1981 Bahraini coup d'état attempt

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After Ayatollah Khomeini came to power in Iran in 1979, Tehran made clear its intention to spread its Islamic Revolution throughout the Middle East^[1] [1]. Arab states on the Persian Gulf with their large Shia populations were seen as primary targets and the Iranian government immediately set about supporting Persian Gulf Islamist organisations with money, arms, logistics and training in urban warfare.

One of the most dramatic manifestations of this strategy was the failed coup d’etat by militants in Bahrain in 1981. Operating under the auspices of the Islamic Front for the Liberation of Bahrain^[2], an Iranian-based Islamist organisation, the plan was for a small force of Bahraini militants augmented by Iranian intelligence officers to assassinate the emirate’s leadership in order to prompt a general uprising of Bahraini Shia as a prelude to the installation of a theocratic government. An Iranian based Iraqi cleric, Hojjat ol-Eslam Hadi al-Modarresi, was to have been put in power as Supreme Leader of a government of clerics or a theocracy.

The coup d'état attempt was foiled after a tip off from another emirate when their security services became suspicious of a large party of young men transiting from Iran to Bahrain. The coup plotters were quickly arrested and large arms caches as well as communications equipment and imitation military uniforms were found in sites around the island. Details were uncovered of the plans to assassinate leading members of the royal family and cabinet ministers, while other units were to take over vital infrastructure facilities such as Bahrain International Airport.

The attempted coup led to a steep downturn in relations between the states of the newly formed Gulf Cooperation Council and Iran. It was also blamed for increasing fissures in Persian Gulf Arab societies between Sunnis and Shias.

Unlike other Middle Eastern countries where those involved in failed coups have usually been executed, the 73 people arrested were sentenced from between seven years to life imprisonment. They were released in 2001 when all political prisoners were amnestied by King Hamad as part of political reforms. Many of the coup plotters are now active politically in the opposition Islamic Action Society, the successor groups established by the Islamic Front for the Liberation of Bahrain.