THE evidence against Qatar is mounting, yet I imagine there may be some people who still don’t believe Doha could really be guilty of having a hand in Bahrain’s unrest.
After all the allegation is shocking, almost to the point of disbelief.
“Surely Qatar, Bahrain’s GCC ally, wouldn’t really try to destabilise its neighbour?” I picture Western diplomats asking themselves as they digest the headlines with their breakfast.
After all, news that Qatar’s Prime Minister was talking to a leader of the Bahraini protest movement at the height of unrest was stunning, as was the revelation that Qatar controlled a Twitter account that instigated unrest in 2011.
But I have another reason for believing the allegations against Qatar are true, particularly accusations that Doha used the Al Jazeera network to add fuel to the fire.
It goes back to a conversation I had a few years ago with an Italian, who used to live in an apartment overlooking the highway leading to the old Pearl Roundabout.
He was explaining to me over dinner why he would never trust a journalist again.
Cast your mind back to the early days of the unrest in February 2011, after the landmark junction had been cleared of protesters a first time and security personnel were deployed to defend it.
My Italian confidant recalled how, looking down from his apartment balcony, he watched as protesters marched towards the Pearl Roundabout.
He had also turned on the news, Al Jazeera to be exact, to keep up to date with what was happening on Bahrain’s streets during those tumultuous times.
What happened next shocked him.
As he looked at the TV he realised Al Jazeera was broadcasting live footage of the same protesters walking towards the roundabout right outside his window.
The channel then showed some of the protesters lying motionless on the street outside his building covered in blood, after apparently being shot.
However, what Al Jazeera didn’t show was something he witnessed with his own eyes – the same protesters had actually taken out blood bags stolen from a hospital, soaked themselves in blood, voluntarily lay down in the street and pretended to be shot for the cameras.
“And the award for Best Director goes to…”
When I first heard this story it didn’t really surprise me, since it was clear very early on that those orchestrating the Bahrain uprising knew how to use the media to generate domestic and foreign support.
I didn’t see the Al Jazeera footage myself, nor was I there to witness protesters covering themselves in blood and pretending they had been shot.
But I have no reason to think my Italian acquaintance was lying, since he had absolutely nothing to gain from sharing this story with me.
The allegation about blood bags is not new and even the Bahrain Independent Commission of Inquiry (BICI), which investigated the events of 2011, confirmed that: “Commission investigators also received video footage showing protesters pouring blood from blood bags onto their clothes.”
But it is only now, after the latest allegations about Qatar’s role in the 2011 unrest, that the real significance of the Italian’s story struck me.
He believed Al Jazeera deliberately portrayed an untrue version of events to its global audience, hence his distrust of journalists – and who can blame him?
At the time I didn’t realise the magnitude of his observation, and possibly neither did he, since he may have been among the first to spot evidence of Qatari collusion with Bahraini protesters.
I wonder if it is only a matter of time before more proof of Doha’s duplicity is made public.