Saddam is due to be hung within the next few hours, and the video should be aired sometime tonight in Iraq, if all goes to plan.
So, this is a real decision we will have to make here soon.
As for me, I'm normally squeamish, and I don't like it when death is filmed. Seems like a personal thing, death. Taping it for the ages to watch is too voyeuristic, too sick. It's enough for me to know the guy got whacked.
But I can't rule it out. I find I'm more than a little curious. I have very little empathy for this fellow, but still, evil dictator murderer or not, guy is still a human being. Sure, he is getting a far easier death than what he dished out, but filming it and sending it out like the latest netflix is slightly rude.
Fox news is reporting they will do it so the Iraqi's will know he is dead, once and for all. No doubt.
I'm back and forth. I think I will end up watching it, as I'm flip flopping back and forth so much, I will just go to youtube and check it out in a moment of extreme curiosity.
I don't think I will watch it, I think that's it just to sick to wrong, for all the terrible things he did that's still a human being at the of that noose. Beside that watching somebody being hung stays with you for a long time.
I don't think the Iraqi's need to tape it if the people want proof then show pictures of his corpse to the media but to watch him choke to deathnah I don't think that is neccesary.
I don't think that I could watch it, and be okay with it.
Not that he doesn't deserve this... but I don't need to watch it.
But, I'm sure that I will end up watching it, because I'm too damn curious, like a cat.
:::>^..^<::: ~*~The Journey is more important than the end or the start~*~ :::>^..^<:::
Just to let you all know he refused the hood. I saw the video minus the actuall hanging of course on tv this morning. He seemed clam and had the rope round his neck but when offered the hood his reply was "there will be no need for that" then he went up the rope was secured and that is when it cuts off then you see him in a body bag with his head sticking out.
I used that link and watched it, you just see him disappear into the gallows at a high speed. Then later, you see him with a broken neck. Wasn't as gruesome as I figured it would be. You don't actually see the moment of neck break or death.
· Leaked film reveals chaotic end
· Taunts and insults hurled
· Sectarian backlash fear
Ewen MacAskill and Michael Howard
Monday January 1, 2007
The Guardian
Camera footage of the final minutes of Saddam Hussein released yesterday shows him being taunted by Shia hangmen and witnesses, a scene that risks increasing sectarian tension in Iraq.
As he stood at the gallows, he was tormented by the hooded executioners or witnesses shouting at him to "Go to hell" and chanting the name "Moqtada", the radical Shia Muslim cleric and leader of the Mahdi army militia, Moqtada al-Sadr, and his family.
The grainy images, which appeared to have been taken on a mobile phone, disclose exchanges between Saddam and his tormentors, the moment when his body drops through the trapdoor, and his body swinging, eyes partly open and neck bent out of shape. In what Sunni Muslims will perceive as a further insult, the executioners released the trapdoor while the former dictator was in the middle of his prayers.
Sunni Muslims, who were dominant under Saddam, but are now the victims of sectarian death squads, will see the shambolic nature of the execution as further evidence of the bias of the Shia-led government. They have repeatedly claimed that the Iraqi government, helped by the US and British, conducted a show trial, based on revenge rather than justice.
Saddam's team of defence lawyers claimed that the hanging had been simply "victors' justice".
The unruly scenes will also dismay the US and British governments, that are also privately alarmed at the sectarian bias of the government, led by the prime minister, Nouri al-Maliki. The US and Britain believe at least some members of the Iraqi government are complicit in sectarian killings, particularly by members of the police force.
The Iraqi government last night denied the execution had been sectarian or designed for revenge. Hiwa Osman, an adviser to the Iraqi president, Jalal Talabani, told the BBC: "This whole execution is about justice."
As Saddam was buried in this home village, Ouja, outside Tikrit, yesterday morning, the leaked footage appeared on the internet and on Arabic television stations. While Saddam was professing Muhammad as God's prophet, he was interrupted by shouts. One of the people observing the execution chants "Moqtada, Moqtada, Moqtada". Saddam dismissively repeats the name Moqtada. The noose around his neck, he appears to smile and shoots back: "Do you consider this bravery?"
Another voice shouts at him to "Go to hell". Saddam, seemingly accusing his enemies of destroying the country he once led, replies: "The hell that is Iraq?"
A Shia shouts "Long live Mohammed Baqir al-Sadr," a member of Moqtada's family thought to have been assassinated by Saddam's security services. Another onlooker pleads for dignity: "Please don't, the man is facing execution. Please don't. I beg you, no!"
As Saddam continues with his prayers, saying "I profess that there is no God but God and that Muhammad ...", the executioners release the trapdoor. There is a shout: "The tyrant has fallen."
Although many Sunni Muslims also suffered under him and were glad to see him go, the manner in which the execution was carried out will have created some sympathy for Saddam. The fact that the execution took place at the start of the main Muslim religious holiday will further inflame Sunni opinion.
The tit-for-tat killings between the majority Shias, who suffered badly under Saddam, and the previously dominant Sunnis, has created a de facto civil war that could break up the country. Sunni insurgents, particularly a branch of al-Qaida, have sought to fan the civil war by carrying out a series of devastating car bomb attacks on Shia population centres, particularly Sadr City in Baghdad and towns such as Hilla and Najaf.
The response among Sunnis to the hanging and the video was to swear revenge. A man from Mosul, a mixed city in the north, told Reuters: "The Persians have killed him. I can't believe it. By God, we will take revenge." He was referring to Iraq's new leaders' ties to Shia Iran, and the Shia in general.
Accusations that the government had mishandled the execution were not confined to Sunni regions. In the Kurdish region, there was also criticism. "This execution should have been for all of Saddam's victims, and instead they have hijacked it and turned it into a sectarian event," said Anwar Abdullah, a student at the technical institute of Sulaymaniyah.
Rebwar Suliman, 21, whose uncle and grandfather were killed by Saddam's secret police in Kurdistan in the 1980s, said: "It does a dishonour to the Kurds."
Saddam was buried in the dead of night, prompting an outpouring of grief and anger from fellow members of his tribe and other Sunni Arabs. His body was flown by US military helicopter to Tikrit and then taken to the village where he was born.
Hundreds of mourners visited his tomb inside a marble-floored hall built by Saddam. Others attended the Great Saddam Mosque in Tikrit.
man, them Arabs are even more sensitive then American Liberals.
peeps need to learn to just chill out.
for some odd reason, while the word "Ganya" was still just a thought-dropping in my head, I thought it'd only be four letters. But apparently it's five. yep.
I used that link and watched it, you just see him disappear into the gallows at a high speed. Then later, you see him with a broken neck. Wasn't as gruesome as I figured it would be. You don't actually see the moment of neck break or death.
Still it's nasty to watch, as it's someone dying.
Boy that was a bad video. The camera bounced around the whole time. Still, it was not that bad IMO. I expected it to be far worse than it was.
Boy that was a bad video. The camera bounced around the whole time. Still, it was not that bad IMO. I expected it to be far worse than it was.
The news is saying it was a cell phone video. Yeah, it was good they had the gallows part where you couldn't see it good. So they just drop and you don't have to see the neck breaking.
The cell video wasnt great...but you get to see an up close look at his face afterwords. Its not a long look, but it shows it. Nothing major as it just happened.
Of course thats just my opinion....I could be wrong. (Dennis Miller)
"You might be the toughest little whacker. . .but in my world, you're about as worrisome as a cloudy day." (Dutch Dooley)
12-30-2006 12:40 AM
