Images of Hanging Make Hussein a Martyr to Many (NYT)

[Beetwasher]

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/06/world/middleeast/06arabs.html?_r=1&hp&ex=1168059600&en=4818277bb06677ae&ei=5094&partner=homepage&oref=slogin

BEIRUT, Lebanon, Jan. 5 — In the week since Saddam Hussein was hanged in an execution steeped in sectarian overtones, his public image in the Arab world, formerly that of a convicted dictator, has undergone a resurgence of admiration and awe.

On the streets, in newspapers and over the Internet, Mr. Hussein has emerged as a Sunni Arab hero who stood calm and composed as his Shiite executioners tormented and abused him.

“No one will ever forget the way in which Saddam was executed,” President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt remarked in an interview with the Israeli newspaper Yediot Aharonot published Friday and distributed by the official Egyptian news agency. “They turned him into a martyr.”

--snip--

Ain't that just swell.

[sharp_stick]

1. Big Surprise There Isn't It?

I mean he actually looked dignified and composed next to the death squad that had been assembled by our "allies" supposedly running that shit hole of a country.

It's just unbelievable, just one fuck-up after another.

[napi21]

2. That may be true in some groups, like those who supported Saddam

when he wasa ruler, but I still believe the images were beneficial to those who wouldn't have believed Saddam was really dead! There are many people, especially in Iraq, who feared Saddam so much, they would have believed he was neverhanged but hidden somewhere and would return to torture them again someday.