What's the Plan, Ya Abu Salman?

In the "non-crackdown" crackdown witnessed in Bahrain since the arrival of GCC forces some weeks ago:

Demonstrations have been crushed, public gatherings of any sort banned.

The very symbol of the February uprising, the Pearl Roundabout, has been razed, and the 500 fils coin bearing its image removed from circulation.

Nearly every identifiable political opposition leader not associated with al-Wifaq has been arrested, including most recently long-time dissident and founder of the Bahrain Centre for Human Rights 'Abd al-Hadi al-Khawajah. (And it looks like Nabeel Rajab is next in line for arrest.) At least 400 other detainees remain in state custody, two of whom died yesterday in their cells.

Just a few months into its new 4-year term, Bahrain's parliament has ceased to be a functional political institution, having lost 18 of its 40 members to resignations (though only 7 of these have been accepted) and seemingly unsure of how to proceed.

Some 500 to 1,000 employees of public organizations and corporations have been fired for their suspected participation or complicity in anti-government protests, with several investigations still ongoing.

Bahrain's only independent newspaper, Al-Wasat, was taken down in an administrative coup, its founder and long-time editor-in-chief Mansur al-Jamri (who also happens to be the son of the late Shi'i marja' and spiritual leader of the 1990s Shi'a uprising, 'Abd al-Amir al-Jamri) ousted along with several other editors and journalists, the latter being deported altogether. Al-Jamri now faces criminal charges.

Insufficiently-"loyal" bloggers, Twitter-ers, and forum-goers have been targeted and arrested, and pro-government websites have sprung up to circulate disinformation.

Students, teachers, and administrators have been expelled from Bahrain's only public university, and those studying abroad who expressed anti-government views have had their scholarships revoked.

More generally, it is clear that many university and secondary school students have not returned to school, with attendance put at 55% as of April 1. (And since "the rate of secondary students [in] both Muharraq and the Southern Governorates" is said to be "normal," we know that most of the absentees are in Shi'a-dominated regions.)

And yet, for all this, not one step has been taken in the direction of resolving the underlying political conflict that put Bahrain in this mess in the first place. Indeed, rather than address the nation's growing rift between ordinary Sunnis and Shi'is, King Hamad took the time last Wednesday to promulgate five new royal decrees (Ar.). A first approved Bahrain's accession to a 1986 Convention on the Early Notification of a Nuclear Accident (though it abstains from Paragraph 2!), which should improve safety at each of its zero nuclear facilities. A second ratifies the Carthage Protocol on Bio-Safety to the Convention on Biological Diversity, agreed in 2000. And so on. Clearly, then, political reconciliation falls startlingly low on the list of national priorities.

Instead, the operative mentality seems to be one of denial. Members of the Saudi Shura Council told a Telegraph reporter that "there has been 'no crackdown' in Bahrain." The Arab News states proudly that the "Bahraini crown prince won't let society split," an vow the latter made a constant theme of his Thursday night television address in which he reaffirmed his commitment to "reform." Any volunteers to tell him that he is a few weeks and a few arrests too late to avoid a "split?"

Even more worryingly, the continued ambiguity surrounding the substance of timing of this "reform" makes one wonder whether the final product might not be reminiscent of the much-lauded but ultimately-illusory "reform" project initiated by King Hamad in 2001 shortly after his ascension to the throne. Aimed at ending a half-decade-long Shi'a uprising, his National Action Charter (NAC) outlining the framework for political liberalization was approved overwhelmingly by popular referendum, only to be followed by a new Bahraini Constitution promulgated unilaterally almost exactly a year later. Not only was the document drafted and issued without outside consultation, it reneged on a number of central promises made in the run-up to the referendum on the NAC, principal among them the notion that Bahrain's primary lawmaking power would reside in an elected lower house of parliament. And we see how that turned out.

So, then, assuming that the present "non-crackdown" crackdown represents Plan A, seemingly one calculated to bait opponents into the sort of violent responses that might be used to justify the portrayal of them not as political reformists but as terrorists*--and of Iran as an instigator--what should we expect for an encore? What's the plan, ya Abu Salman?



* Indeed, many individuals and opposition forums have reported receiving inflammatory mass e-mails and messages calling upon "fellow Shi'is" to undertake violent action against the government.