'Death to the al-Saud clan'
It seems that Egypt and Syria aren't the only countries where there is a popular uprising against the current rulers. This video was made in Qatif, Saudi Arabia on Wednesday. More background about it below the fold, but it looks like there were an awful lot of people there.
Let's go to the videotape.
According to MEMRI, the demonstration was in response to the recent shooting of two local Shiites by police. The House of Saud is Sunni.
Qatif is in the oil-rich eastern part of Saudi Arabia, where much of the population is Shia. Talk about religious overtones. Here's an
update from Thursday morning.
A number of security checkpoints and vehicles had come increasingly under fire since Monday in the Saudi Arabia's Al-Qatif region by assailants motivated by foreign orders, an official source from the Saudi Interior Ministry said in a statement.
Saudi Press Agency (SPA) quoted the source as saying that the security forces handled the situation with self restraint as much as possible, adding that two citizens were killed and six others, including a woman and two security officers, were injured.
The source said that during the funeral of one of the victims, there were several incidents of fire exchange which resulted in the deaths of two and injuries of three citizens.
...
According to the statement, the aim of the riot makers is to serve the goals of their associates from other countries in an attempt to drag citizens and security forces into confrontation, warning that all who date violate laws and regulations shall ''face consequences'', and that security forces at their designated posts are fully authorized to deal with any situation that arises in the manner they deem fitting to stop these criminal acts.
The ministry included the statement an appeal to the residents of Al-Qatif to stand up to trouble makers to spare innocent lives and bystanders.
All who
date? Something tells me that's a mistranslation.
I wonder if the video was made at the funeral and whether we will soon see a video of people being shot. Could it happen in Saudi Arabia?
Labels: Saudi regime change, Shiites v. Sunnis
'Our friends the Saudis' ban all protests
'Our friends the Saudis' have
banned all protests in their tolerant kingdom.
"The kingdom's regulations totally ban all sorts of demonstrations, marches, sit-ins," the interior ministry said in a statement, adding security forces would stop all attempts to disrupt public order.
...
For about two weeks, Saudi Shi'ites have staged small protests in the kingdom's east, which holds much of the oil wealth of the world's top crude exporter and is near Bahrain, scene of protests by majority Shi'ites against their Sunni rulers.
Shi'ite protests in Saudi Arabia started in the area of the main city Qatif and its neighbour Awwamiya and spread to the town of Hofuf on Friday. The demands were mainly for the release of prisoners they say are held without trial.
Saudi Shi'ites often complain they struggle to get senior government jobs and other benefits like other citizens.
The government of Saudi Arabia, an absolute monarchy without an elected parliament that usually does not tolerate public dissent, denies these charges.
The interior ministry said demonstrations violated Islamic law and the kingdom's traditions, according to a statement carried by state news agency SPA.
Will the Saudis do what the Libyans have done to prevent protests? I suspect the answer is yes.
Labels: Saudi regime change
What the Saudis told Mubarak
I suppose it's not too surprising to hear what
advice the Saudis gave Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak.
Egypt’s military, calculating that it was no longer worth defending an 82-year-old, out-of-touch pharaoh with no palatable successor and no convincing plan for Egypt’s future, ultimately sided with the protesters on the street, at least for Act 1.
In so doing, they ignored the advice of the Saudis, who, in calls to Washington, said that President Hosni Mubarak should open fire if that’s what it took, and that Americans should just stop talking about “universal rights” and back him.
As the contagion of democracy protests spread in the Arab world last week, Bahrain’s far less disciplined forces decided, in effect, that the Saudis, who are their next-door neighbors, were right. They drew two lessons from Egypt: If President Obama calls, hang up. And open fire early.
In fact, the Egyptian military defied orders from Mubarak to open fire. That may be why Libya and Bahrain are using mercenaries.
But the Saudis will open fire on protesters if they feel they need to do so. No one should fool themselves about that.
Labels: Bahrain, Barack Obama, Egyptian regime change, Hosni Mubarak, Libya, Saudi regime change
Could it happen in Saudi Arabia?
Could an Egyptian-style uprising happen in Saudi Arabia? At least one Saudi prince
thinks it could.
And check out what a Saudi prince told the BBC: "Unless problems facing Saudi Arabia are solved, what happened and is still happening in some Arab countries, including Bahrain, could spread to Saudi Arabia, even worse."
Hmmm.
Labels: Saudi regime change
