Evolution of the Global Jihad: Female Suicide Bombers in Iraq

Female suicide bombers are increasingly seen in conflicts throughout the world; in recent years, they have become much more prevalent in religious-fundamentalist conflict. Specifically, global jihadist groups are increasingly incorporating female suicide bombers into their operations, a significant ideological and operational shift for most of these groups. Jihadist groups are using women to fill a recruiting void, to achieve tactical surprise, and for strategic purposes. Female suicide bombers are likely to emerge in jihadist conflicts throughout the world, from Nigeria to Pakistan and beyond.     

Rationality,Culture, and Structure in the Making of Suicide Bombers: A Preliminary Theoretical Synthesis and Illustrative Case Study

Suicidal violence involves three levels of analysis: individual motivations, organizational strategies, and societal conflicts. Using rationalist, culturalist, and structuralist approaches to contentious politics, this article explores the intersection of rationality, norms, and conflict in the making of extreme violence. The case of Palestinian suicide bombers demonstrates the interdependence of the three approaches to explaining suicidal violence. For individuals, self-sacrifice is conceived as an act of personal redemption rooted in religious morality and national salvation. For organizations, human bombs provide strategic advantages in the context of asymmetrical warfare. For collectivities, martyrs are venerated when three conditions converge: (1) cultural norms encompass symbolic narratives that honor martyrdom; (2) legitimate authorities acquiesce to extreme violence; and (3) conflicts generate feelings of victimization and threat by external enemies.     

Ghost Martyrs in Iraq: An Assessment of the Applicability of Rationalist Models to Explain Suicide Attacks in Iraq

Scholars have developed several rationalist explanations for the use of suicide attacks by terrorist organizations. Using evidence from Palestine, Israel, Lebanon, Sri Lanka, Chechnya, and Turkey, these authors have created plausible and rational models for attacks, which many consider to be “irrational.” Although the conflict in Iraq has, by most accounts, experienced more suicide bombings than any other struggle, its contemporary nature has made research and analysis on the subject difficult. This article analyzes four of these models and their implications with respect to the events in Iraq. Although the evidence is not conclusive, the data suggests that organizations are not using suicide attacks to (1) gain nationalist objectives, (2) signal strength to a foreign government, or (3)“outbid” rival organizations, as many scholars suggest. Instead, the evidence suggests that these attacks are used for (1) tactical advantages and (2) to aid the global recruiting effort of Al Qaeda–linked organizations.     

Building the Human Bomb: The Case of the 16 May 2003 Attacks in Casablanca

The terrorist attacks that took place on 16 May 2003 in Casablanca were a result of internal factors. These factors include the terrorists" view of their faith, poverty, and under-education. The links between the terrorists in Morocco and the Al Qaeda network, despite their ideological similarities, are not of a “command and control” nature. The relationship can be described as a franchise operation. The attacks resulted in the alienation of the population from movements attempting to use Islam in politics. Consequently, the attacks backfired on the Moroccan Islamist movement.     

Terrorism,Signaling, and Suicide Attack

This article examines the strategic utility of suicide terrorism. Suicide terrorism, we suggest, can be thought of as a form of strategic "signaling." We define terrorism as a signaling game in which terrorist attacks are used to communicate a group's character and objectives to a set of target audiences. This is followed by an examination of the utility of suicide attacks as a signaling tactic. The relative effectiveness of suicide operations is evaluated in relation to other tactical options that are traditionally available to terrorist organizations. We go on to examine the institutional and social context of suicide terrorism, concluding with an examination of the evolutionary use of suicide attacks by Palestinian terrorist organizations and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam.‐     

From Colonial Air Attacks to Drones in Pakistan

President Barack Obama has extended the hand of engagement to the Muslim and Arab world, while warning Israel against new settlements in occupied Palestine and hedging his bets with remote drone strikes against Al-Qaida and the Taliban in Pakistan. The new CIA director, a military historian and the Somali-born feminist Ayaan Hirsi Ali assess his strategy.     

The Bombing of Omagh, 15 August 1998: The Bombers,Their Tactics,Strategy, and Purpose Behind the Incident

The purpose of this article is to review the above incident: what happened, how it happened and who did it and why. Also, to place it in the context of the current "peace process," Irish history and the history of Irish Republican violence. In looking at who carried out the bombing there is also an attempt to explain the split between the Provisional and Real IRA, their motives and ideas, the complex relationship between the two and what they hope to achieve. This is then followed by an analysis of the actual bombing, the tactics involved in carrying it out and what went wrong. And finally to look at the after effects of the bombing. In many ways the bombing was not as unusual as portrayed by the media, just a continuation of what had been happening for the last 30 years; thus, it is instructive in itself as an "ideal" terrorist operation.     

Ethnic differentials: Sri Lanka,Malaysia, and Israel

Studies in Comparative International Development -     

Suicide Terrorism,Occupation, and the Globalization of Martyrdom: A Critique of Dying to Win

This article offers a three-pronged critique of Robert A. Pape's book Dying to Win. The first section of the article highlights problems related to the book's definition of key concepts, its assessment of existing research on suicide terrorism, and its presentation of data. The next section challenges the book's argument that suicide attacks have a high success rate of 54 percent. The alternative analysis offered here arrives at a significantly lower success rate of 24 percent. The last section argues that Pape exaggerates the link between occupation and suicide terrorism, especially with regard to the case of Al Qaeda. In this context, a distinction between traditional (localized) and contemporary (globalized) patterns of suicide attacks is introduced. It is argued that the occupation thesis may help explain the traditional (localized) pattern of suicide attacks, but falls short of illuminating the causes of the contemporary “globalization of martyrdom.”     

巴以龃龉困局难解

2004年3月以来,巴方哈马斯两位高官被以定点清除,布什一反常态,支持沙龙的单边行动计划.5月初,利库德集团党内公决否决单边计划,但沙龙表示矢志不渝.5月中旬,以军向加沙发动大规模进攻.5月30日,经修改后的单边计划没能如期在内阁表决,但沙龙单边计划获得多数民众支持,在沙龙纵横捭阖下,于6月6日在内阁顺利通过表决.沙龙连续采取强硬举措,加之布什的中东政策朝三暮四,导致中东问题一波三折,中东局势仍难以从动荡中解脱.     

Suicidality and Suicide Bombing Revisited: A Rejoinder to Merari

Ariel Merari purports to demonstrate a tendency on the part of suicide bombers to be motivated by depression and suicidal tendencies. However, he misconstrues the present authors' critique of his work and misinterprets their research. By clarifying both issues, this article seeks to substantiate three claims: (1) Merari's sampling procedure precludes generalization; (2) interviewer and contextual effects probably bias his findings; (3) evidence challenges his inferences.     

Jewish-Palestinian Relations in Israel: From Hegemony to Equality?

This article focuses on the relationships between the Jewish majority and the Palestinian minority in Israel. Opening with a historical perspective that emphasizes the marginality of the minority, the article proceeds to describe empirically that minority's inferior and subservient condition. The third section proposes an elaborate conceptual framework for analyzing politics in deeply divided societies and then applies it to the Israeli case. The final part addresses the possibility of transforming Israel's political system from one that is ethnically hegemonic and democratically flawed into a polity that is open, inclusive, and genuinely democratic. The article identifies ways for effecting such a systemic transformation through individual-based approaches (especially liberal democracy) and group-based designs (consociationalism, multinationalism, federalism, cantonization, and autonomy).     

The developmental state: Israel, South Korea, and Taiwan compared

The growth performances of the Israeli economy during the years 1948–1973 were excellent by any criteria, and are comparable to the “miraculous” performances of South Korea and Taiwan. Excellent economic performances in the three countries were accompanied by the presence of an autonomous and an interventionist state as well as by strategies of governed development (in the spheres of finance, investment, and international trade). The comparison is used, to shed new light on the Israeli political economy as well as on the replicability of the developmental state model across regions, cultures, and political regimes. First, by comparing the three countries and pointing to the similarities in the role and autonomy of the state, the article offers a different interpretation of the Israeli economy from that offered by both neoclassical and neomarxist interpretations of the Israeli political economy. Second, successful cases of develoment are rare in our world; this should make the study of the Israeli political economy a valuable case-study for the proponents of the developmental state model. By pointing out the similarities in the growth performances and the developmental strategies of Israel, Taiwan, and South Korea, as well as the dissimilarities in their political regimes, their cultural traditions, and their regional settings, this article further strengthens the arguments in favor of state-guided economic development in developing countries. David Levi-Faur is a lecturer of comparative public policy and business and politics at the University of Haifa. He was a visiting scholar at the L.S.E., University of California, Berkeley, the University of Utrecht, and the University of Amsterdam.