ABSTRACT
During Arab Spring, thousands of Shia protesters gathered in Manama, Bahrain, with longstanding and legitimate social and economic grievances. Instead of fostering an initial national dialogue, the Obama administration did nothing to stop Sunni ally Saudi Arabia’s invasion of Bahrain in March of 2011, at the request of the repressive Bahrain Sunni royal family, to quell Shiite protests. In November 2011, the Bahrain government conceded that it had used “excessive force” against the peaceful demonstration, 1 and the US Secretary of Defense conceded that Iran had nothing to do with the demonstration. 2
