TEHRAN — Protests spread across Bahrain over the weekend as demonstrators demanded the release of detained Shia scholars and clerics, and security forces responded by arresting at least 25 people in raids and summonses.
Marchers filled streets in Sitra Island, Al-Hamala, Al-Markh and Iskan Ali, carrying portraits of jailed clerics and of Sheikh Isa Ahmed Qassim, the country’s senior Shia authority.
Organizers called it a “Day of Popular Anger.” The demand was simple: free every detainee, clerics first, and drop the cases.
On Sunday, a court postponed to Nov. 22 its verdict against 69 defendants, 60 of them clerics, accused of forming a “terrorist group” and “plotting against the constitutional order.”
56 are in custody, and 13 clerics are being tried in absentia. The World Organization Against Torture says the proceedings are marred by torture allegations, and rights groups told Alhurra that confessions were coerced.
Sheikh Qassim, stripped of his citizenship in 2016, urged supporters to back the defendants peacefully.
The security forces did not wait for the marches to end. On Nov. 8, they took Hajj Hassan Al-Muallima, head of the Sanabis matam, and administrator Hajj Ahmed Eid, plus Sayed Ali Ibrahim, Hussein Ali Mahdi, Hussein Mirza Al-Hilli and Saeed Mohammed Saeed, all summoned for questioning.
