Protests have broken out all across the globe, from Tunisia to Egypt to Bahrain to Saudi Arabia. Even on our own soil, protestors in Madison, Wisconsin have come out of the woodwork to oppose drastic measures by that state’s governor. In Libya, a country long under the tyranical rule of Moammar Gadhafi – the only despot in history who has inexplicably kept the title “Colonel” – protests have broken out as well, and in three days as many as eighty-four protestors have been killed by security forces:
The city’s al-Jala hospital received the bodies of 35 people killed in the shooting, according to Human Rights Watch (HRW) and media reports.
In a statement on its website, HRW says there were demonstrations in at least four other eastern cities on Friday – al-Bayda, Ajdabiya, Zawiya, and Darnah – after security forces shot dead a number of protesters in the previous days.
A senior hospital official told the group: “We put out a call to all the doctors in Benghazi to come to the hospital and for everyone to contribute blood because I’ve never seen anything like this before.”
Libya has been ruled by Colonel Gadhafi for 42-years. It has long been considered a terrorist state and has faced US and international sanctions. Reports of the current violence are hard to come by, as journalists can’t get visas, and various internet sites like Facebook and al-Jazeera have been blocked by the Libyan government.
Meanwhile, in Bahrain protestors have been gunned down by government officials not only during protests, but while those protestors slept at night. Government helicopters fired on protestors as they fled the scene. Now France and Brittain have halted arms sales to Bahrain, and international pressure has put pressure on the kingdom to end the violence.
Anything can rise up out of the ashes of rebellion, including frightening bloodshed and civil war. But for the moment, these uprisings should be seen as at the very least a healthy expression of democracy perhaps, at long last, taking root in the middle-east – and not at the barrel of a gun, or at the tail end of American wars, shock and awe, and nation-building. It may still be messy, but at least it’s theirs to own.
