Bahrain Press Association Condemns Attacks Against Journalists

[BPA logo. Image from bahrainrights.org] [BPA logo. Image from bahrainrights.org]

Bahrain Press Association Condemns Attacks Against Journalists

By : Jadaliyya Reports

[The following statement was issued by the Bahrain Press Association on 13 March 2013.]

Bahrain Press Association ("BPA"), the London-based association concerned with defending and addressing issues related to Bahraini media and press people, expresses its deep sorrow to the course of actions Bahrain has been witnessing since the awake of the 14 February Revolution as per the marginalization notion, intimidation of freedom of expression, and the on-going terrorization of journalists, photojournalists, and cyber activists. This poses many questions as to whether the regime is serious about making real reforms to the deteriorating climate in terms of freedoms and human rights situation storming the tiny island for over two years now.

The BPA, which is about to publish its second inclusive annual report that monitors the freedom of expression and the freedom of opinion in Bahrain during 2012, stresses that states, NGOs concerned with the freedom of expression and journalism, and international human rights watchdogs should place much pressure on the Bahraini regime to stop its on-going violations and make justice prevail pertaining to the cases of torture that claimed the lives of three (3) innocent citizens (Blogger Zakariya Al Asheeri, Publisher Kareem Fakrawi,& Photojournalist Ahmed Ismail) in addition to the arresting, torturing, and detention of tens of journalists and photojournalists.

Bahrain: Internet Enemy

On Monday, March 11, the Bahraini authorities arrested 6 cyber activists accusing them of slandering the King on Twitter. This accusation was later confirmed by the head of the persecution directorate, Nayef Yousif, in a press statement issued Tuesday March 12, 2013. The accused were kept in custody in preparation for their trial on "lèse majesté" charges.

The Bahraini judiciary has recently issued imprisonment sentences against 4 Twitter activists on charges pertaining to "slandering the King". Bahrain Center for Human Rights Chair, Mr. Nabeel Rajab, the now-detained human rights defender, and the Monitoring Head in the same Center, Mr. Yousif Al Mahafdha, were tried on charges pertaining to practicing freedom of expression and freedom of opinion on Twitter as well. As per the BPA census, 12 Bahraini citizens were prosecuted within 6 months for their thoughts posted on Twitter.

Journalists Blacklists

The BPA condemns blocking of Dr. Mansoor Al Jamri, editor-in-chief of Al Wasat Daily Newspaper, along with his wife and AP Reporter Journalist Reem Khalifa, from entering the UAE on Monday, February 25 without giving any reasons.

With the recurrence of deny-of-entry lists against media professionals and cyber activists into various Arab countries, especially those with good ties with the Bahraini regime, many of those denied entry have confirmed the authorities of the visited countries made it clear that there are ban lists issued by the Bahraini regime.

Zakariya Al Asheeri: Lost Justice

The BPA also condemns the ruling issued by the Higher Criminal Court presided by a royal family member, Mohamed Bin Ali Al Khalifa, yesterday to acquit 5 policemen, Pakistani nationals, who were accused of torturing and killing the head of Al Dair Forums, Blogger Zakariya Al Asheeri on April 9, 2011 while in the Dry Deck detonation house. This incident was affirmed and documented by Mr. Bassiouni`s report in Clause No. 1001 that reads "The reason of the death of Zakariya Al Asheeri was caused by his being tortured in the dry deck detention house."

The BPA considers such ruling yet another testament to the lost justice in the Bahraini judicial system and at the same time condemns, with the sever sense of the word, the Bahraini regime continuation to wrongfully allege the implementation of the BICI recommendations. The BICI confirmed in its lengthy report issued on November 23, 2011 to hold to account and bring to justice the violators, whether being civilian or military personnel, in crimes of torture and murdering that took place inside detention houses of the ministry of interior or the Bahrain ministry of defense. This commitment was not complied with by the Bahraini regime. Instead, the Bahraini regime has made military personnel of expat nationalities with lower ranks as `scapegoats` leaving the personnel with higher ranks untouched in the case of murdering Blogger Zakariaya Al Asheeri and many other cases. Yesterday, the regime acquitted the accused in a court presided by a royal family member which clearly emphasizes that the impunity culture is but one pillar of the monarchy and all its authorities regardless of their function.

The BPA confirms that the Bahraini regime`s commitments to implement the BICI`s recommendations and those of the United Nations Human Rights Council, and as per what the BPA monitors and documents on ground pertaining to the freedom of expression and the freedom of opinion and media freedoms, are just words of mouth and empty vows. Violations of all types, intimidation, and crackdown are current and are on the rise.

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Past is Present: Settler Colonialism Matters!

On 5-6 March 2011, the Palestine Society at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) in London will hold its seventh annual conference, "Past is Present: Settler Colonialism in Palestine." This year`s conference aims to understand Zionism as a settler colonial project which has, for more than a century, subjected Palestine and Palestinians to a structural and violent form of destruction, dispossession, land appropriation and erasure in the pursuit of a new Jewish Israeli society. By organizing this conference, we hope to reclaim and revive the settler colonial paradigm and to outline its potential to inform and guide political strategy and mobilization.

The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is often described as unique and exceptional with little resemblance to other historical or ongoing colonial conflicts. Yet, for Zionism, like other settler colonial projects such as the British colonization of Ireland or European settlement of North America, South Africa or Australia, the imperative is to control the land and its resources -- and to displace the original inhabitants. Indeed, as conference keynote speaker Patrick Wolfe, one of the foremost scholars on settler colonialism and professor at La Trobe University in Victoria, Australia, argues, "the logic of this project, a sustained institutional tendency to eliminate the Indigenous population, informs a range of historical practices that might otherwise appear distinct--invasion is a structure not an event."[i]

Therefore, the classification of the Zionist movement as a settler colonial project, and the Israeli state as its manifestation, is not merely intended as a statement on the historical origins of Israel, nor as a rhetorical or polemical device. Rather, the aim is to highlight Zionism`s structural continuities and the ideology which informs Israeli policies and practices in Palestine and toward Palestinians everywhere. Thus, the Nakba -- whether viewed as a spontaneous, violent episode in war, or the implementation of a preconceived master plan -- should be understood as both the precondition for the creation of Israel and the logical outcome of Zionist settlement in Palestine.

Moreover, it is this same logic that sustains the continuation of the Nakba today. As remarked by Benny Morris, “had he [David Ben Gurion] carried out full expulsion--rather than partial--he would have stabilised the State of Israel for generations.”[ii] Yet, plagued by an “instability”--defined by the very existence of the Palestinian nation--Israel continues its daily state practices in its quest to fulfill Zionism’s logic to maximize the amount of land under its control with the minimum number of Palestinians on it. These practices take a painful array of manifestations: aerial and maritime bombardment, massacre and invasion, house demolitions, land theft, identity card confiscation, racist laws and loyalty tests, the wall, the siege on Gaza, cultural appropriation, and the dependence on willing (or unwilling) native collaboration and security arrangements, all with the continued support and backing of imperial power. 

Despite these enduring practices however, the settler colonial paradigm has largely fallen into disuse. As a paradigm, it once served as a primary ideological and political framework for all Palestinian political factions and trends, and informed the intellectual work of committed academics and revolutionary scholars, both Palestinians and Jews.

The conference thus asks where and why the settler colonial paradigm was lost, both in scholarship on Palestine and in politics; how do current analyses and theoretical trends that have arisen in its place address present and historical realities? While acknowledging the creativity of these new interpretations, we must nonetheless ask: when exactly did Palestinian natives find themselves in a "post-colonial" condition? When did the ongoing struggle over land become a "post-conflict" situation? When did Israel become a "post-Zionist" society? And when did the fortification of Palestinian ghettos and reservations become "state-building"?

In outlining settler colonialism as a central paradigm from which to understand Palestine, this conference re-invigorates it as a tool by which to analyze the present situation. In doing so, it contests solutions which accommodate Zionism, and more significantly, builds settler colonialism as a political analysis that can embolden and inform a strategy of active, mutual, and principled Palestinian alignment with the Arab struggle for self-determination, and indigenous struggles in the US, Latin America, Oceania, and elsewhere.

Such an alignment would expand the tools available to Palestinians and their solidarity movement, and reconnect the struggle to its own history of anti-colonial internationalism. At its core, this internationalism asserts that the Palestinian struggle against Zionist settler colonialism can only be won when it is embedded within, and empowered by, the broader Arab movement for emancipation and the indigenous, anti-racist and anti-colonial movement--from Arizona to Auckland.

SOAS Palestine Society invites everyone to join us at what promises to be a significant intervention in Palestine activism and scholarship.

For over 30 years, SOAS Palestine Society has heightened awareness and understanding of the Palestinian people, their rights, culture, and struggle for self-determination, amongst students, faculty, staff, and the broader public. SOAS Palestine society aims to continuously push the frontiers of discourse in an effort to make provocative arguments and to stimulate debate and organizing for justice in Palestine through relevant conferences, and events ranging from the intellectual and political impact of Edward Said`s life and work (2004), international law and the Palestine question (2005), the economy of Palestine and its occupation (2006), the one state (2007), 60 Years of Nakba, 60 Years of Resistance (2009), and most recently, the Left in Palestine (2010).

For more information on the SOAS Palestine Society 7th annual conference, Past is Present: Settler Colonialism in Palestine: www.soaspalsoc.org

SOAS Palestine Society Organizing Collective is a group of committed students that has undertaken to organize annual academic conferences on Palestine since 2003.

 


[i] Patrick Wolfe, Settler Colonialism and the Transformation of Anthropology: The Politics and Poetics of an Ethnographic Event, Cassell, London, p. 163

[ii] Interview with Benny Morris, Survival of the Fittest, Haaretz, 9. January 2004, http://cosmos.ucc.ie/cs1064/jabowen/IPSC/php/art.php?aid=5412