Middle East Follow

Did the British government send a family to be tortured in Libya as a gift to Colonel Gaddafi? Sami al-Saadi says so—and he is claiming damages for the years of torture he suffered.

The Bahraini government announced last week that medical staff threatened with 15 years in prison will now be tried by a civilian court.

The Yemeni opposition movement is rightly suspicious of claims made by president Ali Abdullah Saleh on state television last Saturday.

Several thousand Bedouins demonstrated in the Israeli city of Beersheva on Thursday of last week against the government’s Praver plan to dislocate them.

The Bahraini government announced last night (Wednesday) that the medical staff facing sentences of up to 15 years will now be tried by a civilian court.

Nurse and union leader Rula al Saffar has been tortured, threatened with rape, and now faces 15 years in a Bahrain jail.

An unmanned CIA drone blew up Islamist leader Anwar al Awlaki and an unknown number of companions in Yemen last week.

Rula al Saffar is the president of the nursing union in Bahrain, assistant professor at the college of health science and head of the emergency nursing programme.

Protests continued to grow against returned president Ali Abdullah Saleh in Yemen’s capital Sana’a last weekend.

Qatari-owned news network Al-Jazeera’s director general has resigned after eight years—only to be replaced by a member of a Qatari royal family.

Protesters in Bahrain have refused to succumb to repression and continue to take to the streets to fight for freedom. Thousands of Bahrainis from villages surrounding the capital Manama tried to force their way back to the city’s Pearl Square on Friday of last week.

Huge protests defied a new wave of repression in Syria this week, as the regime sought revenge for military defections.