King Arthur

The Magic Stone of Saddam Hussein

Tyrants create their own twisted reality, and force their people to live, as it were, inside the dictator’s skull, and inside his own private drama, endlessly re-enacting it. So complete can this process be that it gives an occult impression: that of a spell cast over an entire country by a master sorcerer. When the tyrant is overthrown or dies, it is as if an entire population is liberated from the spell—there is much relief, but also much surprise—and shame—at being held in thrall for so long.

But the tyrant as sorcerer isn’t just a metaphor borrowed from fantasy. Astonishingly, many twentieth-century tyrants have used magical powers and psychic tools not only to control their people, but to gauge and manipulate their own destinies. Tyrants are instinctive manipulators, but not necessarily analytical. So they tend to place a great deal of stress on the notion of ‘ Providence’, which has ordained their destiny, and protects them, but which must also be placated.

One such tyrant was Saddam Hussein. You are probably familiar with the details of the repressive state apparatus and vicious practices by which the dictator of Iraq and his cronies kept their hold over the country. But did you know that that Hussein, his family and his circle not only believed in magic, but used it, both to promote superstitious fear in Iraqis, and to also try and ‘second-guess’ their opponents and protect their own destinies?

Magic has a strange place in Muslim countries. Its practice, but certainly not its existence (as it’s mentioned several times in the Koran), is reviled by fundamentalist Muslims. However, many ordinary Muslims frequent magicians, faith-healers, fortune-tellers, and many other practitioners of magical arts. Of course there is a distinction made between good and bad magic, and most magic is carried out using the intervention of either angels or jinn(genies)—the latter being seen as much less reliable than angels, being habitual liars and mischief-makers. Nevertheless, jinn (who can be compared to both fairies and demons in Western imagery—some are good, some bad, some merely highly unpredictable) are considered to be easier to use by ordinary magicians.

Saddam Hussein, whose peasant mother Sabha sometimes worked as a fortune-teller, has always believed in magic. He himself was reputed to have had some success in ‘studying the sands’ and summoning jinn to do his bidding. It was believed that he had seven jinn to protect him, and that he spoke daily with the king and queen of the jinn, who advised him. He also ordered Baghdad University to set up a department of parapsychology, to investigate methods to use in the Iran-Iraq war, and later to ‘mind-read’ UN inspectors searching for WMDs in Iraq.

Saddam personally patronised a rotating circle of favourite magicians—not only Iraqis, but a French Arab, a Turk, a Chinese, a Japanese and an Indian magician, and—wait for it—a beautiful Jewish witch from Morocco! His personal magician, interviewed by a reporter from the Washington Post in Baghdad in 2003, before Saddam’s capture, said that his work for the Hussein family involved ‘mostly issues of love, faithfulness and sexual prowess.’ Saddam’s son Uday—who was also a firm believer in magic—scouted through his TV station for magicians and other psychics to come and work for the Hussein family. Brave was the psychic or magician who took up such an offer--if Uday or other family members took exception to a prediction or a spell, you might well be imprisoned or even executed. ( The magician interviewed by the Washington Post was imprisoned for six months because Saddam suspected that his own wife, angry with his womanising, had paid the magician to cast a spell to hurt the dictator’s leg.)

It was said that one or more of these sorcerers had made Saddam a special talisman, a magic stone which he wore either around his neck, or had had implanted under the skin of his arm, depending on who you listened to. This stone made him invulnerable. The fact that the dictator survived several assassination attempts (including one by Mossad, which is regarded in almost supernatural terms by many people in the Middle East), countless plots, the Iran-Iraq war, the first Gulf War, and even the second Gulf War, could only add fuel to the image of Saddam the Sorcerer, arch-manipulator and master of all kinds of forces, historical and parapsychological, whose destiny was protected by dark and dangerous forces, and best not meddled with.

Many believers in Saddam’s magic powers were profoundly shocked by the TV images of the Master of Magicians being pulled, haggard and dirty, from his hiding place last year . But others believe he is still protected. Saddam’s own delusional demeanour at his pre-trial hearing suggests the old fox still thinks he is the darling of Providence.