Terrorism Essay
“Seeing a man praying to Allah is enough for some people to assume he is a terrorist.”- Damian Lewis
However, it is rightly said by Vladimir Putin that ‘Terrorism has no nationality or religion. Terrorism is referred to as the political, religious and ideological activities that make use of terror or violence in order to fulfill personal selfish motives. It is one of the most hazardous problems that the whole world is facing today.
According to the US State Department, it majorly contains four elements. The first is an act of violence. The second is a political objective and the third is that threat of violence is a direct attack on civilians. Lastly, it is usually committed by a supporting nation or nations of terrorism.
Terrorist activities have a widespread impact on mankind. These activities generate fear and anxiety in the minds of the people making them subjective to the ideologies of attacking group by undermining the state rule. Also, it disrupts travel and tourism and wastes potential resources of the economy through terrorist attacks.
People fear travelling to countries where these activities are carried out. It is also observed that over 3 lakh innocent people died due to terrorist attacks from 2006 to 2014. Initially ‘terrorism’ was referred to as the acts committed by a government but at present it is usually referred to as the killing of innocent people.
Terrorism takes various forms depending upon the country and its political system namely, civil disorder, political terrorism, non-political terrorism, criminal terrorism and official terrorism i.e. terrorism referring to those nations whose rule is based upon fear and oppression that is similar to terrorist activities. Terrorism can be carried out by individuals, groups and organisations.
Aden-Abyan Islamic Army, aish-e-Mohammed, Al-Qaeda, ISIS and Lashkar-eTaiba are some of the recognised terrorist organisations that are responsible for the violent activities that take place all around the globe.
The attack on World Trade Center on September 11, 2001 was carried out by Al-Qaeda in United States. Other activities include the German bombing of London, the Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbour, the British fire bombing of Dresden, and the U.S. atomic bombing of Hiroshima during World War II.
Domestic terrorism prevails in democratic countries like India, United Kingdom, United States, Israel, Spain and Indonesia very much. In a democratic country the government is made by the people, for the people and of the people.
Democratic nations provide equal rights and freedom to its citizens to participate in the entire decision making but in countries like Brunei, Qatar, Oman, Iran and Iraq where the country is ruled by monarchs the dictatorship prevails and the civilians have no freedom of expression. This results in anger against the state leading to terrorist activities done in order to undermine state or monarchical laws.
Religious terrorism finds its roots in nations where majority of communist groups undermine the other minority groups by doing violent activities. Terrorism doesn’t takes place only between nations for fulfilling selfish motives but also, takes place internally within citizens and individuals. Intimate terrorism refers to the violent activities that are carried out by one intimate partner over the other for emotional gains or fulfilling ego.
Violence by a person against their intimate partner is often done as a means to control their partner but it does not happen on frequent basis. Terrorist attacks are often targeted to increase fear and publicity, usually by utilising explosives or poison.
There is a lot of concern about terrorist attacks employing weapons of mass destruction.
Mass media performs the job of watchdogs of the democracy and scrutinise and analyse all the aspects regarding the welfare of the state. They have also been successful in minimising the extent of terrorism in various forms.
The governments around the globe must take precautionary measures in order to minimise the activities. People who join these terrorist organisations and harm mankind in the name of religion and selfish motives need to be taught the real essence. Also, they must not be jailed and fed good food but they must be punished instead.
Terrorism in India Essay PDF
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