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Suicide Terrorism: Is Religion the Critical Factor?

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Abstract

The purpose of this article is to investigate empirically the validity of the argument that the religious nature of the terrorist groups accounts for the increase in terrorism's lethality today. In an attempt to explore the relationship between religion and terrorism's newfound lethality, the study utilizes the International Policy Institute for Counter-Terrorism's (ICT) “International Terrorism” database between 1980 and 2002. It employs Ordinary Least Squares regressions to test the hypotheses concerning the effects of religion, suicide bombing, and the intermingling of the two, on the number of terrorist-related deaths and civilian casualties. The study concludes that to understand modern terrorism's increased lethality, one needs to look further than religion as a motive and take into account modern terrorists’ willingness to use “suicide terror” as their primary modus operandi.

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Notes

  1. The Bush Administration has framed the war on terrorism as a struggle between forces of freedom and liberty against the forces of darkness and evil.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Political Science, University of North Texas, P.O. Box 305340, Denton, 76203, TX, U.S.A.

    Matthew B Capell & Emile Sahliyeh

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  1. Matthew B Capell
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  2. Emile Sahliyeh
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Appendices

Appendix 1

Operationalization of variables

Table A1

Table 1 Table A1
Full size table

Appendix 2

Coding of dummy variables

Region

Region1=Middle East North Africa (MENA)

This region includes the following countries: Algeria, Bahrain, Cyprus, Gaza, Iran, Iraq, Israel, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Syria, Turkey, West Bank, and Yemen.

Region 2=Europe

This region includes the following countries: Austria, Belgium, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, England, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Netherlands, Northern Ireland, Norway, Poland, Scotland, Serbia and Montenegro, Spain, Switzerland, and United Kingdom.

Region 3=Eurasia

This region includes the following countries: Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bangladesh, Cambodia, Chechnya, Georgia, India, Indonesia, Japan, Laos, Latvia, Malaysia, Nepal,Pakistan, Philippines, Russia, South Korea, Tajikistan, Thailand, and “Kashmir, India”.

Region 4=Africa

This region includes the following countries: Angola, Central African Republic, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Niger, Nigeria, Rhodesia, Rwanda, Sierra Leone, Somalia, South Africa, Tanzania, and Uganda.

Region 5=North America

This region includes the following countries: U.S.A.

Region 6=South/Central America

This region includes the following countries: Argentina, Bermuda, Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Cuba, Ecuador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Panama, Peru, and Venezuela.

Religious groups

Includes:

Abu-Sayyaf Group, Al-Gama-a al-Islamiya (The Islamic Group, IG), Al-Qa’ida, Armed Islamic Group (GIA), Aum Shinrikyo, Dukhtaran-E-Millat, Hamas (Islamic Resistance Movement), Harakat al-Mujahedin (HUM), Hizballah (Party of God), Hizb-ul Mujehideen, International Justice Group (al-Jihad), Islamic Movement for Change, Jihad Group, Kach and Kahane Chai, Lashkar-e-Toiba, Mujahedin-e Khalq Organization (MEK or MKO), Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ), Qibla and People Against Gangs and Drugs (PAGAD), Sipah-e-Shahaba (SSP), and The Islamic Great Eastern Raiders/Front.

Nationalist groups

Includes:

Al Faran, Algeti Wolves, Basque Homeland and Freedom (ETA), Breton Revolutionary Army (ARB), Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine (DFLP), Fatah Revolutionary Council (Abu Nidal Organization), Fatah Tanzim, Force 17, Irish Republican Army (IRA), Jammu and Kashmir, Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), Liberation Tigers of Tamil Ealam (LTTE), Loyalist Volunteer Force (LVF), Martyrs of al-Aqsa, National Liberation Front of Corsica (FLNC), National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA), Palestine Liberation Front, Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), Real IRA, United Liberation Front of Assam (ULFA), and Sikh terrorism.

Left-wing groups

Includes:

Bavarian Liberation Army, Chukaka-Ha (Nucleus of Middle Core Faction), Ejercito Popular de Liberation, Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front (FMLN), First of October Antifacist Resistance Groups (GRAPO), Manuel Rodriguez Patriotic Front (FPMR), Moranzanist Patriotic Front, National Liberation Army (ELN), Nestor Paz Zamora Commission (CNPZ), New People's Army, Party of Democratic Kampuchea, People's Liberation Army, Red Army Faction (RAF), Red Brigades (BR), Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), Revolutionary People's Liberation Party/Front (DHCP/F), Revolutionary Organization 17 November, Sendero Luminoso (Shining Path), Tupac Amaru Revolutionary Movement (MRTA), Tupac Katari Guerilla Army (EGTK), Turkish Worker's and Peasant's Liberation Army (TIKKO), and the United Popular Action Movement (Mapu Lautaro Group).

Civilian targets

Includes from the ICT database the following listed targets:

Beach/Waterfront, Bus, Businessperson, Bus Stop, Celebrity/Personality, Civilian, Entertainment Facility, Garage, Marketplace, Place of Worship, Restaurant, School/University, Shopping Center, Store, Student, Hotel, Tourist, and Tourist Site.

Those targets included in the ICT database but not included here as “civilian” targets include the following:

Aircraft, Building, Cargo Transport, Checkpoint/Border Crossing, Convoy, Dissident, Bank, Embassy, Government Personnel, Military Personnel Office, Peace-Keeping Mission, Pipeline/Power-line, Plant/Factory, Police Facility/Personnel, Religious Figure, Train/Railway, Ship, and Vehicle.

These targets were not included because they can be categorized as political, military, or religiously significant in nature, or they were infrastructural targets. Secondly, it is not readily discernable as to whether or not the prime motive is actually civilian casualties with many of these target choices, and thus their inclusion in the model would be problematic.

Appendix 3

Regression model one (Dep Var=killed, one-tailed test)

Table A2

Table 2 Table A2
Full size table

Appendix 4

Regression model two (Dep Var = Civ2, one-tailed test)

Table A3

Table 3 Table A3
Full size table

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Capell, M., Sahliyeh, E. Suicide Terrorism: Is Religion the Critical Factor?. Secur J 20, 267–283 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1057/palgrave.sj.8350029

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