Monday, April 17, 2006

Shamed to Death

http://www.terrorism-info.org.il/

A must read. Although it doesn't use the language, the report actually does a very good job of explaining how the "Shame-Honor" dychotomy of Arab culture/psychology is exploited in the recruitment and manipulation of suicide bombers.

Another described how he approached individuals who were suspected for collaborating with Israel, suggesting that a suicide mission would erase the blemish that they have caused themselves and their families. In yet other cases, suicide bombing was offered as a way to erase the shame and “dishonor” that a rumor about suspected female sexual misbehavior caused the woman’s family. Offering to become a shahid and commit suicide to restore the tarnished family reputation was a strategy that recruiters used to recruit candidates. In January 2004 the first Hamas female suicide bomber, a mother of two small children from Gaza who was suspected for an extra marital affair, was driven by her husband to the checkpoint where she blew herself up.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

can you give a link to the article please?

Yoel.Ben-Avraham said...

Sorry ... the link in the post must have become corrupted. http://www.terrorism-info.org.il/malam_multimedia/English/eng_n/pdf/psb_0406.pdf

Anonymous said...

Plato argued in The Republic, that one of the four unjust societies was Timocracy, a society based on honor. While he intended Sparta, there is no better example than modern Islamic society.