Pape Says 'Suicide Attacks' Are Not related To Islam
A surge in "suicide attacks" in Iraq and elsewhere around the world is a response to territorial occupation and has no direct link with "Islamic fundamentalism," a political science professor has said. Robert Pape, associate professor of political science at the University of Chicago, has spent 25 years creating a database of such attacks and has chronicled them in his new book, Dying to Win: The Strategic Logic of Suicide Terrorism.
According to the author, most suicide terrorists were well-integrated and productive members of their communities from working-class or middle-class backgrounds. "Technicians, waitresses, security guards, ambulance drivers, paramedics...few are criminals. Most are volunteers whose first act of violence is their very own suicide attack," Pape said. A broad misunderstanding of the issue, he said, is taking the U.S.-led war on terrorism in the wrong direction and could in fact be fueling an increase in what he calls suicide terrorism.
Pape has created what he calls the first comprehensive database on every suicide terrorist attack in the world since 1980, using Arabic, Hebrew, Tamil and Russian-language sources. The U.S. Departments of Defense and Homeland Security, as well as the UN Secretary-General's office were looking at the information, he said. Not "Islamic fundamentalism"
"Islamic fundamentalism is not the primary driver of suicide terrorism," Pape said. "Nearly all suicide terrorist attacks are committed for a secular strategic goal - to compel modern democracies to withdraw military forces from territory the terrorists view as their homeland." Attacks in Iraq are a response to foreign occupation."Yes, it's true we're killing terrorists day by day, but the real measure of suicide terrorism is simply the number of attacks," said Pape. "The problem with suicide terrorism is that it's not supply limited, it's demand-driven."
Read the entire article here:
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/ED54E9B7-1D51-4296-8CC6-DB3E7DFDC21B.htm
A surge in "suicide attacks" in Iraq and elsewhere around the world is a response to territorial occupation and has no direct link with "Islamic fundamentalism," a political science professor has said. Robert Pape, associate professor of political science at the University of Chicago, has spent 25 years creating a database of such attacks and has chronicled them in his new book, Dying to Win: The Strategic Logic of Suicide Terrorism.
According to the author, most suicide terrorists were well-integrated and productive members of their communities from working-class or middle-class backgrounds. "Technicians, waitresses, security guards, ambulance drivers, paramedics...few are criminals. Most are volunteers whose first act of violence is their very own suicide attack," Pape said. A broad misunderstanding of the issue, he said, is taking the U.S.-led war on terrorism in the wrong direction and could in fact be fueling an increase in what he calls suicide terrorism.
Pape has created what he calls the first comprehensive database on every suicide terrorist attack in the world since 1980, using Arabic, Hebrew, Tamil and Russian-language sources. The U.S. Departments of Defense and Homeland Security, as well as the UN Secretary-General's office were looking at the information, he said. Not "Islamic fundamentalism"
"Islamic fundamentalism is not the primary driver of suicide terrorism," Pape said. "Nearly all suicide terrorist attacks are committed for a secular strategic goal - to compel modern democracies to withdraw military forces from territory the terrorists view as their homeland." Attacks in Iraq are a response to foreign occupation."Yes, it's true we're killing terrorists day by day, but the real measure of suicide terrorism is simply the number of attacks," said Pape. "The problem with suicide terrorism is that it's not supply limited, it's demand-driven."
Read the entire article here:
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/ED54E9B7-1D51-4296-8CC6-DB3E7DFDC21B.htm
