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The Saudi security forces have laid siege to Al-Awamiyah, a village of about 30,000 situated in the Al-Qatif region in the Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia. Cement roadblocks have closed all exits. Electricity and water has been cut off to many houses, and Saudi regime snipers roam the streets in armored vehicles. Residents report suffering from food shortages and are deprived of medical aid.

A number of deaths and injuries have occurred among the residents, including the death of a small child identified as Jawad al-Dagher, and the child’s mother was also critically injured. A young man, identified as Ali Mohammad Kazim, was also shot dead at the hands of the Saudi forces.

After the uprisings in Tunisia, Egypt and Libya, which became known as the Arab Spring, anonymous Facebook users called for demonstrations against the Saudi monarchy on March 11, 2011, but the uprising was met with a brutal crackdown on activists. Some were arrested for using social media, many were imprisoned, and some were beheaded. Saudi nationals are online and 2.4 million of them are active on Twitter, accounting for nearly half of its active users in the Arab region: the possibility of organization and revolt exists.

Saudi Arabia is an absolute monarchy and does not tolerate calls for freedom or reform. The oil rich kingdom executes by beheading over one hundred people each year. The absence of human rights and gender equality in Saudi Arabia are well documented.Amnesty International reported that 156 people were put to death in Saudi Arabia last year. Human rights groups said among those beheaded were political activists.

According to the CIA supported “The Political Instability Task Force” (PITF), which studies risks, the Saudi government could fall by several factors: either from a popular uprising, or by the failure of the Saudi King and royal family, who are the ruling elite, to remain united and loyal to each other, in the face of a revolution. A revolution can be crushed using brutal force against the people, but will the ruling elite remain loyal to each other? According to expert observers of the Saudi Royal family, they are embroiled in power struggles, based on money and jealousy most of the time. In fact, one of their Kings was murdered by his own nephew. At the present time, there is an acutely tense situation between the King’s youthful son Mohammed bin Salman, and the designated Crown Prince Muhammad bin Nayef. If the Monarchy depends on loyalty and brotherly love, we may witness a meltdown.

Nimr Baqir al-Nimr, known as Sheikh Nimr, was a cleric from Al-Awamiyah. During the 2011–2012 protests, al-Nimr called for protestors to resist police bullets using "the roar of the word" rather than violence, and predicted the collapse of the government if repression continued. The uprising developed into a call for equality. He was arrested for his calls for free elections in 2006, 2009, and in 2012 the police shot him and arrested him. On October15, 2014 al-Nimr was sentenced to death, and was beheaded in January 2016 along with 46 others. In March 2017, after a long campaign of harassment, the Saudi security forces killed two members of the Nimr family during a raid on a farm in eastern Saudi Arabia. Miqdad and Mohammad Al-Nimr were killed at a farm in Awamiyah, the Nimr family hometown. Awamiyah is identified as a center for resistance against the Saudi state.

British lawyer Ben Emmerson concluded there are suspected cases of torture and that activists were being jailed by secret, closed door courts. Emmerson conducted an investigation into the Saudi 2014 counter-terrorism law saying it contains an "unacceptably broad definition" of what terrorism is.

"I strongly condemn the use of counter-terrorism legislation and penal sanctions against individuals peacefully exercising their rights to freedom of expression," said the special rapporteur to the UN's high commissioner on human rights.

The attack on Al-Awamiya started at dawn on Wednesday May 10, 2017 with Saudi forces bringing bulldozers, excavators and police armored cars in order to begin the wholesale demolition of a neighborhood called Al-Masoura. Al-Masoura is a neighborhood that comprises historic buildings in Al-Awamiya. Tractors and demolishing equipment, supported by military vehicles, began to demolish houses and ancient structures.

The European Saudi Organization for Human Rights (ESOHR) reported that the security forces closed additional entrances to the city with barricades in an indication that authorities intend to continue their raid until they demolish the largest possible number of houses. “Residents have been pressured in many ways, including through power cuts, to vacate their homes and businesses without adequate alternative resettlement options, leaving them at best with insufficient compensation and at worst, with nowhere to go," said the UN Special rapporteur on the right to adequate housing, Leilani Farha.

Saudi government forces are bombing, shelling, firing and bulldozing houses in a plan of forced displacement and collective punishment against the people in the region over their role in the peaceful demonstrations about demanding reforms in the Kingdom. The Saudi solution to legitimate aspirations of the citizens is to erase the village and disperse the population under forced expulsion and displacement. They think that Awamiyah is the threat against the throne, and not the lack of human rights.

Mohammed Al Nimr, son of the martyr Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr said , “The whole town is under heavy weapons attack by the Saudi forces and the people are suffering under a barbaric regime that does not know any language except violence.” Photos and videos have emerged of destroyed buildings riddled with bullet holes and huge fireballs burning from the aftermath of aerial bombing. The main mosque in Qatif has been shut by Saudi authorities, and regime troops fired rocket-propelled grenades at al-Sayed Mohammad mosque in Awamiyah’s al-Masoura neighborhood, completely destroying it, while attacking another mosque in the district of al-Deira. Saudi Arabia was forced in 2016 to admit their use of UK-made cluster bombs in neighboring Yemen, and now images emerge of their use in Awamiyah, on Saudi citizens.

The British PM Theresa May has time and again denied that the UK is ignoring its value of freedom in order to make money selling the Saudi regime weapons. The US has long sacrificed human rights for other foreign policy objectives. A senior White House official stating on condition of anonymity, said the US arms package could end up surpassing more than $300 billion over a decade to help Saudi Arabia boost its defensive capabilities. The “international community”, so often referred to as the “civilized world”, has no problem with brutal regimes as long as the money is flowing into weapons manufacturers in USA, UK, Canada and France. In fact, US Senators and British MPs as well as German officials all refer to Saudi Arabia as their key ally in the region.

On April 6, 2017 three experts from the United Nations on cultural rights, housing and extreme poverty called on the Government of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia to immediately halt the planned demolition of a 400-year-old walled neighborhood in the village of Awamiyah as these actions violate international law. Karima Bennoune, the United Nations Special Rapporteur in the field of cultural rights, explained the “importance not only to local people and the entire cultural landscape of Awamiyah, but also has national significance for the history and cultural heritage of Saudi Arabia.”

The King and his ruling elite were under the impression they would be immune to the Arab Spring, however by failing to respond to the legitimate demands of the citizens, they are now facing a late Arab Spring which may shake the country to its foundations in the shifting sands.

Sources:

https://www.alaraby.co.uk/english/news/2017/5/5/saudi-arabia-detaining-activists-on-terrorism-charges-says-un

http://www.middleeasteye.net/news/several-killed-saudi-town-enters-fifth-day-siege-2023122130

https://www.cfr.org/expert-brief/how-stable-saudi-arabia

www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-12482678