Haji Ali, a burly Iraqi Shiite businessman, pushed his thick white moustache against the window of the plane as it spiralled towards Baghdad airport and peered down at former president Saddam Hussein's palace sitting like a Disney toy in the middle of a green lake.
"For who did you build all these places?" he said, as though addressing the former leader.
"Now the Americans have taken your places and tomorrow you will be killed. What did all these palaces benefit you?" he said.
Shawkat, a thin, bearded taxi driver, was more reflective of the mood in the city as residents digested the news that the execution of the man who ruled them for two decades was imminent.
"So what if they kill him? Will his execution stop the civil war in the streets? People are getting killed by dozens, looters are manning checkpoints, you leave your house and you're not safe. They can kill him 10 times but it won't bring safety to the streets because there is no state of law," he said.
The sound of heavy machine gun fire echoed through the street as he spoke, and outside his vehicle two US soldiers ran for cover behind their armored vehicles as others fired. For many Iraqis the execution of Saddam seems far less significant than the terrifying violence that has become part of everyday life.
Among those who were talking about the hanging on Friday, opinion was sharply and predictably divided along sectarian lines. In Karrada, a prosperous Shiite neighborhood, the streets were busy with shoppers and people preparing for the Muslim festival Id al-Adha. Vendors laid their merchandise on the pavements and families strolled the streets looking at clothes and toys.
Haif'a, a school teacher in her thirties standing with her daughter, offered a typically Shiite point of view.
"It makes me happy to see him executed, he should have been killed three years ago, his people are still fighting because they believe he will come back," she said.
A few streets away in a small tea room, Abu Karar served sweet black tea in front of a wall covered with posters of Shiite clerics and martyrs.
"It's a day of justice for the Iraqis," he said, pouring some tea before continuing.
"It's a day of justice for the Shiites who for decades were killed and tortured by Saddam the dog. He should be burned alive. He killed four of my cousins and I want to see him die a hundred times in front of my eyes," he said.
Another man dressed in a dark grey dishdasha and an old military jacket, who sat drinking tea, said: "Let them execute him and relieve us, maybe then we can have peace."
Outside the tea room, a convoy of six SUVs with no plates packed with masked men toting guns, drove though the streets, sirens blaring as they shouted at people to give way -- a familiar scene in a city sliding into a full-blown civil war.
"This is what we have these days," said the man with the grey dishdasha, gesturing towards the convoy.
"When Saddam was here you knew who his people were and you avoided them, now you never know who is who," the man said.
For Ahmad al-Ubaidy, a young man who spends his days guarding his Sunni neighborhood as part of a vigilante group, Saddam's execution was just part of a sectarian campaign against the Sunnis.
"When Saddam was the leader he didn't help the Sunnis, he only benefited his clan and people, he made all Iraqis starve," he said.
"But now he has become a symbol -- for the Shiite his execution is a victory over all the Sunnis, and for us we see it as one last move before establishing the empire [a reference to Persian rule of Iraq during parts of the 16th century] in Iraq again," he said.
"There will be blood baths in the streets," said another Sunni insurgent from north Baghdad.
As the plane landed in Baghdad and Haji Ali finished reciting his prayers, he said: "The people who rule today should remember that throughout history, Iraq's rulers were killed by the people who toppled them. Maybe Allah doesn't want for this nation to be stable."
Views of the experts
Rosemary Hollis, director of research at Chatham House, London
It's tawdry. It's not going to achieve anything because of the way the trial was conducted and the way the occupation was conducted. Life in Iraq has become so precarious that many people are saying it was safer under Saddam Hussein -- it makes the whole thing look like a poke in the eye as opposed to closure or some kind of contribution to the future of Iraq. The purpose should have been to see justice done in a transparent manner ... the trial was gruesome, occasionally farcical, and failed to fulfil its promise of giving satisfaction.
Mishkat al-Moumin, former environment minister in transitional Iraqi government, now at the Middle East Institute in Washington.
Ordinary people who were abused by him will be relieved. His opponents will be relieved when he is finally gone. He abused people severely and his abuses were on a nationwide scale. He killed so many people. At the political level, those who support him might try to take revenge but on the people's side they will feel they have seen justice done.
Kamil Mahdi, Iraqi expatriate, Institute of Arab and Islamic Studies, Exeter University, UK.
Quite honestly, I don't think much of it any more, given what's happening in Iraq. It will be taken as a US decision. The worst thing is that it's an issue which, in an ideal situation, should have unified Iraq but the US have succeeded in dividing the Iraqis.
Toby Dodge, expert on Iraq at Queen Mary College, London University.
The new elite were bound to go ahead with the execution because they suffered at his hands. In the long term, though, this means very little in terms of drawing a line under the last four years of occupation or creating a new Iraq. In choosing to kill him, the current government of Iraq have simply reproduced Iraqi history instead of stepping away from the past ... it completes the Islamicization of the insurgency.
Chris Doyle, director, Council for Arab-British Understanding.
For Bush, Blair and their diminishing brotherhood of diehard supporters, Saddam's demise is their sole concrete victory in Iraq in almost four years. This should have been the crowning glory of their efforts, but instead it may pose yet another risk to their demoralized troops. For Iraqis, some will see it as a symbol of the death of the ancien regime. For some Sunnis, Saddam's death represents the final nail in the coffin of their fall from power. But Iraqis may also see this as the humiliation of Iraq as a whole, that their president, however odious, was toppled by outside powers, and is executed effectively at others' instigation.
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