Terror plot—or fantasy?
By Michael Petrou - Tuesday, October 25, 2011 - 2 Comments
Did Iran really plan to kill the Saudi ambassador?
Atta Kenare/AFP/Getty Images
It’s a baffling plot that strains the credulity even of those deeply familiar with Iran’s capacity for murder and intrigue.
Last week, the U.S. Justice Department said it had disrupted an Iranian plan to assassinate the Saudi Arabian ambassador to the United States, Adel al-Jubeir. Several options were supposedly discussed, including a restaurant bombing that likely would have killed many innocent bystanders.
The U.S. has charged two individuals with the alleged plot. One, Gholam Shakuri, is a suspected member of the Quds Force, a wing of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps responsible for operations—including terrorism and assassination—outside Iran. The second, Mansour Arbabsiar, is an Iranian-born American citizen who, over the past three decades, has failed at a variety of business ventures selling everything from used cars to horses, gyros and ice cream. He’s been sued, chased by angry creditors, and charged with theft. Friends say he’d often forget keys and cellphones, and that his socks didn’t always match.
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How free is Al Jazeera?
By Richard Warnica - Monday, August 22, 2011 at 1:30 PM - 7 Comments
Is the news network’s reliance on Qatari donors skewing its objectivity?
On Aug. 4, Al Jazeera aired a documentary about protests and government brutality in Bahrain. The hour-long piece, filmed undercover, was billed as the only witness to the Arab revolution “forgotten by the West.” It featured footage of massive street demonstrations by the Gulf kingdom’s Shia majority, interviews with protesters beaten, shot and threatened with rape by security forces, and included revelations about the government’s use of state TV and Facebook to name, shame and hunt down demonstrators.
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Life in prison for Bahrain activists
By macleans.ca - Wednesday, June 22, 2011 at 2:34 PM - 0 Comments
Dissidents jailed for plotting coup
A special military court in Bahrain handed down life sentences on Wednesday to eight Shiite activists accused of plotting a coup to overthrow the Gulf Arab state’s Sunni monarchy. Thirteen other activists received jail terms of up to 15 years. Seven of the 21 sentences were given in absentia. During the trial, witnesses in Manama say police fired tear gas to stop protesters from convening in a central part of the city, in one of the country’s first demonstrations in months. Human rights organizations have called the arrests and convictions politically driven, as the men are well-known opposition figures.
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Bahrain declares state of emergency
By macleans.ca - Tuesday, March 15, 2011 at 4:30 PM - 5 Comments
Saudi Arabia and U.A.E. send security forces to protect government installations
Bahrain has declared a state of emergency after at least two people were killed during anti-government protests in the Shia suburb of Sitra outside the capital, Manama. The order by Bahrain’s king will be effect for three months and authorizes “the commander of Bahrain’s defence forces to take all necessary measures to protect the safety of the country and its citizens.” The announcement comes a day after hundreds of Saudi troops were sent to help Bahraini authorities protect government facilities amid escalating protests against the country’s monarchy.
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Bahraini protesters shut down financial centre
By macleans.ca - Monday, March 14, 2011 at 12:39 PM - 0 Comments
U.S. fears Iran may get involved
Anti-government protesters in Bahrain shut down the country’s financial district in the capital of Manama on Sunday. The blockade was the most serious challenge to the ruling Bahraini monarchy since protests began in February. Police responded by firing teargas and rubber bullets at the protestors. Meanwhile, at the main university campus, clashes erupted after protesters accused security forces of protecting armed vigilantes tasked with fomenting tensions between the majority Shiite population and the Sunni ruling elite. The protests came a day after U.S. Secretary of Defence Robert Gates met with the ruling Khalifa family to warn against the use of force in quelling protests. Gates expressed worries that Iran might be looking for ways to exploit the sectarian tensions, and told reporters, “time is not our friend.”
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Edge and muscle
By Aaron Wherry - Tuesday, February 22, 2011 at 11:48 AM - 40 Comments
Bob Rae considers the events in Egypt, Libya, Bahrain and Iran.
We need to develop a more effective strategy to deal with this brutality and repression. The promotion of human rights and democracy needs some edge and some muscle. More help to those willing to fight the fight, more consequences for regimes unwilling to change. It is not easy to craft such a strategy, because democracy can never be seen as a foreign import, but the reality of real engagement by a courageous people can’t be met with only goodwill, let alone indifference.
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Anger mounts as Bahrainis bury dead
By macleans.ca - Friday, February 18, 2011 at 11:16 AM - 0 Comments
Protesters call for the end of the monarchy
Four people were killed on Thursday after civil unrest rocked the Bahraini capital of Manama, where thousands of protesters took to the streets to voice their displeasure with the ruling royal family. “We used to demand for the prime minister to step down, but now our demand is for the ruling family to get out,” said Ahmed Makki Abu Taki, the brother of one of the victims. Pro-government supporters held their own rally, protected by security forces, after Friday prayers at Manama’s Grand Mosque. While a Sunni Muslim elite rules Bahrain, the majority of the population is Shia. France has already suspended exports of security equipment to Bahrain and Libya, where hundreds of anti-Gaddafi protestors gathered in the city of Benghazi.
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Military seizes control in Bahrain
By macleans.ca - Thursday, February 17, 2011 at 12:49 PM - 8 Comments
Four killed in harsh crackdown on anti-government protests
After days of protests following the uprisings in Egypt and Tunisia, Bahrain’s military has carried out a definitive and brutal crackdown by banning protests and swarming the capital Manama’s Pearl Square on Thursday. Four people were killed, according to medical officials, who also reported that the wounded were streaming into hospitals with serious wounds. The Interior Ministry sent text messages to Bahrainis warning them to stay indoors, while the army deployed tanks and military checkpoints at key points throughout Manama. Unlike the protests in Egypt and Tunisia, which were unanimous calls from a people’s majority for the end of corrupt and authoritarian governments, the protests in Bahrain seem to be based on religious divisions in the tiny Gulf island nation. Anti-government protesters have demanded that the ruling Sunni monarchy surrender its control over top government posts and address the grievances of the Shia majority, who claim systematic discrimination and exclusion from the public service and military.
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Who did Michael Jackson pray to?
By Katie Engelhart - Monday, July 6, 2009 at 4:28 PM - 23 Comments
Raised Jehovah’s Witness, he dabbled in Kabbalah and Islam
Tuesday morning, the Jackson family will pay tribute to Michael in a small, “private family function” at a cemetery in Hollywood Hills. When it’s over, the real show will begin. The location is set: Los Angeles’s Staples Center. The tickets have been counted: 20,000 to be packed in tight. Even the colour of the coffin has been confirmed (it’s made of gold). But when the final blessing is made, from what holy book will it come?Last Thursday, Jermaine Jackson ended a news conference: “And Allah be with you Michael, always. I love you.” By Friday, news outlets around the world were a buzz with responses to a single question: why “Allah”? In recent years, Michael Jackson’s faith took a few sharp turns. Jackson was raised as a Jehovah’s Witness by his devout mother, but rumours began circulating in 2006 that the star was turning away from the family creed. In June 2005, Jackson was spotted wearing the red string bracelet favored by followers of Kabbalah. Sources reported that Michael had been turned on to the mystical offshoot of Judaism by close friend, Elizabeth Taylor. Continue…
