Background

Bahrain is a country about one-fifth the size of Rhode Island and has a population of 1.5 million. Most sources indicate that the Bahraini citizenry is about 70 percent Shiite. However,  the government maintains that the actual proportion is smaller. 

Bahrain has been ruled by the Al Khalifa family since the royal family’s ancestors arrived from neighboring Qatar in 1783. Although the country has been widely perceived to be more open and progressive than its neighbors in the Gulf, the reality is complex. Bahrain’s government has adopted policies aimed at supporting religious tolerance, bolstering public health care and schooling, and upholding women’s rights, including the right to vote and run for office. 

Despite these policies, Bahrain has long had a dismal human rights record marked by a lack of political accountability.  Furthermore, Bahrain has a history of discriminatory and repressive policies toward the majority Shiite population. On several occasions since the 1970s, tensions in Bahrain have boiled over into widespread protests over government repression. These were met with violence from state security forces. The government has on occasion, promised limited democratic reforms to address protesters’ concerns. However, these reforms were often merely cosmetic changes. The ruling family’s power remained unchanged in reality.

Bahrain has, for decades, maintained a strategic relationship with the United States. The country became the site of a small U.S. naval presence following World War II. After Iraq invaded Kuwait in 1990, the United States enlarged its presence in Bahrain by reestablishing and basing the U.S. Navy’s Fifth Fleet there. In 2002, the George W. Bush administration designated Bahrain a major non-NATO ally. This status entailed certain military benefits for Bahrain. These benefits included participation in military-related research and development and special financing for the purchase of U.S. military equipment. In 2004, the United States and Bahrain signed a free trade agreement that expanded commercial relations between the countries.

Renewed unrest in Bahrain began on February 14, 2011. On this day,  government forces shot at and beat peaceful protesters. Inspired by the successful uprisings in Egypt and Tunisia in the previous months, the demonstrators, generally Shias but also Sunnis, believed the moment was opportune to demand a more democratic society. The government’s attempts to quash the uprising proved counterproductive because its use of force hardened the opposition’s call for an end to monarchy. On February 17, security forces raided a protest camp. This resulted in the killing of several protesters and injuring hundreds more. When protests intensified in March 2011, the ruling family appealed to its allied neighbors for help. In response, the governments of Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates dispatched two thousand troops to Manama to help the Bahraini government put down the protests and reestablish order. 

Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates acted to support Bahrain for two reasons. First, as fellow nondemocratic monarchies, they feared that the same popular movements that brought down Tunisian and Egyptian dictators could spread and endanger their own holds on power. Second, they believed that the mostly Shiite uprising in Bahrain was being incited by Iran—a large, non-Arab, predominantly Shiite country and rival of Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, and their allies. The Bahraini government argued that Iran, which until 1970 claimed Bahrain as part of its territory, was attempting to undermine the monarchy. In February 2013, Bahraini officials arrested eight people taking part in anti-government protests and alleged that these individuals had links to Iran.

Following the initial uprising, King Hamad formed the Bahrain Independent Commission of Inquiry (BICI) to investigate the government crackdown that began in response to the February 14 protests. The commission’s five-hundred-page report found evidence of excessive force and torture and concluded that Bahraini authorities had caused the deaths of protesters. The commission made twenty-six recommendations to the government to ensure that such a crackdown would not happen again. Bahrain and other states welcomed the report. However,  critics expressed concern that its recommendations did not specifically address ways to resolve the underlying political crisis. Bahrain’s government agreed to adhere to the report’s recommendations but ultimately implemented only a handful of them [PDF]. 

In 2012, reports of government-supported raids on Shiite mosques and villages made achieving a political resolution to the crisis more difficult. An upsurge in violence took place in mid-2012, when the government proceeded with plans to host a Formula 1 race. Bahraini officials had previously used this type of event to showcase the country as modern and progressive. Opposition groups took advantage of the large contingent of international news agencies present for the racing event by staging demonstrations before and during the race. This sparked clashes with Bahraini authorities.

In the following years, reports of arbitrary detention and torture continued to surface. Bahraini authorities arrested hundreds of opposition members on charges of militancy, often conducting raids in largely Shiite communities. Bahraini courts frequently jailed dissidents or, in some cases, revoked their citizenship. 

Unrest continued to flare up throughout 2013. Renewed demonstrations frequently met a harsh police response. Several bomb attacks occurred over the course of the year, killing three Bahraini police officers. Opposition groups condemned those attacks. Bahraini authorities accused Iran-linked terrorist groups of carrying them out. Although the government called for a renewed national dialogue at the beginning of the year, Bahrain’s main opposition group later decided to withdraw from the talks after one of its ranking members was arrested on charges of inciting terrorism. As the country approached the third anniversary of its initial uprising, simmering tensions threatened to boil over at any moment.