, including many children. Arab television footage showed a truck carrying the bodies of the dead arriving in Ramadi, the nearest town. Many of the dead were clearly children.

Allegedly, gunfire was fired at the wedding - a tradition in the Arab world as a form of celebration – and this prompted U.S. military retaliation. In July 2002, an American air strike on an Afghan wedding party killed 48 civilians. It is also a tradition in the Central Asian nation to fire gunshots in a show of jubilation.

Brigadier General Mark Kimmitt, deputy director of operations for the U.S. military in Iraq, reported Coalition Forces had “intelligence” that there was no wedding taking place in Mukaradeeb at the time.

It’s uncomfortable to admit that Americans are victims who have turned into perpetrators. The terrorist attacks of September 11 claimed nearly 3,000 innocent lives and the whole world felt sympathy for Americans as the victims of a horrible atrocity. Then George W. Bush declared war on terrorism, and pursued it first in Afghanistan and then in Iraq.

Since then, the war on terror has claimed more innocent victims than the terrorist attacks of September 11. This fact is not recognized in the United States because the victims of the war on terror are not Americans.

It’s also time to admit that as European Jews suffered the horrors of hell at the direct hands of Nazi Germany, Israel is now a perpetrator of appalling disrepute. The guilt of a compliant West during the Holocaust – especially American apathy, has been successfully exploited for decades by Israel as a means of justifying the transfer of Arab-Muslims from Palestine. As the government of the Jewish state forces the Palestinians into more ghettos by creating Apartheid walls, history turns in its grave.

Like the terrorists they both profess to despise, the United States and Israel are linked in destruction, crimes and torture affecting innocent people.