Ayoon Wa Azan (The Western Media and Bahrain)

The Western media, specifically the British and American newspapers which I read every day, have made big mistakes in dealing with the incidents in Bahrain since their eruption 14 months ago, and made even more mistakes in their coverage of the Grand Prix debacle there last Sunday. The reason is not a Zionist conspiracy or a secret agenda, but simply ignorance – and there is more ignorance than hydrogen in this world. I have always maintained that the opposition in Bahrain has legitimate demands, and I repeat that again today. Despite the fact that not all demands by the opposition are indeed legitimate, I chose to say that they all are, to avoid further debate. If the reader wants to know more, then I say that it is the right of every citizen to chant ‘down with the regime’, and if a sufficient majority is rallied around this demand, then it becomes the citizen’s right for this regime to fall. However, the Western media thinks that the Bahraini opposition wants to replace the monarchy with a pluralistic parliamentary democracy, which is a blatant and clear mistake, except to those who choose to have their eyes wide shut. The leadership of the opposition from the Al-Wefaq group, such as Ali Suleiman or the ‘Supreme Leader’ Isa Qassim, wants to establish a Shiite theocracy modeled after Velayat-i-faqih [Clerical Rule] that denies other sects or ethnicities their rights, and which puts in place a Supreme Guide like the one in Qom to rule and rob people of their personal freedoms on the basis of narrow sectarian concepts, concepts which reflect the mentality of a minority within a minority of the Muslims of the world. It suffices to put together a list of the countries and parties that support the opposition in Bahrain to settle the debate over its goals. Every talk other than that is ignorance, which started out in moderate amounts before turning into a tsunami that condemns all those who were fooled in the Western media by the lies of the opposition leadership and its followers- and I do not say all Shiites in Bahrain, who include in their ranks truly democratic people and not just in name. Consider these examples: The Likudnik newspaper The Wall Street Journal carried the following title for a news story on Bahrain on 11/4/2012: “Violence in Bahrain Towns, Threatens Talks”. But I wonder: What talks? Al-Wefaq has boycotted the talks from the outset, and wanted its demands to be approved even before sitting at the negotiating table. As regards violence, well, the police used teargas, while kids sent by cowardly adults used Molotov cocktails, and I insist that these are worse than teargas, or just as bad. I noticed in the WSJ’s story a reference that compared the situation in Bahrain to that in Syria. Then I read a similar comparison in the otherwise prestigious Washington Post, in an op-ed written by the Editorial Board, which includes known Likudniks; the piece was published on the 14th of April. On the following day, Patrick Cockburn in The Independent was talking about ‘double standards’ as he compared the U.S. and UK’s turning a blind eye to the situation in Bahrain, to their focus on Syria. Three days earlier, the same writer was talking about the insistence on holding the Grand Prix despite increasing violence. I say that this violence involved teargas by the police and Molotov cocktails thrown by dissidents, while in Syria, more people were being killed in one afternoon than in Bahrain ever since 14/2/2011. The Western media mentioned the difference between Syria and Bahrain, and then said ‘but’… I claim that in the period between the start of the opposition’s attempt to impose a Shiite regime in Bahrain, more were killed in America’s schools alones than in Bahrain’s entire streets. The Guardian, meanwhile, spared no occasion, and said in one news story that “F1 teams want FIA to postpone Bahrain Grand Prix”, but I soon discovered that the authors of the story relied on one official in one team without even naming him. I am certain that the writers quoted what the man said accurately, but my objection is that he only represents himself. The race was held without a problem, and I await the results of the investigations in what regards the casualty that had died. But no newspaper apologized or retracted their stories, and the otherwise prestigious The Guardian even published a cartoon that showed a champagne bottle pouring out blood. However, I do not forgive The Times for its cartoon that showed a Sheikh fueling a race car being driven by Bernie Ecclestone, CEO of Formula One, with blood. For this newspaper had supported the war on Iraq where one million people, mostly Shiites by the way, were killed, and is now in the middle of a criminal investigation since it is part of Rupert Murdoch’s media empire, the same empire that is at the center of the phone hacking scandal that affected both the living and the dead. Therefore, The Times cannot preach ethics that it is very much devoid of. Then on the eve of the Grand Prix, The New York Times decided that the race is not going according to plan. Yet the event went exactly according to plan. While the opposition was burning tires in its villages, the participants and spectators were celebrating the success of the race, and they left Bahrain safely just as they had entered. Tomorrow, the Western media will sweep its mistakes under the rug, and move on to the next mistake, until it is exposed, and so forth and so on.