The Social Movement in Bahrain in 2011 and the Sectarian Dimension in Electronic Comments.

This study aims to analyze the comments of news readers on related electronic websites concerning topics published in newspapers from Gulf Arab countries and another Arab state. The research problem is linked to the social movement in Bahrain during 2011, which led to significant variation in opinions and comments. The research method followed a content analysis of 124 news articles appearing on the first page of the Al Watan, Al Riyadh, and Al-Ahram online newspapers, in their reporting of Bahrain’s social movement of 2011, these articles comprised 30 news items from Al Watan, 20 from Al Riyadh, and 19 from Al-Ahram totalling 1,929 individual comments in response to news about the social movement in Bahrain. The results indicate that the vast majority of these comments were against the movement, with a considerable number expressing negative feelings towards a specific sect. Furthermore, the results show that readers' comments exhibited racial and political affiliation to the Gulf Cooperation Council, regardless of the geographical dimension, as seen in the case of the Arab Republic of Egypt. The study concludes that these findings suggest the Arab online public sphere provides greater freedom of expression without fear of censorship or punishment. Yet it also exacerbates sectarian anger and tension in Arab societies.