The Dujail massacre was the mass killing of Shia civilians by the Ba'athist Iraqi government on 8 July 1982 in Dujail, Iraq. The massacre was committed in retaliation for an assassination attempt by the Iranian-backed Islamic Dawa Party on the President of Iraq, Saddam Hussein. The town of Dujail had a large Shia population, with 75,000 residents at the time of the incident, and was a well-known stronghold of the Dawa Party. It is located approximately 53 km (33 mi) from the capital of Baghdad, in the Sunni-majority Saladin Governorate of Iraq.