In 1957, he joined the Baath party. The Baath party's basic principles were unity and freedom inside an Arab nation. The party also believed that Arabs had a special mission to end western colonialism. The Baath party was established in Iraq in 1950. In 1958, a non-Baathist group led by general Abdul Qassim led a successful coup against the King whereby general Qassim was placed as the leader of Iraq. One year later, Saddam and a group of Baathist supporters attempted to assassinate General Qassim and were unsuccessful. During the attack, Saddam was shot in the leg but General Qassim.
sentenced Saddam Hussein to death on February 25, 1960, which kept Saddam from coming back to Iraq. He completed high school, in Egypt at the age of 24. In 1961, Saddam joined the Cairo University School of Law but did not finish his studies there because two years later Gen. Qassim was assassinated by a group of Baathist army officers. Hearing the news Saddam quickly rushed back to Iraq to become involved in the revolution. Hussein rose quickly through the ranks of the Baath party, due to his extreme efficiency both an interrogator and torturer at the infamous "palace of the End", in the basement of the former palace of King Faisal. In 1963 the Baathist party broke up and Saddam had supported the winner in the latest party struggle. Michel Aflaq appointed him to be member of the Baath Regional Command. In 1964, a rightist military officer who opposed the Baathist takeover jailed Hussein. In 1966, .
Hussein was elected Secretary-General of the Baathist, while still in jail. In the same year, he escaped from jail and set up the Baathist internal party security system known as the Jihaz Haneem, it was to serve as the continuation of his political and real rise to power in Iraq. In 1968, Gen. Bakr and the Baathist seized the Government. Hussein was made deputy Chairman of the Revolutionary Command Council, in charge of internal security, which is the number two position in the Baathist party, where he remained for the next ten years, He was 31 at the time.
