The Myth of Kuwaiti Democracy

Kuwaiti activist arrested in a Bedoon protest

“We just want to be like Kuwait” is a sentence that one might often hear from people of the Gulf – specifically Saudis and Bahrainis. The sentence reflects either their desire for greater individual freedoms or to be able to express themselves freely in politics. In the 1960s and '70s, Kuwait was one of the centers of the Arab world in hosting politicians, intellectuals, and a dominant, powerful progressive opposition – a place where movements of all kinds were active in demanding change and greater freedoms. Kuwaiti women were involved in sports, the arts, and politics decades before their counterparts in the rest of the Arab Gulf. It is for all these factors that Kuwait has been referred to as the only democracy in the Gulf – factors that have disappeared in the past three decades.

In the 1980s, supporting political Islam was the government’s response to counter the dominance of leftist movements. The game did not succeed at the beginning, but it surely did after the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait. The stance of Arab regimes and Arab leftists in support of Saddam’s invasion was the bullet that killed leftism in Kuwait. A new page was turned and the political map was dominated by the Ikhwan (Muslim Brotherhood), Salafis, old-money conservatives, tribes, and liberals (as the alternative to leftists).

Right now, the political map in Kuwait is confusing and points to a state totally dominated by the government since the constitutional court dissolved the parliament last June. The country is waiting for the reinstalled 2009 parliament to be dissolved by the emir and for new elections to take place. All of this comes after last February’s victory by the Islamist-Conservative majority. The Arab Spring is definitely having an impact on Kuwait; on political citizens and on the stateless (Bedoon) community.

All this time, authorities in Kuwait have been trying to fabricate proof against anyone political in Kuwait. It has been trying to conceal its violations against the stateless and migrant workers. It has been silent towards all those online users sentenced to jail for criticizing authorities or expressing their views toward religion. Why? Simply because the country does not want its ‘democracy’ to die; at least not in front of the world.

All those violated in Kuwait have been paying the price for this dead myth; the councilors of Kuwait keep warning of the perils of letting this myth die. Kuwait does not receive the criticism it deserves, not only because it ‘pays’ to stave off attention, but because violations and conditions across the Gulf are comparatively worse and well-publicized, especially in the media. But there is no Kuwaiti democracy; tear gas and shotguns have already arrived and are in use!

How can there be a Kuwaiti democracy when the country gives money to the regimes of Bahrain and Jordan without parliamentary approval? How can there be a Kuwaiti democracy when the parliament is dissolved and frozen at whim? How can there be a Kuwaiti democracy when protesting is continuously criminalized by the state despite all constitutional rights? How can there be a Kuwaiti democracy when women are still unequal to men despite having obtained their political rights and being publicly elected? How can there be a democracy when the stateless (Bedoon) of Kuwait are always illegally arrested, interrogated, tortured, and threatened? How can there be a Kuwaiti democracy when migrant workers are beaten, tortured, insulted and raped without legal recourse to protect themselves?

On Tuesday, a Bedoon protester was shot in the eye. Let’s open our eyes to the real state of Kuwaiti democracy.

* Published in Al-Akhbar

Whose Refugees Matter More?

In my previous post, I wrote about the recent meeting of the United Nation’s Human Rights Council about Bahrain. Recommendations “demanded” Bahrain to stop its systematic violations that include killing protesters, arresting hundreds, torture cases, and many other things. Will Bahrain take the recommendations seriously? If not, will the United Nations put sanctions on Bahrain? Will it send observers to Bahrain? Will it discuss any kind of intervention? The answer is: of course not!

It is no surprise that the United Nations with all its bodies has brought nothing but disappointment to the Arab world, but when it comes to the regimes of the Gulf and their practices, the story is even worse. Another establishment of the United Nations that should be looked at is the UNHCR – or the UN Refugees Agency. If you are constantly following up the statements made by the agency’s representatives, you will not be surprised to know how double their standards are. In Syria, for decades, the Agency did not bother to fight for the Kurdish community, stating that they would rather work in Syria according to the regime’s rules than lose their place in the country and thus be unable to help other refugees.

Similar statements were made in all the interviews with the Agency’s representatives in Kuwait. Although the agency includes the stateless (Bedoon) community in Kuwait under the umbrella of refugees, the agency offers no help to them and makes no comments on Kuwait’s continuous violations against them. A few days ago, Hanan Hamdan, the head of the Agency’s office in Kuwait, enraged the Bedoon by stating: “Naturalization of Bedoon is a decision up to Kuwaiti authorities.” She also suggested that Kuwait should organize a conference to speak about its “leading experience” in dealing with the issue of statelessness; surely she wasn’t referring to the state’s experience in arresting more than 200 protesters, torture cases, and denying Bedoon their rights to documents, health care, employment, and education. The meeting covered by Kuwaiti press showed Hamdan with Saleh al-Fidala; the man assigned by the Kuwaiti government to solve the issues of Bedoon despite his being openly racist against the stateless community.

This meeting and Hamdan’s statement came right after Kuwait’s donationof a million dollars to Syrian refugees. Certainly, no Bedoon or Kuwaiti objects to the offering of aid to Syrian refugees, especially after seeing their government, in the absence of a parliament, give billions to the regimes of Bahrain, Jordan, and Oman a couple of weeks ago. The objection comes to the policies of the United Nations establishment that cares more about keeping donations from Gulf regimes coming by complimenting their “brilliant” plans in dealing with statelessness!

Shortly after that scandalous meeting, three international human rights organizations published a letter addressed to the Emir of Kuwait calling him to grant rights to the Bedoon community. The statement confirmed that Kuwait hasn’t fulfilled any of its promises made to international committees regarding the issue of Bedoon. It also states that Bedoon are facing continuous abuse and discrimination and are denied their basic rights, documents, and deserved naturalization.

So what should we expect from UN bodies in the Gulf? Well, nothing really. As long as Gulf regimes keep throwing money at them, we will never see them standing clearly against the violations of their donors. The better option is not to expect much of them and to, instead, keep unveiling their hypocrisy.

* published in AlAkhbar

The YouTube Salvation

Last week, many Kuwaitis were either shocked or thrilled by a YouTube video showing a group of young actors getting attacked by some unknown man. The video was uploaded anonymously but since state security men dress casually, people interpreted the video as being footage of a man from Kuwait’s interior ministry attacking the actors for their brave (or off-limits, as some find it) critique of socio-political issues in Kuwait.

Those who are xenophobic and/or in favor of playing the role of “morality police” were happy to believe that those young men were put out of action, while those in favor of free speech were highly disappointed. The latter found the video as evidence of how the government intimidates people for being openly and constructively critical of issues such as racism and corruption. It turns out the video was in fact just staged by the group to generate reactions. 

* Continue reading this post in Al-Akhbar

An Invisible Nation: The Gulf’s Stateless Communities

Image from I. Piccioni-A. Tiso/Molo7 Photo Agency

The issue of statelessness in the Gulf is as old as the post-colonial oil states from which they are actively being excluded. Until the 1980s, the status of the Bedoon was not seen as a political issue, with the fledgling governments more concerned with state building functions than with further limiting citizenship rights. The oil bust of the 1980s, however, strained the budgets of the Gulf regimes, who responded by constraining social services and restricting citizenship laws. The brunt of these restrictions largely fell on the stateless population—and in some Gulf states on migrant workers as well—who had been allowed health care and public education. Their intent was to force those seeking Gulf citizenship—particularly the Bedoon—to leave and start their lives as citizens elsewhere. These restrictions only served to exacerbate the numbers of stateless subjects, as few opted to abandon their family ties and communities or their geographic attachments in search for a new home country.

The 2010 UNCHR statistical book maintains that there are seventy thousand stateless subjects in the Saudi kingdom alone. This surely excludes hundreds of thousands of Mawaleed, a category which includes both those who are born in the country to foreign parents and those children of Saudi women from foreign fathers. In both cases, there is rarely any activism or reporting on statelessness in Saudi Arabia. It is believed that the seventy thousand includes families living in remote areas who are either unaware of documentation procedures or do not care to be registered in the system.

In Bahrain, considering the politicization of naturalization, the oppressed Shia majority understandably opposes the idea of granting citizenship. In the past decade, stateless Bahrainis and “mercenaries” have been naturalized as the state has sought to shift the demographic balance. Bahraini opposition claims that the regime has naturalized up to 120,000 but there are no official numbers. Those naturalized stateless persons are believed to be residents of Bahrain for two generations or children of Bahraini women who are married to foreigners. The “mercenaries” were naturalized after being brought from Yemen, Syria, Pakistan and other countries to work in security forces. The 1994-2001 popular uprising had resulted in the repeal of the State Security Law and the reestablishment of constitutional rule under the new monarch, thus limiting state power. In response, the Prime Minister expanded political naturalization in an attempt to change the demographics of Bahrain to weaken the Shia majority. He felt that he was becoming powerless and, with the support of Saudi Arabia, led the push for naturalization to further strengthen his role through the police and army. Resultantly, the current number of stateless persons in Bahrain does not exceed two thousand, most of whom are children of Bahraini women.

While the struggles of stateless communities in other Gulf countries remain largely undocumented, Qatar presents a slightly different case. Several reports were released for the first time earlier this year about the stateless population there, estimated at three thousand people who belong to one or two tribes. The reports provide accounts from a number of the Bedoon about their living conditions and in which they contrast the Bedoon’s struggle to the ease with which athletes are naturalized in return for their services. The numbers are comparatively smaller but again, little is known about their plight. Few Qatari Bedoon are politically active online and there are no statistics, official or otherwise, on the number of children of Qatari mothers who have not been naturalized. The reports’ criticism centers around Qatar’s increasing role and intervention in regional politics when the small state should be dealing with its own internal problems, including its major violations of human rights against migrant workers and its stateless community.

Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates present the most interesting cases of statelessness in the Gulf. Kuwait has approximately 120,000 Bedoon, the vast majority of whom belong to Arab tribes that had settled in the desert prior to independence. Kuwait does not grant women the right to pass citizenship on to their children, which has greatly exacerbated the problem of statelessness, since many Kuwaiti women have and continue to marry Bedoon men. Instead of attempting to assuage the increasing tension with and the struggles of the Bedoon population, Kuwaiti authorities issued a secret decision in 1986 to gradually strip this community of all its rights. Denied any form of official documentation in the 1990s, the Bedoon lost all access to formal employment, health care, and education.

In 2008, the Bedoon in Kuwait began to organize politically for the first time (following the lead of activists in the United Kingdom—notably, Mohammed Waly Al-Enizi—and in Canada), and have become increasingly active. They started with sit-ins, but participation was low and they were met with significant opposition from the police. With the failure of organized sit-ins, Bedoon activists turned to awareness campaigns about the plight of their community. They started to sponsor lectures that educated Kuwaiti society and media about the Bedoon, focusing on first dismantling all the existing stereotypes on those who are stateless and shedding light on the forms of discrimination they face. It was not until the 2011 uprisings, however, that things really began to change. Bedoon protests started in February 2011. Tens of Bedoon activists have subsequently been arrested, with some tortured, released, tried, and then acquitted. Kuwaiti authorities have responded recklessly, without any sense of direction or long-term plan. On the one hand, they made big promises to the Bedoon in order to diffuse the tension when their protests garnered significant media attention. On the other hand, they violently cracked down on protesters when the media was preoccupied with other things. Bedoon protests are ongoing nonetheless. They are mostly organized in reaction to official statements and the arrest of activists, or to bring attention to their plight. The protests often take advantage of political opportunities and openings, when the country is going through a political crisis such as the latest court decision to dissolve the parliament for being unconstitutional. The Bedoon have achieved little by way of legal gains. Yet, Kuwaiti society is finally getting to know the reality of Bedoon life and suffering and some Kuwaitis are starting to extend their support. Kuwaiti “Group 29” was able to secure one hundred seats for the highest ranking Bedoon students after having a daily sit-in in front of Kuwait University’s admission office last month.

The struggle of the Bedoon in the United Arab Emirates has recently emerged from the political unrest of the Arab Spring. Until last year, the United Arab Emirates had not only successfully managed to block any information about its stateless communities, but was also actively engaged in removing the Bedoon from their homeland. UAE authorities bought passports from the Comoros and gave its stateless community an ultimatum: either accept these new citizenships, or become illegal residents and detained. Surely this inspired their Kuwaiti counterparts who instead purchased Eritrean, Dominican, and Albanian passports. The United Arab Emirates provides no official statistics on its stateless community but according to a report in the Emirati English-language newspaper The National, they numbered about one hundred thousand four years ago. The actual population is likely double this number, without even including the thousands of children of Emirati mothers who are denied passing citizenship to their children. While the United Arab Emirates has recently claimed to have issued a decision to allow female citizens to pass citizenship to their children, in reality, committees were formed to examine their cases on an individual basis.

In the past few years, when communicating online with stateless men from the United Arab Emirates, I was surprised by how terrified they were of speaking about statelessness or even telling me that they are stateless. Some Emirati artists and bloggers do not openly admit that they are stateless for fear of both being judged according to society’s stereotypes against them and being arrested. Their fears are justified, given that the UAE authorities recently revoked Bedoon activist Ahmed Abdalkhaleq’s travelling document, gave him a Comoros passport instead, and exiled him to Thailand. Abdalkhaeq was one of the UAE5 who were arrested last year for demanding reforms. According to The Economist, he also runs a website about the stateless community in his country. So far, the wave of political arrests in the United Arab Emirates has cost the community fourteen members and stripped several of them of their nationalities.

In Kuwait, there are many blogs and forums that allow the Bedoon to speak of their cause. This year alone witnessed the rise of Kuwaiti activists devoted to the Bedoon, their protests, and their rights. The cyber world, however, seems to have no place for the Emirati activists, who are much more fearful of their security regime. However, just the way the UAE5 encouraged others to speak up, Abdelkhaleq seems to be the one who will set up the way for his community to be active and speak out. Abdelkhaleq is one of the UAE5, but he had received little media attention until his detention and subsequent deportation.

Despite all differences, with Saudi Arabia being the most extreme model and Kuwait being the least oppressive example, the Gulf countries look very much alike in their failed policies when dealing with statelessness. This is a region with corrupt and oppressive authoritarian regimes committing political and economic suicide by refusing to heed calls for change. This invisible nation of stateless communities residing in and around the Gulf is becoming increasingly outspoken. Oppression, forged passports, and exile are all methods that do not seem to work with the Gulf’s stateless community, especially when we consider how thousands of young women and men are denied basic rights and have no means to leave their countries. The Gulf states, with the exception of Bahrain, have so far been able to portray their countries as less in crisis than the rest of the Arab region and thus to hide their internal problems from the light of day. This status quo will not long remain, as minorities and communities like the Bedoon continue to mobilize.

* Published in Jadaliyya

Exile is Not the Answer to Statelessness!

A year ago, many Bedoon activists wouldn’t have been able to answer questions about the status of their counterparts in the United Arab Emirates due to a media blackout that the country was able to maintain until this year when they decided to send Bedoon activist Ahmed Abdul-Khaleq into exile. The Bedoon in the UAE number at least 100,000. Many of them are children of citizen mothers who are not allowed to pass citizenship to their children or spouses. Abdul-Khaleq was one of the five arrested last year for demanding reforms and democratic changes in the country. Since his release, the government has been planning to get rid of him as he calls on other Bedoon to speak up for their rights.

* Continue reading this post in Al-Akhbar's "The Subaltern." 

Saudi Women and the Need to be Political

Since the 1990s, Saudi women have been demanding the right to drive cars, travel alone, and abolish the male guardianship system. The struggle was limited to certain women from less conservative communities. After the Arab Spring, with the driving campaign, Saudi women were able to make their demands heard through a larger number of people involved and with the help of media exposure; western and Arab. It was believed that they were leading what can be called a ‘Saudi spring’.

Right after the Egyptian uprising, Saudi women worked online under the name ‘Saudi Women Revolution’ and although they started with bigger demands that sought radical changes to their status, gradually, the mild voices among them were able to dominate because they were less controversial and ‘more reasonable’, as some claim. Women were arrested and this was the easiest way to create leaders that exclusively were able to define the movement and its direction. A good example of that is Manal Al Sharif.

What has the movement achieved so far? Nothing when it comes to legislation, but a lot when it comes to having more women getting involved and speaking up. King Abdullah Bin Abdul Aziz promised that in the coming municipal elections (that have no set date) women would be able to contest and vote. The decision did not state whether those who wished to run for election needed permission from their male guardians.

* Continue reading this column in Gulf News

عن نعيم أبو سبعة الذي بعبص التنين

تفتح الرواية، تبدأ بخطاب حب للسيد الرئيس حسني مبارك، ثم تقرأ 8 صفحات عن رجل اسمه نعيم. الصفحات الأولى تأتي مسرحية أو وصفية (يقول الراوي بأن اللغة العربية لغة وصف وليست لغة أفكار)، تشعر بالارتباك، هل تتورط في قراءة رواية لا تعرف طريقها بين السرد والمسرح؟ هل اضطر الروائي لخلق مفارقة فنتازية في شخصية البطل في الفصل الأول الذي أسماه "نفق"؟ كل هذه مجرد تساؤلات شرعية لقارئ يريد أن يضع خطة أولية لقصة نعيم أبو سبعة- تساؤلاتي أنا، إلا أنها اختفت مع الفصل الثاني.

في الحكي، لن يكون نعيم أكثر من رجل في دولة دكتاتورية يحاول التحايل على الدولة. في الحالة العامة، الصفحات الأولى تضع جملة تتكرر بصياغات مختلفة من حين إلى آخر طوال الرواية "هذا ما كان نعيم يخشاه، بعبصوه بعدما كتب كتابه على عطيات، بعبصوه وهو حي عدة مرات، بعبصوه بأشياء غير الأصابع، ويبيعبصونه اليوم وهو ميت". الرواية ليس لها ثيمة واحدة، هي عن الشخصية المصرية، عن البعابيص المصرية، عن البيروقراطية المصرية الشامخة، عن فنتازيا الفساد المصري الذي يغلب أي مخيلة، عن "الدولة العميقة"، وهي قبل كل شيء دليل قد يكون عنوانه "كيف تصبح ديكتاتوراً في 276 صفحة؟".

بعد فصلين قصيرين من الرواية، يعود الرجل المجهول لكتابة خطاباته لرجل الدولة "صلاح". كل الخطابات غير موقعة و"صلاح" غير معّرف. يبدأ كاتب الرسالة بتعريف القائد، صورة القائد، كيف أن القائد ينتهي إذا احتلت رأسه الصلعة. طوال الرواية، يتنقل في الأمثلة والمقارنات بين عبدالناصر والسادات ومبارك، مرات قليلة عن محمد علي. بشكل سريع، تبدأ الرسالة الثانية إلى صلاح بشرح مبسط لعهدي السادات وعبدالناصر، ومن ثم تسهب في الحديث عن مبارك وشعاره الأول والأخير "الاستقرار".

صاحب الرواية محمد ربيع كان قد قال بأنه بدأ العمل على روايته قبل سقوط مبارك، توقف عن العمل لستة أشهر بعد الثورة معتقداً أن لا معنى لنصه، ومن ثم عاد لاستكمال الكتابة. لا أعلم ما الذي كان يدور في عقل ربيع، إلا أنني فسرت الستة أشهر باعتبارها تلك الفترة التي اعتقد فيها المصري بأن مبارك وأطيافه قد رحلوا. قد يكون الروائي احتاج لستة أشهر ليستمع لاسطوانة "الاستقرار" مرة أخرى، ليرى "صلاح" في الوجوه القديمة- الجديدة: الدولة العميقة كتبت لنعيم أبو سبعة الحياة مرة أخرى!

يعمد الروائي على رسم خطين في الرواية، هنالك نعيم أبو سبعة زوج عطيات وأبو وليد والبنتين الذي يحاول تلفيق موته ومحاربة البيروقراطية المصرية للحصول على بوليصة التأمين. شخصية خلابة يطعمها الروائي بغرائبية من حين إلى آخر حتى لا تموت. أما الخط الثاني فيعتمد كلياً على المخاطبات المكتوبة لـ "صلاح" والتي تشرح لنا السياق السياسي والزمني للحكاية. بشكل طبيعي، يجد القارئ مواطناً مسحوقاً وآخر يعمل من أجل الدكتاتور.

فصل "دعارة" الذي لم يتجاوز عدة صفحات كان مبهراً، قصة سريعة عن انتشار الدعارة في مصر محمد علي، كيف أن مصر كانت (ومازالت) تعيش من أجل شيء واحد وهو "الجيش" ولذلك كان هنالك جيش من العاهرات. يترك الروائي الرجل الفتوة يكبر، يتركه ليصبح أباً للجميع، أسطورة شعب بلا أب، تتكرر وتتشابه الأسماء، يكون هو نقطة نهاية وبداية. حكاية نعيم في الفصول الأولى لم تكن مشبعة، تفاصيل جديدة متتالية يحتاج القارئ أن يتآلف معها، يكون فيها، ولذلك تنجح الخطابات الموجهة لصلاح في جذبك وجعلك تنتظر المزيد منها: تفكيك الديكتاتورية وشعور القارئ الديمقراطي بالرضا عن نفسه، بالذكاء، إيماناً منه بأن خًدع الدولة لم تنتصر عليه.

الأهم في تلك الخطابات أنها تبدأ قوية، تقول لمبارك (والرواية لا تشير إلى ثورة يناير) أن يتفادى الأخطاء الغبية: الوضوح، المباشرة، الإدعاء، بينما كل ما يحتاجه أن يبقى غامضاً وأن يضحم أعدائه ويتركهم بلا ملامح في مخيلة المصري. الخطابات تصبح أحياناً مكاناً لتفريغ النقد الاجتماعي: كيف يهرب المصري من مواجهة الدولة.. كيف يبحث بشغف عن أفخاخ السلطة ليقع فيها ويغمض عينيه مرتاحاً. الخطابات تؤكد بأن "لكل مواطن مصري ملف يحوي معلومات عنه، موجود في مكان ما في مصر" وبأن "الخوف يا عزيزي هو الحل".

بعد ثلث الرواية، يكتب ربيع فصلاً بعنوان "معرّص" يسرد فيه أصل هذه الكلمة المصرية الشهيرة، كيف كانت تعني "التشييد والبناء" وكيف تحولت منذ العصر الفاطمي لتصف اثنين هما "القواد ومؤيد الحكام". في الفيديو التالي، يقرأ محمد من روايته معنى كلمة "معرص":  

بعدها مباشرة، يأتي خطاباً قوياً، هذه المرة عن المثقفين. باختصار شديد، عن المثقفين الذين عرف السادات تهمشيهم وجعل المصري ينظر لهم باحتقار. تلك الصورة النمطية التي نشاهدها في أفلام عادل إمام. السادات استغل طريقتين لإقصاء المثقف المصري: حب المصري للسخرية ورغبة المصري في عدم الشعور بتفوق الآخر عليه. "التريقة" الساداتية قتلت النخبة، النخبة التي كان بإمكانها أن تنقذ القليل، إلا أن الرغبة العامة بسقوط الهرمية الاجتماعية كانت الغالب. الروائي، بطبيعة الحال، لا يترك مصطلح المثقف فضفاضاً بل يشرحه ويمر سريعاً بقضية الرقابة التي لطالما سرقت المثقف من همه الأكبر: الصراع المباشر ضد الديكتاتورية. كان جديداً بالنسبة لي أن أرى نصاً يتطرق لقضية المثقف من هذه الزاوية خاصة وأن الحالة المسيطرة لا تملك سوى النقد والتهكم للمثقفين باعتبارهم سلبيين ومنفصلين عن الواقع.

بعد ذلك، لا يبذل كاتب الخطابات المزيد من الجهد، يستسلم لحالة العبودية السائدة، يشير لكلمة "العيش" والتي تعني الخبز باللهجة المصرية.. يتعجب "تخيل يا صلاح، أن يقرن الشعب أحد أصناف الطعام بالحياة ذاتها.. شعب كسول كهذا لن يختار الديمقراطية" ويضيف "رغيف الخبز هو مفتاح حكم المصريين.. فكرة الفرعون المعبود يجب أن تظل حاضرة في أذهان المصريين إلى الأبد".

بعد منتصف الرواية، يتغير الكثير. يدخل القارئ في شخصية نعيم أكثر، بعالمه الغرائبي، بحياته المسحوقة التي لا تثير تعاطفك، بتنقلاته المختلفة، بالخط الفاصل المبهم بين الواقع والخيال.. بعدها لا تريد أن تقرأ المزيد من الخطابات. تصبح مباشرة، مكررة، تخطفك مراراً إلى حوار سياسي مللته خاصة حينما يقوم الروائي (لأسباب تتضح في النهاية) بالتطرق لمحمد حسنين هيكل وفكرة الكاتب- الكاتب الشريك في السلطة وسحر الألفين كلمة! الخطابات تصبح متعبة فيما عدا الخطاب الذي يتحدث عن إضراب المحلة وقد يكون تفضيلي الشخصي لهذا الخطاب يعود لمعايشة جيلنا لتلك الأحداث التي أسميناها بلا تردد "ثورة". 
 

 تدريجياً، قصص نعيم تقل وتستبدل بأفكاره وهواجسه.. النهايات شارفت.. المزيد من الخطابات تُكتب.. شعرت باستفزاز. أردت أن لا تذهب القصة بذلك الاتجاه، أردت أن لا تكبر الخطابات عن كونها مجرد إطار تعريفي، أردت لنعيم أي يبقى "كبيرنا الذي علمنا السحر" وأردت فوق كل شيء أن لا أرى مبارك مباشرة، فهو في كل شيء ولا أحتاجه. الروائي أراد أن يصعد بسخطه من الشخصية المصرية وعبادتها للدكتاتور. التصاعد كان متعباً وسريعاً بالنسبة لي. لم يكن مهماً مبارك، لم يكن مهماً أن تظهر الحقيقة "كوضوح الشمس" كان يهمني حقاً أن أرى تجليات نعيم في ميتاته وحيواته. الفكرة السياسية لدى الروائي انتصرت على الفكرة السردية: الروائي غاضب، الروائي شعر بأنه عليه أن يقول للمصري بأن الصنم لم يسقط بعد الثورة، الروائي لم يستطع أن يراهن أكثر على نعيم. في الحقيقة، الروائي استخدم صورته كصورة لنعيم. الروائي قتل ذاته في النهاية.

In response to Mona Eltahawy’s hate argument

Mona Eltahawy’s article “Why do they hate us?,” published in Foreign Policy Magazine’s special issue on women, has a catchy title.  When I first saw it, I honestly thought it was referring to the Egyptian military’s violations of women’s rights by performing “virginity tests” — especially as the military’s aim seemed to be to exclude women from taking part in political life by brutalizing them and showing them as fragile and vulnerable.

Continue reading at Al Monitor

Kuwait: Art Exhibition Shut Down for “Controversial” Content

Kuwaiti artist Shurooq Amin is in shock after her exhibition of paintings was shut down without an explanation. Reports say that men walked into the show, three hours after its opening, and took the paintings down, saying they had received a complaint over the content of the paintings. 

Keep reading this post in GlobalVoices

Statslöshet i Kuwait

Att vara statslös innebär att man saknar alla medborgerliga rättigheter, som personliga dokument, utbildning, arbete och tillgång till sjukvård. Den som vill bli medborgare i Kuwait måste ha registrerat sig i 1965 års folkräkning, annars betraktas de av regeringen som illegala bofasta. I dag finns det omkring 100 000 statslösa i Kuwait. Journalisten Mona Kareem som själv är statslös, förklarar det kontroversiella i ett problem som sällan diskuteras i internationella medier.

10 Years Anniversary: My First Poetry Collection

10 years passed since my first poetry collection was published in Kuwait. Thanks to Coco_Controverse who took these two shots of the book yesterday.

Are bloggers journalists?

Here's my talk with Al-Jazeera English show "The Stream", in case you missed it.

Arrests and Trials of Kuwait’s Stateless Protesters

Kuwaiti riot police use water cannons to disperse stateless protesters (AFP, Yasser al-Zayyat).

There are at least 120,000 Bidun jinsiyya (without nationality) in Kuwait today suffering from the lack of human rights. They cannot legally obtain birth, death, marriage or divorce certificates. The same applies to driving licenses, identification cards, and passports. They do not have access to public education, health care, housing or employment. And while they face some of the state’s harshest discrimination policies, they have no recourse to the law and its courts. Simply stated, the Bidun, who are equal to about 10% of the Kuwaiti population, do not exist. They have been dehumanized and rendered invisible by government policies coupled with pervasive social stigmatization.

Last February and March, Hundreds of the stateless community in Kuwait protested demanding their rights of documentation, education, health care, employment, and naturalization. The protests were brutally dispersed by riot police and tens of young men were arrested for a week or so. Riot Police used water cannons, teargas, smoke bombs, and concussion grenades to disperse the protesters. According to Human Rights Watch, over 30 people were injured and 120 were detained by state security in the first day of Bidun protests.

On the 12th of December, the stateless attempted to protest again to state their demands and to show support for those who were going on trials for protesting. Around 31 men were in court for ‘illegal protesting’ and were released as the judge decided to adjourn the case to the 23rd of January. Kuwaiti and stateless activists showed up to the court hearing to show support as the interior ministry refused to give permissions for any sit-ins. Kuwait Human Rights Association issued a statement condemning the trials and stating that the Kuwait constitution grants the rights to peaceful protesting and thus none should be prosecuted. Parliament members did not have a say in this and the only political bloc to have issued a statement in solidarity was the leftist Taqadomi movement. According to their lawyer Mousaed Al-Shammari, the 31 men might get 3 to 5 years jail sentences.

On the 14th, three other stateless men faced another trial for illegal protesting: Abdulhakim Al-Fadhli, Tariq Al-Otaibi, and Ridha Al-Fadhli. On Sunday the 18th, other 45 stateless men will face another trial and this time charged with violence against police men. The charges in the first two trials were submitted by the public prosecution, but in the coming trial, charges were submitted by the state security police. According to Kuwait Human Rights Association’s spokesman Taher Al-Baghli, state police did not charge the stateless for ‘illegal protesting’ only because such a charge will most probably be dismissed by the higher court.

Since the first trial started, the stateless community had several attempts to protest again. Activists tried to get permissions to protest in Erada square, in front of the parliament, where protests took place in the past two months against former prime minister Nasser Al-Mohammed which led to his resignation. The interior ministry refused to give such permission which made some of the stateless protest in their poorly-conditioned areas. The number was not large and protesters left in response to calls from some activists to avoid clashes.

This Friday, as reported by activists, tweeps, and news agencies, riot police used violence against stateless protesters and more than 20 men were arrested, among them two journalists who were later released (Fahad Al-Mayah and Hamad Al-Sharhan). According to a report by AFP: “Kuwaiti riot police used tear gas and water cannons on Friday to scatter hundreds of stateless protesters demanding citizenship. The police sought to break up a crowd of 400 people gathered after noon prayers in Jahra, raising Kuwaiti flags and banners that read: We demand Kuwaiti citizenship.” Stateless activist Mousaed Al-Shammari was reportedly arrested as he was trying to convince protesters to leave. Some wrote that he is now on hunger strike protesting his detention. According to a report by Reuters, there were also minors beaten and arrested in Friday protest. 

* Published in MidEast Youth

Undocumented and Afraid

They took them in, shackled their brown hands, threaded out their thick hair, and told them “We will now turn you into soldiers, fighting against hope, warring against life. You have two choices: death or death.” They stared at the hours, then removed their eyes, hanging each upon its nail. Then they waited and waited for the funeral of memory to start. They set the light on fire and recited myths, fairytales, and stories about their fathers, their stupid fathers, who were once heroes and are now nothing but cowards.

Why did you leave us in this trap without any poems? Why did you color the sky yellow? Why did you give us stars to hang our hearts on? We did not do anything, we only wanted to sing. We have read the Quran, the New Testament, and the Old Testament. We read every verse and we pretended to be religious enough to read, and to know if hope was a sin, and it wasn’t.

In this trap, we recreated time and turned every thousand hours into another day, another attempt to save our youth from the wasteland. On the broken stairs of time we walked and we asked God, “Why didn’t you let us choose our pain—for the pain of waiting is the ugliest kind of heaven. Allow us to choose our own pain for once. If we were permitted to make choices we might begin to think.  And then we might believe, for a second, that we are human.”

“Undocumented and unafraid.” That is what a Hispanic girl wrote on her shirt as an American policeman shackled her hands. I said, “I am undocumented and afraid. And fear is genetic, even if scientists have not yet discovered that fact.” I let my memory sail me off to the shore of my childhood and I remembered that I had books, a soccer ball, and an old lady asking me, “Where are you from?” I paused and said, “I am from Bidun.” She laughed “There’s no such place. No country is Bidun.”

I removed my small feet and drew a flag, a jersey, and a national anthem. Then I waited and hoped, like all my people. I waited and hoped that she would reappear so that I might show her my country. The woman died and I grew up. I killed my imagination even as I continued to practice the sins of hope and waiting. Here, a kid puts his nail in the sand and tries to build a home, but it rained.

Let us live our evenings to the fullest so we might be allowed to imagine that we are what you are—creatures of flesh and blood and rainbows. Give an answer for a mother to say when her child asks her, “Mother, where are we from?” We are the prisoners of yesterday. We make collages out of the Yellow Pages. We like to be pawns since we are not allowed to die just like our fathers who fought, died, and went forgotten in a truck, a grave, or a sandstorm.

Our children have no kites; for we have no wind to fly them, no money to buy them, and no sky. Our children take the road to the mosque and make their prayers. “Oh god, I do not want to take the same road again, not because I do not love you but because I want to take the road to school.” We will love life one day we will one day hope again without the fear of losing our nails.

We will take no portion of your ego, we will always bend our heads when we see you in the streets. We will buy hats if we need to, just so we might take them off when we see you, just so you feel secure in your self while your cars run, and our heads bend. Let us offer you three hats for every slap your policeman draws on a man’s face, and for every horror he puts in a teenage heart, or in a girl’s breast.

We are lonely but our loneliness does not bring us together. Our fathers shook off their tents. They hid their pride in their pockets. They pointed towards you and said, “Let us join our brothers; let us go home.” And when they arrived, they heard a word, and they opened their dictionaries under the letter “e” and read “enemy.” We waited, in the yellow bus, for our brothers to take us home. The bus was a candle. The bus melted under the sun. The sun died. And we made chairs out of our hope, we sat, and we waited.

Let us be whatever you want us to be—your trains, your music, your fleeting smiles, but just let us be. Let us have an answer for the question of life while you solve your question of God, let us be. Let us sing a love story and do not mock our thick accents for we do not have the luxury of your tongues; we have no tongues, no speech, no songs. We are waiting for our mothers to sow our youth and give us the song of salvation. We are waiting for the anti-hope pills that never work.

Make exceptions for us before we die. Let us have a day to build a house near the schools. Let us watch our children be happy and complain about their teachers. Let us see them burn with the fire of knowledge. Let us frame our losses and crucify them on the imaginary walls. Let the father see his dead son and sigh, “Now who is going to bury me?” Let us buy new chairs, let us have chairs first, let us have the choice to take off our hats for you, or not to take them off. Let us have shadows, ghosts, and more fears.

I do not hate you but I do not love you. I look at you and I know. I know that my heart is not like the size of your shoe. Pardon me, but I cannot lie. My whole existence is a lie and I, once and for all, blame my fathers for being lies. You do not allow me to wait, hope, or live and I do not allow you to make me lie. We are the statues on which you will build your birdhouses.

Published in Jadaliyya - 12/12/2011

Sectarianism, Opposition Parties, and Online Activism in Bahrain

An Interview with Blogger Chan'ad Bahraini

For the blogosphere in the Gulf region, the name Chan'ad became a reference to all of those who were seeking accurate, well written, and up-to-date inside information from Bahrain in English. Chan'ad, author of the blog Chan'ad Bahraini 2.0, has been a prominent figure of digital activism in Bahrain and the region since 2004 as he works on unveiling regime tactics to fuel sectarian fear, suppress facts, and keep up state repression. After the 14 February uprising, Chan'ad, whose real name is Fahad Desmukh, played an important role in exposing the lies of state-controlled media in Bahrain and the Bahraini regime’s hiring of foreign journalists and firms to whitewash its image. In this interview, Chan'ad shares his views on the unrest in Bahrain, the regime’s handling of the uprising, the pattern of the opposition, and relative issues such as blogging, social networking, and xenophobia in Bahrain.

Mona Kareem (MK): Who are you?

Fahad Desmukh (FD): Chan'ad is the local Arabic name for mackerel. I work as a freelance journalist based in Karachi, Pakistan. I grew up in Bahrain and in 2004, while I was still there, started blogging about Bahraini politics and society. In 2006 I was summoned for an interrogation by the National Security Agency because, it seems, they found activities related to my blogging suspicious. I left the country shortly after and when I tried to return, I was told by immigration officials at the Bahrain airport that I was on an entry blacklist. I have been living in Pakistan since then, and in my free time have tried to keep blogging and tweeting about the human rights and political situation in Bahrain.

MK: Bahrain reached a dead end, agree or disagree?

FD: This certainly is not a dead end for Bahrain as the current situation in Bahrain is not sustainable. Despite eight months of repression of the uprising, there has been no end for protests. Since March, protesters have been jailed, tortured, killed, maligned, sacked from their workplaces and expelled from schools and universities, and yet you can still find protests in Bahrain on almost any day of the week. At some point, something has got to give.

MK: How can you imagine the Bahraini scenario if it weren’t for the Saudi/GCC interference?

FD: If it weren’t for Saudi/GCC interference, it is quite possible that there would not have even been anything for people to be protesting about when this uprising began on 14 February. The problem in Bahrain is that the Al Khalifa regime relies on Saudi Arabia and other foreign powers as the source of its legitimacy rather than the Bahraini people. Until this changes, there will always be political strife. If it weren't for this outside interference, then—maybe—the regime would be forced to listen to its people and share some power.

MK: Many Bahrainis live in denial and state that sectarianism is only practiced by the regime. Do you agree? Or do you think instead people should admit that sectarianism exists deeply in Bahrain and has increased after 14 February?

FD: It is true that sectarianism does exist in Bahraini society and has a long history, but this must be distinguished from the regime's deployment of sectarianism as a political divide-and-rule strategy. The “social sectarianism” that exists between the Sunni and Shia communities in Bahrain is akin to the fear and suspicion that exists between any different social groups that have distinct histories and customs. The Sunni and Shia communities in Bahrain have historically lived in separate settlements, speak differing dialects of Arabic, mostly marry among themselves, and obviously have their own religious practices. It is not surprising then that there are elements in the two communities that are suspicious of and have false ideas about each other. The self-proclaimed keepers of tradition in both communities benefit from the divide, and seek to maintain this status quo.

MK: How did the regime use sectarianism?

FD: The Al Khalifa regime has managed to maintain its power precisely by exploiting this division. Abdulhadi Khalaf has explained in his work how the regime has not simply supported the Sunnis and suppressed the Shia, as is often portrayed. Rather, the strategy has been to tolerate or patronize representatives, from either group, who interact with the regime as confessional agents of their community, and to discourage or punish those who seek to co-operate across the sectarian divide and make demands of the regime on a “national” rather than confessional basis.

Indeed, it is worth noting that the first political prisoner after the start of the 14 February uprising was a Sunni former army officer, Mohammed Al-Buflasa, who gave a speech about Sunni-Shia unity at the Pearl Roundabout. Also, the first political party to be targeted by the regime was the National Democratic Action Society, or Wa'ad, a secular nationalist group that has both Sunni and Shia members. Two of its offices were firebombed; the home of one of its Sunni leaders, Dr. Munira Fakhro, was firebombed; the Bahraini regime temporarily suspended the party; and its Sunni secretary general, Ibrahim Sharif, was sentenced to five years in prison. In contrast, Al Wefaq, the largest political society in Bahrain, and an openly Shia Islamist group, was not targeted in this same manner (initially at least). The political bloc that the regime has targeted the most severely is the “Alliance for a Republic.” Although it has an overwhelmingly Shia support base and often couches its rhetoric in religious symbolism, its demands are always nationalist and non-sectarian.

MK: Wouldn’t the regime fail to use sectarianism if it had not already existed?

FD: If we look back in history, we find that the “social sectarianism” between Sunni and Shia citizens in Bahrain has been restricted to fear and suspicion and has not manifested itself in the form of violence, since the 1950s. Violent sectarian clashes peaked in 1953-54, in reaction to which Bahrain saw for the first time, the rise of a “national” political movement that explicitly sought to unite Sunni and Shia on a common platform and eradicate sectarianism. Needless to say, the regime saw this as a threat and cracked down on the movement, and on other “nationalist” movements in subsequent decades, through a combination of both co-optation and brutal violence. But in all this time since 1954, there have not been any significant cases of violent clashes between the Sunni and Shia communities. Rather, any violence that has occurred has been between the regime and the opposition. If the conflict was of a solely sectarian nature, we should have seen incidents of Sunni citizens violently attacking their Shia neighbors, or vice versa—but this has not occurred. There have been some cases of violence since February that the regime has sought to portray as having a sectarian motive, but no evidence has yet been presented to support this claim.

MK: How did the regime employ the media for its sectarian bet?

FD: The regime has used the state apparatus, especially the media, to incite sectarianism in society. Maybe the most explicit example of state sectarianism is what has been dubbed the “Bandargate affair.” In 2006, Dr. Salah al-Bander, then a British adviser to the Bahraini government, released a 240-page report blowing the whistle on an alleged conspiracy led by a royal family member that sought to foment sectarianism, including changing the demographic makeup in the country and influence the parliamentary elections. One should be skeptical of such conspiracy theories, but it is indicative that immediately after al-Bander released the report he was deported from Bahrain, and a gag order was imposed on any media discussion of the scandal. The government has refused to respond to any public demands for the scandal to be investigated.

MK: Where did the Bahraini opposition falter, what went wrong, how to get back on track?

FD: Maybe the biggest fault of the Bahraini opposition was that it did not reach out enough across the sectarian divide before the start of the protests. Yes, there were many Sunnis who joined the protest movement, but it did not have that critical mass of Sunnis needed to create cracks in the state apparatus and force the regime to listen to the people.

Having said that, it is difficult to see how this could have happened. The opposition has always sought allies in its very modest national demands for a contractual constitution, real powers for the elected legislature, and fairer electoral districts. Yet, the regime has, through the mobilization of sectarian fear, managed to ensure that Sunnis do not ally with their Shia brethren in these simple demands.

MK: So you suggest that unity is the only way to achieve these demands?

FD: This is, in my eyes, where the opposition needs to work the hardest. The most important site for cross-sectarian cooperation is in the workplace and the labor movement. It was the labor movement that was the focus of the nationalist opposition movement in the 1950s and I believe this is what the opposition should focus on strengthening. This will of course be extremely difficult to do, given how severely the regime has cracked down on the trade union movement since February. Nonetheless, I cannot see it happening any other way. This strengthening of the labor movement will of course necessarily require building solidarity with migrant workers also, who have been largely ignored up until now.

MK: Do you think it hurt the opposition that some demanded the fall of the regime instead of focusing on toppling the Prime Minister?

FD: I remember in 2004 when Abdulhadi al-Khawaja of the Bahrain Center for Human Rights for the first time publicly accused the Prime Minister of corruption and called for him to step down. Many of the “moderates” in the opposition at the time insisted that this was too radical a demand for Bahrain and that it will hurt the movement. For most people in the world, I imagine, calling for the resignation of an unelected prime minister who has been in power for forty years would hardly be regarded as a radical demand. The mainstream opposition did not call for his resignation and nothing happened.

Similarly, after 14 February, when protesters started calling for the downfall of the regime, the mainstream opposition insisted it was too radical a demand to call for the downfall of an autocratic monarchy, one that has killed and tortured its people.

But 14 February brought about a change unseen before. At the Lulu Roundabout people were able to express how they really felt. Now that the cork has been removed, it is impossible to bottle everything up again. The chant of "yasqut Hamad" ("Down with King Hamad") has become the chant of the movement. It is spray painted all over walls, it is chanted by protesters, and it is honked by cars. I think there is a strong argument for a transition to a genuine constitutional monarchy rather than a republic. However, there is great value in letting people tell the government how they really feel. There is nothing sectarian or racist about calling for the fall of the regime. In the words of Malcolm X: "Stop sweet-talking him. Tell him how you feel. Tell him what kind of hell you've been catching and let him know that if he's not ready to clean his house up, he shouldn't have a house."

MK: Many anti-regime Bahrainis like to portray the revolution as a non-Shia movement, but isn’t it more convenient and rational to say that it is a Shia movement as Shia are oppressed and are entitled to demand equality?

Yes, it would be disingenuous to pretend as though it is sheer coincidence that Shias form the overwhelming majority of the protesters. There is a reason why anti-apartheid protesters in South Africa and civil rights activist in the United States were mostly black. This reason applies to Bahrain.

MK: Do you believe youth should have acted independently of opposition political parties? Wouldn’t that be more helpful?

It is the youth who have led this movement from the start, while most of the mainstream opposition parties offered only lukewarm support. Since 14 February, the established opposition groups have had to make their decisions keeping in mind that it is the independent youth groups, and not the political party activists, who face the bullets and batons every day at the front lines.

MK: If the Crown Prince becomes the king of Bahrain, will that be better than nothing?

FD: Yes it will be better than nothing. If Bahrain were to transition to a genuine constitutional monarchy, all the other members of the royal family would stand to lose their guaranteed positions as ministers, ambassadors, judges and military officers. The Crown Prince however would be the only one who stands to benefit, as he would retain his position. Having said that, the Crown Prince has so far given little reason for the people to believe that he has the desire or the political ability to take on the rest of his family in trying to implement such a transition.

MK: The Media has turned its back to Bahrain with Saudi pressure and other factors, how do you think Bahrainis should respond to that?

FD: While the international media has not been paying as much attention to Bahrain as other Arab uprisings, when they do report on the situation it is generally sympathetic to the cause of the pro-democracy movement and critical of the regime. This is not where the problem lies. The real problem lies at home where the state-controlled local media has managed to divide and scare the people along sectarian lies. Bahrainis need to challenge this narrative through people-to-people contact and solidarity building.

MK: Do you believe the regime has an electronic army that works on bashing oppositionists and their supporters?

FD: I don not think there is any hard evidence to prove that the regime has such an electronic army, but anyone who blogs or tweets against the regime in Bahrain is familiar with the barrage of foul personal attacks that comes in response. We also know that the government has hired Washington D.C.-based Public Relations company “Qorvis,” which offers online reputation management as one of its services. According to a Huffington Post article, “the firm uses ‘black arts’ by creating fake blogs and websites that link back to positive content, ‘to make sure that no one online comes across the bad stuff,’ says the former insider. Other techniques include the use of social media, including Facebook, YouTube and Twitter.” So potentially, this may be happening in Bahrain, but there is no hard evidence for it yet.

MK: In the last year, blogging has been replaced in Bahrain with social networking. Do you think that was a productive shift considering how much more organized and argument-strong blogging is, comparatively speaking?

FD: Much of the group brainstorming, planning, and organizing of online activism movements still takes place on discussion forums like BahrainOnline, rather than on blogs, Facebook, or twitter. However, real-time social media tools like Facebook and twitter were essential for real time information dissemination and feedback. The latest information about a protest or police attack could be spread around the country and the world within seconds. This does have its down side, as it means that false rumors can and are spread just as faced using this social media tools. But of course the real blame for this is the people who spread or choose to believe this false information without any real evidence for it.

MK: Remembering Ali Abdulimam?

FD: I was actively involved in the online campaign to free Ali after he was arrested in 2005 along with two other administrators of BahrainOnline. It was the first case of a blogger being detained in the Gulf as far as I know. His short time in detention brought him international recognition and allowed him to meet and share notes with other cyber-dissidents around the world. All the while his website continued serving hub for opposition debate and discussion, and in August 2010 he was arrested again along with scores of other people as part of a widespread crackdown on the opposition. He was released this February after the start of the uprising, but rather than keep quiet, the first thing he did after leaving prison was to join the protests at Pearl Roundabout. He spoke to the international media about the torture and abuse he faced during his detention. So when the Saudi-backed crackdown began in March he was to be rounded up. The security forces raided his family’s home to find him, but he is believed to have fled before their arrival. He has been missing in the eight months since then, and was sentenced in June in absentia to fifteen years in prison by a military court. I hope he actually is in hiding somewhere safe as I have heard.

MK: Do you think the choice of many netizens to remain anonymous have weakened the credibility of news coming from Bahrain?

FD: A great many netizens in Bahrain have always chosen to hide behind pseudonyms because of the threat from the state that has always existed. I myself tried to hide my identity while I was in Bahrain. You can assess the trustworthiness of anonymous online sources by looking at: (i) whether they are regarded as trustworthy by people who you trust highly, and (ii) how consistently accurate a source’s published information proves to be after observing them over a period of time. The problem that was witnessed in Bahrain was that after the start of the uprising there was a sudden rush of people joining twitter without understanding how it works or those who weren't as concerned about sources. At the same time you had hundreds of new twitter accounts being created overnight that appeared to be actively spreading false information about the unrest and crackdown.

MK: If Sunnis committed anti-Shia acts, then do you think Shia acted reactionary by making remarks against naturalized Bahrainis who are being stereotyped as mercenaries?

FD: Yes I think xenophobia is just as condemnable as sectarianism. However there is a difference in Bahrain’s case. Most of the opposition activists I have met are keen to make the distinction that when they use the term “naturalization” they are usually referring to “political naturalization.” That is, the use of naturalization for demographic engineering as a political tool. Having said that, I do not think it is particularly helpful to repeatedly use this term as a blanket insult against people, many of whom are just looking for a decent life. Nor should we deny the existence of xenophobia in Bahrain.

MK: Shouldn’t the naturalized Bahrainis be accepted in society instead of being rejected and hated? The remarks used against them exclude them for being racially non-Arabs or recent arrivals?

FD: Yes, just because the policy of political naturalization should be condemned does not mean that naturalized people should be hated. This applies especially to the many naturalized citizens, or their children, who were born and raised in Bahrain and regard it as their home. If the opposition was wise it would try harder to reach out to them, even those working in the security forces, to make them understand that they are both being exploited by the same fat cats.

* Published in Jadaliyya - December 2011. 

Kuwait is SEGREGATING Health Care between Citizens and Non-Kuwaitis

Racial Segregation ended decades ago but is coming back now in Kuwait!

As the world fights for providing free health care to everyone regardless of their financial powers, nationalities, races, colors, religions, and/or gender, Kuwait is working now on creating 3 hospitals (with 300-beds-capacity for each) and 15 clinics to take care of 1.5 million expatriates and stateless people in the near future. Parliament members and the government have neglected the discriminatory nature of this project and responded to citizens’ complaints about waiting times when using health services. Many times, Kuwaitis, with the lack of awareness, talked openly that they should not be waiting in ‘their hospitals’ because of the long line ups of expatriates. Thus, parliament members, with their motivation to guarantee more votes to stay in the game box, have passed this scandalous project.

The project aims to build three hospitals with a capacity of 300 beds each and with land area of 50,000 square meters for two and 36,000 square meters for the third. These hospitals will provide integrated medical services even dispensing of some drugs. This will cost 130 KD in the first two years, 150 KD for the third and forth, 170 KD for the fifth and sixth, 180 KD for the seventh and eighth, and 190 KD for the ninth and tenth. This proves that this project is a financial failure for Kuwait as those few centers will not be able to provide 1.5 million people with good health services including surgeries.

Two weeks ago, a lecture entitled “Racist Segregation Hospitals” was held in Kuwait Transparency Society to condemn this project and demand terminating it. The speakers said the project is a shameful mark in Kuwait’s history and is very much a racist project in a country that is known of its civil bodies and establishments. They found it nothing but a commercial project the government offered to companies robbing national funds. Speakers also emphasized that this can be considered, according to international laws, a project of racist segregation. They called on parliament members to be considerate of non-kuwaitis who have rights, as the constitution guarantees quality to all, and to stop this project that will be bad for Kuwait’s reputation internationally.

Columnist Dr. Sajed Al-Abdali wrote about the project and spoke in the lecture saying this project will offer 2 to 6 for each 10,000 non-Kuwaitis. He wondered why isn’t the money of this project injected into reforming health services. Salma Al-Essa, from Kuwait’s association of transparency, assured the racist nature of this project. She also asked why isn’t the report of World Bank regarding this project still not published, if it exists, and added that there are no guarantees that the project will function well especially that it will not be under observation.

Dr. Amer Al-Tamimi from Kuwaiti Human Rights Association said this project is an economical failure as it will cost 130 million Kuwaiti Dinars and this amount of money should not be invested in such a project that will harm Kuwait’s reputation of human rights. Al-Tamimi said: “do not expect this project to offer all services. This will surely not include treatment of psychological problems, kidney failure, treatment of war damages and permanent diseases.”

Fawaz Farhan was the only medic present in the lecture and he said: “it is unfortunate that the medical association is not hosting this project.” Farhan said that racism already exists in hospitals as non-kuwaitis do not get any medicine as citizens do and also because they are paying fees for each visit and tests needed. Farhan also said that racist segregation already exists in some clinics. He described the project saying “They want steal the money of non-kuwaitis to practice racism against them!”

Kuwait is taking a suicidal step by executing this project which has been cooked in the past few years. This will definitely take the country into a serious crisis as 1.5 million people will be forced to use facilities that cannot logically be able to provide them with good health services. Segregating people based on their nationalities can pen the country with the most famous scandals in the new century.

To read the leaked proposal of this project in both Arabic and English, click here and here. Also, you can read the complete document that announced the auction for those interested in investing in this project, click here.

Sha7wal شحوال

Remembering Ali Abdulemam

To know the Arab blogosphere, you need to know Ali Abdulemam, the Bahraini blogger who spent more time in jail than in blogging in the past year. He is one of the fathers of Arab blogging and Bahrain's most famous blogger as he was the founder of Bahrain Online, a forum that the regime blocked in 2002. When Ali’s name comes up, we think of a man who had the courage to challenge the criminal authorities and thus became not only an opposition figure but also an icon for his people and a voice to their struggle. His cell, where he was kept since September 2010 until February 2011, symbolized the oppression that a new generation is facing in Bahrain.

As we are witnessing the case of Egyptian blogger Alaa Abdelfatah challenging the military junta in post-revolution Egypt by refusing to accredit their military trials of civilians and answering their questions, we need to remember that 6 years ago, Ali Abdulemam went through the same challenge when he and his fellow Bahraini blogger Hussain Yousef refused to be bailed out because they did not want to admit to the system and its false accusations. Ali, after his release last February, has disappeared and was sentenced to 15 years in jail for ‘spreading false information and trying to subvert the regime’. Surely, just the way he was denied a lawyer when he was imprisoned last year, Ali like all other Bahrainis after the uprising, was denied a fair trial and was sentenced in absentia.

When speaking to Hussain Yousef about how he and Ali refused to be bailed out back in 2005, he narrated the story in details: “It was March 2005, we heard of a solidarity protest that took place in front of the police station where we were jailed (Al-Qathibiya police station). We were worried about the safety of the protesters. The long interrogation sessions ended with us and Wael Bualai. They faced us with seven charges. Our lawyers said these charges will lead to the sum up of 107 years in jail! We were laughing at those charges that regimes usually use to kill freedom of speech, such as insulting the king or the royal family, spreading false information, threatening national security, attempting to subvert the regime etc. We rejected the charges, decided to go on a hunger strike, and leaked our news out somehow. We heard that the king was out of the country and that he was faced with our case by journalists wherever he went. Free people stood in solidarity with us from all over the world and Bahrain human rights center did a great job campaigning for us. Statements came out from different organizations and we continued with our hunger strike.

Then, the Interior minister sent someone to ask us to sign an apology to let us out. I asked: for whom? For the king? Or for the people? If it is for the king then let his palace ask us so, and if it is for people, let the parliament come and talk to us. I asked him in return for an apology and told him that we are on a hunger strike and that if we die it will be his responsibility and the responsibility of those who asked to jail us. He offered to bail us out for 1000 Bahraini dinars (around 3000$), and again I rejected. I was taken back to the cell, I explained the situation to my friends, and we agreed. That night we were taken to somewhere unknown and dark. Our eyes were open when we got into the bus and we had intensive security around us and a wave of cars followed us to the new place where we met a person in civilian clothes. The guy started to threaten to put each of us in a separate cell, I asked him who he was and we figured out that he was someone brought back from his vacation just to deal with us. We asked to call our lawyer to inform him of our place and he said no one would know of our place. I said it will be his responsibility if we die and the whole world will know about it. Ali called one of our lawyers. Suddenly, they treated us differently, asked us which cells we like, and we were released the following day. It was the statement of the American Association of Journalists that scared them and we knew more about the calls of the American embassy by reading the cable documents that came out last month through wiki leaks.”

This is an interesting phenomenon that we are witnessing; bloggers are going head-to-head against dictatorships and wrestling their ways out even if they were left alone. It is truly disappointing to see bloggers still getting jailed, tortured, and/or brutalized in the Middle East after the uprisings. Iran, Egypt, and Syria are only behind China when it comes to the number of bloggers and cyber activists harassed or arrested. Saudi Arabia has recently arrested, later released, three vloggers for making an episode on poverty, Kuwait interrogated and arrested five twitter users this year, while a ‘retweet’ in Bahrain might get you interrogated or even jailed.

When speaking with Nasser Weddady, the Mauritanian blogger and activist talked to us about the campaign he launched: “When Ali was arrested in September 2010, Arab bloggers and others from around the globe created one of the nosiest campaigns to demand his release by putting together a showcase for advocates rising through different platforms and multiple mediums.” In comment on what both Ali and Alaa are doing, Weddady added: “This is for liberty; it is a moral stand. These two bloggers chose their principles over their freedoms. It is not about politics, it is about principles.”

Weddady exclaimed: “Ali is a delicate case; he is not a member of a political party because he is above the frame. He was targeted by the regime because when he speaks, there’s a huge blogging community that listens to what he has to say; he has international respect. The stand of world’s democracies towards Ali’s case is shameful. His fate hinges on the world’s complacency towards Bahrain’s dictatorship. We need to realize that this is not only an Arab cause, it is a global one.”

Ali Abdulemam is not a case of his own; he is the face of his people, his generation, and a true example of how online free speech is getting raped by regimes in the Middle East. Founding the Bahrain Online forum in 1998 was a tunnel that Ali digged for Bahrainis to walk out to the world. Revealing his identity in 2002 was seen as a mix of insane courage and suicidal wrestling against a brutal regime. Refusing to be bailed out in 2005, losing his job, and living the nightmare of Bahraini prison in 2010 are all factors that make the world owe this man more than silence. It is a shame how the Arab world and the globe in general are watching the crimes done against Ali and his people, adding water on their revolution to die off. With memory we try to fight for Ali Abdulemam and with spoken words the world should get the Bahraini regime to stop its crimes and to respect the sacred human right of free speech.

Published in Global Voices Advocacy