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Who Are the Palestinian "Lone Wolf" Terrorists?

(Israel Hayom) Nadav Shragai - An Israel Public Security Ministry study presented earlier this year at the International Homeland Security Forum in Jerusalem found that 2/3 of Palestinians involved in "lone wolf" attacks against Israelis between 2015 and 2017 were driven by personal distress and mental health problems. Those with suicidal tendencies - 54% - said their preferred method of suicide was to die while carrying out an attack. Professor Ariel Merari, who led the study, asked, "What causes one particular Palestinian and not 1,000 others to get up one morning and decide that this is the day he'll stab or run over a Jew?...We found that 67% of the attackers we looked at had indicators of psychopathology, including suicidal tendencies, and in some cases serious personality disorders that were close to psychosis." Merari said family troubles were much more likely to motivate women to commit a terrorist attack. Security officials recount stories of women who took to terrorism because they were being forced to marry against their will, or because their husbands were divorcing them and trying to take their children. "Muslims, like Jews or Catholics, are not allowed to commit suicide.... Dying while carrying out a terrorist attack, on the other hand, is not only not forbidden, it is recommended....The daily reporting of these incidents in the Palestinian media and the legitimacy they are given there guides a potential suicide terrorist to choose this manner of death." The writer is a journalist and commentator who has documented Jerusalem for 30 years.
2018-08-31 00:00:00
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