Bahrain’s Al Khalifah regime deports youth for supporting Sheikh Qassim

Bahraini regime officials have deported a young man to neighboring Saudi Arabia over his support for prominent Shia cleric, Sheikh Isa Qassim, who has been stripped of nationality by the Al Khalifah regime and is suffering from deteriorating health.

Ahmed Ali al-Attiya, born to a Saudi father and a Bahraini mother, was handed over to Saudi authorities earlier this week, Arabic-language Lualua television network reported on Monday.

Attiya was a resident of the northwestern village of Diraz, where the residence of the 79-year-old clergyman is located, and had spent nearly two months in detention prior to his deportation. His two brothers have also been jailed.

On May 21, a Bahraini court convicted Sheikh Qassim of illegal collection of funds and money laundering and sentenced him to one year in jail suspended for three years.

It also ordered him to pay $265,266 in fines. The court ruling sparked widespread demonstrations across the kingdom.

Bahraini authorities stripped the cleric of his citizenship on June 20, 2016. They later dissolved the Islamic Enlightenment Institution, founded by him, in addition to the opposition al-Risala Islamic Association.

Sheikh Qassim is reportedly suffering from high blood pressure, diabetes, and heart disease.

United Nations spokesman Stephane Dujarric demanded last November that the top Shia cleric be released, and asked for immediate medical attention for him.

Manama regime has stepped up crackdown on political dissent in the wake of US President Donald Trump's meeting with Bahraini monarch King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifah during a summit in the Saudi capital city of Riyadh on May 21, 2017.

Less than 48 hours after the US president left Saudi Arabia, Bahraini regime troops attacked supporters of Sheikh Qassim, in Diraz, killing at least five people and arresting 286 others. Reports said 19 policemen were also injured in the clashes.

The London-based Bahrain Institute for Rights and Democracy said Trump “effectively gave Hamad a blank check to continue the repression of his people.”

Thousands of anti-regime protesters have held demonstrations in Bahrain on an almost daily basis ever since a popular uprising began in the country in mid-February 2011.

They are demanding that the Al Khalifah dynasty relinquish power and allow a just system representing all Bahrainis to be established.

Manama has gone to great lengths to clamp down on any sign of dissent. On March 14, 2011, troops from Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates were deployed to assist Bahrain in its crackdown.

Scores of people have lost their lives and hundreds of others sustained injuries or got arrested as a result of the Al Khalifah regime’s crackdown.

On March 5, Bahrain’s parliament approved the trial of civilians at military tribunals in a measure blasted by human rights campaigners as being tantamount to imposition of an undeclared martial law countrywide.   

King Hamad ratified the constitutional amendment on April 3.

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