{"id":16320,"date":"2012-09-06T09:22:17","date_gmt":"2012-09-06T17:22:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/antiwar.com\/blog\/?p=16320"},"modified":"2012-09-06T09:22:17","modified_gmt":"2012-09-06T17:22:17","slug":"bahrain-documentary-shows-the-brutality-supported-by-the-us","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/2012\/09\/06\/bahrain-documentary-shows-the-brutality-supported-by-the-us\/","title":{"rendered":"Bahrain Documentary Shows the Brutality Supported by the US"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Yesterday, in our news section, we provided a link to <a href=\"http:\/\/www.guardian.co.uk\/world\/2012\/sep\/04\/cnn-international-documentary-bahrain-arab-spring-repression\">Glenn Greenwald&#8217;s article<\/a> on CNN International&#8217;s refusal to air a documentary it commissioned uncovering the brutal crackdown by the US-backed dictatorship in Bahrain. Greenwald linked to the documentary, now available on YouTube, but many people still have not seen it. It does a brilliant job of illustrating the <a href=\"http:\/\/news.antiwar.com\/2012\/08\/01\/rights-group-bahrain-regime-weaponizing-tear-gas\/\">abuses<\/a> the people have suffered at the hands of the regime.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/zB2DeZBgTEk\" frameborder=\"0\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>It&#8217;s useful to remind yourself while watching this that Washington <a href=\"http:\/\/antiwar.com\/blog\/2011\/06\/08\/obama-praises-bahrain-tyrant-on-visit-dims-awakenings-prospects\/\">wholeheartedly supports<\/a> this kind of <a href=\"http:\/\/antiwar.com\/blog\/2012\/04\/30\/repression-beatings-and-torture-in-us-supported-bahrain\/\">repression<\/a>. The US has sent more than <a href=\"http:\/\/foreignassistance.gov\/OU.aspx?OUID=252&amp;FY=2013&amp;AgencyID=0&amp;budTab=tab_Bud_Planned\">$60 million in direct aid<\/a> to Bahrain since 2008, and has another $11 million scheduled for 2013. In recent years, the US <a href=\"http:\/\/www.tomdispatch.com\/archive\/175367\/\">has sent Bahrain<\/a>\u00a0riot gear,\u00a0tanks, helicopter gunships, and over a million pounds of ammunition &#8211; all of which have been integral to the ruthless crackdown imposed on reform-minded Bahrainis. After international condemnation, the Obama administration was forced to suspend a new $53 million package of military equipment, making it conditional on reform. And when\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/news.antiwar.com\/2011\/12\/19\/bahrain-opposition-urges-serious-reform-condemns-government-violence\/\" target=\"_blank\">Bahraini opposition groups<\/a>\u00a0and a\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/news.antiwar.com\/2011\/12\/21\/bahrain-failing-to-prosecute-abuses-continuing-repression-says-un\/\" target=\"_blank\">U.N. statement<\/a>\u00a0acknowledged that no substantive move towards reform had been made, Obama began <a href=\"http:\/\/thecable.foreignpolicy.com\/posts\/2012\/01\/27\/obama_administration_selling_new_arms_package_to_bahrain\">secretly pushing through<\/a> the arms package, circumventing congressional rules and failing to inform the public.<\/p>\n<p>The protests in Bahrain are not just protests against that particular regime; they are de facto protests against this reprehensibly US foreign policy, which <a href=\"http:\/\/www.theamericanconservative.com\/articles\/exporting-tyranny-through-foreign-aid\/\">bribes dictatorships<\/a> in order to maintain control of the Middle East. As a 2004\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.dod.mil\/pubs\/foi\/dsb\/05-F-0422.pdf\">Defense Department report<\/a> put it, when referring to the Gulf Arab states, &#8220;Without the US these regimes could not survive.&#8221;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Yesterday, in our news section, we provided a link to Glenn Greenwald&#8217;s article on CNN International&#8217;s refusal to air a documentary it commissioned uncovering the brutal crackdown by the US-backed dictatorship in Bahrain. Greenwald linked to the documentary, now available on YouTube, but many people still have not seen it. It does a brilliant job [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":86,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-16320","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"meta_box":{"disable_donate_message":"","custom_donate_message":"","subtitle":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16320","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/86"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16320"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16320\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":16322,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16320\/revisions\/16322"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16320"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16320"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16320"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=16320"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}