Terrorist Attacks

Terrorist attacks are very common in the world today. They refer to a well organized use of violence by the perpetrators against civilians in order to achieve political, religious, or ideological goals in nature through intimidation, force or intimidation by instilling fear.  This paper will investigate some of the world’s deadliest terrorist attacks and discuss the methods and motives associated with these attacks.

According to Walker the most deadly terrorist attack in the world is the 11 September 2001 terrorist attack in USA. It involved crashing of hijacked planes in to the world trade centre, and New York, New York City, Pentagon in Alexandria, Pennsylvania, and various sites in Virginia. This attack was organized as a terrorist act by 19 terrorists and al-Qaida members. The motives of the attack were stated in several sources before the incidence through video conferencing and interviews. The attacks were initiated by the terrorists against US because of their support to Israel, and the presence of the USA military in the kingdom of Saudi Arabia, in addition, the attacks were as a result of the enforcement of sanctions by the US against Iraq. The sanctions against Iraq made Muslims to make a ruling to kill Americans and civilians and military on the basis of fulfillment with Allah’s order. In addition, some believe that the existence of a criminal collusion and conspiracy between the administration of President Bush, the Saudis, al-Qaeda, and the terrorist might have led to the attacks.

The second deadliest terrorist attack was a multiple truck bombings in Al-Qataniyah and Al-Adnaniyah, Iraq that claimed more than 200 lives in 14^th August 2007. This kind of terrorism involved differences in religion. Most of the terrorist attacks occurred in Al-Qataniyah which is majorly inhabited by people from the Yazidi religious sect. this group of believers followed the pre-Islamic ancient religion. The attacks were not intended for any political or sectarian moves but merely a criminal gang. The major motive of this war was to target the ancient Yazidi religious sect.

The motives for arson of theater in Abadan, Iran in 20^th August 1998 is not well known, however, many allegation have been made regarding the motives of the incidence that led to the Cinema Rex fire. The terrorist attack has been identified to be the main cause that triggered the Iranian revolution. The cause of the fire has been attributed to the pursuit of individuals by SAVAK agents. These individuals ran and locked themselves into a movie theater and locked the cinema doors and started the fire that claimed lives of everyone in the cinema who died due to conflagration.

Another deadly terrorist attack took place on 1^st to 3^rd September 2004, in which hostage taking and bombing at school in Beslan. In the Beslan school hostage, more that 300 people died. There were also 31 hostage tankers; it led to more then 700 people injured. This incidence included the death of 30 terrorist involved. The motives of this terrorist incidence included the demands by the hostage tankers to withdraw of Russian troops from Chechnya. In addition, those who were involved in the act demanded the release from prison 30 terrorists who were previously captured. The main cause of terrorism in Beslan was not an international terrorist attack, but triggered as a result of political insurgency and the failure of the Russian Government to respond accordingly to the internal Russian problem. The other motives included the presence of various people who were named as planners and offered financial support of the terrorism attack.