Monday, April 17, 2006

Desperation Can Lead To Desperate Acts

Often that is the driving force of the individual who is involved in terror. Desperation, a total loss of hope, seeing no other workable option makes the unimaginable appear logical.

Today another soul saw no other option.

A Palestinian suicide bombing has left at least six people dead and around 30 injured in the Israeli city of Tel Aviv, Israeli media report. The bomb went off at a falafel restaurant on a busy street near a bus station in the Neve Shaanan area.


While the leadership of these groups talk of mission, and nationhood, and even revenge, most of those who carry out these attacks appear more lost than driven, more hopeless than anything.

An effective way of reducing the number of suicide bombings would appear to be reducing the number of people who would consider becoming suicide bombers. You have to wonder why that is never mentioned when planning a defense against them.

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4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Do you think this person acted alone? Or was he recruited, trained and funded by Islamic Jihad and tacitly supported by Hamas? Is killing 7 innocent people by committing suicide with a bomb at a felafel restaurant a legitimate act of "self defense" or a legitimate response to "desperation" in your view? How do you propose to reduce the number of suicide bombers when the Hamas leadership is overtly and covertly recruiting them, supporting them, and encouraging them to kill themselves? Do you have some connection to Hamas that you can use to cause this miracle to occur?

What is your answer? Would you rather that Israel stand down its security forces and ask the bombers to stop, out of the goodness of their hearts? Should American universities divest from Israel out of sympathy for the "desperation" of murderers?

Anonymous said...

Of course the bomber was recruited trained and armed by a group, but what if that group couldn't find a willing carrier.

Just a thought, some are driven by a cause, but most appear to take to the cause not out of love of the cause but dispare at their existance.

Maybe as a start, Israel could stop attacking inside PA territory. I suspect that far more Palistinians have been killed by Israel than Israelies have been killed by bombers in the last 5-10 years.

Anonymous said...

yeah, this kid was real desperate... he had to drop out of university because he didn't have the money for tuition. the perfect solution - murder nine people. it makes sense.
happens all the time.

A murderer is a murderer. A child raised by a warped society to be a murderer is still a murderer. interesting that through millennia of persecution, Jews never used 'desperation' as an excuse to murder innocents.

On the first night of this holy week of Passover, Jews the world over pray that the Almighty lead the Palestinians, and terror apologists such as yourself, to the same end as the Babylonians, Romans, Crusaders, Soviets, Nazis, and all other haters of Israel.

Jon said...

He also had no job, and no prospects of a better life..... ever.

That is a touch more than 'he had to drop out'.

And yes a murder is a murder, so are the helicopter pilots who fire hellfire missiles onto crowed city streets, so are those who fire homemade rockets into villages, and drive tanks through peoples homes.

This is not in defense of suicide bombers, but amazement that no one appears interested in not creating more of them.

A willingness to sacrifice yourself for your people is ageless. In WWII we saw the kamikaze of Japan, to some German suicide units being formed. Even the Allies honored this sacrifice. The Congressional Medal of Honor has been awarded to those who made the choice to give themselves so that others lots may improve.

But few of these, from the CMH winners, to those in Japan and Germany who joined suicide units, to the terrorist of today, do this as a FIRST option.

It is a option created when all other options are seen as not being viable.

Where there is a better choice, most will take it.

In any conflict there are two sides, and another universal truth of war, those fighting on both sides think they are right. The motivations of the individual can not be judged on the world stage, but within the life that one person is living.

Those making the decision to stay at their station we see as noble, the decision to blow up a bus we see as flawed (but consider this, just before the choice to stay at the station was made, the same person may have been bombing civilians in thier homes), but in neither case do we consider what may have led to that decision that were made.

In some cases it is simply the desire to survive, but in others it is the decision that without drastic change there is no point in surviving.

Thanks to three of you for posting, and your hate is clouding you judgment Andrea. You have made an assumption about me that is a bit foolish. I have no hatred for Israel, it is a nation with many fine people, and a few flawed ones (like most of the nations of the world). Israel is a nations with many wonderful attributes, and a few disgusting ones (like most of the nations of the world).