As
part of an observer delegation in Bahrain with the peace group Code Pink, I
visited the village of Bani Jamrah with local Bahraini human rights activists.
In
one of the many horrific cases we heard, a 17-year-old boy Hasan, his friend
and his 8-year-old brother left their home to go to the grocery store. As they
were entering the store they noticed some other youngsters running. Fearing the
police would be following them, they decided to wait in the store. The 8 year
old hid behind a refrigerator. The police entered the store with face masks on.
They grabbed the older boys, pulling them out of the store and into the street.
Once
outside the shop the police began to beat them with their sticks and hit them
on the head, shouting obscenities and accusations. The police were accusing
them of having been involved with throwing Molotov cocktails, asking over and
over "Where are the Molotov cocktails?"
The
four policemen, all masked and wearing regulation police uniforms, took turns
beating the boys while one was instructed to keep watch to make sure no one was
video taping. They seemed to be very concerned that there be no witnesses.
Quickly, they forced the boys into the waiting police car. Inside the police
vehicle was another youth about 18 who appeared to be "Muhabharat,"
or plain-clothes police thugs associated with many dictatorships in the Middle
East.
As
the car sped off, the boys were told to keep their heads down "or we will
kill you." Soon they arrived at an open lot away from possible onlookers. As
the two boys were being pulled from the car, the policeman who seemed to be in
the charge shouted, "Make them lie down." Once they were face down on the
ground, the policemen took out their knives and stabbed both boys in the left
buttock, leaving a gaping wound. The police thugs continued their
"questioning", using profanity to scare their victims. They
threatened the boys that they would go to jail for 45 days for "investigation"
and that they would never go back to school or get work.
When
the thugs realized that they had no choice but to leave these victims, since
they had no knowledge of the Molotovs, they searched them to see what they
could steal. They took the boys' mobile phones and asked them to hand over
whatever money they had. When they discovered that the boys only had 500fils
(about $1.50US), they kicked one of them in the raw wound, laughing as they
left them bleeding.
"Who
are these masked police and why would they do such things to children?"
The boys said they were Syrian immigrants,
part of a mostly foreign police force imported by the government and paid to
inflict pain on the local people to dissuade them from protesting for their
rights.
I
asked if the police checked their hands, or smelled their clothes to detect the
presence of petrol, since they were accusing the boys of carrying Molotov
cocktails. Hussan, laying uncomfortably on his stomach, still in his bloody
pants, answered, "No, they made no investigation. These police don't
investigate, they only accuse and punish. We had no contact with petrol, we are
students."
In
the corner of the room was Husan's aunt, holding a little baby that looked very
sickly, the red hue of its skin almost burnt looking and its tiny eyes sore and
red. I was straining now in my inquiry, like having to push words out my
throat. "How old is your child?", I asked. "Eight months
old", she replied. I knew about the nightly raids in this community, as I
happen to be staying less than 200 meters from there and can see the light show
each night as hundreds of teargas canisters are shot into this tight grip of
middle class houses.
"How
do you stop the teargas from getting in the house and affecting your
baby?" I inquired in a pained voice. I, myself, although not in the
village, feel the effects of the massive clouds of poison that pour over the
entire area at night.
"Well,
sir, wet towels, we place them each night under the doors," she answers,
as she lights down on the couch near a large flat screen television. "But,
sadly, sir, this does not stop the gas. The baby suffers. I try to cover her
face with a cloth but she does not like it and cries at the gas and the cloth
at the same."
"One
way to stop the gas is to put plastic over the air conditioning unit," she
continued, "but the policemen always cut off the plastic and the gas seeps back
inside quickly."
They
showed me a homemade video of those white-helmeted terrorists, using the very
same issued knife that they used to cripple the boys, systematically,
methodically removing the plastic that was placed to prevent the venomous gas
from entering the house. Once removed, they can now shoot the gas, knowing that
it will enter the house and poison all inside, especially the kids.
And
so it goes in the Kingdom of Bahrain. So it goes in a world so addicted to oil,
money and power that children can be stabbed, kidnapped, tortured, terrorized
and gassed with nary a word from the outside world.
Are
we, in America, so addicted to oil and beholden to powerful Saudis that we will
block our ears to the cries of these Bahraini children? Or will we help them
grow up in a world where they can know the joy and security that we all want
for ourselves? The choice is ours.
(Note: You can view every article as one long page if you sign up as an Advocate Member, or higher).
