Saddam Hussein's lawyer Monday challenged findings of handwriting experts verifying the former president's signature on documents linked to a crackdown on Shiites, and demanded a review by specialists from anywhere except Iran or Israel.

Former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, right, listens to prosecutors as Abdullah Kazim Ruwayyid, left, and Awad Hamed Al-Bandar, rear, look on during their trial held under tight security in Baghdad's heavily fortified Green Zone, Monday April 17, 2006. Saddam and the seven former members of his regime are on trial for the deaths of 148 Shiites and the imprisonment and torture of others during the crackdown launched after a 1982 assassination attempt against the former Iraqi leader in the Shiite town of Dujail. [AP]

The report from handwriting experts said a signature on a document approving rewards for intelligence agents involved in the crackdown in the 1980s was Saddam's, prosecutors said, reading from the report.

Saddam's lawyer Khamis al-Obaidi disputed the experts' finding and insisted that the documents be analyzed by international experts except those from Iran because of "its obvious hostility against Arabs and Islam."

"And Israel," shouted Saddam, dressed in a black suit and white shirt. "Because we don't consider Israel a state, you didn't mention it. But the international community recognizes Israel as a state so you must mention Israel."

Iraq and Iran fought an eight-year war in the 1980s, and Saddam, a Sunni Arab, had accused Iraqi Shiite militants of supporting Shiite-dominated Iran.

After hearing the report, chief judge Raouf Abdel-Rahman adjourned the court until Wednesday to give the experts time to look at more documents.

In a previous session, Saddam had refused to confirm or deny his signature, and some of his seven co-defendants had said their alleged signatures on other documents were forgeries.

Saddam and the others are on trial for the deaths of 148 Shiites and the imprisonment and torture of others after a 1982 assassination attempt against the former Iraqi leader in the Shiite town of Dujail. The defendants face possible execution by hanging if convicted.

In their report, the handwriting experts said Saddam and his top co-defendant Barzan Ibrahim ¡ª Saddam's half brother and former head of the Mukhabarat intelligence agency ¡ª refused to give samples of their handwriting for comparison.

So the experts compared the signatures to other documents not related to the case, the report said.

The experts confirmed Ibrahim's signatures on several documents connected to the crackdown, the report said. Among them was a memo requesting the rewards for six Mukhabarat officers involved in the crackdown, which Saddam allegedly approved. Another listed Dujail families whose farmlands were to be razed in retaliation for the incident.

Al-Obaidi said the report was prepared by civil servants "who are always subject to the will of the government." He asked the court to appoint five international handwriting experts and gave assurances the defendants would provide samples.

"We contest all the details of the report," chief defense lawyer Khalil al-Dulaimi added.

Saddam and the other defendants have insisted their actions in the crackdown were legal because they were taken in response to the attempt to kill Saddam as he drove through Dujail on July 8, 1982.

The prosecution has argued that the crackdown went far beyond the actual perpetrators of the attack and was aimed at punishing the mainly Shiite town.

It presented intelligence and other documents from the time showing that entire families ¡ª including women and children ¡ª were arrested in the sweep that followed and imprisoned for years without trial. It said minors ¡ª including an 11-year-old boy ¡ª were among those sentenced to death for the attack.

Dujail residents, including several women, have testified in court that they were tortured with electrical shocks and beatings during their imprisonment.

In Saddam's hometown of Tikrit, about 60 high school students protested the trial in support of the former leader. They held Iraqi flags and posters of Saddam, chanting "We defend Saddam with our blood and souls" in the city 80 miles north of Baghdad.