Page 34 - Records of Bahrain (7) (i)_Neat

20 Records of Bahrain

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religious ^ypteria of tho Bhiites on tho Tenth of

Wuharram provides moons nlso to express sooial end
political feelings thot ore at other times oupprosaod or
frustrated,
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4, About tho middle of tho morning of Sunday September
20, whon the processions wore moving down Belgrave Rood

in Manama some olteroation occurred between some of the
Shiite participants and a group of 8unnite spectators,
with whom the aidoo of tho rood were crowded, Mr.Wpllace,
who saw this, reports that tho police tried to remove
one Shiite who appeared to bo threatening the speotptorp,

but were hindered from doing so by tho jostling of tho
crowd, A Bahrain Government oar forcod a passage thrpugh
tho mob and order was temporarily restored pntil a body

of Shiites arrived to rescue the one the police were
trying to arrest; these were armed with sticks..and chair,
legs, and it seems clear thot at this stage the battle
had begun, and the police hod lost control of the crowd,

6, The main body of the procession was brought to a
halt in Belgrave Road, and there is evidence of some sort
of parley between the Shiite leaders and a group of
Sunnites, but individual fights seem to have been going on
at the some time, end "the arrival on the scene of a

number of men with bloody clouts on their heads and
dressed in white tunics sprinkled with blood" marked a
resumption of the general melee. (The blood,.of course,
flowed from wounds self-inflicted in religious fervour -
if It was not henna, or borrowed from chickens). A .
considerable number of Shiites had now armed themselves

with sticks or handy plecos of wood. The police tried to
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