"He Gives Us a Ray of Hope"

By Otto Friedrich

In Western eyes, Saddam Hussein is a killer, a bloodthirsty tyrant, a new Hitler. But to many Arabs he is a hero, the charismatic champion of pan-Arab nationalism, the resolute foe of "imperialist" interventions they long for. Perhaps one of the most surprising, and dangerous, concussions from the gulf crisis has been the deep vein of potent Arab emotions uncovered by Saddam's actions and appeals. His confrontation with America has stirred strong pride among people bitter over generations of Arab humiliation and foreign interference. His subversive appeal to poor Arabs has struck a chord: "Make it clear to your rulers, the emirs of oil, as they serve the foreigner: tell the traitors there is no place for them on Arab soil after they humiliated Arab honor and dignity." Even some who admire neither the repressive dictator nor his rape of Kuwait are attracted by his rhetoric of Arab greatness.

Logic in the Arab world is often eclipsed by emotion. Saddam's populist message against corrupt regimes kept in control by American and Zionist powers, and the swagger of a leader who can and will fight them, has had an intoxicating effect on the dispossessed across national boundaries. To Palestinians in the West Bank and Jordan, in Yemen, in Tunisia and in the Sudan, where large numbers of the destitute live, Saddam offers a ray of hope. They believe they can only benefit from a violent reshuffling of the regional status quo.

But in countries like Egypt, where the ordinary Arab has firsthand knowledge of Saddam's brutal rule, his rhetoric has mostly fallen on deaf ears. Some 2 million Egyptians went to work in Iraq during the Iranian war, and many were cheated, mistreated, pressed into military service, even killed. "His treatment of Egyptian workers has been barbaric," said an Egyptian journalist. "We cannot forgive him for that." In the princely states of the gulf, most regard Saddam with horror: after Kuwait, he is a real threat to their own security and prosperity.

No one knows if the forces Saddam has unleashed will vanish along with this crisis, but the emotions he has tapped run deep. One is the widespread sense among Arab nationalists that the region's oil wealth is unfairly divided, that most of it goes to the selfish "oil emirs" of the Persian Gulf and very little to the millions of working people who live in poverty. The oil belongs to all Arabs, says Jordanian newspaperman Ramai Khoury. "This wealth is our only chance to develop the Arab world. People know Saddam wants to help the poor Arab nations."

Second is Arab xenophobia, the abiding hatred of foreigners -- specifically Europeans and Americans -- who have long divided, despoiled and dishonored the once powerful Arab world. Many Arabs share Saddam's complaint that the boundaries of the present-day Middle East were imposed arbitrarily by colonial rulers after World War I. And their anger was only intensified after World War II when Europe and America allowed another wave of usurpers, the Jews, to stake their ancient claim to Middle Eastern land. Regardless of their nationality, the Arabs still share an almost universal hatred of Israel as an aggressor and oppressor, and nothing since its founding has diminished that. Though these views may be exaggerated, even somewhat irrational, they are undeniably powerful.

In the past two weeks Saddam supporters took to the streets across the Arab world. "No to America! No to Jews!" shouted thousands of Yemenites marching through their capital of San'a. Similar demonstrations erupted in Jordan, Syria, Algeria, Tunisia, the Sudan. "Foreigner, go home! War is coming!" shouted a Jordanian driving a Mercedes in downtown Amman. Then he slashed his hand across his throat. "Touch Iraq, and the whole Arab world will tear you to pieces!"

This is not just a matter of street-corner threats. Educated and experienced Arabs say similar things, with passionate conviction. "I love any Arab leader who will unite the Arabs, even by force," says Major General Yusuf Kawash, a retired Jordanian army officer who once studied in the U.S. "We want to see one empire restoring our culture to its former glory."

One of Saddam's most telling charges is against what is widely perceived as the double standard practiced by the West. Why did the U.S. not react with the same force when Israel occupied the West Bank and Gaza? The argument, of course, ignores the fact that Israel moved into the West Bank only after Jordan entered the Six-Day War, but that does not diminish its force among Arabs. "The big trouble with the Americans is that they don't propose sanctions against Israel, but only against Iraq," says Elia Khoury, assistant Anglican archbishop in Amman. "They are blinded by Zionist influence."

Khoury is a Palestinian, a member of the P.L.O. Executive Committee, and the Palestinians have rallied to Saddam more strongly than almost any other Arabs. They owe Saddam for his public support of the Palestine Liberation Organization, they embrace his hostility to Israel, and they feel their own position is so hopeless. Explains Saeb Erakat, a political science professor at An-Najah University, in the West Bank city of Nablus: "We have nothing to lose."

The Palestinians remain at the center of the argument because their continuing homelessness is still the most rankling problem in the area. They and their supporters bitterly resent the Israelis' refusal to negotiate, the U.S.'s failure to overcome that refusal, and the Palestinians' own inability to do much more than throw stones. Saddam seems the only Arab leader capable of making Israel tremble. Palestinian hatred for the all-powerful Israelis is so violent that pro-Saddam demonstrators in the West Bank even carried placards last week urging their hero to GAS THE ZIONISTS.

But Arab support for Saddam is by no means limited to Palestinians. The borders drawn since the colonial era seem to many Arabs to have been devised mainly to make the region's oil safely and cheaply available to the West. Jordan, Syria and Tunisia are classic have-not nations; they have no oil. They watched as tiny city-states grew fabulously rich while their citizens were imported as cheap labor. The glaring disparities bred further resentment and class tensions. In economic terms, the have-nots see little future except as part of that dream kingdom known as the Arab Nation.

What Westerners see as Saddam's megalomaniacal claim to lead the Arab world appears to many Arabs as the natural response to a role in search of a hero. Few foreigners understand how Arabs yearn for a return of the puissant and united Arab world that dominated the globe in the 7th and 8th centuries. The intervening years have brought little but humiliation and division. Egypt's now revered Gamal Abdel Nasser breathed life into that dream when he seized the Suez Canal in 1956; so did Libya's Muammar Gaddafi when he led the Arab oil producers to triple the price of crude in 1973. Such paladins of Arab nationalism portray themselves as the reincarnation of the mighty Saladin, who pushed out the Christian crusaders in the 12th century.

Some observers discount today's support for Saddam, all the noisy threats and curses, as traditional Arab rhetoric, and they judge the demonstrations insignificant in the long term. They believe Saddam's momentary personal popularity will vanish as his true qualities are exposed. But others see the historical tensions he has uncovered as harder to dispel. The forces of anti- Western nationalism could grow stronger and more violent, particularly if the U.S. gets embroiled in a shooting war, or if its intervention turns into a kind of long-term occupation. Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak last week observed that the Arab mind is "as changeable as the weather." But Arab League Ambassador to the U.S. Clovis Maksoud saw signs of new windstorms. "The Arab world is never going to be the same," he said. "History will not be made just for us. It has to be made by us."

With reporting by James Wilde/Amman, with other bureaus