Bahrain minister’s Twitter account hacked
manama — Hackers took over the Twitter account of the Bahraini foreign minister on Saturday just 10 days after a cyber attack on the official news agency of Qatar.
The hack, which purported to be carried out in the name of a fringe militant group, came after the authorities dissolved the country’s major opposition movement.
Bloodied bodies, demolished mosques and what appeared to be a child’s illustration of war rolled down the official Twitter page of Foreign Minister Khaled bin Ahmad Al Khalifa.
The pictures were captioned: “What the petrodollar media doesn’t show you,” a reference to the satellite television channels funded by neighbouring countries.
The foreign ministry confirmed the hack, blaming it on the “terrorist party”, without elaborating.
“The Account of H.E. Minister of Foreign Affairs has been hacked. Kindly be aware,” the foreign ministry said in a message posted on its Twitter account.
The Arabic-language Al Wasat newspaper said on its website that hackers had posted several tweets and videos insulting to the minister. “Judging by the tweets, the hacking began at around 5.30 in the morning,” it said.
Saturday’s hackers tagged their posts with the name and logo of Saraya Al Mukhtar, a Shia militant group with a strong online presence, and made threats against the ruling family.
The hackers also spoke out against the treatment of Shias in neighbouring countries.
“We will soon reap the skulls of you who danced on the blood of our men in Bahrain, Qatif and Yemen,” another tweet said.
The hackers retweeted a number of posts by Numur Al Hurriya (Tigers of Freedom), which purports to be an opposition group in the Qatif district of eastern Saudi Arabia.
Two men were blown up in Qatif on Friday by what the Saudi authorities said was munitions they were transporting in their vehicle.
Qatar is still investigating the May 24 hack of its official news agency website and Twitter account.