Bahrain: The Day of Wrath · Global Voices
Amira Al Hussaini

This post is part of our special coverage of Bahrain Protests 2011.
Protests took place in many places in Bahrain today, in what has been called Bahrain's Day of Wrath. Netizens gasped in horror as they saw how police forces dealt with peaceful protesters from the early morning, quickly exchanging links to horrible videos showing police atrocities on Twitter and other social networking sites.
Still from a video showing riot police charging at a peaceful demonstration in Diraz village, Bahrain on 14 February 2011, firing as people flee. Video posted on Youtube by user smodh92.
One protester is reportedly dead (killed) and several people are said to be injured as riot control police fired gas canisters and rubber bullets directly at protesters at close range, as you can all see from this video and this photo post.
Tweeps are now complaining that the Internet is slow. While some are debating whether the government has a hand in this, others are quick to point that the slow speed could be as a result in the surge in traffic as people rummage through different sites to see what happened in the country today.
Also today, the government censored a YouTube video page and reportedly the Bambuser account of Human Rights activist Nabeel Rajab.
Here's a snapshot of reactions on Twitter:
@chanadbh: Internet censorship in #Bahrain continues: Bambuser channel of activist @Nabeelrajab is blocked, along with other videos of protests
@BuZain: @ahmedalsairafi excessive uploads excuse doesn't make sense. int. uplinks r usually symmetric with same up/down bandwidth @eyade @ammar456
@BuZain: @JustAmira hard to tell. I've been running tests with no conclusive results. it's clear than only international uplinks are slow.
@eyade: @BuZain is on the money, I am not buying it, upload and download aren't the same thing @ahmedalsairafi @ammar456
@ba7ari: Regime had slows down the Internet in a way to stop ppl to send what is happening in ​#Bahrain #Feb14 #HRW #EU
@bh14feb: The government is very likely throttling the internet speed to hinder people from reporting the crimes committed by the police #bahrain
@ahmadbr: Internet is becoming more slower over the time #Bahrain #batelco #Internet #feb14
@nadooi_wish: #Bahrain get the internet back into normal. This getting on my nerves!
@BaghdadBrian: #CONFIRMED from #Bahrain its very very slow, internet is generally slow, doesnt appear to be targetted, no blocks #friendinbahrain
@phoul: To the people of #Bahrain: Use Tor to get around the Internet Blockade and avoid monitoring. https://www.torproject.org/ #Tor
@justamira: The Internet is dying. Bye bye laptop, off to grab those carrier pigeons I have been training for this dark day #Feb14 #Bahrain
@M_Sharaf: Viva and Zain internet disconnect and connect a minute later simultaneousely… #Bahrain experimenting with the off switch?
@MennatAllah87: #Algeria-Internet banned just like wt took place in #Egypt. Now in #Bahrain they r playing it smart..Slow;so no1 can upload anything. SHAME.
On blogs, Bint Battuta in Bahrain translates some of the demands made by protesters; Mahmood Al Yousif calls for wisdom to prevail and I predict how the police forces will deal with political dissent in my country.
For more on the protests in Bahrain, follow the Twitter hash tag #14Feb
This post is part of our special coverage of Bahrain Protests 2011.