Word: saddams
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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Perhaps it was inevitable that Saddam Hussein's end would be accompanied by low theatrics instead of high drama. After all, he had ruled for nearly three decades by a crude medieval code that vulgarized Iraqi public life. And yet the former dictator's final moments--the screams of "Go to hell" from spectators at the gallows, the taunts of "Muqtada, Muqtada" by guards evidently loyal to Shi'ite leader Muqtada al-Sadr--were undignified even by Saddam's standards. As if to block out the barbs, Saddam loudly intoned his final prayer, the traditional Islamic invocation...
...Just as consequential, for Sunnis and anyone else who knows Iraqi history, Saddam's executioners shouted the name of Ayatollah Sayyid Muhammad Baqir al-Sadr, Muqtada's father-in-law. Ayatollah Sadr, whom Saddam executed in 1980, is perhaps as responsible as Iran's Ayatollah Khomeini for modern, resurgent Shi'a Islam. Sadr founded the Da'wa Party, a violent, secretive organization committed to the creation of an Iraqi Shi'a Islamic republic - and today a political party that counts none other than Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki as a member...
...Sadr and the Da'wa took the side of the Iranian revolution, sparking demonstrations and unrest across Iraq. After Sadr's Da'wa attempted to assassinate Hussein's longtime foreign minister Tariq Aziz on April 1, 1980, Saddam, in fairly quick succession, executed Sadr and invaded Iran. Saddam was convinced that unless he pre-empted Sadr - in other words, Iran - he would end up on the gallows. Two years later, in Dujail, the Da'wa did try to assassinate Saddam. Saddam's brutal retribution against Dujail is what got him hanged last Saturday...
...Only time will tell us what Sadr intends do with Iraq if he ever does take over. But the Sunnis today will tell you they don't need to wait. On Saturday, they saw all the evidence they needed: the symbolism of executing Saddam on the Muslim High Holiday of Id al-Adha as a gift to the Shi'a, and and the decision of Maliki to get special approval from Iraq's senior Shi'a clerics, the "marja'iya," to carry out the execution on that...
...which he was nominated in February 2005, and a desire to return to his roots as a diplomat. The Director of National Intelligence (DNI) was a post created to provide streamlined control to 16 U.S. intelligence agencies after the failures that led to 9/11 and the mistaken assessments of Saddam Hussein's weaponry. Negroponte, 67, was the America's first DNI and his departure after little more than 20 months on the job is being viewed as a setback for America's beleaguered spy community and the continuity of leadership at the top that many believe it needs...