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The Culture of Death: Terrorist Organizations and Suicide Bombing

(Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars) Ami Pedahzur, deputy chair of the National Security Studies Center at Haifa University, is a world renowned expert on suicide terrorism. "Islam is not the factor that explains suicide terrorism," Pedahzur cautions. "Islam has no culture of death embedded in it. Organizations market this culture of death by using religious symbols because it helps them achieve their goals, he says. Pedahzur notes that suicide terrorism has worked in the past. It drove the U.S., France, and Israel from Lebanon in the mid-1980s, and will continue to be employed by groups when they believe it will be effective. Conversely, suicide terrorism will decline when the terrorist organizations conclude that it is not effective as an instrument or if its employment will undercut their political agenda.
2005-03-04 00:00:00
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