TERRORISM  (part 1)

                                          

Depending on how broadly the term terrorism is defined, the roots and practice of terrorism can be traced at least to the 1st-century AD when Sicarii Zealots existed in what is now Israel. However some dispute whether the group which had assassinated collaborators with Roman rule in the province of Judea, were in fact terrorists. The first use in English of the term 'terrorism' occurred during the French Revolution's Reign of Terror, when the Jacobins, who ruled the revolutionary state of France employed violence, including mass executions by guillotine, to compel obedience to the state and intimidate the regime’s enemies.

 The association of the term only with state violence and intimidation lasted until the mid-19th century, when it began to be associated with non-governmental groups such as Anarchism, that were often in league with rising nationalism and anti-Monarchism which was the most prominent ideology linked with terrorism. Near the end of the 19th century, anarchist groups or individuals committed assassinations of a Russian Tsar and a U.S. President, McKinley when Leon Czolgosz, an anarchist, shot him twice in the abdomen. McKinley died eight days later on September 14, 1901 of gangrene caused by the gunshot wounds. He was the fourth American president to have been assassinated, after Abraham Lincoln in 1865, James A. Garfield in 1881,  McKinley 1901 and later, President Kennedy in 1963.

Terrorism, in its broadest sense, describes the use of intentionally indiscriminate violence as a means to create terror, or fear, in order to achieve a political, religious or ideological aim. It is used in this regard primarily to refer to various forms of violence against peacetime targets or in wars against non-combatants. 

The terms "terrorist" and "terrorism gained mainstream popularity during the U.S. Presidency of Ronald Reagan (1981–89) after the 1983 Beirut, Lebanon  barracks bombings and again after the attacks on New York City and Washington, D.C. in September 2001 and on Bali in October 2002. Incidentally, an attempt to assassinate President Reagan failed although he was seriously wounded.

There is no commonly accepted definition of "terrorism". Being a charged term, with the connotation of something "morally wrong", it is often used, both by governments and it’s police forces to abuse or denounce opposing groups. Broad categories of political organizations have been claimed to have been involved in terrorism in order to further their objectives, including right-wing and left-wing political organizations, nationalist groups and supremists. 

Legislation has been adopted in various world states regarding stating "terrorism" as a crime which in my opinion, is a suitable definition,    Alas there is no universal agreement as to whether or not "terrorism", in some definitions, should be regarded as a war crime. In my opinion, I don’t believe that such acts should be classed as a war crime because most terrorist acts are committed in countries in which there are no wars underway.

For example, during the Second World War, the Allies assassinated generals in war-torn areas in Europe.  However, I am mindful of that horrible murder of members of a village in Viet Nam when an American team of soldiers slaughtered everyone in the village. The murder of the babies, children and adults wasn’t an act of terrorism; it was an act of mass murder.

Attacks on 'collaborators' are used to intimidate people from cooperating with the state in order to undermine state control. This strategy was used in Ireland, in Kenya, in Algeria and in Cyprus during their independence struggles.

Attacks on high-profile symbolic targets are used to incite counter-terrorism by the state to polarize the population. This strategy was used by Al-Qaeda in its attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon in the United States on September 11, 2001. These attacks are also used to draw international attention to struggles that are otherwise unreported, such as the Palestinian airplane hijackings in 1970 and the South Moluccan hostage crisis in the Netherlands in 1975. 

Terrorist organizations do not select terrorism for its political effectiveness. Individual terrorists tend to be motivated more by a desire for social solidarity with other members of their organization than by political platforms or strategic objectives, which are often murky and undefined. There are possible relationships between the type of economy within a country and ideology associated with terrorism. Many terrorists actually have a personal history of being victims of domestic violence.

Some terrorists like Timothy McVeigh were motivated by revenge against a state for its actions against its citizens. He was the  American terrorist who detonated a truck bomb in front of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City on April 19, 1995. Commonly referred to as the Oklahoma City Bombing, the attack killed 168 people and injured 650. He was executed on June 11, 2001.

A state can sponsor terrorism by funding or harboring a terrorist group. Opinions as to which acts of violence by states consist of state-sponsored terrorism vary widely. When states provide funding for groups considered by some to be terrorists, they rarely acknowledge them as such.

Further, a so-called benign non-government organization that promotes the welfare of the people in their country such as the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) who gave support to the Palestinian terrorist group Black September was as much as a terroristic organization as those that actually carry out the acts.  

The Munich massacre was an attack during the 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich, West Germany, at which eleven Israeli Olympic team members were taken hostage and eventually killed, along with a German police officer, by the terrorist group, the Black September.

In September 1975, at the suggestion of the Solicitor General of Canada, the United Nations invited me to participate in the Fifth United Nations Congress on the Prevention of Crime and the Treatment of Offenders held at the UN Permanent Headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland.

In one of my speeches that I gave was on the subject of terrorism in which I took issue with respect to the UN’s proposal for the creation of a transnational tribunal to try terrorists. I was concerned about the possible jurisdictional problems inherent in such a tribunal.  The majority of the delegations of the 190 nations attending the UN Congress agreed with me. The UN withdrew its proposal. Three years later, the jurisdictional problem I had forecasted actually occurred.

The official Observer to the UN (Fiasal Oueda) attending the UN Congress (conference) was representing Yasser Arafat who was the Palestinian leader and chairman of the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO), president of the Palestinian National Authority, and leader of the Fatah, which he founded in 1959.

Right after my speech, Ouida invited me to join him for lunch. I agreed even though the Canadian government publicly stated that it wouldn’t truck (meet and negotiate) with the PLO.  This didn’t mean that a private citizen couldn’t do it.  The late Warren Allman, who was the solicitor general of Canada approached me and asked me how my speaking to Ouieda turned out. I told him it was a congenial lunch.

The Canadian government was aware that it was necessary to get the PLO to no longer sanction the Black September into committing another terrorist act in the upcoming Olympic Games being held in Montreal the following year. Since the government still wouldn’t deal directly with the PLO, I was asked to do it as a private citizen.

I was successful. After making an offer to Ouieda to pass on to Arafat, the latter agreed to publicly denounce terrorism and no longer sanction any Palestinian group to commit a terrorist act in any future Olympic Games beginning in Montreal.  He kept his word and Canada kept my word that the PLO could have an office in three-year’s time in Ottawa, Canada’s capital.

State sponsors have constituted a major form of funding; for example, Palestine Liberation Organization, Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine and other groups considered to be terrorist organizations, were funded by the Soviet Union. The Stern Gang received funding from Italian Fascist officers in Beirut to undermine the British Mandate for Palestine. Pakistan has created and nurtured terrorist groups as policy for achieving tactical objectives against its neighbours, especially India.

"Revolutionary tax" is another major form of funding, and essentially a euphemism for protection for money. Further, Revolutionary taxes play a secondary role as one other means of intimidating the target population especially when the terrorists demand ransoms from those they have captured.  

Other major sources of funding include kidnapping for ransoms, smuggling (including wildlife smuggling),^[167] fraud, and robbery.^[163]The Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant has reportedly received funding "via private donations from the Gulf states

Each act of terrorism is a "performance" devised to affect many large audiences. Terrorists also attack national symbols,^[35] to show power and to attempt to shake the foundation of the country or society they are opposed to. This may negatively affect a government, while increasing the prestige of the group given  ideology behind a terrorist act.

Terrorist attacks are often targeted to maximize fear and publicity, usually using explosives or poison. Terrorist groups usually methodically plan attacks in advance, and may train participants, plant undercover agents, and raise money from supporters or through organized crime. Communications occur through modern telecommunications, or through old-fashioned methods such as couriers. There is also concern about terrorist attacks employing weapons of mass destruction although nuclear weapons have not been sues as of yet.

Part 2 will be about specific  groups of terrorists.