

In September 1960, Qasim proposed that the company share 20 percent of its ownership and 55 percent of its profits with the Iraqi government. Hostility to Qasim was held also by the Anglo American-owned Iraq Petroleum Company. These moves created more hostility toward Qasim. Women were to be protected from arbitrary divorce, and women were to be given equal protection concerning inheritances. Polygamy was outlawed and a minimum age for marriage established at eighteen. He promoted a revision of the personal status code. In December, Qasim pushed for greater equality for women. Saddam Hussein was shot inĪnd then back to Egypt, where he had been a university student. He is said to have messed-up the operation by firing his weapon too early. One of the participants was Saddam Hussein. But for the Ba'athists Qasim's opposition to Nasser's United Arab Republic remained an issue, and in early October 1959 they moved against Qasim in a traditional way – assassination. Qasim had allied himself with the Communist Party, but rather than beholden to it he was containing its ambitions, to the extent of putting some Communists in prison. The Eisenhower administration has been described as wanting Qasim overthrown.

The CIA was following the Eisenhower administration's Cold War concern about what it perceived to be the dangers of Communism. On the internet are descriptions of CIA contacts with Ba'athist members, including Saddam. One of Iraq's Ba'athists by the year 1959 was a 19-year-old Saddam Hussein. Qasim came into conflict with the Ba'athists and the deputy prime minister, Arif, who were in sympathy will the intentions of President Nasser of Egypt to create a political unity of Egypt, Syria and Iraq – a United Arab Republic. So too were members of a small Ba'ath party, a party with perhaps less than 1,000 members at the time. The Eisenhower administration was alarmed. And Qasim did what Egypt's president, Nasser, had done: he moved to form alliances with communist countries. Qasim is said by his admirers to have worked to improve the position of ordinary people in Iraq. And Qasim lifted the ban that had been placed on Iraq's Communist Party. Exiled Kurds were welcomed by the new Iraqi government. Political prisoners were freed, including Kurds who had participated in 1943 to 1945 uprisings against the Iraqi state. The constitution proclaimed equality under the law for all Iraqi citizens, freedom without regard to race, nationality, language or religion. The Interim Constitution listed the state religion as Islam.
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A permanent constitution was to be created following a free referendum.

On 26 July an Interim Constitution was adopted. The cabinet under the presidency was composed of a broad spectrum of Iraqi political movements, including two from non-Marxist National Democratic Party, one member of anti-colonialist al-Istiqlal independence party, one member of the Ba'ath party and one Marxist. The tripartite group assumed the role of the presidency. Those doing the choosing were members of the Revolutionary Council, headed by a three-man sovereignty council composed of members of Iraq's three main communal/ethnic groups: Shi'a, Kurds, and Sunni. Soon after the coup, Qasim was chosen to be the head of government – the prime minister – and the minister of defense. Qasim had been a bright student and a school teacher before joining the army. One of the coup leaders was Abd al- Karim Qasim, a nationalist and the product of a union between a Sunni of Arabic and Kurdish descent and a mother who was Kurdish and Shi'a. Iraq became a republic, with many looking forward to good luck with that. Thirty-seven years of Hashemite family rule had ended. King Faisal II, second cousin of Jordan's King Hussein, was killed. Iraq sized control of Baghdad and overthrew Iraq's monarchy.
