People in Bahrain have held protest rallies across the Persian Gulf island country to condemn Bahraini officials over receiving Israeli minister of military affairs Benny Gantz, who arrived in the capital Manama on an unannounced visit.
On Friday, scores of Bahrainis took to the streets in different parts of the country, including Manama, to denounce Gantz’s visit to Bahrain and the Al Khalifah regime’s normalization of ties with Israel.
Protesters also walked over the occupying regime’s flag and highlighted their commitment to resist the Tel Aviv regime and support the resistance against the Zionist enemy.
They also carried banners and signs reading “Down with the US, Down with Israel.”
Gantz landed in Bahrain on Wednesday. He is the first Israeli minister of military affairs to ever officially visit the Persian Gulf country, and was accompanied by several top military and security officials, including Israeli navy chief Admiral David Saar Salama. The two sides signed a security pact.
On Thursday, Bahrain’s al-Wefaq National Islamic Society lambasted the Bahrain-Israel security pact as being devoid of legitimacy, warning it would pave the way for “intelligence and military training cooperation” between the occupying regime and Manama.
Bahrain’s ruling regime refused to inform the nation in advance about “the Israeli war minister’s visit” in order to stave off the resentment and protests that it would incur, the statement noted.
Bahrain was one of the regional states that normalized its relations with the Israeli regime via the Washington-mediated so-called “Abraham Accords” in August 2020.
On September 30 last year, Israeli foreign minister Yair Lapid arrived at the Manama airport to become the regime’s highest-ranking official to visit the Persian Gulf country since the two sides normalized their ties.
Demonstrations in Bahrain have been held on a regular basis ever since a popular uprising began in mid-February 2011.
The participants demand that the Al Khalifah regime relinquish power and allow a just system representing all Bahrainis to be established.
Manama, however, has gone to great lengths to clamp down on any sign of dissent.