Liberation

Do Iraqis want "President Bush to extend the United Nations weapons
inspections and stand down the armada he has massed on Iraq's frontiers?" Iraqi refugees hiding illegally in Jordan say, "No, no, no!"

According to The New York Times, these same Iraqis regard the U.S. as a "greedy, menacing imperial power" that "has enabled the humiliation of Palestinians by arming Israel; craves control of Iraq's oil fields; supported Mr. Hussein in the 1980's and cared not a fig for his brutality then, and grieved for seven lost astronauts even as its forces prepared to use 'smart' weapons that, the migrants said, threatened to kill thousands of innocent Iraqis."

Yet they await American liberation, hoping for a short, precision conflict in which the U.S. kills Saddam and his murderous entourage, but spares civilians and Iraq's infrastructure. And they want the U.S. to act soon.