This video image released by Iraqi state television shows Saddam Hussein being led to the gallows by guards wearing ski masks moments before his execution Saturday Dec. 30. 2006. Clutching a Quran and refusing a hood, Saddam Hussein went to the gallows before sunrise Saturday, executed by vengeful countrymen after a quarter-century of remorseless brutality that killed countless thousands and led Iraq into disastrous wars against the United States and Iran.

Hot Air has the UNCUT execution video via Rusty and Vinnie.

Flap now has the video which I will embed here (graphic warning – not for children):

Obviously this wasn’t shot by the official Iraqi cameraman: he was up on the platform with Saddam and using a real lens, not a cell phone. This probably was taken by one of the Shiite witnesses, who passed it along to the Sadrists for dissemination on the web.

I don’t know whose bright idea it was to let three punks in leather jackets and balaclavas take care of business instead of the Iraqi army, but the more I watch it, the more it looks like a hit instead of a state execution.

Telegraph: Saddam’s end: tormented as his death loomed

Read it all for a description of Saddam’s last moments alive.

Frankly, Flap could care less.

Good Riddance to this POS.

Related:

Video: Saddam’s final moments

In pictures: Life and times of Saddam Hussein

Timeline: Life of a tyrant

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Reuters: Saddam hanged as violence goes on

Saddam Hussein was hanged at dawn on Saturday for crimes against humanity after
Iraq’s prime minister rushed through an execution that delighted victims of Saddam’s harsh rule.

The former president, toppled by the U.S. invasion four years ago, was shown going calmly to his death on the scaffold in images of his last moments broadcast on state television.

“It was very quick. He died right away,” one official witness told Reuters, adding that the body was left to hang for 10 minutes and death was recorded at 6:10 a.m. (0310 GMT).

The bearded Saddam, still robust at 69, refused a hood or to have a cleric present but did say a brief prayer before a short drop to oblivion on gallows once used by his own secret police.

Hot Air (Via Michelle Malkin) has the Video here.

Saddam Hussein the Butcher of Baghdad is dead. Let’s move on,finish the job and allow the Iraqi people to determine their own fate without a ruthless dictator.

Grainy video later showed his body in a white shroud, the neck twisted and blood on a cheek. An adviser to Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki said he would probably end up in a secret grave.

Three decades after Saddam established his personal rule by force, it closed a chapter in Iraq’s history marked by war with
Iran and a 1990 invasion of Kuwait that turned him from ally to enemy of the United States and impoverished his oil-rich nation.

But, as President Bush said in a statement, sectarian violence pushing Iraq toward civil war has not ended.

Car bombs set off by suspected insurgents from Saddam’s once dominant Sunni minority killed over 70 people in Baghdad and near the Shi’ite holy city of Najaf, striking areas populated by Shi’ite Muslims oppressed for decades and now in the ascendancy.

But Maliki, his fragile authority among fellow Shi’ites enhanced after he forced through Saddam’s killing over Sunni and Kurdish hesitation just four days after his appeal failed, reached out to Saddam’s Sunni followers.

“Saddam’s execution puts an end to all the pathetic gambles on a return to dictatorship,” he said in a statement as state television showed film of him signing the death warrant in red ink. “I urge … followers of the ousted regime to reconsider their stance as the door is still open to anyone who has no innocent blood on his hands to help in rebuilding … Iraq.”

It is time to rebuild Iraq…….

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This video image released by the Biladi TV stations, which are affiliated with the Dawa party of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki. appears to show the body of former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein wrapped in a white shroud following his execution Saturday Dec. 30. 2006. Clutching a Quran and refusing a hood, Saddam Hussein went to the gallows before sunrise Saturday, executed by vengeful countrymen after a quarter-century of remorseless brutality that killed countless thousands and led Iraq into disastrous wars against the United States and Iran.

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Fox News is reporting Saddam Hussein, the Butcher of Baghdad has been executed.

The Hanging Scene

AP: Saddam Hussein Executed for War Crimes

Saddam Hussein, the shotgun-waving dictator who ruled Iraq with a remorseless brutality for a quarter-century and was driven from power by a U.S.-led war that left his country in shambles, was taken to the gallows clutching a Quran and hanged Saturday.

In Baghdad’s Shiite enclave of Sadr City, people danced in the streets while others fired guns in the air to celebrate the former dictator’s death. The government did not impose a round-the-clock curfew as it did last month when Saddam was convicted to thwart any surge in retaliatory violence.

President Bush called Saddam’s execution “the kind of justice he denied the victims of his brutal regime.”

And Hot Air has a reminder of Saddam and his nefarious acts here.

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Saddam Hussein Watch: Hangman Cometh – Within Hours

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Iraq War Watch: Saddam Huissein Convicted and Sentenced to Hang For Crimes Against Humanity

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***Scroll Down for Updates***

Reuters: Saddam may hang within hours: senior Iraqi source

Saddam Hussein could be hanged within hours, a senior Iraqi source told Reuters on Friday after Saddam’s lawyer said U.S. forces had handed over the former president to Iraqi authorities for execution.

“Things have changed in the past three hours. There were some issues … and now that is resolved so it seems it’s possible he may be hanged tonight,” the source, who is in a senior position of authority, said after a day of confusion.

However, the start of the Muslim festival of Eid al-Adha on Saturday raised the possibility of a delay until after the week-long holiday is over, he added: “It’s not certain,” he said.

Najib Naimi, a former Qatar justice minister who served on Saddam’s legal defense team, said he expected his client to be executed soon.

“We think he might be executed by tomorrow as a gift for the Iraqis,” he told BBC News 24.

Fox News at 10:25 AM PST is reporting that Saddam continues in United States custody and has not been turned over to the Iraqis for execution.

Update 1:38 PM PST:

AP: Saddam Asks U.S. to Block Execution

Lawyers for Saddam Hussein on Friday made a last-minute appeal to an American court to avert execution in Iraq, asking a judge to block his transfer from U.S. custody to the hands of Iraqi officials.

Hussein’s lawyers filed documents Friday afternoon asking for an emergency restraining order aimed at stopping the U.S. government from relinquishing custody of the condemned former Iraqi leader to Iraqi officials, a spokeswoman for a federal court in Washington D.C. said.

The documents were being processed and were not immediately made public. The Justice Department had not yet responded to the request.

A similar request by the former chief justice of the Revolutionary Court, Awad Hamed al-Bandar, was denied Thursday and is under appeal. Al-Bandar also faces execution. The Justice Department argued in that case that U.S. courts have no jurisdiction to interfere with the judicial process of another country.

Al-Bandar argued that his trial violated his rights under the U.S. Constitution but Justice countered that foreigners being tried in foreign courts are not protected by the U.S. Constitution.

No standing here……..

Tick Tock Tick Tock

Update 2:10 PM PST

Fox News is reporting that Saddam will be hanged before 6 AM Baghdad time. It is now 1:10 AM there.

Update 2:44 PM PST

Fox News is reporting that the final arrangements for Saddam’s release to Iraqi authorities are being made and that Saddam will be hanged within hours – by 10 PM EST, 7 PM PST.

Update 4:00 PM PST

Matt Drudge is reporting that Saddam Hussein is about to be executed.

The official witnesses to Saddam Hussein’s impending execution gathered Friday in Baghdad’s fortified Green Zone in final preparation for his hanging, as state television broadcast footage of his regime’s atrocities.

With U.S. forces on high alert for a surge in violence, the Iraqi government readied all the necessary documents, including a “red card” _ an execution order introduced during Saddam’s dictatorship. As the hour of his death approached, Saddam received two of his half brothers in his cell on Thursday and was said to have given them his personal belongings and a copy of his will.

State television, which spent Friday evening preparing the public for Saddam’s death by playing footage of torture and murder carried out by his forces, said the execution would take place between 5:30 am and 6:00 am.

Two and one half hours to go?

The execution of the Butcher of Baghdad.

Update 4:56 PM PST

Saddam’s daughter is requesting that her father be buried in Yemen. And Saddam be reburied in Iraq when it is liberated.

Update 6:08 PM PST 5:08 AM Baghdad time

Fox News is reporting that a United States court has rejected a stay of execution for Saddam. Execution is expected within the hour.

Update 6:16 PM PST  5:16 AM Baghdad Time

Final Plans Made for Saddam’s Execution

An adviser to Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki said Saddam would be executed before 6 a.m. Saturday, or 10 p.m. Friday EST. Saddam and others were convicted of murder in the killings of 148 Shiite Muslims from an Iraqi town where assassins tried to kill Saddam in 1982.

Also to be hanged were Saddam’s half-brother Barzan Ibrahim and Awad Hamed al-Bandar, the former chief justice of the Revolutionary Court, the adviser said.

The time was agreed upon during a meeting Friday between U.S. and Iraqi officials, said the adviser, who declined to be quoted by name because he was not authorized to speak to the media.

“Saddam will be handed over shortly before the execution,” the official said. The physical transfer of Saddam from U.S. to Iraqi authorities was believed to be one of the last steps before he was to be hanged. Saddam had been in U.S. custody since he was captured in December 2003.

Stay tuned for updates…..

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