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Ad-Dawr

Ad-Dawr

Ad-Dawr (الداور) is a small agricultural town near the Iraqi town of Tikrit, Saddam Hussein's birthplace. The town is populated mainly by pro-Saddam Sunni Arabs and is located in what has become known as the "Sunni Triangle" region of Iraq. It was quiet during the 2003 invasion of Iraq but Coalition forces had long suspected that Saddam was hiding somewhere nearby and anti-US insurgents were known to be operating in the area. On May 15, 2003, troops from the U.S. Army's 4th Infantry Division raided the town, arresting more than 260 suspected Baath Party supporters. The vast majority were soon released but five Iraqi special security forces officers were reported captured, including two Iraqi army generals and a general from Saddam's security forces who had disguised himself as a shepherd. An attack near ad-Dawr killed two American soldiers and injured three on August 13, 2003. The 4th Infantry Division's 124th Signal Battalion adopted the Nasiba Primary School for Girls in the town and completed its refurbishment in November 2003. On December 13, 2003, the 4th Infantry Division returned to ad-Dawr under the auspices of Operation Red Dawn and found Saddam Hussein hiding in a spider hole in front of a hut occupied by a man believed to be his former cook, Qais Namuk.

Links and References

- ad-Dawr map coordinates:
- [http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/iraq/ad-dawr.htm Map and satellite imagery showing ad-Dawr and environs - GlobalSecurity.org]

Iraq

The Republic of Iraq (Arabic العراق; Kurdish Êraq) is a Middle Eastern country in southwestern Asia at the confluence of the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers, and also including southern Kurdistan. It shares borders with Kuwait and Saudi Arabia to the south, Jordan to the west, Syria to the north-west, Turkey to the north, and Iran (Persia) to the east. Iraq has a very narrow section of coastline at Umm Qasr on the Persian Gulf. The Republic of Iraq sits on land that is historically known as Mesopotamia, which means 'land between the rivers' in Greek. This land was home to some of the world's first and most distinguished civilizations. These included Sumerian, Akkadian, Babylonian, Assyrian and many other cultures, whose influence extended into neighbouring regions, certainly from around 5000 BCE. These civilizations produced some of the first writing, science, mathematics, law and philosophy known to man, making it the center of what is commonly called the "Cradle of Civilization". Ancient Mesopotamian civilization dominated other civilizations of its time. The modern state contains a mixture of various Arab, Muslim and Kurdish cultures, deeply influenced by Persian and Ottoman rule and societies. It also hosts three of the most important religious sites in Shia Islam - the Sacred Mosque of Imam Ali in Najaf and the mosques of Imam Hussein and Imam Abbas in Karbala. Najaf and Karbala are cities in southern Iraq. A transitional government of Iraq was elected in January 2005, following the March 2003 occupation of Iraq, led by American and British military forces, which drove Saddam Hussein and his Ba'ath Party from power. American offensives on such cities as Fallujah and Tal Afar, the continued lack of such basic services as electricity and clean water, and deep political division in the country, have continued to contribute to disenchantment and disorder in the country. Supporters of the Iraqi insurgency blame the occupying forces for the disorder, but others blame the insurgency itself. In the meantime, the country is still struggling to form stable democratic institutions. On October 15, 2005, the people of Iraq approved a new Constitution of Iraq in a referendum. Though it received a 79% "yes" vote, it was opposed by a large majority of Sunni Arab Iraqis, and is considered to have "barely" passed (as a few more votes against it would have caused its defeat, due to three provinces rejecting it by more than 2/3).

Modern History

Main article: History of Iraq Modern Iraq became a British mandate (the British League of Nations Trust Territory of Iraq) at the end of World War I and was granted independence from British control in 1932. It was formed out of three former Ottoman Willayats (regions): Mosul, Baghdad and Basra. The British-installed Hashemite monarchy lasted until 1958, when it was overthrown through a coup d'etat by the Iraqi army, known as the 14 July Revolution. It brought Brigadier General Abdul Karim Qassim's leftist government to power (which withdrew from the Baghdad Pact and established friendly relations with the Soviet Union), from 1958 till 1963, when he was overthrown by Colonel Abdul Salam Arif. Salam Arif died in 1966 and his brother, Abdul Rahman Arif, assumed the presidency. In 1968, Rahman Arif was overthrown by the right wing Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party. The Ba'ath's key figure became Saddam Hussein who acceded to the presidency and control of the Revolutionary Command Council (RCC), Iraq's supreme executive decision making body, in July 1979, killing off many of his opponents in the process. Saddam's absolute and particularly bloody rule lasted throughout the Iran-Iraq War (1980–1988), which ended in stalemate; the al-Anfal campaign of the late 1980s, which led to the alleged gassing of thousands of Kurds in northern Iraq; Iraq's invasion of Kuwait in 1990 resulting in the Gulf War; and the United Nations-imposed economic sanctions. The United States and Britain declared no-fly zones over Kurdish northern and Shiite southern Iraq.

Modern Politics

Main article: Politics of Iraq Iraq was under Ba'ath Party rule from 1968 to 2003, in 1979 Saddam Hussein took leadership and became president until 2003, when he was unseated by a US-led invasion. The unicameral Iraqi parliament, the National Assembly or Majlis al-Watani, had 250 seats and its members were elected for 4-year terms. No non-Ba'ath candidates were allowed to run. In November 2003, the US-managed Coalition Provisional Authority announced plans to turn over sovereignty to an Iraqi Interim Government by mid-2004. The actual transfer of sovereignty occurred on 28 June 2004. The interim president was Sheikh Ghazi Mashal Ajil al-Yawer, and the interim prime minister Iyad Allawi. On January 30, 2005, a majority of the Iraqi people voted in an election conducted by their transitional government which elected a 275-member Transitional National Assembly. The election was seen by many as a victory for democracy in the Middle East, but that opinion is not shared by all. Seymour Hersh has reported that their was a effort by the United States Government to shift funds and other resources to Iyad Allawi and that there may have been similar under the table dealings by other parties. Although he did not get the most seats in the Iraqi Congress, Allawi's delegation jumped from a projected 3 to 4% of the vote to 14% of the vote giving him power in the writing of the Constitution. The Iraqi Assembly would:
- Serve as Iraq's national legislature. It has named a Presidency Council, consisting of a President and two Vice Presidents. (By unanimous agreement, the Presidency Council will appoint a Prime Minister and, on his recommendation, cabinet ministers.)
- Draft Iraq's new constitution. This constitution was presented to the Iraqi people for their approval in a national referendum in October 2005. Under the new constitution, Iraq would elect a permanent government in December 2005. Under the Iraqi transitional constitution, signed March 2004, the country's executive branch is now led by a three-person presidential council. The election system for the council effectively ensures that all three of Iraq's major ethnic groups are represented. The constitution also includes basic freedoms like freedom of religion, speech, and assembly, and is perceived by some to be more progressive than the U.S. Constitution.[http://www.alternet.org/waroniraq/18267/] Controversially, however, it states that all laws that were in effect on the transfer date cannot be repealed. Furthermore, since the coalition forces are currently working to maintain order and create a stable society under the United Nations, coalition troops can remain in control of the country indefinitely despite the transfer of sovereignty. Since Iraqi forces are currently considered not fully trained and equipped to police and secure their country, it is expected that coalition troops will remain until Iraqi forces no longer require their support. However, these rules will be set aside once the Transitional National Assembly is seated. On 5 April 2005, the Iraqi National Assembly appointed Jalal Talabani, a prominent Kurdish leader, President. It also appointed Adel Abdul Mehdi, a Shiite Arab, and Ghazi al-Yawar, the former Interim President and a Sunni Arab, as Vice Presidents. Ibrahim al-Jaafari a Shiite, whose United Iraq Alliance Party won the largest share of the vote, has been appointed the new Prime Minister of Iraq. Most power is vested in him. The new government was faced with two major tasks. The first is to attempt to rein in a violent insurgency, which has blighted the country in recent months, killing many Iraqi civilians and officials as well as a number of U.S. troops. (As of mid-2005, approximately 135,000 American troops remain in Iraq.) The second major task was to re-engage in the writing of a new Iraqi constitution, as outlined above, to replace the Iraqi transitional constitution of 2004. In the meantime, the Iraqi government is considered by many international governments to be a legitimate government. According to the US administration, the judiciary in Iraq operates under the primacy of rule of law, so war criminals from the totalitarian regime of Saddam Hussein will get a fair and open trial, in which their rights will be subjected to due process and be protected by the scrutiny of a free press, the requirements of modern court proceedings. On October 15, 2005, more than 63% of eligible Iraqis came out across the country to vote on whether to accept or reject the new constitution. On October 25, the vote was certified and the constitution passed with a 78% majority. [http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory?id=1248677] The new constitution had overwhelming backing among the Shia and Kurdish communities, as well as among a sizeable minority of the Sunni Arabs of Western Iraq. Three provinces rejected it (Salah ad Din with 82% against, Ninawah with 55% against, and Al Anbar with 97% against), but the final vote against the constitution was not 67%, which would have defeated the constitution. Although fraud is widely believed in the Ninawah results, the results are unlikely to be overturned. Under the terms of the constitution, the country will conduct fresh nationwide parliamentary elections on December 15 to elect a new, permanent government.

Governorates

Main article: Governorates of Iraq Governorates of Iraq Iraq is divided into 18 governorates or provinces (Arabic: muhafadhat, singular - muhafadhah, Kurdish: پاریزگه Pârizgah). Particularly in Iraqi government documents the term governorate is preferred: #Baghdad Arab, Kurdish #Salah ad Din Arab, Kurdish #Diyala Kurdish, #Wasit Arab #Maysan Arab #Al Basrah Arab #Dhi Qar Arab #Al Muthanna Arab #Al Qadisyah Arab #Babil Arab #Al Karbala Arab #An Najaf Arab #Al Anbar Arab #Ninawa Kurdish #Dahuk Kurdish #Arbil Kurdish ( also called Hewlêr in Kurdish) #At Ta'mim Kurdish #As Sulaymaniyah Kurdish The constitutionally recognized Kurdish Autonomous Region includes parts of a number of northern governorates, and is largely self-governing in internal affairs.

Geography

Kurdish Autonomous Region Main article: Geography of Iraq Large parts of Iraq consist of desert, but the area between the two major rivers Euphrates and Tigris is fertile, with the rivers carrying about 60 million cubic meters of silt annually to the delta. The north of the country is largely mountainous, with the highest point being Haji Ibrahim at 3,600 m (11,811 ft). Iraq has a small coastline with the Persian Gulf. Close to the coast and along the Shatt al-Arab (known as arvandrūd: اروندرود among Iranians) there used to be marshlands, but many of these were drained in the 1990s. The local climate is mostly a desert clime with mild to cool winters and dry, hot, cloudless summers. The northern mountainous regions experience cold winters with occasional heavy snows, sometimes causing extensive flooding. The capital Baghdad is situated in the centre of the country, on the banks of the Tigris. Other major cities include Basra in the south and Mosul in the north. Iraq is considered to be the cradle of human civilization.

Economy

Mosul Mosul] Mosul Mosul Mosul Main article: Economy of Iraq Iraq's economy is dominated by the oil sector, which has traditionally provided about 95% of foreign exchange earnings. In the 1980s financial problems caused by massive expenditures in the eight-year war with Iran and damage to oil export facilities by Iran led the government to implement austerity measures, borrow heavily, and later reschedule foreign debt payments; Iraq suffered economic losses from the war of at least US$100 billion. After hostilities ended in 1988, oil exports gradually increased with the construction of new pipelines and restoration of damaged facilities. A combination of low oil prices, onerous repayment of the war debts (at around US$3 billion a year) and the costs of reconstruction resulted in a serious financial crisis which was the main short term motivation for the invasion of Kuwait. Iraq's seizure of Kuwait in August 1990, subsequent international economic sanctions, and damage from military action by an international coalition beginning in January 1991 drastically reduced economic activity. Although government policies supporting large military and internal security forces and allocating resources to key supporters of the Ba`ath Party government have hurt the economy, implementation of the United Nations' oil-for-food program, started in December 1996, was to have improved conditions for the average Iraqi citizen. For the first six phases of the program (each phase lasting six months), Iraq was allowed to export limited amounts of oil in exchange for food, medicine, and some infrastructure spare parts. Subsequent investigation of the program has revealed significant corruption, with highly-placed U.N. officials being bribed, Ba'ath Party officials receiving lucrative kickbacks, and much of the money from oil sales being redirected into weapons research and acquisition by the Iraqi military. In December 1999, the UN Security Council authorised Iraq to export under the program as much oil as required to meet humanitarian needs. Iraq changed its oil reserve currency from US dollar to euro in 2000. Oil exports were more than three-quarters of the pre-war level. However, 28% of Iraq's export revenues under the program were deducted to meet UN Compensation Fund and UN administrative expenses. The drop in GDP in 2001 was largely the result of the global economic slowdown and lower oil prices. Following the 2003 invasion of Iraq, the economy to a great extent shut down; attempts are underway to revive it from the damages of war and rampant crime. During his year as the chief executive of Iraq, Ambassador Paul Bremer issued a series of orders designed to restructure Iraq's broadly socialist economy in line with neo-liberal thinking. Order 39 laid out the framework for the privatization of everything in Iraq aside from the "primary extraction and initial processing" of the oil reserves themselves, and permitted 100% foreign ownership of Iraqi assets. Other orders established a flat tax of 15% and permitted foreign corporations to repatriate 100% of profits earned in Iraq. Opposition from senior Iraqi officials, together with the poor security situation meant that Bremer's privatization plan was not implemented during his tenure, though his orders remain in place. Privatization of the oil industry, in addition to around 200 other state-owned businesses, is currently scheduled to begin sometime in late 2005. [http://www.dailystar.com.lb/article.asp?edition_id=10&categ_id=3&article_id=15131] The second attempt to liberalize Iraq's economy is linked to the Iran-Iraq war debt. The creditors who financed the Iran-Iraq war had presented post-Saddam Iraq with a bill of nearly US$130 billion of debt and past-due-interest, which had not been serviced during the 13 years of sanctions. The Jubilee Iraq campaign argued that these debts were odious (or illegitimate) given that they came from loans to a dictator fighting a war which caused the Iraqi people a great deal of harm, and should therefore be written off unconditionally. The creditors, however, offered only a partial reduction and rescheduling of their claims in return for an Iraqi commitment to implement an International Monetary Fund economic program. This deal, with the Paris Club cartel of creditors including the U.S. and Britain, was signed on 20 November 2004. The following day the interim Iraqi National Assembly issued a strongly worded resolution rejecting the Paris Club's terms and declaring that the debt was odious.

Demographics

2004 Main article: Demographics of Iraq Seventy-five to eighty percent of Iraq's population (mainly Iraqi but some Hejazi) speaks Arabic; the other major ethnic groups are the Kurds (15–20%), Assyrians (4%), and Turkomans (3%), who mostly live in the north and north-east of the country. The Assyrians, Kurds, and Turkomans differ from Arabs in many ways, including culture, history, clothing, and language. Other distinct groups are Persians, Lurs, and Armenians (possible descendants of the ancient Mesopotamian culture). About 2,500 Jews and 20,000–50,000 Marsh Arabs live in Iraq. Arabic and Kurdish are official languages; English is the most commonly spoken Western language. Assyrian is also used by the country's Assyrian population. There are more Arab Iraqi Muslim members of the Shiite sect than there are Arab Iraqi Muslims of the Sunni sect; but there is a large Sunni population as well, made up of mostly Arabs and Kurds. (Shiite 60% of total population made up of mostly Arabs). Iraq's sizable Christian population numbers some 750,000, most of them of the Chaldean rite. Bahá'ís, Mandaeans, Shabaks, and Yezidis also exist. Most Kurds are Sunni Muslims. Demographic information from the 2004 edition of the CIA's The World Factbook:
- Ethnic groups: Arab, 75–80%; Kurdish, 15–20%; Assyrian or other, 5%
- Religions: Muslim, 93–95% (Shi'ite, 60%; Sunni 40%); Christian, Yezidi, or other, 5–7%

Culture

Main article: Culture of Iraq
- Music of Iraq

Miscellaneous topics

- Economy: Iraq Stock Exchange, Iraqi Dinar, Economy of Iraq
- Events: 2005 in Iraq, 2004 in Iraq, 2003 Invasion of Iraq, Post-invasion Iraq, 2003-2005, Iraqi insurgency
- Geography: List of places in Iraq, Communications of Iraq, Transportation in Iraq, Arab Tribes in Iraq
- Politics: Politics of Iraq, New Iraqi Army, Foreign relations of Iraq, Human rights violations in Iraq, Iraqi insurgency, M. Ismail Marcinkowski, Religion and Politics in Iraq. Shiite Clerics between Quietism and Resistance, with a foreword by Professor Hamid Algar of the University of California at Berkeley. Singapore: Pustaka Nasional, 2004 (ISBN 9971775131)
- History: List of Kings of Iraq, List of Presidents of Iraq, List of Prime Ministers of Iraq, British Mandate of Iraq, History of the Jews in Iraq
- Others: Postage stamps and postal history of Iraq, Gay rights in Iraq

External links

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- [http://www.activistmagazine.com/index.php?option=content&task=category§ionid=3&id=152&Itemid=56 ACTivist Magazine] Iraq Article Archive
- [http://www.mourningthevote.com/iraq.htm Mourningthevote.com] Information on US troops in Iraq
- [http://www.iraqigovernment.org/ Iraqi Interim Government] official government site
- [http://www.krg.org/ Kurdistan Regional Government]
- [http://www.al-bab.com/arab/countries/iraq.htm al-Bab - Iraq]
- [http://www.h-net.org/~museum/iraq.html / H-Museum Iraq site]
- [http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/country_profiles/791014.stm BBC News Country Profile - Iraq]
- [http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos/iz.html CIA World Factbook - Iraq]
- [http://www.state.gov/p/nea/ci/c3212.htm US State Department - Iraq] includes Background Notes, Country Study and major reports
- [http://dmoz.org/Regional/Middle_East/Iraq/ Open Directory Project - Iraq] directory category
- [http://dir.yahoo.com/Regional/Countries/Iraq/ Yahoo! - Iraq] directory category
- [http://story.news.yahoo.com/fc?cid=34&tmpl=fc&in=World&cat=Iraq Yahoo! News Full Coverage - Iraq] news headline links
- [http://www.newsxs.com/en/preset/101 Iraq - News and Rss-feed by NewsXS]
- [http://www.newsxs.com/en/preset/396 News on the Iraq Constitution]
- [http://www.newsxs.com/en/preset/424 News on Saddam's Trial]
- [http://www.edinarfinancial.net/news Iraq News]
- [http://www.lawksalih.com Lawk Salih] News on Iraq, Iraqi Music, Kurdish News
- [http://schema-root.org/region/mideast/iraq/ Schema-root.org: Iraq] 300 Iraq related topics, each with its own current news feed
- [http://www.juancole.com/ Informed Comment] Commentary on war in Iraq from Middle East scholar Juan Cole
- [http://www.dahrjamailiraq.com/index.php Dahr Jamail Iraq Dispatches] News From Inside Iraq
- [http://www.indepthinfo.com/iraq/index.shtml Indepth Analysis of the Gulf War]
- International Freedom of Expression eXchange monitors [http://www.ifex.org/en/content/view/full/222 attacks on journalists in Iraq]
- [http://fax.libs.uga.edu/DS49x2xM465D/ A DWELLER IN MESOPOTAMIA], being the adventures of an official artist in the garden of Eden, by Donald Maxwell, 1921. (a searchable facsimile at the University of Georgia Libraries; DjVu & [http://fax.libs.uga.edu/DS49x2xM465D/1f/dweller_in_mesopotamia.pdf layered PDF] format)
- [http://fax.libs.uga.edu/DS49x2xW684B/ BY DESERT WAYS TO BAGHDAD], by Louisa Jebb (Mrs. Roland Wilkins) With illustrations and a map, 1908 (1909 ed). (a searchable facsimile at the University of Georgia Libraries; DjVu & [http://fax.libs.uga.edu/DS49x2xW684B/1f/desert_ways_to_baghdad.pdf layered PDF] format)
- [http://home.developmentgateway.org/iraq Iraq: Relief and Recovery] Development Gateway's knowledge sharing community on Iraq's development needs and efforts.
- Sourcewatch on [http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Reconstruction_of_Iraq_contractors reconstruction of Iraq contractors].
- [http://www.iraqwiki.com Iraq Wiki]
- [http://www.iraqanalysis.org/ Iraq Analysis] Information Source Listings and analysis on post-invasion Iraq
- [http://www.jubileeiraq.org Jubilee Iraq] Campaign to eliminate Iraq's pre-war debt and reparations
- [http://web.amnesty.org/library/Index/engMDE140082001?OpenDocument&of=COUNTRIESIRAQ Amnesty International Report on Iraq]
- [http://www.brucegourley.com/iraqtheocracy/ Iraq Theocracy Watch]
- [http://www.cpa-iraq.org/ Coalition Provisional Authority] Now-defunct occupation authority; site is archived
- [http://baghdad.usembassy.gov/ US Embassy in Baghdad, Iraq]
- [http://www.ameinfo.com/iraq/ AME Info - Country Guide: Iraq]
- [http://mysite.wanadoo-members.co.uk/mesopotamia/ Pictures of Iraq (Mespotamia) during World War One, showing the peoples, Red Cross River Ambulances and British Army/Indian taken by Captain Weaver]

Video

- Category:Arab League Category:Southwest Asian countries Category:Middle Eastern countries Category:Near Eastern countries Category:Persian Gulf states Category:100 most endangered sites zh-min-nan:Iraq ko:이라크 ms:Iraq ja:イラク simple:Iraq th:ประเทศอิรัก

Saddam Hussein

Saddām Hussein ʻAbd al-Majīd al-Tikrīti, sometimes spelled Hussayn or Hussain; (Arabic صدام حسين عبد المجيد التكريتي; born April 28, 1937 ) was President of Iraq from 1979 until his removal and capture after the 2003 invasion of Iraq.

Overview

A leading member of the mukaburat Ba'ath Party, which espoused secular pan-Arabism, economic modernization, and socialism, Saddam (see regarding names) played a key role in the 1968 coup that brought the party to long-term power. As vice president under his cousin, the frail General Ahmed Bakr, Saddam tightly controlled conflict between the government and the armed forces by creating repressive security forces, and cementing his own firm authority over the apparatuses of government. As president, he ran an authoritarian government, and maintained power through the Iran-Iraq War (1980–1988) and the Persian Gulf War (1991), a period which was devastating to Iraq, lowering living standards and human rights. Saddam's government allegedly repressed movements that it deemed threatening, particularly those from ethnic or religious groups that sought independence or autonomy. While he remained a popular hero among many Arabs for standing up to his opponents in the West, such as the United States, some members of the international community continued to view Saddam with deep suspicion following the 1991 Persian Gulf War, and certain Iraqi groups lived in fear of his security forces. Saddam was deposed by the U.S. and its allies during the 2003 U.S.-led invasion of Iraq. Captured by U.S. forces on December 13, 2003 while hiding in a hole in a barn outside Tikrit, he is standing trial before the Iraq Special Tribunal, established by the Iraq Interim Government.

Youth

Saddam Hussein was born in the village of Al-Ouja, 8 kilometers from the city of Tikrit district of Iraq, to a family of sheep-herders. His mother named her newborn son "Saddam," which in Arabic means "one who confronts." He never knew his father, Hussein 'Abd al-Majid, who died or disappeared five months before Saddam was born. Shortly afterwards, Saddam's twelve-year-old brother died of cancer, leaving his mother severely depressed in the final months of the pregnancy. She attempted suicide by throwing herself in front of a bus and refused to care for her new baby when he was born. The infant Saddam was sent to the family of his maternal uncle, Khairallah Talfah, until he was three. His mother, Subha Tulfah al-Mussallat, remarried, and Saddam gained three half-brothers through this marriage. His stepfather, Ibrahim al-Hassarvn, treated Saddam Hussein harshly after his return. He was abusive and forced the young boy to steal chickens and sheep for resale. At about the age of ten, he fled the family to return to live with his uncle, who was a devout Sunni Muslim, in Baghdad. Later in his life, relatives from his native Tikrit would become some of his most influential and powerful advisors and supporters. According to Saddam, he learned many things from his uncle, especially the lesson that he should never back down from his enemies, no matter how superior their numbers or capabilities. Under the guidance of his uncle, he attended a nationalistic secondary school in Baghdad. In 1957, at age 20, Saddam joined the revolutionary pan-Arab Ba'ath Party, of which his uncle was a supporter. Revolutionary sentiment was characteristic of the era in Iraq and throughout the Middle East. The stranglehold of the old elites (the conservative monarchists, established families, and merchants) was breaking down in Iraq. Moreover, the populist pan-Arab nationalism of Gamal Abdel Nasser in Egypt would profoundly influence the young Ba'athist, even up to the present day. The rise of Nasser foreshadowed the wave of revolutions throughout the Middle East in the fifties and sixties, which would see the collapse of the monarchies of Iraq, Egypt, and Libya. Nasser challenged the British and French, nationalized the Suez Canal, and strove to modernize Egypt and unite the Arab world politically.

Rise in the Ba'ath party

A year after Saddam had joined the Ba'ath party, army officers led by General Abdul Karim Qassim overthrew Faisal II of Iraq. The Ba'athists opposed the new government, and in 1959, Saddam was involved in the attempted assassination of Prime Minister Qassim. Saddam was shot in the leg, but managed to flee to Syria, from where he later moved to Egypt. He was sentenced to death, in absentia. In exile he claimed to have attended the Cairo University School of Law. Army officers, including some aligned with the Ba'ath party, came to power in Iraq in a military coup in 1963. However, torn by rife factionalism, the new government was ousted within seven to eight months. Saddam returned to Iraq, but was imprisoned in 1964 when an anti-Ba'ath group led by Abdul Rahman Arif took power. He escaped from jail in 1967 and became one of the leading members of the party. According to many biographers, Saddam never forgot the tensions within the first Ba'athist government, which prompted his measures to promote party unity as well as his ruthless resolve to maintain power and programs to ensure social stability. In July 1968 a second coup brought the Ba'athists back to power under General Ahmed Hassan al-Bakr, a Tikriti and a relative of Saddam, who by this time had become an interrogator and torturer at the infamous "Palace of the End," the cellar of the former palace of King Faisal II. The Ba'ath's ruling clique named Saddam vice-chairman of the Iraqi Revolutionary Command Council and vice president of Iraq.

Consolidation of power

Iraqi Revolutionary Command Council] In 1976 Saddam was appointed a general in the Iraqi armed forces. He rapidly became the strongman of the government, and was the de facto ruler of Iraq some years before he formally came to power in 1979. He slowly began to consolidate his power over Iraq's government and the Ba'ath party. Relationships with fellow party members were carefully cultivated, and Saddam soon gained a powerful circle of support within the party. As Iraq's weak and elderly President Ahmed Hassan al-Bakr became increasingly unable to execute the duties of his office, Saddam began to take an increasingly prominent role as the face of the Iraqi government, both internally and externally. He soon became the architect of Iraq's foreign policy and represented the nation in all diplomatic situations. By the late 1970s, Saddam had emerged as the undisputed de facto leader of Iraq.

Consolidation of power

Saddam consolidated power in a nation riddled with profound tensions. Long before Saddam, Iraq had been split along social, ethnic, religious, and socioeconomic fault lines: Sunni versus Shi'ite, Arab versus Kurd, tribal chief versus urban merchant, nomad versus peasant. Stable rule in a country torn by political factionalism and conflict required the improvement of living standards. Saddam moved up the ranks in the new government by aiding attempts to strengthen and unify the Ba'ath party and taking a leading role in addressing the country's major domestic problems and expanding the party's following. Saddam actively fostered the modernization of the Iraqi economy along with the creation of a strong security apparatus to prevent coups within the power structure and insurrections apart from it. Ever concerned with broadening his base of support among the diverse elements of Iraqi society and mobilizing mass support, he closely followed the administration of state welfare and development programs. At the center of this strategy was Iraq's oil. On June 1, 1972, Saddam Hussein led the process of expropriating Western oil companies, which had had a monopoly on the country's oil. A year later, world oil prices rose dramatically as a result of the 1973 world oil shock, and Saddam was able to pursue an all-the-more ambitious agenda through skyrocketing oil revenues. Within a period of just a few years, the state provided some social services to Iraqi people unprecedented in other Middle Eastern countries. Saddam initiated and controlled the "National Campaign for the Eradication of Illiteracy" and the campaign for "Compulsory Free Education in Iraq," and largely under his auspices, the government established universal free schooling up to the highest education levels; hundreds of thousands learned to read in the years following the initiation of the program. The government also supported families of soldiers, granted free hospitalization to everyone, and gave subsidies to farmers. Iraq created one of the best public-health systems in the Middle East, earning Saddam an award from the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). [http://www.cbc.ca/news/background/iraq/saddam_hussein.html] [http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/middle_east/iraq/war/player1.html] In order to diversify the oil-dependent economy, Saddam oversaw and advocated a national infrastructure campaign that made great progress in building roads, promoting mining, and development of other industries. The campaign effected a comprehensive revolution in energy industries. Electricity was brought to nearly every city in Iraq, including many communities in the countryside and far outlying areas. Before the early 1970s, the majority of the population resided in the countryside, where Saddam himself was born and raised; and peasants accounted for roughly two thirds of the populace. This number would decrease dramatically, though, during the rapid industrialization and urbanization of Iraq in the 1970s, which was propelled by Saddam's channeling of oil revenues into the rapidly growing Iraqi industrial sector and the new Ba'athist welfare programs. Nevertheless, Saddam focused intensely on fostering loyalty to the Ba'athist government in the rural areas. After nationalizing foreign oil interests, Saddam supervised the modernization of the Iraqi countryside, the mechanization of agriculture on a large scale, and the distribution of land to farmers. He broke up the large holdings of the landowners and gave land to peasant farmers. The Ba'athists established farm co-operatives, in which profits were distributed in accordance with the labors of the individual peasant and the unskilled were trained. The government's commitment to agrarian reform was demonstrated by the doubling of expenditures for agriculture development in 1974–1975, a policy that Saddam largely spearheaded. Moreover, agrarian reform in Iraq improved the living standards of the broad strata of the peasantry and increased production, though not to the levels for which Saddam had hoped. Saddam became personally associated with Ba'athist welfare and economic development programs in the eyes of many Iraqis, thus widening his original popular base of support while co-opting new sectors of the Iraqi population. Part of a combination of "carrot and stick" tactics, expanding government services forged patron–client ties between Saddam and his support base among the working class and the peasantry and within the party and the government bureaucracy. Saddam's ruthless organizational prowess was credited with Iraq's rapid pace of development in the 1970s; development went forward at such a fevered pitch that two million persons from other Arab countries and Yugoslavia worked in Iraq to meet the growing demand for labor.

Succession

In 1979 President al-Bakr began to make treaties with Syria, also under Ba'athist leadership, that would lead to unification between the two countries. Syrian President Hafez al-Assad would become deputy leader in a union, and this would drive Saddam to obscurity. Saddam, the Vice President and de-facto ruler of Iraq, had to act to secure his grip on power. He forced the ailing al-Bakr to resign on July 16, 1979. Saddam formally assumed the presidency. Shortly afterwards, he convened an assembly of Ba'ath party leaders on July 22, 1979. During the assembly, which he ordered videotaped, Saddam claimed to have found spies and conspirators within the Ba'ath Party and read out the names of members who he thought could oppose him. These members were labeled "disloyal" and were removed from the room one by one to face a firing squad. After the list was read, Saddam congratulated those still seated in the room for their past and future loyalty.

Saddam Hussein as a secular leader

Saddam saw himself as a social revolutionary and a modernizer, following the model of Nasser. To the consternation of Islamic conservatives, his government gave women added freedoms and offered them high-level government and industry jobs. Saddam also created a Western-style legal system, making Iraq the only country in the Persian Gulf region not ruled according to traditional Islamic law (Sharia). Saddam abolished the Sharia law courts, except for personal injury claims. Domestic conflict impeded Saddam's modernizing projects. Iraqi society is divided along lines of language, religion and ethnicity; Saddam's government rested on the support of the 20 percent minority of largely working-class, peasant, and petit-bourgeois Sunni Muslims, continuing a pattern that dates back at least to the British mandate authority's reliance on them as administrators. The Shi'a majority were long a source of opposition to the government due to its secular policies, and the Ba'ath Party was increasingly concerned about potential Sh'ia Islamist influence following the Iranian Revolution of 1979. The Kurds of northern Iraq (who are Sunni Muslims but not Arabs) were also permanently hostile to the Ba'athist party's Arabizing tendencies. To maintain his regime against sources of opposition, the core of Saddam's government was made up of a retinue of close relatives and members of his Tikriti tribe. In dealing with Shiites, Kurds, Communists, and other likely regime opponents, the government tended either to provide them with benefits so as to co-opt them into the regime, or to take repressive measures against them. The major instruments for accomplishing this control were the paramilitary and police organizations. Beginning in 1974, Taha Yassin Ramadan, a close associate of Saddam, commanded the People's Army, which was responsible for internal security. As the Ba'ath Party's paramilitary, the People's Army acted as a counterweight against any coup attempts by the regular armed forces. In addition to the People's Army, the Department of General Intelligence (Mukhabarat) was the most notorious arm of the state security system, feared for its use of torture and assassination. It was commanded by Barzan Ibrahim al-Tikriti, Saddam's younger half-brother. Since 1982, foreign observers believed that this department operated both at home and abroad in their mission to seek out and eliminate perceived opponents of Saddam Hussein. [http://lcweb2.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query] Saddam's internal security regime achieved notoriety for its extreme ruthlessness. In 1982, an assassination attempt was mounted against Saddam in the town of Dujail 40 km (25 miles) north of Baghdad. In retaliation, Saddam's security forces attacked the town, killing and executing up to 160 of its inhabitants, including a number of children. Around 1,500 townspeople were sent to prison and tortured. A resident of Dujail now in his thirties recalls "They blindfolded me. But I was so young, it kept falling." and at a Baghdad detention center he witnessed "a machine that looked like a grinder and had some blood and hair [on it and] I saw bodies of people from Dujail". [http://www.smh.com.au/news/world/witness-wont-let-saddam-intimidate-him-court-hears-of-horror-nightin-dujail-town/2005/12/06/1133829598921.html] The entire town was also punished by having 1,000 square kilometres (250,000 acres) of farmland destroyed; replanting was only permitted 10 years later. The events in Dujail became the subject of criminal charges following Saddam's overthrow in 2003. [http://www.theledger.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050703/ZNYT03/507030469] Saddam justified Iraqi patriotism by claiming a unique role of Iraq in the history of the Arab world. As president, Saddam made frequent references to the Abbasid period, when Baghdad was the political, cultural, and economic capital of the Arab world. He also promoted Iraq's pre-Islamic role as the ancient cradle of civilization Mesopotamia, alluding to such historical figures as Nebuchadrezzar and Hammurabi. He devoted resources to archaeological explorations. In effect, Saddam sought to combine pan-Arabism and Iraqi nationalism, by promoting the vision of an Arab world united and led by Iraq. As a sign of his consolidation of power, Saddam's personality cult pervaded Iraqi society. Thousands of portraits, posters, statues and murals were erected in his honor all over Iraq. His face could be seen on the sides of office buildings, schools, airports, and shops, as well as on Iraqi currency. Saddam's personality cult reflected his efforts to appeal to the various elements in Iraqi society. He appeared in the costumes of the Bedouin, the traditional clothes of the Iraqi peasant (which he essentially wore during his childhood), and even Kurdish clothing, but also appeared in Western suits, projecting the image of an urbane and modern leader. Sometimes he would also be portrayed as a devout Muslim, wearing full headdress and robe, praying toward Mecca.

Foreign affairs

Mecca, during a state visit to Paris in 1976]] In foreign affairs, Saddam sought to have Iraq play a leading role in the Middle East. Iraq signed an aid pact with the Soviet Union in 1972, and arms were sent along with several thousand advisers. However, the 1978 executions of Iraqi Communists and a shift of trade toward the West strained Iraqi relations with the Soviet Union, which took on a more Western orientation from then until the Persian Gulf War in 1991. He made a state visit to France in 1976, cementing close ties with some French business and conservative political circles. Saddam led Arab opposition to the Camp David Accords between Egypt and Israel (1979). In 1975 he negotiated an accord with Iran that contained Iraqi concessions on border disputes. In return, Iran agreed to stop supporting opposition Kurds in Iraq. Saddam initiated Iraq's nuclear enrichment project in the 1980s, with French assistance. The first Iraqi nuclear reactor was named by the French Osiraq, after the Egyptian God of the dead. It was destroyed by an Israeli air strike, because Israel suspected it was going to start producing weapons grade nuclear material. After Saddam had negotiated the 1975 treaty with Iran, Shah Pahlavi withdrew support for the Kurds, who suffered a total defeat. Nearly from its founding as a modern state in 1920, Iraq has had to deal with Kurdish separatists in the northern part of the country. Saddam did negotiate an agreement in 1970 with separatist Kurdish leaders, giving them autonomy, but the agreement broke down. The result was brutal fighting between the government and Kurdish groups and even Iraqi bombing of Kurdish villages in Iran, which caused Iraqi relations with Iran to deteriorate.

The Iran–Iraq War (1980-1988)

In 1979 Iran's Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi was overthrown by the Islamic Revolution, thus giving way to an Islamic republic led by the Ayatollah Khomeini. The influence of revolutionary Shi'ite Islam grew apace in the region, particularly in countries with large Shi'ite populations, especially Iraq. Saddam feared that radical Islamic ideas—hostile to his secular rule—were rapidly spreading inside his country among the majority Shi'ite population. There had also been bitter enmity between Saddam and Khomeini since the 1970s. Khomeini, having been exiled from Iran in 1964, took up residence in Iraq, at the Shi'ite holy city of An Najaf. There he involved himself with Iraqi Shi'ites and developed a strong, worldwide religious and political following. Under pressure from the Shah, who had agreed to a rapprochement between Iraq and Iran in 1975, Saddam agreed to expel Khomeini in 1978. After Khomeini gained power, skirmishes between Iraq and revolutionary Iran occurred for ten months over the sovereignty of the disputed Shatt al-Arab waterway, which divides the two countries. Iraq invaded Iran by attacking Mehrabad Airport of Tehran and entering the oil-rich Iranian land of Khuzestan on September 22, 1980. Saddam declared Khuzestan a new province of Iraq. In the first days of the war, there was heavy ground fighting around strategic ports as Iraq launched an attack on Iran's oil-rich, partly Arab-populated province of Khuzestan. After making some initial gains, Iraq's troops began to suffer losses from human-wave attacks by Iran. By 1982 Iraq was on the defensive and looking for ways to end the war. Iraq quickly found itself bogged down in one of the longest and most destructive wars of attrition of the twentieth century. During the war, Iraq used chemical weapons against Iranian forces and Kurdish separatists. Many of these chemical weapons, along with Iraq's nuclear program, were developed with the help of companies from East and West Germany. ([http://www.fas.org/nuke/guide/iraq/cw/az120103.html]) On March 16, 1988 Iraqi troops, attempting to crush a Kurdish uprising in the Al-Anfal Campaign, allegedly attacked the Kurdish town of Halabjah with a mix of poison gas and nerve agents, perhaps killing around five thousand people, mostly civilians. This action was not condemned at the time. Saddam's regime claimed at the time that Iran was responsible for that and some other chemical attacks, a claim that is largely supported by the evidence gathered by international observers and accepted by most governments. . Saddam reached out to other Arab governments for cash and political support, particularly after its oil industry severely suffered at the hands of the Iranian navy in the Persian Gulf. Iraq successfully gained some military and financial aid from the United States, the Soviet Union, and France, which together feared the prospects of the expansion of revolutionary Iran's influence in the region. The Iranians, claiming that the international community should force Iraq to pay the casualty of the war to Iran, refused any suggestions for a cease-fire. They continued the war until 1988, hoping to bring down Saddam's secular regime and instigate a Shi'ite rebellion in Iraq. The bloody eight-year war ended in a stalemate. There were hundreds of thousands of casualties. Perhaps upwards of 1.7 million died on both sides. Both economies, previously healthy and expanding, were left in ruins. Saddam borrowed a tremendous amount of money from other Arab states during the 1980s to fight Iran and was stuck with a war debt of roughly $75 billion. Faced with rebuilding Iraq's infrastructure, Saddam desperately sought out cash once again, this time for postwar reconstruction. The desperate search for foreign credit would eventually humiliate the strongman who had long sought to dominate Arab nationalism throughout the Middle East.

Tensions with Kuwait

The end of the war with Iran served to deepen latent tensions between Iraq and its wealthy neighbor Kuwait. Saddam saw his war with Iran as having spared Kuwait from the imminent threat of Iranian domination. Since the struggle with Iran had been fought for the benefit of the other Persian Gulf Arab states as much as for Iraq, he argued, a share of Iraqi debt should be forgiven. Saddam urged the Kuwaitis to forgive the Iraqi debt accumulated in the war, some $30 billion, but the Kuwaitis refused, claiming that Saddam was responsible to pay off his debts for the war he started. Also to raise money for postwar reconstruction, Saddam pushed oil-exporting countries to raise oil prices by cutting back oil production. Kuwait refused to cut production. In addition to refusing the request, Kuwait spearheaded the opposition in OPEC to the cuts that Saddam had requested. Kuwait was pumping large amounts of oil, and thus keeping prices low, when Iraq needed to sell high-priced oil from its wells to pay off a huge debt. Meanwhile, Saddam showed disdain for the Kuwait-Iraq boundary line (imposed on Iraq by British imperial officials in 1922) because it almost completely cut Iraq off from the sea. One of the few articles of faith uniting the political scene in a nation rife with sharp social, ethnic, religious, and socioeconomic divides was the belief that Kuwait had no right to even exist in the first place. For at least half a century, Iraqi nationalists were espousing emphatically the belief that Kuwait was historically an integral part of Iraq, and that Kuwait had only come into being through the maneuverings of British imperialism. The colossal extent of Kuwaiti oil reserves also intensified tensions in the region. The oil reserves of Kuwait (with a population of a mere 2 million next to Iraq's 25) were roughly equal to those of Iraq. Taken together Iraq and Kuwait sat on top of some 20 percent of the world's known oil reserves; Saudi Arabia, by comparison, holds 25 percent. The Kuwaiti monarchy further angered Saddam by allegedly slant drilling oil out of wells that Iraq considered to be within its disputed border with Kuwait. Given that at the time Iraq was not regarded as a pariah state, Saddam was able to complain about the alleged slant drilling to the U.S. State Department. Although this had continued for years, Saddam now needed oil money to stem a looming economic crisis. Saddam still had an experienced and well-equipped army, which he used to influence regional affairs. He later ordered troops to the Iraq–Kuwait border. As Iraq–Kuwait relations rapidly deteriorated, Saddam was receiving conflicting information about how the U.S. would respond to the prospects of an invasion. For one, Washington had been taking measures to cultivate a constructive relationship with Iraq for roughly a decade. The Reagan administration gave Saddam roughly $40 billion in aid in the 1980s to fight Iran, nearly all of it on credit. The U.S. also sent billions of dollars to Saddam to keep him from forming a strong alliance with the Soviets. U.S. ambassador to Iraq April Glaspie met with Saddam in an emergency meeting on July 25, 1990, where the Iraqi leader stated his intention to continue talks. U.S. officials attempted to maintain a conciliatory line with Iraq, indicating that while George H. W. Bush and James Baker did not want force used, they would not take any position on the Iraq–Kuwait boundary dispute and did not want to become involved. Later, Iraq and Kuwait then met for a final negotiation session, which failed. Saddam then sent his troops into Kuwait.

The Persian Gulf War

James Baker On August 2, 1990, Saddam invaded and annexed the oil-rich emirate of Kuwait, thus sparking an international crisis. The annexation of Kuwait gave Iraq, with its own substantial oil fields, control of twenty percent of the world's total crude oil reserve. The U.S. provided assistance to Saddam Hussein in the war with Iran, but with Iraq's seizure of Kuwait, the United States led a United Nations coalition that drove Iraq's troops from Kuwait in February 1991. U.S. President George H. W. Bush responded cautiously for the first several days. On one hand, Kuwait, prior to this point, had been a virulent enemy of Israel and was the Persian Gulf monarchy that had had the most friendly relations with the Soviets. On the other hand, Washington foreign policymakers, along with Middle East experts, military critics, and firms heavily invested in the region, were extremely concerned with stability in the region. The invasion immediately triggered fears that the world's price of oil, and therefore control of the world economy, was at stake; Kuwait controls approximately ten percent of the world's total crude oil reserve. [http://www.kuwait-info.org/Country_Profile/economy.html] President Bush was perhaps swayed while meeting with the British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, a staunch ally of the U.S. during the Reagan-Bush years, who happened to be in the U.S. at the time. Britain had a much closer historical relationship with Kuwait than did the U.S., dating back to British colonialism in the region. The country also benefitted from billions of dollars in Kuwaiti investment. Cooperation between the United States and the Soviet Union made possible the passage of resolutions in the United Nations Security Council giving Iraq a deadline to leave Kuwait and approving the use of force if Saddam did not comply with the timetable. U.S. officials feared Iraqi retaliation against oil-rich Saudi Arabia, since the 1940s a close ally of Washington, for the Saudis' opposition to the invasion of Kuwait. Accordingly, the US and a group of allies it had hastily rounded up, including countries as diverse as Egypt, Syria and Czechoslovakia, deployed massive amounts of troops along the Saudi border with Kuwait and Iraq in order to encircle the Iraqi army, the largest in the Middle East. During the period of negotiations and threats following the invasion, Saddam focused renewed attention on the Palestinian problem by promising to withdraw his forces from Kuwait if Israel would relinquish the occupied territories in the West Bank, the Golan Heights, and the Gaza Strip. Saddam's proposal further split the Arab world, pitting U.S. and Western-supported Arab states against the Palestinians. The allies ultimately rejected any connection between the Kuwait crisis and Palestinian issues. Saddam ignored the Security Council deadline. With unanimous backing from the Security Council, a U.S.-led coalition launched round-the-clock missile and aerial attacks on Iraq, beginning January 16, 1991. Israel, though subjected to attack by Iraqi missiles, refrained from retaliating in order not to provoke Arab states into leaving the coalition. A ground force comprised largely of US and British armored and infantry divisions ejected Saddam's army from Kuwait in February 1991 and occupied the southern portion of Iraq as far as the Euphrates. On March 6, 1991, referring to the conflict, Bush announced: "What is at stake is more than one small country, it is a big idea—a new world order, where diverse nations are drawn together in common cause to achieve the universal aspirations of mankind: peace and security, freedom, and the rule of law." In the end, the over-manned and under-equipped Iraqi army proved unable to compete on the battlefield with the highly mobile coalition land forces and their overpowering air support. Some 175,000 Iraqis were taken prisoner and casualties were estimated at approximately 20,000 according to U.S. data, with other sources pinning the number as high as 100,000. As part of the cease-fire agreement, Iraq agreed to abandon all chemical and biological weapons and allow UN observers to inspect the sites. UN trade sanctions would remain in effect until Iraq complied with all terms.

Gulf War aftermath

Iraq's ethnic and religious divisions, together with the resulting postwar devastation, laid the groundwork for new rebellions within the country. In the aftermath of the fighting, social and ethnic unrest among Shi'ite Muslims, Kurds, and dissident military units threatened the stability of Saddam's government. Uprisings erupted in the Kurdish north and Shi'a southern and central parts of Iraq, but were ruthlessly repressed. The United States, which had urged Iraqis to rise up against Saddam, did nothing to assist the rebellions beyond enforcing the "no fly zones". U.S. ally Turkey opposed any prospect of Kurdish independence, and the Saudis and other conservative Arab states feared an Iran-style Shi'ite revolution. Saddam, having survived the immediate crisis in the wake of defeat, was left firmly in control of Iraq, although the country never recovered either economically or militarily from the Persian Gulf War. Saddam routinely cited his survival as "proof" that Iraq had in fact won the war against America. This message earned Saddam a great deal of popularity in many sectors of the Arab world. Saddam increasingly portrayed himself as a devout Muslim, in an effort to co-opt the conservative religious segments of society. Some elements of Sharia law were re-introduced (such as the 2001 edict imposing the death penalty for homosexuality, rape and prostitution, and the ritual phrase "Allahu Akbar" ("God is great"), in Saddam's handwriting, was added to the national flag.)

1991-2003

Relations between the United States and Iraq remained tense following the Persian Gulf War. In April of 1993 the Iraqi Intelligence Service attempted to assassinate former President George H. W. Bush during a visit to Kuwait. However, Kuwaiti security forces foiled the car bomb plot. On June 26, 1993, the U.S. launched a missile attack targeting Baghdad intelligence headquarters in retaliation for the attack against former President Bush[http://www.clintonfoundation.org/legacy/062693-speech-by-president-address-to-nation-on-iraq.htm][http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/inatl/longterm/iraq/timeline/062793.htm]. The UN sanctions placed upon Iraq when it invaded Kuwait were not lifted, blocking Iraqi oil exports. This caused immense hardship in Iraq and virtually destroyed the Iraqi economy and state infrastructure. Only smuggling across the Syrian border, and humanitarian aid ameliorated the humanitarian crisis. UN organizations (such as UNICEF and the WHO) have estimated between 500,000 and 1.2 million deaths were caused by the sanctions, mostly in the under-5 age group [http://www.ugcs.caltech.edu/~progress/pamp_ed3.html]. Skeptics have estimated that only 350,000 excess deaths occurred between 1991 and 2000 [http://www.alternet.org/story/11933], and that many deaths were actually due to the bombing of Iraqi infrastructure. Some object to the accusation that these deaths were caused by the sanctions. They argue that Hussein's hoarding his country's resources was the true cause of the crisis. On December 9, 1996 the United Nations allowed Saddam's government to begin selling limited amounts of oil for food and medicine. Limited amounts of income from the United Nations started flowing into Iraq through the UN Oil for Food program. However, it alleged that, due to corruption on both sides, very little food and medicine was actually delivered to the Iraqi people. U.S. officials continued to accuse Saddam Hussein of violating the terms of the Gulf War's cease fire, by developing weapons of mass destruction and other banned weaponry, refusing to give out adequate information on these weapons, and violating the UN-imposed sanctions and "no-fly zones." Isolated military strikes by U.S. and British forces continued on Iraq sporadically, the largest being Operation Desert Fox in 1998. Charges of Iraqi impediment to UN inspection of sites thought to contain illegal weapons were claimed as the reasons for crises between 1997 and 1998, culminating in intensive U.S. and British missile strikes on Iraq, December 16-19, 1998. After two years of intermittent activity, U.S. and British warplanes struck harder at sites near Baghdad in February, 2001. Saddam's support base of Tikriti tribesmen, family members, and other supporters was divided after the war, and in the following years, contributing to the government's increasingly repressive and arbitrary nature. Domestic repression inside Iraq grew worse, and Saddam's sons, Uday Hussein and Qusay Hussein, became increasingly powerful and carried out a private reign of terror. They likely had a leading hand when, in August 1995, two of Saddam Hussein's sons-in-law (Hussein Kamel and Saddam Kamel), who held high positions in the Iraqi military, defected to Jordan. Both were killed after returning to Iraq the following February. Iraqi cooperation with UN weapons inspection teams was not total through much of the 1990s, and access to inspectors was ultimately blocked in 1998 by Saddam (see Governments' positions pre-2003 invasion of Iraq#Opposing U.S. Position). It has been speculated that either Iraq was deliberately hiding the weapons or playing a game of bluff, hoping to convince the Western powers and the other Arab states that Iraq was still a power to be reckoned with, rather than that Iraq was hiding significant stockpiles of prohibited materials. Scott Ritter, chief UN weapons inspector at the time, suggests that it was US foreign policy from the Bush 41 through the Clinton presidencies to depose Saddam Hussein, using the notion that he was a threat as justification, and that these adminstrations interfered with the action of weapons inspectors. [http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=05/10/21/144258] Saddam continued to loom large in American consciousness as a major threat to Western allies such as oil-rich Saudi Arabia and Israel, to Western oil supplies from the Gulf states, and to Middle East stability generally. Bush's successor, U.S. President Bill Clinton (1993-2001), maintained economic sanctions, as well as military control of the "Iraqi no-fly zones". In 1998, in response to the departure of U.N. weapons inspectors from Iraq, President Clinton signed the Iraq Liberation Act, declaring that regime change was necessary in order for Iraq to "rejoin the family of nations" [http://www.library.cornell.edu/colldev/mideast/libera.htm] and allocating funding to support Iraqi exile groups. This was soon followed by the three-day Operation Desert Fox, an air-strike effort to hamper Saddam's weapons-production facilities and suspected weapons of mass destruction sites.

2003 Invasion of Iraq

Operation Desert Fox The domestic political equation changed in the U.S. after the September 11, 2001 attacks, which bolstered the influence of the neoconservative faction in the presidential administration and throughout Washington. In his January 2002 state-of-the-union message to Congress, President George W. Bush spoke of an "axis of evil" comprising Iran, North Korea, and Iraq. Moreover, Bush announced that he would possibly take action to topple the Iraqi government. Bush stated, "The Iraqi regime has plotted to develop anthrax, and nerve gas, and nuclear weapons for over a decade." "Iraq continues to flaunt its hostility toward America and to support terror," said Bush. As the war was looming on February 24, 2003, Saddam Hussein talked with CBS News anchor Dan Rather for more than three hours—his first interview with a U.S. reporter in over a decade. CBS aired the taped interview later that week. The Iraqi government and military collapsed within three weeks of the beginning of the U.S.-led 2003 invasion of Iraq on March 20. The United States made at least two attempts to kill Saddam with targeted air strikes, but both failed to hit their target. By the beginning of April, Coalition forces occupied much of Iraq. The resistance of the much-weakened Iraqi Army either crumbled or shifted to guerrilla tactics, and it appeared that Saddam had lost control of Iraq. He was last seen in a video which purported to show him in the Baghdad suburbs surrounded by supporters. When Baghdad fell to the Coalition on April 9, Saddam was nowhere to be found.

Pursuit and capture

April 9

Pursuit

Saddam Hussein's whereabouts remained in question during the weeks following the fall of Baghdad, and the conclusion of the major fighting of the war. Various sightings of Saddam Hussein were reported in the weeks following the war, but none were authenticated. A series of audio tapes claiming to be from Saddam were released at various times, although the authenticity of these tapes remains uncertain. Saddam Hussein was at the top of the "most-wanted list," and many of the other leaders of the Iraqi government were arrested, but extensive efforts to find him had little effect. His sons and political heirs, Uday and Qusay, were killed in July 2003 in an engagement with U.S. forces after a tip-off from an Iraqi informant.

Capture

On December 14, 2003, the Islamic Republic News Agency (IRNA) of Iran first reported that Saddam Hussein had been arrested, citing Kurdish leader Jalal Talabani. These reports were soon confirmed by other members of the Governing Council, by U.S. military sources, and by British prime minister Tony Blair. In a press conference in Baghdad, shortly afterwards, the U.S. civil administrator in Iraq, Paul Bremer, formally announced the capture of Saddam Hussein by saying, "Ladies and gentlemen, we got him." Bremer reported that Saddam had been captured at approximately 8:30 PM Iraqi time on December 13, in an underground "spider hole" at a farmhouse in ad-Dawr near his home town Tikrit, in what was called Operation Red Dawn. [http://www.cnn.com/2003/WORLD/meast/12/14/sprj.irq.saddam.operation/] Bremer presented video footage of Saddam in custody. Saddam Hussein was shown with a full beard and hair longer and curlier than his familiar appearance, which a barber later restored. His identity was later reportedly confirmed by DNA testing. He was described as being in good health and as "talkative and co-operative." Bremer said that Saddam would be tried, but that the details of his trial had not yet been determined. Members of the Governing Council who spoke with Saddam after his capture reported that he was unrepentant, claiming to have been a "firm but just ruler." Later it emerged that the tip-off which led to his capture came from a detainee under interrogation. The Special Operations Forces soldiers who captured Saddam Hussein turned him over to the 4th Infantry Division in order to avoid media publicity that would compromise their future missions. The 4th Infantry Division troops also received credit for their months of Military Intelligence and scouting work prior to the operation. The soldiers involved have this operation noted on their official US Army records (Officer and Non Commissioned Officer Evaluation Reports), and have received US Army Awards.

Incarceration

On May 20, 2005, Rupert Murdoch-owned tabloid newspapers The Sun of U.K. and New York Post, printed photos of Saddam Hussein in his jail cell wearing only his briefs with the headline "Tyrant's in his pants" (The Sun). On the page three of The Sun which is traditionally preserved for topless "Page Three girls", Saddam Hussein was shown wearing a white robe while doing laundry by hand, with the caption: "a pathetic figure as he washed his trousers in jail. (...) Now he sits astride a plastic pink chair while he carries out the chores of a laundry maid." [http://www.nytimes.com/2005/05/21/politics/21saddam.html?ex=1270785600&en=37bef79604f97228&ei=5090&partner=rssuserland] These photos, said to be "provided by American military sources to undermine the Iraqi rebellion" [http://www.nytimes.com/2005/05/21/politics/21saddam.html?ex=1270785600&en=37bef79604f97228&ei=5090&partner=rssuserland], were officially not authorised, being qualified "a clear violation of D.O.D. directives, and possibly Geneva Convention guidelines for the humane treatment of detained individuals" by Bush's deputy press secretary Trent Duffy. The U.S. military said that it would "aggressively investigate" how the photographs of Saddam Hussein in captivity were released [http://edition.cnn.com/2005/WORLD/meast/05/20/saddam.photos/index.html].

Trials

Geneva Convention] On June 30, 2004, Saddam Hussein (held in custody by U.S. forces at Camp Cropper in Baghdad), and 11 senior Ba'athist officials were handed over legally (though not physically, as there is, at present, no adequate Iraqi prison to hold them) to the interim Iraqi government to stand trial for war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide. Particular attention will be paid to his activities in violent campaigns against the Kurds in the north during the Iran-Iraq War, and against the Shiites in the south in 1991 and 1999 to put down revolts. On July 1, 2004, the first legal hearing in Saddam's case was held before the Iraqi Special Tribunal. Broadcast later on Arabic and Western television networks, it was his first appearance in footage aired around the world since his capture by U.S. forces the previous December. On June 17, 2005 The former Malaysian prime minister, Mahathir Mohamad announced the formation, under his joint chairmanship, of an international Emergency Committee for Iraq, with a main objective of ensuring fair trials for Saddam Hussein and the other former Ba'ath Party officials being tried with him. [http://www.adnki.com/index_2Level.php?cat=Politics&loid=8.0.178168945&par=0] On July 18, 2005, Saddam was charged by the Special Tribunal with the first of an expected series of charges, relating to the mass killings of the inhabitants of the village of Dujail in 1982 after a failed assassination attempt against him. On August 8, 2005, the family announced that the legal team had been dissolved and that the only Iraq-based member, Khalil al-Duleimi, had been made sole legal counsel. [http://www.boston.com/news/world/middleeast/articles/2005/08/08/saddams_jordan_based_legal_team_dissolved/] On October 19, 2005 Iraqi authorities put Saddam Hussein back on trial – four days after the October 15 referendum on the new constitution. The trial was adjourned until November 28. On November 28, 2005, Chief Judge Rizgar Mohammed Amin adjourned the trial until December 5 to allow time to find replacements for two defense lawyers who were slain and another who fled Iraq after he was wounded. On December 5, 2005, Saddam's legal defense team stormed out of the court after questioning its legitimacy and asking about security issues regarding the protection of the defense. Saddam along with his co-defendents railed against Chief Judge Amin and the tribunal. On December 6, 2005, Saddam Hussein shouted that he will not return "to an unjust court" when it convenes for a fifth session the following day. At the end of the session, when the judges decided to resume the trial the next day, Saddam suddenly shouted as the judges left : "I will not attend an unfair trial" and added "Go to hell!" [http://uk.news.yahoo.com/06122005/325/saddam-defies-judges-bombers-kill-40.html]

Personal

Saddam married Sajida Talfah in 1958. Sajida is the daughter of Khairallah Talfah, Saddam's uncle and mentor. Their marriage was arranged when Saddam was 5 and Sajida was 7, however, the two didn't meet until their wedding; they were married in Egypt during his exile. They had two sons (Uday and Qusay) and three daughters, Rana, Raghad and Hala. Uday controlled the media, and was named Journalist of the Century by the Iraqi Union of Journalists. Qusay ran the elite Republican Guard, and was considered Saddam's heir. Both brothers made a fortune smuggling oil. Sajida, Raghad, and Rana were put under house arrest because they were suspected of being involved in an attempted assassination of Uday on December 12, 1996. General Adnan Khairallah Tuffah, Sajida's brother and Saddam's boyhood friend, was allegedly executed because of his growing popularity. Saddam also married two other women: Samira Shahbandar, whom he married in 1986 after forcing her husband to divorce her (she is rumored to be his favorite wife), and Nidal al-Hamdani, the general manager of the Solar Energy Research Center in the Council of Scientific Research, whose husband a

Arab

The Arabs ((Arabic: عرب ʻarab) are a large ethnic group widespread in the Middle East and North Africa, originating in the Arabian Peninsula of southwest Asia.

Who is an Arab?

The definition of who an Arab is has several aspects:
- Ethnic identity: someone who considers himself to be an Arab (regardless of racial or ethnic origin) and is recognized as such by others.
- Linguistic: someone whose first language is Arabic (including any of its varieties); this definition covers more than 200 million people.
- Genealogical: someone who can trace his or her ancestry back to the original inhabitants of the Arabian Peninsula.
- Political: someone who is a resident or citizen of a country where Arabic is an official or national language, or is a member of the Arab League or is part of the wider Arab world; this definition would cover more than 300 million people, but it is rather simplistic and rigid in that it excludes the entire Diaspora but includes indigenous or migrant minorities The relative importance of these factors is estimated differently by different groups. Most people who consider themselves Arabs do so on the basis of the overlap of the political and linguistic definitions. However, some members of groups which fulfill both criteria reject the identity on the basis of the genealogical definition; Lebanese Maronites, for example, may reject the Arab label in favor of a narrower Phoenecian-Lebanese national identity. Groups which use a non-Arabic liturgical language - such as Copts in Egypt - are especially likely to be considered non-Arab. Not many people consider themselves Arab on the basis of the political definition without the linguistic one—thus, Kurds or Berbers do not usually identify themselves as Arab—but some do (for instance, some Berbers do consider themselves Arabs, and Kurds were in some historical circumstances seen as Arabs or Turks or Persians). In addition, a majority of the population of Qatar and the United Arab Emirates is made up of non-citizen non-Arab immigrants and so the political definition does not apply there either. A hadith of questionable authenticity[http://www.islamtoday.com/show_detail_section.cfm?q_id=266&main_cat_id=11], related by Ibn Asakir in Târîkh Dimashq and attributed by its narrator Salmân b. `Abd Allah to Islam's prophet Muhammad, expresses a common sentiment in declaring that: :"Being an Arab is not because of your father or mother, but being an Arab is on account of your tongue. Whoever learns Arabic is an Arab." According to Habib Hassan Touma (1996, p.xviii), "An 'Arab', in the modern sense of the word, is one who is a national of an Arab state, has command of the Arabic language, and possesses a fundamental knowledge of Arabian tradition, that is, of the manners, customs, and political and social systems of the culture." On its formation in 1946, the Arab League defined an "Arab" as follows: :"An Arab is a person whose language is Arabic, who lives in an Arabic speaking country, who is in sympathy with the aspirations of the Arabic speaking peoples." As a number of the Prophet companions were of non-Arab descent, Salman the Persian, Suhaib the Roman and Bilal from Abisinia. The genealogical definition was widely used in medieval times (Ibn Khaldun, for instance, does not use the word Arab to refer to "Arabized" peoples, but only to those of originally Arabian descent), but is usually no longer considered to be particularly significant.

Religions

Before the coming of Islam, most Arabs followed a religion featuring the worship of a number of deities, including Hubal, Wadd, Al-Lat, Manat, and Uzza, while some tribes had converted to Christianity or Judaism, and a few individuals, the hanifs, had apparently rejected polytheism in favor of a vague monotheism. The most prominent Arab Christian kingdoms were the Ghassanid and Lakhmid kingdoms. With the expansion of Islam, the majority of Arabs rapidly became Muslim, and the pre-Islamic polytheistic traditions disappeared. At present, most Arabs are Muslims. Sunni Islam dominates in most areas, overwhelmingly so in North Africa; Shia Islam is prevalent in Bahrain, southern Iraq and adjacent parts of Saudi Arabia, northern Yemen, and southern Lebanon, as well as parts of Syria. The tiny Druze community, belonging to a secretive offshoot of Islam, is usually considered Arab, but sometimes considered an ethnicity in its own right. Reliable estimates of the number of Arab Christians, which in any case depends on the definition of "Arab" used, vary. According to [http://arabworld.nitle.org/texts.php?module_id=6&reading_id=63&sequence=4 Fargues 1998], "Today Christians only make up 9.2 per cent of the population of the Near East". In Lebanon they now number only about 40 per cent of the population, in Syria they make up about 10 to 15 per cent, in the Palestinian territories the figure is 3.8 per cent, and in Israel Arab Christians constitute 2.1 per cent. In Egypt, they constitute 5.9 per cent of the population, and in Iraq they presumably comprise 2.9 per cent of the populace. Most North and South American Arabs (about two-thirds) are Arab Christians, particularly from Syria, Palestine, and Lebanon. Arabic-speaking Jews - mainly Mizrahi Jews and Yemenite Jews - are today usually not categorised as Arab. Prior to the emergence of the term Mizrahi, the term "Arab Jews" (Yehudim ‘Áravim, יהודים ערבים) was used to describe Jews of Arab world. The term is rarely used today. The few remaining Jews in the Arab countries reside mostly in Morocco. Between the late 1940s and early 1960s, following the creation of the state of Israel, most Arabic-speaking Jews left their countries of birth. Most are now concentrated in Israel, but many also live in France (see Jewish exodus from Arab lands).

History

The first written attestation of the ethnonym "Arab" occurs in an Assyrian inscription of 853 BC, where Shalmaneser III lists a King Gindibu of mâtu arbâi (Arab land) as among the people he defeated at the Battle of Karkar. Some of the names given in these texts are Aramaic, while others are the first attestations of Proto-Arabic dialects. The Hebrew Bible likewise refers occasionally to peoples called `Arvi (or variants thereof), translated as "Arab" or "Arabian". The scope of the Hebrew term at this early stage is unclear, but it seems to have referred to various desert-dwelling tribes in the Syrian Desert and Arabia. Its earliest attested use referring to the southern "Qahtanite" Arabs is much later. Proto-Arabic, or Ancient North Arabian, texts give a clearer picture of the Arabs' emergence into history. The earliest such texts are written not in the modern Arabic alphabet, nor in its Nabataean ancestor, but in variants of the Epigraphic South Arabian musnad, beginning in the 8th century BC with the Hasaean inscriptions of eastern Saudi Arabia, and continuing from the 6th century BC on with the Lihyanite texts (in southeastern Saudi Arabia) and the Thamudic texts (found throughout Arabia and the Sinai, and not in reality connected with Thamud). Later come the Safaitic inscriptions (beginning in the 1st century BC) and the many Arabic personal names attested in Nabataean inscriptions (which are, however, written in Aramaic.) From about the 2nd century BC, a few inscriptions from Qaryat al-Faw (near Sulayyil) reveal a dialect which is no longer considered "Proto-Arabic", but Pre-Classical Arabic. By the fourth century AD, the Arab kingdoms of the Lakhmids in southern Iraq and Ghassanids in southern Syria had emerged just south of the Fertile Crescent and ended up allying respectively with the Sassanid and Byzantine Empires. Thus they were constantly at war with each other on behalf of their imperial patrons. However, their courts were responsible for some notable examples of pre-Islamic Arabic poetry, and for some of the few surviving pre-Islamic Arabic inscriptions in the Arabic alphabet. The Lakhmid kingdom was dissolved by the Sassanids in 602, while the Ghassanids would hold out until engulfed by the expansion of Islam. During the 8th and 9th centuries, the Arabs (specifically the Umayyads, and later Abbasids) forged an empire whose borders touched southern France in the west, China in the east, Asia Minor in the north, and the Sudan in the south. This was one of the largest land empires in history. Throughout much of this area, the Arabs spread the religion of Islam and the Arabic language (the language of the Qur'an) through conversion and assimilation. Many groups came to be known as "Arabs" not through descent but through Arabization. Thus, over time, the term Arab came to carry a broader meaning than the original ethnic term. Many Arabs in Sudan, Morocco, Algeria and elsewhere became Arab through Arabization. Arab nationalism declares that Arabs are united in a shared history, culture and language. Arab nationalists believe that Arab identity encompasses more than outward physical characteristics, race or religion. A related ideology, Pan-Arabism, calls for all Arab lands to be united as one state. Anti-Arabism is hate or prejudice against Arabs. It is usually also associated with anti-Muslim hatred.

Traditional genealogy

Medieval Arab genealogists divided the Arabs into three groups:
- the "ancient Arabs", tribes that had been destroyed or vanished, such as Ad and Thamud; they are often alluded to in the Qur'an as examples of God's power to destroy wicked peoples.
- the "Pure Arabs" of South Arabia, descending from Qahtan. The Qahtanites (Qahtanis) are said to have migrated the land of Yemen following the destruction of the Ma'rib Dam (sadd Ma'rib). The Qahtanite Arabs were responsible for the ancient civilizations of Yemen, notably including that of the Sabaeans (known in the Bible as Sheba.)
- The "Arabized Arabs" (musta`ribah) of North Arabia, descending from Adnan, supposed to be a descendant of Ishmael (Ismail), the eldest son of Abraham and Hagar. The Arabic language as it is spoken today in its classical Quranic form was the result of a mix between the original Arabic tongue of Qahtan and the northern Arabic which shares a great deal with northern Semitic languages from the Levant. The Arabs take a great pride in their language and it's survival as usable and comprehendable language for over thousand years. In Jewish and Christian traditions, the identification of the Ishmaelites, described in the Bible as a people of the Arabian wilderness, with Arabs began at least by the time of Josephus, and became standard centuries prior to Islam (in which the term "Hagarenes", a pun on the Arabic muhajir and the name of Hagar, was commonly used.) Efforts to reconcile the Biblical and Arab genealogies later led to the identification of Joktan with Qahtan, probably due to his Biblical identification as the ancestor of Hazarmaveth (Hadramawt) and Sheba.

Etymology

The term "Arab" or "Arabian" (and cognates in other languages) has been used to translate several different but similar sounding words in ancient and classical texts which do not necessarily have the same meaning or origin. The etymology of the term is of course closely linked to that of the place name "Arabia". Although the term mâtu arbâi describing Gindibu in Assyrians texts is conventionally translated of Arab land, nothing is known with certainty about the exact location or extent of the land being referred to, nor what literal meaning the name had. In fact several different ethnonyms are found in Assyrian texts that are conventionally translated "Arab": Arabi, Arubu, Aribi and Urbi. The presence of Proto-Arabic names amongst those qualified by the terms arguably justifies the translation "Arab" although it is not certain if they all in fact represent the same group. In Hebrew the words `arav and `aravah literally mean "desert" or "steppe". In the Hebrew Bible the latter feminine form is used exclusively for the Arabah, a region associated with the Nabateans, who spoke Arabic. The former masculine form is used in Isaiah 21:13 and Ezekiel 27:21 for the region of the settlement of Kedar in the Syrian Desert. 2 Chronicles 9:14 contrasts “kings of `arav " with “governers of the country” when listing those who brought tribute to King Solomon. The word is typically translated Arabia and is the name for Arabia in Modern Hebrew. The New Revised Standard Version of the Bible uses instead the literal translation “desert plain” for the verse in Isaiah. The adjectival noun `aravi formed from `arav is used in Isaiah 13:20 and Jeremiah 3:2 for a desert dweller. It is typically translated Arabian or Arab and is the modern Hebrew word for Arab. The New Revised Standard Version uses the translation "nomad" for the verse in Jeremiah. In the Bible, the word `arav is closely associated with the word `erev meaning a "mix of people" which has identical spelling in unvowelled text. Jeremiah 25:24 parallels "kings of `arav " with "kings of the `erev that dwell in the wilderness". The account in 1 Kings 10:15 matching 2 Chronicles 9:14 is traditionally vowellized to

Ad-Dawr

Links and References

See also

Iraq

Modern History

Modern Politics

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Geography

Economy

Demographics

Culture

Miscellaneous topics

External links

Video

Saddam Hussein

Overview

Youth

Rise in the Ba'ath party

Consolidation of power

Consolidation of power

Succession

Saddam Hussein as a secular leader

Foreign affairs

The Iran–Iraq War (1980-1988)

Tensions with Kuwait

The Persian Gulf War

Gulf War aftermath

1991-2003

2003 Invasion of Iraq

Pursuit and capture

Pursuit

Capture

Incarceration

Trials

Personal

Arab

Who is an Arab?

Religions

History

Traditional genealogy

Etymology