“TRIAL of the century” blared the headline on one Arabic satellite channel, with a picture of a birdcage descending on to an empty chair.

Iraqi newspapers have also given coverage to Saddam’s impending court appearance.

“The court questions the tyrant and seven of his supporters tomorrow,” trumpeted the government-funded As-Sabah, while others have so far concentrated on the constitutional referendum and its aftermath.

Papers in the Shia religious capital of Najaf, where many of Saddam’s victims are buried, also gave it prominent, but not wall-to-wall, treatment.

“The families of the Dujail martyrs will make the trial of Saddam tomorrow,” proclaimed one publication run by supporters of Ahmad Chalabi, the foremost champion of de-Baathification.

But until the man himself appears on screen much of the Arabic media has been muted, focusing on their own domestic problems. Many Arabs have expressed unease at the prospect of an Arab leader going on trial in a US-backed legal process.

On the BBC’s Arabic forum most comments are from Iraqis calling for the execution of Saddam, but not while Iraq remains — as they see it — under US occupation.

While Palestinian newspapers have made little or no mention of the fate of their former benefactor — Saddam infamously paid thousands of dollars to the families of Palestinian suicide bombers — most sympathetic responses online have been from Palestinian Islamic forums.

“A new era awaits all our dictators with Saddam being the first. Let us start the countdown to see who is next on America’s list,” wrote one correspondent to the Ahlam al-Ghad forum.

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