Survey of Terrorism • 421Eastern events from 2000 to 2005? What happens in the coming years will
highlight some events at the expense of others. Let us give you an example
by looking backward. At the dawn of the twentieth century, a burning is¬
sue was the building of the Berlin-to-Baghdad railway by a German com¬
pany. Our forebears believed that this railway would enhance German
power in the Ottoman Empire and harm the interests of Britain, France,
and Russia. In contrast, few noticed that a British subject obtained from
the Persian government a concession that led to the first big oil discovery
in the Middle East. Yet today we see Middle East oil as much more impor¬
tant than a railroad that was never completed. By the same token, will an
incident that we now view as a major event seem trivial by 2025? Having
given you this caveat, we would say that three issues dominate the Middle
East as we write these lines in April 2005: The first is the so-called war on
terrorism; the second is the US war in Iraq; the third is the debilitating
struggle between Israel and the Palestinians.
SURVEY OF TERRORISMWhen representatives of the world's governments met at the UN General
Assembly just a few days after the September 11 terrorist attacks, which
came to be called "9/11," nearly everyone agreed that terrorism deserved
unanimous condemnation, but they did not agree on a definition. Neither
do the various agencies of the US government, nor do most scholars; even
the authors of this book differ somewhat on this issue. Let us use a defini¬
tion by the Central Intelligence Agency: the threat or use of violence for
political purposes by individuals or groups, whether acting for, or in op¬
position to, established governmental authority, when such actions are in¬
tended to shock or intimidate a large group wider than the immediate
victims. The US and its allies are as likely as their enemies to use such tac¬
tics. We believe that a form of state terrorism is now being practiced by the
US in Iraq and by Israel in its occupied territories. Indeed, state terrorism
has been a policy of the US government and its Middle Eastern surrogates,
most of them dictatorial and undemocratic, for years.
In common usage, terrorism is carried out by individuals or by secret
societies in opposition to an established government, whether elected or
dictatorial. It is commonly assumed that a terrorist is a young man,
though in fact children and older people can commit terrorist acts, as of
course can women. Americans picture the terrorist as a poorly dressed fel¬
low with a compelling political agenda, but some dress neatly, are female,
and disclaim or perhaps hide their leanings. Most people now know about