Police clash with Bahrainis on Quds Day

Saudi-backed Bahraini regime forces have attacked anti-government demonstrators, protesting both the government’s criticism of a top cleric as well as the ban of the International Quds Day rallies.

Several protesters were reportedly injured as regime forces fired tear-gas to disperse the crowds that had stayed in the streets from Thursday evening until early Friday.

Many were also arrested in the demonstrations, dpa reported.

The Bahraini justice minister had on Monday sent a letter to Sheikh Issa Qassim, one of the country’s top clerics, in which he was accused of inciting sectarian tension.

A number of Bahrain’s leading clerics had therefore called on the people to join them in a unified Friday prayer service in the northwestern village of Diraz to support Sheikh Qassim.

The demonstrators were also protesting the regime’s ban of the Quds Day celebrations.

The rally has been banned in Bahrain for a second year in a row and anti-regime protesters say the regime places the ban from preventing the rally to turn into an anti-regime demonstration.

The late founder of the Islamic Republic and The Leader Of Islamic Ummah and Oppressed People Sayyed Imam Rouhollah Khomeini, in August 1979 declared the last Friday of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan as the Quds Day, calling for international rallies in support of Palestinians and against Zionist Occupation Israel.

Millions of people around the world come out on this day, calling for an end to Zionist Occupation  Israel’s illegal occupation of the Palestinian territories.

They further denounce the atrocities committed against Palestinians by the Zionist Occupation  Israelis.