ÿş<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN">  <HTML><HEAD><TITLE>Al Jazeera - objective and balanced global news coverage and analysis- Profiles</TITLE> <META http-equiv=Content-Type content="text/html; charset=UTF-16"> <META http-equiv=Content-Type><LINK href="article-saddam-hussein_files/style.css" type=text/css rel=stylesheet> <META content="MSHTML 6.00.2722.900" name=GENERATOR></HEAD> <BODY leftMargin=0 topMargin=10 rightMargin=0> <DIV align=center xmlns:UDF="http://mycompany.com/mynamespace" xmlns:msxsl="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:xslt"> <CENTER> <TABLE style="BORDER-COLLAPSE: collapse" borderColor=#111111 cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=0> <TBODY> <TR> <TD style="PADDING-BOTTOM: 10px" align=left><IMG src="article-saddam-hussein_files/banner.gif"></TD></TR> <TR> <TD><IMG src="article-saddam-hussein_files/mainheader.jpg"></TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE></CENTER></DIV> <DIV align=center> <CENTER> <TABLE id=AutoNumber2 style="BORDER-COLLAPSE: collapse" borderColor=#999999 cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=0 width=770 border=1> <TBODY> <TR> <TD> <TABLE id=AutoNumber3 style="BORDER-COLLAPSE: collapse" borderColor=#111111 cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=0 width="100%" border=0> <TBODY> <TR> <TD class=dates id=hDate dir=ltr style="PADDING-LEFT: 5px" width="80%" bgColor=#cccccc></TD> <TD dir=ltr width="20%" bgColor=#cccccc></TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE> <TABLE id=AutoNumber4 style="BORDER-COLLAPSE: collapse" borderColor=#111111 cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=0 width=768 border=0> <TBODY> <TR> <TD width=565> <TABLE cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=0 width="100%" border=0> <TBODY> <TR> <TD colSpan=2 height=5></TD></TR> <TR> <TD style="PADDING-LEFT: 5px" colSpan=2> <TABLE cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=0 width="100%" border=0 xmlns:UDF="http://mycompany.com/mynamespace" xmlns:msxsl="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:xslt"> <TBODY> <TR> <TD class=indicationLink2 vAlign=top><A class=indicationLink href="http://www.thememoryhole.org/media/al-jazeera/index.html">Homepage<IMG src="article-saddam-hussein_files/spacer.gif" width=2 border=0></A><IMG src="article-saddam-hussein_files/spacer.gif" width=3 border=0><IMG src="article-saddam-hussein_files/spacer.gif" width=3 border=0>/ <IMG src="article-saddam-hussein_files/spacer.gif" width=2 border=0><A class=indicationLink href="http://www.thememoryhole.org/media/al-jazeera/topics/index8a90.html?cu_no=1&template_id=274&temp_type=42">Profiles<IMG src="article-saddam-hussein_files/spacer.gif" width=3 border=0></A>/ </TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE></TD></TR> <TR> <TD colSpan=3 height=6></TD></TR> <TR> <TD width=10></TD> <TD><INPUT id=item_cu_no type=hidden value=1 xmlns:UDF="http://mycompany.com/mynamespace" xmlns:msxsl="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:xslt"><INPUT id=item_no type=hidden value=517 xmlns:UDF="http://mycompany.com/mynamespace" xmlns:msxsl="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:xslt"><INPUT id=version type=hidden value=1 xmlns:UDF="http://mycompany.com/mynamespace" xmlns:msxsl="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:xslt"><INPUT id=date1 type=hidden value=23/03/2003 xmlns:UDF="http://mycompany.com/mynamespace" xmlns:msxsl="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:xslt"><INPUT id=dateTime type=hidden value=10:53PM xmlns:UDF="http://mycompany.com/mynamespace" xmlns:msxsl="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:xslt"><INPUT id=articalText type=hidden value="<P><FONT size=2><FONT face=Arial>Saddam Hussein has rarely left the international spotlight since he attained power in 1979. First he led his country into a ruthless war </FONT>
<TABLE width=10 align=right border=0>

<TR>
<TD align=middle><FONT face=Arial><IMG height=150 src=_/mritems/images/2003/3/22/1_722_1_6.html width=190 border=0></FONT></TD></TR>
<TR>
<TD class=imgcaption id=Comment dir=rtl vAlign=top align=middle>
<P align=left><FONT face=Arial size=1>President Saddam Hussein appears on Iraqi state television after an attempt by US stealth fighters and cruise missiles to assassinate him on Thursday&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;</FONT></P></TD></TR></TABLE><FONT face=Arial>against Iran, at the same time managing to consolidate his grip on power in a nation torn by sectarian conflicts. </FONT></FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial size=2>A decade later he invaded Kuwait and emerged unscathed after US-led forces devastated his country over a period of six weeks to liberate the&nbsp;oil-rich sheikhdom. </FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial size=2>Today, as the United States and its allies are stepping up their military&nbsp;campaign to overthrow Saddam Hussein, the fate of 26 million people who have suffered under economic sanctions for more than a decade, again hangs in the balance. </FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial size=2>The UN-imposed sanctions, which have eroded the economic and social life of ordinary Iraqi citizens, aimed at stripping Iraq of its weapons of mass destruction, which Saddam Hussein was able to develop with the assistance of the US and other western countries during his eight-year-old war with neighbouring Iran.</FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial size=2>But as he invaded Kuwait in August 1990, US support turned into enmity. </FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial size=2>Almost overnight, Saddam Hussein became the most hated figure in the United States, only recently being overtaken by Osama bin Laden. </FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial size=2>The United States accuses the Iraqi regime of cooperating with al-Qaeda despite a taped message, believed to be from bin Laden, branding Saddam Hussein an infidel. </FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial size=2>The message, broadcast on the Doha-based Al-Jazeera Channel in February, urged Muslims to support the Iraqi people and resist any attack on their country, but it said Saddam's secular "socialist" government had lost credibility. "Socialists are infidels wherever they are," it said. </FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial size=2>Saddam Hussein heads the ruling Arab Baath Socialist Party, which he joined in 1956 climbing to the top in little time.</FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial size=2>The Iraqi leader participated in an unsuccessful 1959 assassination attempt against Iraqi Prime Minister Abdul Karim Qassem in which he was shot in the leg. </FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial size=2>He fled to his hometown of Takrit, 170&nbsp;km in northern Baghdad. Saddam Hussein was born on April 28, 1937 to a poor Sunni family in the village of Auji. It is not clear if his father, Hussein al-Majid, abandoned the family or died before he was born. </FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial size=2><STRONG>Nationalist leanings</STRONG></FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial size=2>Whatever the case, Saddam was raised by his mother and his shepherd stepfather. He then moved to Baghdad and lived with his uncle, Khairallah Talfah, soon falling under the sway of his nationalist leanings.</FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial size=2>Never feeling safe, even in his heartland, Saddam left Takrit for Syria and then to Egypt. Ten months later, in December 1961, a military tribunal in Baghdad sentenced him to death for taking part in the botched effort.</FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial size=2>He returned to Iraq after the Baath Party conducted a coup d’etat on July 14, 1963, but was thrown in jail with other accomplices in October 1964 due to differences with the new Iraqi president, Abdel-Salam Aref, and Baath party leaders. </FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial size=2>In 1966, Saddam Hussein was elected as the party’s secretary general while he was still in detention. In the same year he and other inmates escaped from prison as they were being taken to court.&nbsp; </FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial size=2>In 1968, Saddam Hussein played a significant role in planning and carrying out the revolt that ousted Abdel-Rahman Aref, who had succeeded his late brother to the presidency.</FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial size=2>The Baath Party finally came to power under General Ahmed Hassan Bakr, and Saddam Hussein, who was 32 at the time, attained the vice president's post for 10 years. </FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial size=2>To expand his power, Saddam Hussein appointed members from his Takriti clan to high-ranking posts in the government. At that time, he was in charge of internal security which he used to build a strong and elaborate security network. </FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial size=2>Saddam Hussein played a major role in nationalizing the Iraqi oil industry in 1972. He also signed an agreement in March 1975 with the Iranian ruler, Reza Shah Pahlavi, who was a staunch US ally, changing the demarcation of the borders between Iran and Iraq in the Shatt al-Arab waterway. Both agreed to have an equal share of the channel in return for Iran’s cessation of its support to the Kurdish opposition in northern Iraq.</FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial size=2>In his own country, Saddam Hussein implemented a huge project to eliminate illiteracy by imposing up to three years imprisonment on those failing to show up to classes. </FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial size=2>On June 6, 1979, Bakr announced his resignation and relinquished the presidency to Saddam Hussein. </FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial size=2><STRONG>Brutality</STRONG></FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial size=2>Since then, the regime has carried out an unspecified number of executions in a bid to keep Saddam Hussein’s grip on power. The Iraqi president has brutally put down Kurdish rebellions in the north and Shiite uprisings in the south.</FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial size=2>The executions have not extended to family members. Saddam Hussein is married to Sajida Khairallah Talfah and has two sons and three daughters. Two of his daughters were married to the brothers Saddam Kamel and Hussein Kamel, who defected with their families to Jordan in 1996. The brothers returned to Iraq after they were pardoned by the Iraqi president but were killed upon their arrival to Baghdad. </FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial size=2>While Iraqi media reports said they were killed by their tribes that were outraged by their defection, other reports said they were killed by Saddam and his sons, Udai and Qusai. </FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial size=2>Udai Hussein is no longer considered the likely successor to his father after he survived an assassination attempt that left him crippled in 1996. However, he is still a powerful figure in Iraq and runs a major Iraqi newspaper, Babel. </FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial size=2>Udai Hussein is notorious for his violent attitude. He once stormed into a party held in honour of Suzanne Mubarak, the wife of the Egyptian president, and beat the Iraqi president’s personal valet, Kamal Hana Gegeo, to death. It was believed that he was punishing him for his role as a mediator for Saddam Hussein’s second marriage to Samira Shahbandar.&nbsp; </FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial size=2>Qusai Hussein is the second son of the Iraqi president and the likely apparent heir to his father. Qusai heads several security and intelligence apparatuses.</FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial size=2>With the technical assistance of the West, Saddam has used chemical weapons against civilians. The most publicized incident was against Halabja, a pre-dominantly Kurdish town in the northern province of Sulaimaniya. Led by lieutenant Ali Hassan al-Majid, the infamous “Chemical Ali,” the Iraqi air forces bombarded the town with gas poisons on March 16, 1988 killing up to 5,000 people.</FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial size=2>This event is used today by the United States to justify the war on Iraq. “As we remember Halabja, we wish to reaffirm to ourselves and the international community that Saddam Hussein’s regime must never be permitted to rebuild its programs for the development of weapons of mass destruction,” said Richard Boucher, US State Department spokesman, to mark the 13th anniversary of the massacre on March 16, 2001.</FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial size=2>Boucher also said that the Iraqi regime “killed thousands of Iranians with chemical weapons during the Iran-Iraq War from 1983 to 1988.” During that period, the United States was strongly supporting Saddam Hussein and providing him with military assistance since they considered the Islamic republic that was established in Iran in 1979 a greater threat to their interests in the region.</FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial size=2>Critics of US foreign policy point to the provision of chemical weapons used by Saddam Hussein by the United States and other countries.</FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial size=2>Just after Iraq and Iran conducted a cease-fire in 1988, differences surfaced between Iraq and Kuwait over oil prices and the control of oilfields that are located along the borders of the two neighbouring countries.</FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial size=2>Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait on August 2, 1990 proclaiming the sheikhdom Iraq’s 19th province.&nbsp; His army was forced to retreat when a US-led coalition bombarded Iraq in a military action known as “Operation Desert Storm.”</FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial size=2>Today, the Iraqi president’s chances of staying in power are decreasing. While he sees that “victory has become a certainty,” neighbouring Arab countries want him to go to exile to avert the possible war. But Middle East analysts rule out this possibility, saying it is out of his character.</FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial size=2>Whether he chooses the road of exile or to fight until the end, the consequences of the current war will continue to shape the region for years to come.</FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial size=2><STRONG>Al Jazeera</STRONG></FONT></P>" xmlns:UDF="http://mycompany.com/mynamespace" xmlns:msxsl="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:xslt"> <TABLE id=AutoNumber5 style="BORDER-COLLAPSE: collapse" borderColor=#111111 cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=0 width="100%" border=0 xmlns:UDF="http://mycompany.com/mynamespace" xmlns:msxsl="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:xslt"> <TBODY> <TR> <TD> <TABLE id=AutoNumber5 style="BORDER-COLLAPSE: collapse" borderColor=#111111 cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=0 width="100%" border=0> <TBODY> <TR> <TD dir=ltr width="100%"><A href="http://www.thememoryhole.org/media/al-jazeera/xml/topics/printarticle345b.xml?cu_no=1&item_no=517&version=1&template_id=274&parent_id=258"><IMG hspace=5 src="article-saddam-hussein_files/print.gif" align=right vspace=5 border=0></A><IMG onmouseover="this.style.cursor = 'hand' ;" onclick=SendByEmail(); onmouseout="this.style.cursor = '' ;" hspace=5 src="article-saddam-hussein_files/email.gif" align=right vspace=5 border=0></TD></TR> <TR> <TD height=5></TD></TR> <TR> <TD class=articalTitle>Saddam Hussein - under the spotlight, always</TD></TR> <TR> <TD height=15></TD></TR> <TR> <TD id=artical vAlign=top></TD></TR> <TR> <TD height=12></TD></TR> <TR> <TD width="100%" background=article-saddam-hussein_files/h-dotedline-bg.gif><IMG height=1 src="article-saddam-hussein_files/spacer.gif" width=1></TD></TR> <TR> <TD height=10></TD></TR> <TR> <TD dir=ltr width="100%"><A href="http://www.thememoryhole.org/media/al-jazeera/xml/topics/printarticle345b.xml?cu_no=1&item_no=517&version=1&template_id=274&parent_id=258"><IMG hspace=5 src="article-saddam-hussein_files/print.gif" align=right vspace=5 border=0></A><IMG onmouseover="this.style.cursor = 'hand' ;" onclick=SendByEmail(); onmouseout="this.style.cursor = '' ;" hspace=5 src="article-saddam-hussein_files/email.gif" align=right vspace=5 border=0></TD></TR> <TR> <TD height=5></TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE></TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE> <SCRIPT language=JavaScript1.2 xmlns:UDF="http://mycompany.com/mynamespace" xmlns:msxsl="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:xslt"> if(document.all.artical) document.all.artical.innerHTML = document.all.articalText.value ; </SCRIPT> </TD> <TD width=10></TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE></TD> <TD dir=ltr width=1 bgColor=#cccccc><IMG height=1 src="article-saddam-hussein_files/spacer.gif" width=1 border=0></TD> <TD vAlign=top width=202> <TABLE cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=0 width="100%" border=0> <TBODY> <TR> <TD colSpan=3 height=10></TD></TR> <TR> <TD width=10></TD> <TD><A href="http://www.thememoryhole.org/media/al-jazeera/index.html"><IMG src="article-saddam-hussein_files/homepage.gif" border=0></A></TD> <TD width=10></TD></TR> <TR> <TD colSpan=3 height=8></TD></TR> <TR> <TD width=10></TD> <TD></TD> <TD width=10></TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE></TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE></TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE></CENTER></DIV> <SCRIPT language=JavaScript1.2> if( document.all.date1 ) { docDate = document.all.date1.value ; } </SCRIPT> <SCRIPT language=JavaScript src="article-saddam-hussein_files/HomeMenu.js"></SCRIPT> </BODY></HTML>