TEHRAN Iraq bombarded U.S. President George W. Bush with insults on Sunday for ordering air strikes that stirred international condemnation, as thousands of Baghdadis staged angry protests for a second day, AFP reported.

The demonstrations were matched by a pro-Iraqi mass rally in Gaza, reviving Iraq's efforts during the 1990-1991 Persian Gulf crisis to forge a link between its confrontation with the West and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

"This criminal will fare no better against Iraq than his father," George Bush, who as president waged the 1991 war that expelled Iraqi occupation forces from Kuwait, said the **** Babel **** newspaper run by President Saddam Hussein's elder son Uday.

"The new dwarf in the black house' will not be capable of doing any better than his father, who suffered a stinging defeat," it said, referring to the survival of Saddam's rule.

Another official daily, the ruling Baath Party's **** Ath-Thawra ****, said Bush had "failed to grasp the extent of the changes that have taken place on the Arab and international scenes" since the Persian Gulf conflict.

The air strikes, which sparked international condemnation, were "proof of his stupidity and his arrogance," it charged.

In the meantime an IRNA report said Palestinians at all levels strongly condemned the joint British-American aerial bombing near Baghdad on Friday which resulted in the death of a number of civilians and inflicted heavy material damage.

Palestinian Authority officials denounced the bombing as "vicious" and opined that it was meant "to cover up the criminal Zionist aggression against our people," said a despatch from Al-Qods.

PA Legislative Council member, Ahmed Qrei, said in a solidarity letter to his Iraqi counterpart, National Council Speaker Sa'adoun Hamadi, that the Palestinian people were identifying with Iraq against American aggression.

Moreover, popular forces in the West Bank and Gaza as well as in 1948-occupied Palestine also expressed their outrage at the American bombing.