Pall Falls Over Town of Tikrit

AD DAWR, Iraq — All was quiet in this village by the Tigris on Sunday, a day after U.S. troops swept in to capture Saddam Hussein in his crude hide-out near a barn for sheep.

But there was a sense of grief among those brave enough to venture out and speak, sorrow that a leader still much respected -- even revered -- seemed permanently sealed off from any return to power. Faded slogans praising Hussein still grace the walls of the local girls school.

“We will not be allowed to have somebody like him again,” said Hatem Yassin, 45, dressed in the traditional headdress and robe. “What a pity.”

The mood here was in sharp contrast to the rest of the country where citizens rejoiced in the arrest of the man whose flight had clouded Iraq’s future. Celebratory bullets were fired in the air from Basra in the south to Baghdad in the center of the country to Kirkuk in the north and beyond. People rushed into the streets to display their jubilation.

“Today divine justice has prevailed!” shouted Ali Mohammed, 43, in Kirkuk, as Kurds danced traditional steps on the streets.

But in Hussein’s home region -- the city of Tikrit and its environs, where his tribal ties go deep -- a sense of mourning and disbelief seemed to prevail. Some appeared shattered by the news.

People cried when told of the arrest of the former dictator, who is thought to have hid in this area for months, jumping from safe house to safe house. Widespread disbelief greeted images of his disheveled appearance after he emerged from the dirt hole where he had been hiding from U.S. troops.

“We have collapsed today,” said Mohammed Sarhan, 22, a university student in Tikrit who had tears in his eyes. “The news that the historical leader is arrested is catastrophic. The Americans are the real criminals.”

The people of Tikrit are resolute in the defense of their hometown hero, who rose from a nearby town -- Al Auja -- to become Iraq’s supreme leader. He surrounded himself with tribesmen and showered privileges on his favored town where most of the people survived on government patronage. As a result, Tikritis were bitterly resented most everywhere else.

This region is steeped in the lore of Saddam Hussein. Hussein is said to have swam across the Tigris here, with a bullet lodged in his leg, in 1959 while on the run after an unsuccessful attempt to assassinate the prime minister. Hussein’s renowned escape-artist ability -- he also escaped with his power intact after his humiliating defeat in the 1991 Persian Gulf War -- tended to bolster disbelief in the news that Hussein was now in custody.

“I swear to God this is not him!” shouted one man as he and dozens of other men in the Almanar electrical appliance shop on Tikrit’s main drag watched the TV images of the deposed leader. “This is an American fabrication.”

The shop’s owner asked an employee to turn off the TV, the better to save everyone the grief. The sight was too much.

“Oh my God,” the owner murmured. “Oh my God.”

While U.S. officials voiced hope that Hussein’s capture might diminish anti-U.S. sentiment, the arrest seemed to have had the opposite effect, at least here. Some people seemed ready to take up arms.

“The resistance will go on,” vowed Mohammed Ahmed, 23, his fists clenched, as though ready to fight. “I am grieved. I tell the Iraqis who are happy, they are collaborators.”

Along the streets, some women too were teary-eyed. The somber atmosphere extended to homes, where in some cases a mood of mourning prevailed.

“He [Hussein] is a courageous man, but regretfully he has been betrayed,” said Mahdiya Saleh, 77, an aunt of Hussein’s wife. “The Americans feared him. He is gone.”

Her son, Rashid Mahmoud, a cousin of Hussein, suggested that she fetch snapshots of the toppled leader, for comfort. “Bring the photos,” he said. “Bring all the photos.”

But his mother saw no point. “What is the benefit of the photos? He is gone. Gone. Gone. He always had a tough life since his childhood.”

The grief in Tikrit was so great that it even seemed wildly exaggerated. In a region with many insurgent cells, no one wants to be heard saying anything negative about the man who had been the rallying point for some anticoalition forces. Insurgents have directly targeted Iraqis, killing police officers and others who were deemed to be working with the occupying forces.

“I wish that I received the news of the death of all of my family rather than hearing the news of the capture of the president,” said Fawzi Hamid, 32, a municipal official in Tikrit. “He is the most courageous among the Arab leaders.”

But not all were paying tributes.

Ali Hussein Salih, a 26-year-old physician, said the capture was a relief. “His detention is necessary for the city to be quiet because he was financing the military operations” against the coalition, he said. If “there is no one who finances those mercenaries ... then the resistance will vanish.”

But that was a minority view here and, in this atmosphere, probably an opinion best kept private.

“He may have committed some mistakes,” allowed Mazin Mohammed, 30. “But his love is planted in our hearts.... He is the only person among the Arabs who hit both America and Israel.”

As Mohammed spoke, a figure shouted from an apartment balcony. He wanted to reassure those who were mourning this loss.

“Don’t worry,” he bellowed from above, “all of us are Saddam Hussein.”

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Special correspondent Zedan reported from Ad Dawr and staff writer McDonnell from Tikrit. Times researchers Raheem Salman and Suheil Ahmed contributed to this report.