Is Bahrain creating a new terrorist threat?

On April 4, the Saudi cabinet issued a statement claiming that "peace and stability" had returned to Bahrain "as a result of the wisdom of its leadership in dealing with its internal matters and because of its people giving priority to national interests." Nearly three weeks earlier, the Saudi-dominated Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) had sent some 1,200 ...

NOAH SEELAM/AFP/Getty Images
NOAH SEELAM/AFP/Getty Images
NOAH SEELAM/AFP/Getty Images

On April 4, the Saudi cabinet issued a statement claiming that "peace and stability" had returned to Bahrain "as a result of the wisdom of its leadership in dealing with its internal matters and because of its people giving priority to national interests." Nearly three weeks earlier, the Saudi-dominated Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) had sent some 1,200 troops across the 16-mile causeway linking the two countries. Their official mission was to secure key government facilities from the thousands of protesters who had taken to the streets since Feb. 17. Unofficially, they were there to send a chilling, unequivocal message: Game over.

On April 4, the Saudi cabinet issued a statement claiming that "peace and stability" had returned to Bahrain "as a result of the wisdom of its leadership in dealing with its internal matters and because of its people giving priority to national interests." Nearly three weeks earlier, the Saudi-dominated Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) had sent some 1,200 troops across the 16-mile causeway linking the two countries. Their official mission was to secure key government facilities from the thousands of protesters who had taken to the streets since Feb. 17. Unofficially, they were there to send a chilling, unequivocal message: Game over.

Since then, the government of Bahrain has instituted a total crackdown, beating teenagers in the streets, clamping down on press freedoms, and hauling online activists in for questioning. The daily demonstrations, overwhelmingly by Shiite protesters demanding equal political and civil rights, have indeed stopped. Yet, far from ensuring "peace and stability" in Bahrain, by apparently eliminating all other political options, the ruling Al Khalifa family has established the conditions for a potential outbreak of urban terrorism by Shiite extremists. Long-standing Gulf Sunni fears of a sectarian rebellion in Bahrain and the possibility of major Iranian interference in the island nation have informed an extreme overreaction that is developing all the signs of becoming a self-fulfilling prophecy. This can’t end well.

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Hussein Ibish is a senior resident scholar at the Arab Gulf States Institute in Washington.

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