THERE'S A REASON THE SA'UDS LOVE DONALD AND BIBI (AND VICE VERSA):

If the US-backed, Saudi-led coalition's war on Yemen was known as "the forgotten war", the 2011 anti-government protests in Bahrain soon became "the forgotten uprising". [...]

Needless to say, Bahrain's uprising was short-lived due to the military intervention of Saudi forces, who assisted the Bahraini government in brutally cracking down on the popular and peaceful protests.

The mass demonstrations by the largely Shia majority population against the iron rule of the Al-Khalifa family (who are from the archipelago's Sunni minority and have been ruling since the 18th century, with origins said to be from what is today's central Saudi Arabia) were inspired by the events in the region nine years ago. However, they are rooted in the country's referendum ten years prior, whereby citizens voted in favour of the National Action Charter which was supposed to usher in democratic reforms, and did not materialise into any lasting reconciliation between the state and the people.

Instead, human rights abuses and state repression intensified as many dissidents and opposition leaders were imprisoned, executed or faced exile under stringent counterterrorism measures. Blame was directed at Iran for being behind the civil unrest, a charge which Tehran and the local opposition denied. Furthermore, the country's main oppositionist party Al-Wefaq was dissolved in 2016, considered to be one of the biggest setbacks for Bahraini civil society. Alarmingly, hundreds of Bahraini nationals have had their citizenship revoked by the state, rendering most of them stateless.

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