Bahrain’s Monarchy Cries Sectarianism to Hoard Public Wealth

NOTE:The following article was written by Bahrain Watch member Fahad Desmukh and was originally published on the website of TRT World on May 29, 2017. However TRT World had to remove it the following day after Bahrain’s foreign ministry made a complaint about the article to the Turkish government.

Saudi warmongering against Qatar, Alkhalifa decide to kill more Bahrainis VOB.ORG

The Saudis are grinding their axes to throttle Qataris as they have been doing in Yemen and had done in Iraq, Syria, Bahrain and Egypt. Riyadh’s decision to severe diplomatic links with its neighbour and GCC partner is another twist in the kingdom’s quest for regional dominance.

EGYPT, For the People or Against the People? – Shia Rights Watch

While the history of Shia Muslims in Egypt is long and extensive, anti-Shiism is prevalent in this nation. Once called the forgotten minority, Shia Muslims in Egypt are lost amidst country’s political unrest. Shia numbers are always undermined in state-issued reports in aims of suppressing the population.

For the rest of the SRW’s recent mailing, including ‘Incidents of Anti-Shiism in May, 2017’, see here.

In wake of Trump visit, Saudi-led Sunni bloc already splintering

Author: Bruce Riedel The Saudi-orchestrated bloc of Sunni Muslim states celebrated at US President Donald Trump’s visit to Riyadh is splintering less than two weeks after the summit. There is growing unease with the summit’s intense animosity toward Iran and increasing concerns that the Saudis are inflaming the sectarian divide between Sunnis and Shiites.

President Trump and the Muslim World

In an ostentatious conference hall in Riyadh, President Trump lectured a group of bizarrely deferential leaders from 50 Muslim majority nations, while actually telling them he was “not here to lecture”. Magically changing the campaign rhetoric of “I think Islam hates us.”

Trump’s Alignment with Sunni Autocrats Masks Shallow Understanding of Region

President Trump’s visit to Saudi Arabia has engendered endless press reporting and analysis. Two key points stand out in the media coverage. First, the trip was mostly show than action. Second, the Saudis played up to Trump’s craving for adulation and narcissism. They knew he was a fickle showman and acted accordingly.

Two conferences spotlight Muslim world’s struggle to counter militancy

Two conferences this week spotlight the Muslim world’s struggle to come to grips with extremism and militancy. The conferences, the Arab-Islamic-American summit in Riyadh and a gathering in East Java of youth leaders of Nahdlatul Ulama (NU), the world’s largest Muslim movement, laid bare the difficulty of reforming cultures in the battle against extremism, called into question the commitment of Muslim states to combat radicalism and political violence, and put on display US President Donald J.

Experimenting in Mapping Online Anti-Shia Sectarianism on Twitter in the Middle East

Wouldn’t it be interesting to see if sectarianism itself was more dominant in one place than an other, at least online? Are some countries/cities more sectarian than others? Is sectarianism a localised phenomenon, despite what we might see in the news? If we knew this, we could then highlight where to prioritize tackling it.

This is the aim of Donald Trump’s visit to Saudi Arabia

Donald Trump sets off on Friday to create the fantasy of an Arab Nato. There will be dictators aplenty to greet him in Riyadh, corrupt autocrats and thugs and torturers and head choppers. There will be at least one zombie president – the comatose, undead Abdelaziz Bouteflika of Algeria who neither speaks nor, apparently, hears any more – and, of course, one totally insane president, Donald Trump.