[Salon] Ashura Protests and Arrests Reflect Bahrain’s Damaged Civil Peace - ArabDigest.org Guest Post

Ashura Protests and Arrests Reflect Bahrain’s Damaged Civil Peace Summary: as the war in Iran again heats up the repression of Bahrain’s majority Shi’a community has intensified. We thank Andrew McIntosh for today’s newsletter. Andrew is the Director of Research at the NGO SALAM for Democracy and Human Rights. His specialty fields are media analysis, sectarianism and statelessness in Bahrain, Kuwait and Syria. With the onset of the war between Israel, the US and Iran and Iranian strikes on Bahrain, high tensions between some Shi’a Bahrainis and the Sunni monarchy have manifested as a crackdown on all forms of dissent, both real and perceived. Limitations have been placed on rituals, processions, and clerics and participants have been summoned and arrested by security forces. Recent Ashura commemorations were subjected to wide-scale securitisation by the authorities. While protests from Bahraini Shi’a, who are often marginalised in Bahraini society, are not new, causes such as opposition to normalisation with Israel and anger over Bahraini involvement in the war with Iran have galvanised segments of the Shi’a population, which the government regards as a threat. The result has been further polarisation, where members of the opposition have decried security actions as a state-sponsored “War on the Shia” while pro-government influencers accuse activists of being treasonous and aligned with “foreign powers”. An Iranian newspaper with a front page photo of the Bahraini dictator King Hamad bin Isa bin Salman Al Khalifa and others, along with the words of the Leader of the Iranian Islamic Revolution: "The inevitable revenge against the criminals." Acts of suppression and protests by Shi’a are more overt in 2026, following an established pattern of constraints on Ashura in Bahrain. These events are monitored and policed by authorities, as Shi’a have become politicised over the past six years. Increasingly harsh, sectarian regulations from the government, as well as defiance from protesters, some of whom have gravitated increasingly towards support for Iran and the Axis of Resistance, have further enflamed tensions between communities in Bahrain. Ashura has historically served as a focal point for sectarian tensions in Bahrain. For the Shi’a population, the advent is a time of mourning, where Hussein Ibn Ali, the third Shi’a imam and grandson of the Prophet Muhammad, who was killed at the Battle of Karbala in 680, is commemorated. It involves large processions, battle re-enactments and religious sermons. Often framed as an event of sacrifice, injustice, and resistance to tyranny, it has the potential to galvanise Shi’a crowds around political issues. Since 2011, Ashura commemorations in Bahrain have been subject to robust restrictions, with the government fearful of crowds coalescing into a powerful protest movement, like the one violently suppressed during the Arab Spring. These have manifested as prohibitions on where crowds can gather and partake in rituals, as well as the surreptitious removal of religious banners and the closure of Shi’a mosques. Since the Hamas attacks on 7 October 2023, Shi’a events, including Ashura, have become more overtly political, with imams and reciters publicly criticising the Bahraini government for normalising relations with Israel via the Abraham Accords and often being arrested afterwards. In 2024, Imam al-Siddiq Mosque, the largest Shi’a house of worship in Bahrain and a site of repeated anti-normalisation protests, was forcefully shuttered by authorities, who violently clashed with local worshippers. In 2024 and 2025, this resulted in an unprecedented number of Shi’a clerics and reciters being summoned for interrogation or arrested by security forces during Ashura. By 2025, it had become commonplace for a religious figure to publicly condemn normalisation at Ashura, only to be arrested 24-48 hours later. In 2026, Ashura restrictions have increased dramatically, in the wake of a securitised campaign against dissent following what the Ministry of Interior has called “exceptional circumstances” of continued Iranian attacks on Bahrain. The subsequent crackdown has targeted all forms of dissent. Security forces have arrested individuals for posting footage of Iranian drone strikes, criticising the Bahraini or US government, or expressing sympathy for Ayatollah Khamenei after his death. In March, one individual died in Bahraini custody, having been severely tortured. Although the campaign is far-reaching, Bahrain’s Shi’a communities, of whom an estimated 52% regarded Iran as a friendly country before the war, have been disproportionately targeted by security forces and cast as “traitors to the homeland” or of “non-Bahraini origin.” Vigilant of any public dissent or unrest, and claiming Iran is weaponising Shi’a grievances, the Bahraini government has imposed the harshest curbs on Ashura celebrations in its history, in line with a systematic security campaign against anyone the state associates with Iran. Over the past two months, over 50 Shia clerics and preachers were arrested in a series of night raids. The Bahraini Ministry of Interior announced that the clerics were detained for “sympathy with Iranian attacks”, "contact with foreign entities” and “having links to the Iranian Revolutionary Guard.” The names and photos of those arrested were shared on social media by authorities. In the wake of the arrest campaign, numerous Shia clerics and activists were barred from participating in Ashura activities or have reported facing intimidation by security forces, telling them not to take part. There has also been increased monitoring of sermons and displayed religious symbols, with warnings from authorities against discussing topics considered a “politicisation of Ashura.” Bahraini authorities have decreed that Ashura’s 10-day observance be halved this year. It has banned travel to and from Iraq and Iran, common sites of pilgrimage for Ashura, and restricted processions, which typically last until dawn, to 2 am in the capital, Manama, and 12 am in the countryside. Processions can only be led by registered, pre-vetted Shi’a clerics, with gatherings departing from mosques or operating outside the framework established by the authorities strictly prohibited. Moreover, the Ministry of Interior instructed worshippers to refrain from “raising of flags and chanting of slogans linked to regional organisations and agendas.” Angered and defiant, many Bahraini civilians have engaged in civil disobedience by violating these regulations. This has included engaging in unauthorised processions, remaining in gatherings past curfew and praying outside permitted areas. The result has been a renewed campaign of mass arrests. In June, 130 Bahrainis, including organisers of religious events, were detained on the grounds of political activity, including “unauthorised” participation in Ashura. Some arrests appear to be sectarian and politicised in nature, such as those of clerics and laymen for reading Shi’a texts authorities consider politicised, such as the Ziyarat of Imam Hussein, or for wearing t-shirts with the image of Qassem Soleimani the IRGC chief assassinated by the US in 2020. Hardening positions from the Bahraini authorities and those who oppose the crackdowns is indicative of the country’s sectarian and political impasse, with both sides regarding the other as untrustworthy. While the government and their supporters feel justified in suppressing expression and peaceful assembly to prevent the potential weaponisation of events by a hostile neighbour, for many Bahraini Shi’a, these measures are taken as proof of the government’s sectarianism, with opposition groups framing events as an attack on their religious identity and depicting unauthorised Shia gatherings as a form of resistance and praising those who take part. With the ceasefire between the US and Iran declared over by President Trump and further attacks occurring in Bahrain, civil peace could be tested to its breaking point, as Shi’a protesters engage in illegal symbolic funerals for Ayatollah Khamenei while the Bahraini government has recently stripped 69 Shi’as and their families of their citizenship without formal charges. With both sides entrenched in fear and resentment, sectarian securitisation and human rights abuses create the conditions for further protests and growing Iranian sympathies among segments of the majority Shi’a population, resulting in more anxiety from the ruling Sunni population. With no middle ground or dialogue being explored, civil peace in the Gulf island kingdom appears extremely fragile.