As Iraq surveyed the damage inflicted by the US and British air strikes, it found consolation in the chorus of condemnation of the US by the international community.
For Saddam Hussein, who sees himself as the champion of Arab rights, Arab anger at the US was the greatest source of satisfaction.
Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, which allow US and British aircraft to take off from their bases, discreetly backed the attacks against Iraq. Elsewhere, however, public opinion was outraged, while governments feared that the US move could not only produce new tensions in the region but also confound efforts to contain the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
For the Arab world, the US and UK move comes at a difficult time, with the election of Mr Ariel Sharon, Israel's rightwing leader, earlier this month already leading to an upsurge in violence. Public opinion is contrasting the US behaviour towards Iraq with its support for Israel.
When US Secretary of State Colin Powell visits the region later this week, Arab leaders will underline that Iraq cannot be viewed in isolation from the Arab-Israeli conflict.
"We are rather incredulous at the timing of the strikes, which coincide with what seems to be the collapse of Arab-Israeli peace-making, the election of a right-wing prime minister in Israel whose regard for Arab life is light and the emergence of an Arab population that is more disillusioned about the future of the region than at any time in the past two decades," the Jordan Times, an English-language daily, stated.
"Was the present situation of the Middle East a secondary consideration for those perhaps still smarting from the embarrassment of having been outclassed for a decade by their Iraqi adversary?" the newspaper asked.
The likely radicalisation and heightened anti-US feelings the air strikes will create among Arab public opinion could exacerbate the region's instability and add pressure on moderate Arab governments to follow a harsher line towards Mr Sharon.
As Abdul Ilah Khatib, Jordan's foreign minister, said: "It has categorically been proven that the use of force will not result in any solution, but will complicate the situation in the whole region."
Mr Saddam's belligerent statements over the weekend threatening retaliation may be no more than his usual and often empty rhetoric. But Arab officials yesterday were not ruling out a new provocation by Iraq.
Emboldened by the international and regional criticism of the US move and his own gradual rehabilitation in the Arab world over the past year, Mr Saddam may be tempted to test President Bush further.
The Iraqi president immediately portrayed the military attack that Iraq says killed three Iraqi civilians, as a "Zionist-designed" assault on Palestinians as much as on Iraq. His officials called on Arabs to strike against US targets and encouraged Palestinians to resist Israeli occupation.
In linking Iraq to the Palestinian issue, the Iraqi leader was exploiting the frustrated mood in the Arab world.
Although Israel's Mr Sharon has yet to form his government, his long-held positions against the return of occupied Arab East Jerusalem or more West Bank land to Palestinians have provoked alarm across the region.
The Palestinians have stepped up their five-month intifada. Moreover, the US-UK air strikes coincided with escalation on the Lebanese-Israeli border. On Friday, Lebanon's Hizbullah movement killed an Israeli soldier and wounded two others in an attack on Israeli positions.
The expectation of more volatility following Mr Sharon's election has been driving Arab governments such as Egypt and Jordan to try to "neutralise" the Iraq problem during this period of transition.
"The strike against Iraq also makes it embarrassing for Arab governments that are giving Sharon a chance," said Abdel Moneim Said, head of the AlAhram Centre for Strategic Studies in Cairo. "What people will be asking is this: if Sharon deserves a chance, why doesn't Saddam?
"And if the US is using massive force against Iraq, why is it not interfering in Palestine?"