British and American troops were led to expect open arms and warm embraces when they arrived to “liberate” Iraq, particularly in the south, which was supposed to be a hotbed of opposition to the regime. But there have been bullets instead of flowers. Why?

Tony Blair believes it is because the Shi’ites of southern Iraq, let down by the West when they rebelled against Saddam Hussein after the last Gulf war, do not yet trust the Anglo-American forces to protect them. Allied officers seem to believe that the residents will at last dance in the streets of Basra once the local “remnants of the regime” have been destroyed.

They are deluded. Iraqis, including the Shi’ites, fight not to save Saddam Hussein but to defend their honour.

America and Britain may believe their war symbolises liberation from Saddam, but for many Iraqis the allied forces are invaders desecrating their country’s honour and dignity. This is an unforgivable sin in Iraq’s culture. Land and territory are as sacred as the honour of women and occupation is as vile, shameful and abominable as rape.

Iraqis may not like their president but they believe that America threatens them with aggression on a scale not previously known to mankind.

Consequently, the Iraqi leader and his officials have not tried to rally support around the ideology of the ruling Ba’ath party. Instead, they have cast the war as a jihad in defence of the homeland. Saddam has worked hard to rally the nation behind a sense of patriotism. Many say that he has succeeded.

That Iraqis may wish for the present regime to change is not in question. That they dream of democracy and transparency is hardly in doubt. But in the face of foreign invasion, internal political differences are put aside. Arab tribes, Ba’ath party members and religious sects have united under one banner, faith and culture — that of patriotism.

The Arab saying, “My brother and I against our cousin, and my cousin and I against the enemy”, comes to mind — as it did 21 years ago when I reported from Lebanon as Israel invaded under the pretext of liberating the country’s south from Palestinian forces.

It did not take long for the Shi’ites of south Lebanon to begin a campaign of resistance and Hezbollah was born. Despite its Islamic ideologies, it managed to rally and unite the Lebanese, including its harshest Christian foes and critics, behind the struggle against the Israelis. As with Iraqis now, land, honour and the country’s integrity were the common elements that brought them together.

It was guerrilla warfare that eventually drained the Israelis. Every attempt to penalise the entire country through aerial bombardment only rallied more support for Hezbollah.

I recall the leader of Hezbollah once telling me that while they knew they were no match for Israel in any conventional military manner, they would nevertheless be a constant irritant, “just like the pestering mosquitoes: we will continue to buzz and bite whenever and wherever we can until they eventually leave us alone”.

Israel had failed to read the Lebanese psyche and in particular that of the Shi’ites, just as the Americans have failed to understand the real mentality of the Iraqi people, their history and nature.

Some put this down to the lack of reliable intelligence coming from Iraq over the years. Having mostly received information from the Iraqi opposition — who may have wanted an invasion so much that they intentionally misled the Americans about the likely reaction — the West has failed to absorb the mood of the people here or even to understand the images now coming out on television.

Footage of Shi’ite Muslims dancing around the dead bodies of British soldiers in Basra was offensive to say the least, yet this was no dance of contempt for the dead or a sign that the Shi’ites of Basra had turned into fundamentalists bent on killing the “infidels”.

It may be incomprehensible for many in the West, but for the Iraqis this was an expression of triumph — triumph in the fact that despite the awesome military superiority of the coalition, the “invaders” were not invincible.

Saddam has been playing on this shrewdly on television. The names of overnight heroes — including the elderly “brave peasant” said to have downed an Apache helicopter with an old Czech rifle, and a southern woman who destroyed an armoured personnel carrier — were announced in press conferences given daily by Iraqi ministers with updates from the “battlefield”.

In a speech, Saddam read a roll call of honour naming commanders and their locations, including the port of Umm Qasr, which has rapidly gained legendary status as a tiny town doggedly resisting the world’s mightiest army.

Despite the bombing of Iraq’s main television and satellite stations, the country continued to be fed hour after hour footage of dead US soldiers, prisoners of war and the charred remains of American tanks — together with reams of old footage of Saddam and new montages of Iraqi history and the Iraq-Iran war.

News broadcasts repeatedly showed images of anti-war demonstrations around the globe and extracts from an interview with Robin Cook after his resignation from the cabinet. Also on the television screens, clerics brandishing AK-47s have called for jihad.

No matter what George Bush or Blair may say, no liberation pretext or sentiment of compassion has swayed the Iraqis from the belief that this is a war of colonial occupation for the benefit of Israel, to curb Iraq’s potential as a regional superpower and to win control of its oil.

Many Iraqis are ashamed of their country’s invasion of Kuwait, but they are also weary of paying the price, in sanctions and poverty, for that debacle. They are also convinced the war is not related to weapons of mass destruction and Saddam’s “alleged threat to international security”.

They watched as Saddam made what they saw as concessions — from allowing UN inspectors back into their country to the “demeaning” destruction of al-Samoud 2 missiles, which many saw as a legitimate weapon of self-defence — and became convinced that despite all Iraq’s compromises, the United States and Britain were set on war.

It is worth remembering that for most Iraqis history is repeating itself. They have been taught that the Iraqis liberated their country from British occupation after the first world war against heavy military odds at the cost of thousands of lives.

The Israeli-Palestinian issue also plays a major role in Iraqi distrust. Many blame Britain for the creation of the state of Israel, and the Bush administration’s strong support for Ariel Sharon’s government adds to the misgivings.

There is another paradoxical motivation behind the Iraqis’ continued support for the regime: the fear of civil war. Saddam may be an oppressive tyrant but he has managed to keep the country, with all its tribes, sects and differences, cemented together under one secular banner.

But perhaps most importantly, the Iraqis want to look future generations in the eye and say: “We did go down but we went with dignity and having put up a fight.”