Iraq vowed to avenge US and British air strikes around Baghdad that underscored a tougher line by the new Bush administration in the decade-old showdown between President Saddam Hussein and Washington, said AFP.
The President and the rest of the country's top leadership discussed what "military measures" to take following Friday's air raids that killed two and injured more than 20, AFP said, citing the official INA news agency.
The Iraqi President chaired an emergency meeting of the Iraqi leadership and struck a tone of defiance, said the agency.
"Iraq will continue to fight them (enemies) on land, in the air and at sea. Iraq will finally win," a communiqué said overnight.
A later meeting of the Revolutionary Command Council and the leadership of the ruling Baath party considered "the extent of the aggression and the military measures to be taken against the United States and (the countries) which provide facilities" to Washington, said a statement.
The President also said that "21 divisions of volunteers" will be formed "to join the army for the liberation of Jerusalem."
Several thousand people protested in and around Baghdad, many of them urging Saddam to carry out threats to bombard Israel.
Chanting anti-US and anti-Israeli slogans, hundreds of angry mourners in a Baghdad suburb buried an 18-year-old woman who Iraqi authorities said was among the two dead and more than 20 wounded in Friday's raids, said the agency.
ISRAEL NOT CONCERNED ABOUT THE ATTACKS
Haaretz newspaper quoted the army radio as saying that the government had decided to take no extra precautions.
The paper quoted deputy defense minister, Ephraim Sneh, as telling the radio that "we don't need to be concerned about the events" of Friday.
Sneh, meanwhile, stressed that an Iraqi build-up of weapons of mass destruction poses a long-term, rather than immediate, threat to Israel and the region as a whole.
"Hussein is exploiting the absence of international inspections to build chemical, biological and probably nuclear weapons," Sneh said.
The Baghdad air attacks provoked demonstrations of support for Iraq in leading West Bank cities, said reports.
In the West Bank city of Ramallah, about 200 demonstrators waved Iraqi flags and posters of Saddam Hussein and chanted "Death to America and Long live Iraq."
In Nablus, about 1,500 protesters burned American and Israeli flags and pictures of US President George W. Bush, said Haaretz.
Mu'awia al-Masri, a member of the Palestinian Legislative Council (PLC), urged Arab leaders not to welcome US Secretary of State George Powell during his visit to the Middle East, said Haaretz.
Powell, during his first month as secretary of state, has said little publicly about the use of military force against Iraq, said the Washington Post newspaper.
He has spoken mostly about reinvigorating the international sanctions placed on Iraq after its 1990 invasion of Kuwait.
Powell has indicated he will focus his energy on the "arms control objective" of preventing the Iraqi government from importing material that could be used to develop chemical, biological and other weapons, and from accumulating enough revenue to rebuild its military, said the Post.
Washington said the strikes on the suburbs of Baghdad, the first in two years, had knocked out air command and control centers after increased Iraqi threats to allied warplanes policing the skies of southern Iraq.
Bush, who called the attack a "routine mission", warned the Iraqi president that the United States expected him to abide by the cease-fire agreements that ended the 1991 Gulf War.
British Prime Minister Tony Blair said he would not hesitate to take further action against Baghdad if necessary, AFP said.
"Operations such as the one last night would not be needed if Saddam stopped attacking us," Blair said in a statement.
FOREIGN, ARAB COUNTRIES CONDEMN US-BRITISH AIRSTRIKES
International reactions were generally unfavorable, both from heavyweight countries like Russia and China and Washington's traditional hate-figures such as Iran and Libya, though Gulf Arab states maintained an embarrassed silence, said AFP.
"What the American military is in the process of doing, at the beginning of the new US administration, is a threat to international security," said Russian defense ministry official, General Leonid Ivashov.
The Washington Post quoted China's Xinhua news agency as quoting foreign ministry spokesman Zhu Bangzao as saying, "We condemn the air attacks of the United States and Great Britain on Iraq and express our deep regrets to the innocent civilians killed and injured."
France said the raids would make the search for a peaceful solution to the Iraqi problem more difficult, AFP said.
Norway, which heads the UN's Iraq sanctions committee, said Saturday it regretted the US-British decision to stage fresh aerial raids on Iraq, said the agency.
"Foreign Minister (Thorbjoern) Jagland has said it is unfortunate that the US and Britain found it necessary to execute yesterday's operations against targets in Iraq," ministry spokesman Torgeir Larsen told AFP.
The Cairo-based Arab League protested that the attack had "no justification," according to the agency, which added that League secretary general Esmat Abdel Meguid warned that the raids had provoked "angry sentiments and discontent in the Arab world."
The Egyptian parliament, said AFP, described the attack as an aggression against the Iraqi people.
Speaker Ahmed Fathi Surur announced "the condemnation of any aggression against the Iraqi people."
In Lebanon, al-Safir newspaper accused Bush of "trying to torpedo any attempt at appeasement and proving he is his father's son by brandishing war."
"The air strikes against Iraq cover the coming of another war, which will take place with the arrival in power of Ariel Sharon (in Israel)," said the newspaper, quoted by AFP.
In Amman, hundreds of protesters burned Israeli and US flags and chanted slogans of support for the Iraqi people and their president, whom they described as "the hope of the Arab nation," said AFP.
"We're with you Saddam and against America," changed the demonstrators, including many women, children and students, as they held up Jordanian, Iraqi and Palestinian flags.
Yemen condemned the air raids and warned they were a "grave development" which threatens regional security and stability, said AFP.
"The Yemeni government looks with grave concern on the bombing of Iraqi military sites in the Baghdad region," a foreign ministry spokesman was quoted as telling the official SABA news agency.
In Malaysia, Hatta Mohamad Ramli, a senior leader of the fundamentalist Pan-Malaysian Islamic Party, called the air strikes "international hooliganism," said the Post, adding that in Pakistan, the Islamic political party Jamaat-e-Islami branded the actions the "worst kind of state terrorism." - Albawaba.com
© 2001 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)
